As for the bed itself, it was an honest-to-god four-poster bed complete with a lacy white canopy hanging above it. The mattress was thick and looked sumptuous and comfortable.
I thought of all the shitty, secondhand furniture in my soon-to-be-former apartment. If I moved in here I could dump it all at a consignment shop.
These pictures, and the emails, suggested that while Frederick might be a lot older than me, he probably wouldn’t steal all my stuff the day after I moved in.
I could handle an awkward roommate who was maybe in his seventies as long as he wasn’t going to rob or kill me.
Then again, you could only tell so much from tone in an email.
From: Cassie Greenberg [[email protected]]
To: Frederick J. Fitzwilliam [[email protected]]
Subject: Your apartment listing
Frederick,
Okay, those pictures are amazing. Your place looks great! I definitely want to see it, but I can’t come by in the evening tomorrow until around 8. Is that too late? Let me know, and thanks.—Cassie
His next reply came in less than a minute.
From: Frederick J. Fitzwilliam [[email protected]]
To: Cassie Greenberg [[email protected]]
Subject: Your apartment listing
Dear Miss Greenberg,
Eight o’clock tomorrow evening works perfectly with my schedule. I will make sure to tidy up so that all looks as it should when you arrive.
Yours in good health,
Frederick J. Fitzwilliam
* * *
Sam came by my apartment that evening with a bunch of moving boxes and two venti Starbucks coffees.
“Pull up a chair,” I deadpanned, gesturing to where my old secondhand La-Z-Boy used to be. I’d sold it on Facebook for thirty dollars the day before, which was about what it had been worth.
Sam smirked and gingerly spread a flattened moving box on the ground before sitting down on it cross-legged.
“Don’t mind if I do,” he said.
“Thanks for bringing those over,” I said, nodding at the boxes. Even if I didn’t end up moving into Frederick’s fully furnished room, all I planned to bring with me from this place were my clothes, my art supplies, and my laptop. Just the essentials—but I still needed boxes to pack it up.
“It was no problem,” Sam said. He handed me the coffee I’d asked him for. He’d said he’d get me whatever I wanted, but I’d felt guilty about asking for the pricey rainbow-colored sugar bomb I actually wanted and just asked for a plain black coffee.
“I can’t wait to live someplace with Wi-Fi again,” I mused, taking a sip. I winced at the bitter taste. How could anyone actually enjoy drinking coffee black? It was something I asked myself every time I worked at Gossamer’s. “I miss Drag Race.”
Sam looked affronted. “I’ve been keeping you posted on the winners, haven’t I?”
I waved a dismissive hand. “It’s not the same.” Reality television had long been a guilty pleasure of mine, and Sam’s dry summaries just didn’t cut it. “Anyway, you’re coming with me tomorrow night, right?”
“Of course,” he said. “This was my idea in the first place, right?”
“It really was.”
“If you’re meeting him at eight, I should pick you up around seven forty-five. Will that work?”
“Yeah. I’ll be just getting off my shift at the library.” The library hosted special activities for kids on Tuesday evenings, meaning it would be all hands on deck until seven-thirty. In all honesty, I loved Tuesday nights at the library. There was usually some kind of arts and crafts–related activity, and I could pretend for a little while that creating was still a significant part of my life.
I’d made a mental note to leave out my Sesame Street–themed Reading Is for Winners! T-shirt when I started packing. The library liked us to dress up for the kids on Tuesdays.
“Great,” Sam said. “If I pick you up then, we’ll have plenty of time to get to the apartment. Although . . .”
He trailed off and looked down at his coffee.
I recognized that worried look. “What is it?”
He hesitated. “It’s . . . probably nothing. But you should know I couldn’t find a Frederick J. Fitzwilliam earlier today when I Googled him.”
I stared at him. “What?”
“Yeah.” Sam sipped his coffee, looking contemplative. “If my criminal justice clinic taught me anything it’s that you should never move in with someone without looking them up first. So I tried searching for him online, figuring that with a name like Frederick J. Fitzwilliam I’d find him in two seconds, but . . .”
He shook his head.
That ever-present knot of anxiety in the pit of my stomach cinched itself a little tighter. “Nothing?”
“Nothing,” Sam confirmed. “I even checked the Cook County criminal docket. There is nothing anywhere about a Frederick J. Fitzwilliam.” He paused. “It’s like he doesn’t exist.”
I sat there, stunned. In an age where everything about everyone was knowable with a simple two-minute internet search, how was it possible that Sam hadn’t found anything?
“Maybe it’s a fake name he’s giving to people asking about the apartment,” Sam suggested. “Craigslist can be creepy. Maybe he wants to stay anonymous.”
That made me feel a little better. Because that sounded plausible. I thought back to a time in college when I wish I’d thought to give a fake name to someone on Craigslist. I graduated ten years ago, and the Younker College Literary Society still wouldn’t leave me alone.
“Yeah,” I said. “Though if he wanted to stay anonymous, why’d he bother including an email address in the post? He could have just used the anonymous email account Craigslist automatically generates for people placing ads.”
Silence stretched between us as we both pondered what all this could mean, interrupted only by the muffled sound of traffic from the street outside my window.
Eventually, I leaned towards Sam and asked, “If this guy turns out to be the next Jeffrey Dahmer, promise me you’ll avenge my death?”
Sam snorted. “I thought you wanted me to go with you. If he’s the next Dahmer, we’ll both be screwed. Also possibly dead.”
I hadn’t considered that. “Good point.” I thought a moment. “Maybe wait in the car. I’ll text you once I’m inside. If I’m not out in thirty minutes, call the police.”