With the arrangements made and most of the work officially foisted off on Harmony, Loren had to deal with the rest of the consequences of technically being homeless again. He finally went back home—it was the middle of the day, so his parents were at work and his sister was in school, but their housekeeper let him in—and from there sent his parents a message that due to things he wasn’t told about his apartment, he couldn’t stay there for a bit, but he was already dealing with it, so could he stay at home for a few days?
Then he put down his phone, set up his laptop, and got on with sending out more internship applications.
Being an alchemical pharmacist required that after he finished his college course, he had to be accepted into an internship or apprenticeship. Only after he finished his internship could he apply for an alchemical-pharmacist’s license. While he could already make alchemical pharmaceuticals—everyone knew all you needed was a liquid containing a combustible substance, usually oil or alcohol, but sugar syrup worked too, and he’d even heard some people using milk—unless he had an alchem-pharm license he couldn’t legally sell any potions he made. And he wanted to. There was good money in it, after all.
Unfortunately, it turned out he’d missed an interview… this morning… but who sends the email at 5 in the morning? Admittedly, if he’d checked he might have had time to make it on the way back from Happy Homes…
Ugh.
Well, he’d sent out applications to other pharmacy internships, so hopefully he’d get accepted to at least one…
He spent the rest of afternoon putting together something smart-looking for interviews—what he’d planned to wear had been left in the apartment with the ghost—looking for internship programs that he’d missed and applying for them—he’d found two, although it was at the very tail end of their application period—and… well, trying not to think of the implications of what Steve had told him about having a ghost as a roommate…
Fortunately, his dad didn’t give him too hard a time about his apartment being haunted, just telling him he should have asked more questions and found out about the haunting before he’d paid for it, and what he was going to do about it, and was he sure that these people could do what they promised…
“It’ll be fine, Dad. Harmony works for these guys, and I trust her when she says they can take care of the problem,” Loren said, suppressing the urge to sigh.
“Well, I hope they know what they’re doing,” his dad said, still sounding skeptical, but dropped the subject.
“How are your internships?” his mother asked, changing the subject. “Have you picked one yet?”
“N-not yet. I’m waiting on interviews right now, so there’s nothing else I can do unless they call or Harmony says she needs me for something to deal with the apartment.” It was hurry up and wait all the way down.
“I guess we had your moving out party a bit early,” Lily said, looking at him sympathetically. Ah, his little sister was the best. She was the only one on his side! “Remember, you promised to invite us to a house warming party when your apartment was ready.”
Loren winced slightly at that. He tried to image what that party would be like. Would he need to introduce his new roommate? He’d probably have to, at the very least they’d notice the cold spots…
Still, there was something comforting about sleeping in his childhood bed. At least, there would have been if he hadn’t already moved the mattress that had been on it to his apartment, so he had to improvise by getting a bunch of the throw pillows from the sofa. They were horrible things that you had to shove aside to sit down, and he had no idea why his mom insisted on having them. The result was an uneven cushion that he had to stay absolutely still on or else they’d move aside and parts of his body would end up lying down on the bare wood of the bedframe.
If getting the ghost amenable to living together didn’t work, he was at least getting his mattress back.
Over the next three days, the flat-pack furniture he’d ordered arrived. A small table to eat at, a wardrobe for his clothes, a bedside table… he had to store them all in his room for the moment, since he didn’t have an apartment for them yet. He just had to hope that none of the flat-packs had anything missing, because he couldn’t really check. If Loren opened them up, he didn’t know if he’d be able to pack them up again.
Between these times, he had to do internship interviews at odd times. Most of the interviews were done over the phone, and in each and every single one, he was nervous during the interview and full of dread and anxiety afterwards. A couple of interviews required him to show up in person, so he dressed up, commuted, and went to the various hospitals and small pharmacies. On awkward moment, he received a call for an interview at the tail end of one of the live interviews, and while the interviewer seemed understanding and let him go—they were wrapping up anyway—Loren got the feeling that had been a mark against him. The interview over the phone didn’t feel like it went very well either, since he’d been nervous and trying to walk to somewhere private while he had already been talking to the interviewer.
Well, it’ll be fine. He’d sent a lot of applications, at least one had to be accepted…
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That Saturday, Loren found himself back at his alleged apartment with Harmony.
“Why Saturday?” he asked.
“When else are your neighbors likely to be home?” Harmony said cheerfully. “All of them were gone when we got your stuff, so they obviously work. On a Saturday morning, it doesn’t matter if they’re a Friday night party animal or the kind who have a sensible sleep schedule, they’ll be home at 8 o’clock on a Saturday morning.” It was 7.
“What if they’re morning people health nuts who went jogging before dawn so they could be fit and healthy while they watch the sunrise?” Loren said, still a little groggy from waking up so early. He hadn’t been able to nap during the commute because that was just asking to get robbed or, as had been strangely popular some years ago, have some asshole burn or slice his clothes off so he had to walk around naked. It wasn’t so common anymore, but he sometimes heard reports of it happening.
“Why do you think I went with 8 o’clock? They’ll be coming back to either have breakfast or a shower.”
“How are you this energetic?” Loren said as he showed his resident’s ID to the security guard—a different one from “You’re not a morning person. We’ve had sleepovers, I have proof.”
“Self-medication!”
“How much sugar did you eat?”
“Not everything is about sugar, you know. I had coffee.”
He gave her a flat look as he pressed the button for the elevators.
“All right, it had a bunch of sugar, but it was mostly coffee!”
The elevator was empty when it came down, which Harmony seemed to think was proof she was right if her ‘see?’ look at him was anything to go by. “So, do we know who we’re asking about?”
Harmony nodded as they stepped into the elevator, though she kept silent until the doors closed. “I managed to find our possible ghost in a police report. Sara Dalisay. She was found dead in her home—your current apartment—after neighbors made a noise complaint of her banging on the wall. They found her body in room, and judged she’d died of a heart attack. That was about two months ago.”
Loren frowned at her. “Isn’t that the sort of thing that you find out in an autopsy?” At least, that was what documentaries and vigilant shows had taught him.
“Well, they found her with five empty cans of energy drink, so while it was probably confirmed by autopsy, they probably had enough evidence to make a decent guess.”
“She drank five cans?” That was actually horrifying to contemplate, even for him. Just because his Flame would allow him to metabolize that much sugar, caffeine, and all the other stuff mixed in completely didn’t mean he wasn’t unaffected, especially in those quantities. “Was she trying to commit suicide?”
“Given they apparently found more of the energy drink in her refrigerator and lots of empties in the apartment, I think she drank it regularly. From there I found an obituary, and it turns out she worked on the night shift at one of those places where foreign companies outsourced work they were too cheap to hire their own people for, which explains the energy drinks.”
“It… does?”
“Trust me, it does. I worked for one for a week before I realized it would let me Symbolize at the drop of a hat and drive me nuts.”
“Was that the week when I couldn’t call you because you were always sleeping?”
“Yup,” Harmony confirmed, popping her lips at the last. “Thank goddesses I found a job I actually like. Well, most of the time.“ She gave him an annoyed look.
He shrugged as they reached the fourth floor and the two of them stepped out. “The friends and family discount was your idea.”
Harmony sighed. “You better stay away from the door of 409. We saw that Sara remembers you. If you walk in front of the door she’ll probably react again.”
“Isn’t she likely to remember you more? You were the one who tied her up.”
“Which is why I’m going to take the long way around when I knock on the apartments on the other side of 409,” Harmony said confidently as she reached into the bag she was carrying and pulled out a notebook and a pen. “Because I really don’t want to get stuff thrown at me. Uh, you don’t have any knives in your apartment, do you?”
“No, no kitchen stuff yet.” He frowned. “Huh, I knew I was forgetting something. Need to buy kitchenware.” Not having a stove and refrigerator wasn’t a problem, at least for him.
He felt silent as they neared the apartment he was allegedly leasing. Through the doors, Loren heard the faint but audible murmuring of what might have been TVs. With a confidence that he lacked, Harmony knocked on the door of apartment 407. The sounds of the TV coming through the door lessened, as if the people on the other side weren’t sure of what they heard.
Harmony obligingly knocked again, a bit more gently than before.
Eventually, the door open, and man who looked about Loren’s age looked at them, his face curious and slightly suspicious. He had sleepy-looking eyes, but didn’t seem like they’d just woken him up, and Loren could smell beef instant noodles coming from inside the apartment.
Damn, now he wanted instant noodles.
“Hi,” Harmony said, wearing a cheerful, sincere smile that manage to not look customer-service fake. Only Loren’s years of being her friend could tell it was basically the same smile she’d used when they were younger to try and get them out of trouble. “I’m sorry for bothering you, but I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions about one of your neighbors? We’re trying to find out what she did in the days before she died.”
The guy was opening his mouth, clearly about to tell them off, but at Harmony’s words he frowned. “Someone died?” he said sounding concerned.
Harmony nodded. “Yes, the resident of room 409. A miss…” she made a shot of opening and checking her notebook, “Sara Dalisay. Did you know her?”
“Uh… I think I met her… could I see some ID?”
“Of course,” Harmony said, reaching into her bag again. Loren wanted to raise his eyebrows as Harmony pulled out her old college ID, wrapped around it’s official college lanyard. “I’m Harmony Adlawan, my friend and I are just putting together something for a report. Could we come in, Mr… ?”
The guy glanced at the ID, then looked at the back, grunting almost approvingly as he saw all the official-looking legalese, like how the ID was non-transferrable and how if found it should be returned to the University Registrar. It was probably because it wasn’t just some printout that had been laminated, which any random person could make and fake. He handed the ID back and gave them a look that made it was clear he was seriously considering just closing the door on them before giving a small shrug. “Come in, I guess?” he said, opening the door slightly and waving them inside. Loren noted that he stayed behind the door and closed it firmly behind them before he led the way into the rest of the room. “I guess I can answer a few questions, but I didn’t really know them that well…”