The Everborn - Nicholas Grabowsky [84]
Melony arrived at the address, pulled up and parked along the street’s curb directly in front of Andrew’s three-story apartment complex. She hoped she hadn’t underdressed, but the date was informal and her goal wasn’t to seduce him but to get to know him. And maybe she would allow him a bit of insight on herself, too. Maybe more than a bit. She gathered a Nikon and its shoulder strap from the passenger seat into her purse and emerged with the purse, from her vehicle, locked the door and set the alarm. She wore blue jeans and an almost silky thin orange tank top.
The apartment complex was plain, but maintained noticeably well for its hum-drum and run-down surroundings. Entering through the building’s towering wrought-iron security gate after finding it unlocked, she made her way past a battalion of mail boxes beneath a curved archway, and across a concrete floor which split into separate directions leading through an arena of green grass and hedges and a spacious, lawn-chaired gazebo.
The setting appeared remarkably quiet and restful, and perhaps catered to a select clientele of respectful, low-income and low-profile adult types with no children and habitually tedious lives. There were no signs of the tenants which lived there but for a dozen or two lights within windowed and curtained front rooms.
Melony made an immediate right and proceeded up three flights of stairs and across the top floor walkway, while she rationalized how Andrew’s choosing to live here seemed more and more fitting, as fittingly low-profile as he was.
At the corner of the walkway she made a right into an enclosed hallway, which reached in the direction of the street and sheltered the doorways of three separate apartments. She approached the only door at the inner hallway’s left. She took a deep breath to calm herself from the constricting assault of tension that threatened to make her flake out at the last minute. A polite series of knocks to announce her arrival and the finality of crossing over the threshold between consistent reality and persistent curious abandon and it would be behind her.
It’d better be.
Because when she knocked and then waited a minute and then a few seconds more, raising her curled knuckles to try again, the door opened and what she saw on the other side was a reality as consistent and as unimpressive as her own.
Then again, what did she expect, anyway?
The next moment found Melony crossing the threshold without so much as a second thought to it, forsaking her expectations, but for the simple rule of thumb to expect the unexpected.
As she entered and greeted the shy young man, dressed modestly in a black dress shirt and white tie as he was and clearly delighted by his date’s arrival, it came to her that consistent reality was what she’d expected all along. After all, she wasn’t boarding a crystal ship to the stars. It was all down here on Earth, in a down-to-earth apartment; Melony was simply beginning to fear that perhaps everything about Andrew had a down-to-earth explanation.
But that just couldn’t be.
“Melony, welcome,” Andrew said cordially. He was in the gladdest of spirits, free and easy and lighthearted. If she had a coat, he would’ve offered to take it for her. He was indeed no ordinary gentleman. “I’m ecstatic that you’ve made it! Dinner is pretty well done, Chinese like I promised. But in French, je vis de bonne soupe et non de beau langage, it’s good food and not fine words that keeps me alive. First, though, let me give you the grand tour. It’s not very often I get to show off.”
“Really,” Mel said with a smile, enchanted. She set her purse down upon the black recliner. “So show off.”
“Would you like anything to drink?”
“What do you have?”
Andrew listed several beverages in almost rehearsed order, and Mel surprised herself in agreeing to a brandy