Page 6 of The Invisible Roommate

Getting down from the chair, he checked the corners and electrical outlets for cameras; he did the “finger test” on the bathroom mirror to make sure it wasn’t two-way. If he was being surveilled, there were absolutely no signs of it. Regina had said the house wasn’t even wired for internet, so why was he so paranoid?

3

By morning, everything was back in the apartment.

Every chemical, beaker, substance, substrate, scale, dropper, ruler …

Gerard wiped the sleep crusts from the corners of his eyes and pinched his cheeks. He was awake. There was no denying that.

Heart rate picking up speed, he slid off the bed, changed into fresh clothes, and marched out to the curb.

At only 6 AM, the island had obviously been alive for hours. Boats bounded across the waves. Horns blared in the distance.

There was nothing beside the trash bins. Not a bag, box, book, or piece of broken furniture.

Gerard was losing his mind.

He’d run away from his life, his obligations, and this was the price he’d pay. His sanity.

“James? Something the matter?” Regina called out from the porch.

Gerard didn’t respond immediately. Nobody called him by his middle name. Except that was the name he’d given her yesterday when he’d arrived on her doorstep asking after lodging. He couldn’t risk his identity and location being compromised. Not that a woman in her late seventies who owned a shuttered inn on a disconnected island posed much of a threat.

“James?” she called again.

Rational thought kicked back in, and Gerard wrenched himself out of his confusion. “Yes?” he responded.

“Everything all right?” she asked from her spot on a white-painted porch swing, holding a steaming mug the shape of a crab in one hand and a folded newspaper in the other.

Careful not to disturb the paltry Halloween decorations she had staked in the squelchy lawn, he marched over and asked, “Did you see me bringing stuff down to the curb yesterday?”

“’Course I did. I don’t miss much around here,” she said. “Guess you changed your mind?”

He furrowed his brow, thought really hard. “No, I—”

“It’s all quite interesting, ain’t it? The nuggets left behind by a scientific investigator,” she said almost wistfully. “At least that’s what he told me he was, and I believed him. I’m usually good at sniffing out a liar.”

Gerard swallowed and hoped there hadn’t been an audible sound. Were her eyebrows raised because she smelled deceit wafting off him or because he was asking after the vanished tools?

“My tenant was a smart one, that’s for sure,” she concluded.

“Emory Griffin?” he asked, remembering the name on the notebook.

“That was him. He had gone to school for physi— No, was it pharm— I can’t remember. Some kind of medical science,” she said. “He worked under a friend of mine named Joe for a time. Apparently, he was a no-fuss hard worker with a lot of perceptive ideas about the bay’s weather patterns influencing their crabbing spots. Joe said he was the biggest help he ever had on the Susanna, which is why I couldn’t believe for a second that he was some sort of criminal despite all that banging around at odd hours. It didn’t bother me much. The banging around, I mean. I liked the sounds. Not the cursing, mind you. He had a sailor’s mouth even before he worked on the Susanna. That I could’ve done without, but he was reclusive. For the past several weeks, I’d have sworn he was still living up there by the way the floorboards creaked and the doors banged. Wishful thinking, I suppose.”

Gerard processed none of that information. He was too busy juggling the fragmented logic of how the items had gotten back inside his apartment. “You’re sure he’s gone?” he asked.

“As sure as I can be,” she said.

“Do I have the only key to the apartment?” He’d locked the door last night.

“I have one, too,” she said, which should’ve been obvious.

“Then did you bring the stuff back up last night?” The air felt thick and impossible to inhale.

“Heavens, no. Why would I? How could I? I didn’t have the strength to get it down, howdja think I’d have the strength to carry it back up?” she asked.

“Sure. Sorry,” he said, still uneasy.