Keys and Doors

I sling my backpack over my shoulder, set one, two textbooks on my forearm, grab my coffee. Thumping the door of my convertible closed with my hip, I manage to find my keys and am rewarded with two reassuring beeps.

I swing and sway my to the staircase, carefully up the single flight, to the floor that my apartment is on. My door is in sight, if I can just make it ten more steps... when I hear the jingle of my car keys hitting the concrete. Damn.

I don't have a free hand to get them right now, so I make it to the door of my apartment. Finally I can let my arms rest as I set my load down and double back for my keys, which are... wait? Where are they?

They're gone. Stolen. Someone must have nabbed them while I was away. I look around, but the hallway is empty.

If my dad actually lived here, instead of moving in with his stupid girlfriend, this wouldn't be such a huge problem. I briefly wonder what it's like to come home to a family.

I give my dad a call. It goes to voice mail one, two times.

Loading up with all my stuff again, as I won't have anything else stolen, I make my way down to the front office. There is a sign that says, "Out for lunch, will return 2:30." It's five o'clock.

Back up the stairs, slowly. Reaching the top, I spill my Starbucks all over my new J Brand jeans. And that's when I started crying.

I try my dad one more time. No luck.

I wish mom were alive.

I call Aunt Jane to see if I can crash at her place tonight, but her phone goes to voice mail as well. Figures. If I got a call after what my father did to her, I would probably hang up on me too.

I am wallowing in self pity as six o'clock approaches, when I hear footsteps. A girl my age: seventeen, maybe eighteen. She's skinny with dark brown hair. I've seen her around. She goes to the public high school across the street, so we've never talked.

She walks over and looks at me thoughtfully.

"Are you okay?"

"Fine." I am not in the mood to deal with this girl.

I expect her to keep walking, when she sits down next to me.

She's getting in my personal space now, and as if she's reading my thoughts, she replies, "I thought you might want some company. You look sad."

And it's kind of sweet.

"My name's Kit," she says, and extends her hand. "You look like you can't get in to your apartment."

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"Andrea. And that's true. I admire your persistence."

"I can't get into my apartment either."

For a blissful forty five minutes, we sit and talk. Not about anything too serious. The sun is starting to set, and I'm cold, so we get up and walk around.

We're wandering the halls when she asks, "Want some snacks from the vending machine?"

I didn't even know our apartment building had a vending machine.

We pass a door, and I hear screaming and plates breaking. I shudder.

"That's where I live," Kit says uneasily. We lock eyes, our worlds not as different as we'd hoped.

"There's something I should tell you," says Kit. I hear a jingle and she pulls my car keys out of her pocket.

Dad calls, and I let it go to voice mail.