She was lying, but he took the bag and peeked inside. “Thanks. I’ll bring your dish back later.”
“I know you will.” She smiled. “Is it quiet at night now?”
“No,” he muttered. “Someone is still playing music in the middle of the night. It sounds like it’s being piped directly into my studio. I can’t sleep.”
Ximena pinched the bridge of her nose. “Okay. Well, I’ve already talked to Randi, and she’s never home at night, either working or staying at her girlfriend’s place, so it’s not her.”
“Which one is she?”
“Directly above you.”
No wonder pounding on the ceiling didn’t do any good. But if it wasn’t her, then who? “Maybe I need to buy a white noise machine or a louder fan.”
“No. I’ll figure it out.”
“Just ask them to show you their playlists. Whoever has Soft Cell set to repeat is your culprit. You can ask them when you’re installing more mirrors that have fallen down from crumbling silicone.”
She shook her head. “This apartment is the only one I’ve had trouble with.”
“You said you had to replace one of the mirrors before.”
“Yes, here! Same thing happened to the last tenant. He said it fell by itself in the night.”
“That’s… odd.” He chuckled. “He wasn’t tormented by eighties music at two am, was he?”
“Not that I remember. But he was weird. And his sculptures were” – she wrinkled her nose – “grotesque. Garish.”
“He was an artist too?” This neighborhood was called the Artists’ District for a reason, but he’d met plenty of people here who weren’t. Or they wrote horrible poetry, which was worse.
“Yes, of course. And he was a polite boy. Friendly. But his art was not tasteful like yours. It wouldn’t surprise me if he broke the mirror in the bathroom on purpose as part of some experimental, artsy thing.”
Making garish and grotesque art to channel complicated feelings wasn’t any worse than what Micah was doing – except that he was able to hide his peculiar habits from everyone but his phone company.
Ximena peered at her reflection in his window and tucked loose strands of hair back into her updo. He didn’t think she wasthatmuch older than him, maybe ten years, but her gray hair and motherly concern threw him off. Turning back to him, she said, “That wasn’t right. Forget I said any of that. I shouldn’t be talking about the dead.”
“The last tenant died?”
“Yes.” She clutched her elbows and shifted uncomfortably, her gauzy blouse rippling in the wind. “I came out of the office one day to see people moving furniture out of his place. They gave me an invitation to the funeral, but I didn’t go.”
“Damn. What happened to him?”
“I don’t know. There was an obituary, but they never tell you in those things. Shame, though. He couldn’t have been more than twenty-six, twenty-seven.”
The door creaked open, and the maintenance men walked out. “All done,” one of them said. “Hey, your art is really good. Do you draw those from live models?”
“Dead ones. It’s a little tricky getting a corpse up the stairs, but I can pose them on the couch, and they’ll sit still for me for hours. They never complain that they have a cramp or that it’s too drafty…” Micah trailed off at the man’s blank expression, then said, “That was a joke.” Maybe not a very good one in light of the previous topic. “And no, I didn’t draw those ones from live models, but I used to. They’d commission me to do their portrait.”
“Some of those women you’ve got up there are super hot.” He whistled. “That’s a sweet gig. They pay you to look at them naked basically. Wish I knew how to draw.”
Micah pursed his lips and hoped it resembled a smile. “The people who came to my studio usually stayed clothed. I appreciate you stopping by this morning.” He nodded to Ximena. “Thanks for the chicharrónes.”
He carried the bag inside and set it on the kitchen counter. As he reached in for the food, the front door swung open, and the maintenance man stepped over the threshold and onto the carpet.
“I forgot the silicone.”
Micah screeched, and his heart caught in his throat. No no no. No one could be inside with him.
Get out!
