[September 2, 2042]
Cal met Ellie, the tenant of room 03, the next morning.
Cal had gotten up early, before the sun had truly risen, as was his habit. For a moment, he looked at the silver light of early-dusk illuminating the supine form of Mel and the shape of her dress, floating in the middle of room 01. Her mouth was open, and she was snoring away. For around a minute, Cal considered this surreal scene he had woken up to and how his life had led to this. Finally, he sighed, rose from the bed, ducked under Mel’s levitating legs (though he supposed he could have walked straight through them, if he wished) and opened the door to the hallway.
Cal took his time in the hot shower, washing off the particular soreness that comes from sleeping in a new bed, then hastened downstairs. He began to cook immediately, as also was his habit, taking care to only use foodstuffs from the general-use drawers that Isaac Frost had showed him yesterday, and not ingredients that the tenants may have bought themselves. By 8 in the morning, there was a hot batch of pancakes waiting in a container in the center of the kitchen table, fluffy and delicious-looking.
Still alone in the kitchen, Cal took some pancakes from the container himself, covered the rest with a lid so they would stay warm, and drizzled on some syrup that he had found in the refrigerator. He chewed the pancakes slowly, listening to the birds outside and watching the sunlight inch across the floor. The emptiness of the large room seemed particularly highlighted by the shadows.
This is somewhat nostalgic, in its own way, he thought to himself.
By 8:30, Cal had given up waiting and was ready to put the pancakes in the refrigerator with a note saying that they were free to take for all tenants, but at that moment a girl he had never seen before walked into the kitchen. She was a very pretty girl, with black skin and long dark dreadlocks that were styled to fall over the left side of her head. Cal thought that she was perhaps a year or two older than himself. She was extremely tall and in good shape, like a volleyball player, though it was a little hard to tell, since she was dressed in black full-body fuzzy pajamas, which were decorated with yellow stars, red rocket-ships, and tiny planets.
When she entered the kitchen, the girl was in the midst of a huge yawn, but when she opened her eyes she froze mid-step, clearly surprised to see someone else in the kitchen. She raised her hand awkwardly in greeting. “Hello, there…” she said, uncertainly.
Cal nodded to her. “Hello, there.”
The girl yawned again, unsuccessfully tried to prevent it, and finally compensated by coughing once into the back of her hand. Then, after a moment, her dark eyes lit up. “Oh, I see!” She pointed at Cal, though playfully. “You’re the new caretaker. Mr. Frost mentioned that you would be arriving yesterday. It slipped my mind, sorry.”
Cal nodded, relieved that she knew who he was and that the awkward situation had been resolved. “Yes, that’s right. I arrived here yesterday. I’m Cal.”
“I’m Ellie, it’s nice to meet you.” The girl walked further into the kitchen and sat down at the kitchen table, with only one empty chair separating them. Her previous self-consciousness had been completely forgotten. “Sorry, if I seemed surprised, I’m so used to being completely by myself in the mornings, you know? The other girl who lives here doesn’t like to leave her room much. What are those?”
She nodded at the container in the middle of the table, which Cal had covered with a lid.
“Oh,” said Cal. “Pancakes. As part of my job, I’m supposed to cook for you tenants twice a day. Starting today, I’ll be making breakfast at 8 in the morning and dinner at 5 in the evening.” He nodded at the container containing the pancakes. “You’re free to help yourself, of course. They might be room-temperature by now.”
“Dude, seriously?! Thanks!” Elli practically leapt from her seat, grabbed a plate from the cupboard, and immediately filled up the plate with three pancakes. “I’m kind of broke right now — you get it, you’re in college too, aren’t you? — so I’ll take whatever. To be honest, my breakfast has been a slice of toast for like a month now.”
Cal watched, bemused, as she poured half the contents of the syrup bottle onto her pancakes. “So you’re the one in room 03, correct?” he asked. “I meant to introduce myself yesterday, but you weren’t in by the time I went to bed.”
“Mmhmm,” said Ellie through a mouthful of pancakes. She swallowed. “I stay out suuuper late most days.”
She tapped her plate with her fork, as if calling for a toast. “Dude, I love you, these pancakes are delicious! Just the perfect balance between fluffy and firm, buttery but not overpowering. You said you’ll be making breakfast every morning? Count me in, in that case. I’d get up at the crack of dawn for pancakes as good as this.”
“Dude?” Who says “dude” these days? thought Cal, it’s like something a middle-aged person would say.
Out loud, he said: “I’m happy to hear someone will be eating my cooking. I invited your neighbor in room 02, but it seems like she wasn’t interested.”
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Ellie picked up a pancake with her fork and inhaled the whole thing whole. “Who, Ram?” She wiped some syrup from the corner of her mouth with a napkin.” “I wouldn’t take it personally. That girl is the biggest shrinking violet I have ever met in my life. We’ve been in this house for about a month, and I’ve hardly seen her, nevermind say a word to her. If I had to guess, she would have preferred to come and eat, but was too scared.”
Cal frowned. “Scared of what? Just talking?”
Ellie laughed, showing her bright white teeth and large dimples. “Well, you know, that’s part of it but…” She leaned forward conspiratorially in her seat, and prompted Cal to lean in as well. “I get the impression that the poor girl has barely said a word to a boy that wasn’t her father in her life. She wouldn’t even say a word to Mr. Frost whenever he dropped by. So don’t drop your head.”
Ellie leaned back in her chair again. “Don’t you worry, if I happen to see her, I will definitely relate to her the tale of these spectacular pancakes.” She took another bite. “I’m being serious man, these are like, restaurant-quality or something. Thank you.”
“It’s not a problem…” murmured Cal.
He was already distracted by something else. In the frame of a kitchen doorway, a pair of glaring blue eyes had appeared, and a black hair full of disheveled bedhead.
She doesn’t even sleep in a bed, how is that possible? wondered Cal.
“Say Ellie,” he said, locking his eyes with Mel’s, “do you see something in the door frame, just behind you?”
“Mmm?” Ellie, mid-bite, jerked upon being addressed and turned awkwardly, almost dropping a piece of pancake hanging from her mouth onto her pajamas. “Nump. I dun see anfing.”
“I see. Just my imagination then. Unrelated question, but in the time you’ve lived here, have you seen or heard anything unusual? Bumps in the night? Shapes in the mirror?”
Ellie finished chewing, and smiled. “What, like a ghost or something? Are you one of those boys who are really into paranormal videos on the internet? Hey, no judgment, I respect people’s hobbies.”
Cal smiled gently back, if only to keep up appearances. “Nothing like that. I don’t need you to tell me ghosts aren’t real, I was just curious. I heard some odd noises last night.”
“You probably heard Ram then,” said Ellie. “As quiet as that girl is, some of the sounds I hear coming from her room… I don’t even know how to describe it. I have no idea what she does there half the time.”
Cal nodded slowly. “I see, so that must have been it.”
He met eyes with Mel once more and raised his eyebrows. The ghost girl stuck out her tongue at him and disappeared around the corner of the door frame.
The rest of Cal’s conversation with Ellie passed uneventfully. He found he liked talking with her. She was easy-going and had a good sense of humor that wasn't overbearing. Eventually, after consuming five pancakes in total, Ellie excused herself upstairs to shower and change. The moment she left, Mel drifted into the kitchen, emerging from a wall head-first. “You seemed to be getting along with that girl,” she remarked.
Cal stood up with his chair and began to clear and wash the plates. “Yes, I was. Good rapport between people living in the same building ensures a peaceful and productive coexistence.”
“You were a lot nicer to her than you have been to me,” grumbled Mel, “you even woke me up last night because you said I was snoring too much.”
“You were snoring too much,” retorted Cal, “who has even heard of a ghost that snores? You don’t even need to breathe! What is up with that?”
“Don’t ask me! Us ghost girls are very elegant and mysterious!”
“Whatever.” Cal rolled his eyes. “Why are you even here? I saw you staring at the pancakes. Why? You can’t eat them, right?”
A blank expression came over Mel’s face. “No, I… don’t think so, unless… Well, I’m still allowed to miss eating food, aren’t I?”
Cal looked at her, and decided not to fire back with a barbed remark. “I suppose,” he said, “I guess I would feel the same in your situation.”
There was a short pause where neither of them spoke. Eventually, Mel slowly drifted over to where Cal was washing dishes in the sink, her head hovering around his shoulder. “I saw what you pulled earlier,” she remarked, “trying to determine if that girl could see me.”
Cal used the soapy sponge to scrape away some particular stubborn syrup. “And the results were clear. You were telling the truth, about that at least.”
Mel tilted her head, and looked at Cal with wide blue eyes. “Why can you see me?” she said, her voice pondering. “It’s so weird. Not even… people I want to see me can.”
She stayed quiet for a little longer, and then smirked. “Maybe you’ve got a hidden terminal disease. They say those who are close to death can see spirits from the other side.”
Cal waved a hand dismissively in her direction. “Yeah, yeah, I’m sure I’ll be dead in a few days from a mysterious illness. Scram, Poltergeist. I need to finish cleaning up here.”
Mel stuck her tongue out at him again, but surprisingly she left him alone, floating up into the ceiling. The last view Cal had of the ghost girl was her pale foot disappearing into the wooden beams that criss-crossed the high ceiling of the kitchen.
After he was finished cleaning up in the kitchen, Cal retrieved a piece of paper from the drawer in the living room, and wrote on it a simple message before he pushed it underneath the door frame of room 02: Hi Ram, it’s Cal. There are some pancakes from breakfast in the refrigerator, if you want some. They should still be pretty good if you warm them up. You can use the microwave, but they’ll taste better if you use the toaster oven.
Later that day, after Cal had finished dusting Otter Manor, including the large empty room in the loft, he found his note outside room 02, amended by a few lines with a delicate hand. It said: Hello Cal, it’s Ram. The pancakes were delicious! To be honest, they reminded me of the ones that my father used to make me. I got a little-teary eyed when I first tasted them because they brought me so much nostalgia. Thank you so much for that. I’m sorry I’m not brave enough to talk with you in person. I’m only three videos into the seven-video online course. So please be patient. If possible, I want us to be good friends.
Cal smiled, and took out the pen he had placed in his pocket specifically for this reason. He wrote a response on the paper, and pushed it back underneath the door. As he did, he could swear he could hear a small intake of breath on the other side of the door.
The message he wrote was only this: Hey Ram, it’s Cal. I’m glad you liked the food I made so much. As far as I’m concerned, that already makes us good friends.