“I don’t know,” Hideo said with an effortless shrug.
“I love those types of ghost stories.”
A scratching noise by the door made Hideo frown. Minerva opened the door and let in an orange tabby, which stared at Hideo while she looked for the can opener.
“You have a cat?”
“It’s a stray. It started coming around for no reason.”
“If you’re feeding it, it has a reason. Did you name it?”
“Karnstein.”
“It’s definitely yours if you named it.”
Minerva opened a can of cat food and poured it into a shallow ceramic dish, which she set down on the floor. The cat began munching on it.
“I should get going. I need to get this to my client,” Hideo said, and slid the manga back into his backpack. “Are you going to Patricia’s party tomorrow?”
Now that the campus had been vacated, Minerva had intended to focus on her thesis. Realistically, she was probably going to spend twelve hours a day in bed, but she at least wanted to imagine she could achieve a modicum of efficiency if she was not bound to the needs of students.
“I’m not sure,” she said.
“I can drive you to Patricia’s and back. I want to see if there are good-looking guys there, I haven’t hooked up with anyone in three months. Who was the last guy you went out with?”
She preferred to keep her thoughts veiled, to not overshare, andthere wasn’t anyone to talk about, not really. In the winter, she’d watched a movie with a guy from Brookline whom she’d met through a message board. But although she’d gone out with him a few times, by the spring she’d stopped responding to his emails and calls. It wasn’t that she meant to cut him off—she simply figured she’d reply another time, and it was hard to go on dates when she didn’t even want to change out of her pajamas. Her energy was exhausted simply by following her everyday routine and maintaining a semblance of normalcy. Perhaps she’d be able to cocoon herself during the summer, to emerge revitalized.
She’d never been much for romance, anyway. There’d been Jonás in university, although that had felt like an obligation, like she should at least try to have an adult relationship. But she’d suspected it would never lead anywhere and had been unwilling to consider going long-distance or, even worse, to reject the scholarship offer. At Stoneridge she had tiptoed around…well, there had been that thing with Conrad Carter, which was not even a thing.
“Isolation is not going to allow you to craft a more brilliant thesis, you know,” Hideo said, as if guessing her thoughts.
“I’m not isolated,” she said, and picked up her cup of coffee, taking a sip. Then she pretended to look for sugar, avoiding Hideo’s gaze.
“Jessica said you want to do your night rounds alone during the summer.”
“It’s more convenient.”
“We’re supposed to walk in pairs.”
“Everyone says it’ll be quiet.”
“Sure, but don’t you want to talk to some of the few people around? I’ve barely seen you in the last month and a half. You keep making excuses.”
“I’ll go with you to the party,” she said, which was the best evasive maneuver she could come up with. She didn’t want to discuss her research roadblocks or her problems with anyone, even if he was a friend.
After Hideo left, Minerva looked at the cover ofThe Vanishing,which showed an open door and an empty room. It was interestinghow Nana Alba had also told her a story of a disappearance that was tied to witchcraft, just as Beatrice Tremblay’s novel had connections with the occult. Perhaps that was why she’d loved the book so much, why she’d devoted years of her life to pursuing this tale. This was what got her pulse racing, not lovers or romance—it was the thrill of research, of odd questions and murky answers.
“Back then, when I was a young woman, there were still witches,” she said, and tapped her fingers against the book.
1908: 1
Alba wanted to makesure that the set of porcelain mancerinas was ready. She knew her mother would ask that chocolate be served and had done her very best to time it correctly, calculating how long it would take for a cart to roll down the roads and toward the farm after the five o’clock train made its stop. But the mancerinas with their painted birds and insects, old and fine artifacts from another era, were kept in a locked cabinet. Alba hurried around the house, trying to find the key.
“Can’t we pour the chocolate into a cup?” Fernanda asked. “Why do we need that funny little plate to hold the cup up?”
“It’s the way chocolate is supposed to be served,” Alba said. “When noble people held their parties, they always drank their chocolate in a mancerina.”
“We’re not nobility and those dusty antiques are best kept locked away,” Tadeo said.
