They Gave My Sister My Room, Now They've Lost Everything novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: The Hall

Elena reaches Columbia at dawn, and Luca, the resident adviser, gets her an emergency bed without asking why; he sends her to the aid office with a folder and tells her to bring every paper about her parents, which are all at the house.

I got to Columbia at seven in the morning, a week before anyone was supposed to be there.

I had slept an hour in the ER chair, then taken the first train from Newark with my suitcase between my knees.

The hospital bracelet was still on my wrist.

My lips had gone down, but they still felt like someone else's.

My aid file closed on Friday, and I needed a bed and an office before I could fight for it.

The gate of the first-year hall was locked, and there was a laminated sign taped to the glass.

Move-in begins August 25. The housing office opens at nine.

I sat down on the steps and put my suitcase beside me.

I had a plan for this morning, and the plan was to sit here until nine.

It was not a good plan.

"You're not going to get in that way."

A guy stood two steps below me, holding a paper coffee cup in each hand.

He was tall, with dark hair pushed back and his sleeves rolled to the elbow.

A lanyard with a keycard hung around his neck, and the card said STAFF.

"I know move-in isn't until the twenty-fifth," I said quickly. "I'm just waiting for the housing office."

"That's two hours from now."

"Then I'll wait two hours."

He looked at the suitcase.

Then he looked at the bracelet on my wrist, and I pulled my sleeve over it.

He didn't say anything about that.

"I'm Luca," he said. "I'm the resident adviser on the third floor, which means I live here, which means I'm the only person on this campus who is legally required to care about you."

"Elena."

"Are you hungry, Elena?"

I thought about the Caesar salad.

"I can't eat anything with anchovies or shellfish," I said.

"Then it's a good thing the dining hall makes terrible eggs and nothing else." He held out one of the coffees. "This one's mine, but I only drank a little."

I didn't take it.

I knew this kind of kindness.

It came with a bill, and the bill always arrived when you were most tired.

"What do you want?" I asked.

He blinked at me, and then he almost laughed.

"Honestly? I want you to sign a piece of paper that says you slept here. It's called an emergency bed form. If the office finds a first-year in my hall with no record, I get yelled at."

"I can't pay for a room."

"The form says the office decides about money after it opens. Tonight is just a bed."

"Why would you do that for me?"

"Because I'm on call this week and you're sitting on my steps." He shrugged. "It's the least interesting reason I have."

He swiped his card, and the door opened.

I stood there with my hand on my suitcase.

If I said no, I had nowhere to go.

So I said yes, and I hated how quickly I did.

The hall was empty and smelled like fresh paint.

He walked me to a room on the third floor with a bare mattress and a window that looked out on a brick wall and one tree.

It was the nicest room I had been offered in two days.

He put the coffee on the windowsill and handed me a clipboard.

I wrote my name and my student number.

Under "reason for request," I wrote nothing.

He read it upside down and didn't ask.

"There are sheets in the closet at the end of the hall," he said. "And the dining hall opens at seven thirty. I'll swipe you in on my card until yours works."

"You don't have to."

"I know."

He went to the door and turned around with his hand on the frame.

"For the record, the eggs really are terrible."

When he was gone, I sat down on the mattress and drank half the coffee.

It was too sweet, and I finished it anyway.

For the first time since Dad had put four names in that app, I was somewhere nobody could shut me out of.

I sat there and waited to feel safe.

Instead I started counting what I owed him.

My phone buzzed.

It was Mom this time, not Dad.

"Your father is very upset. He says you took money from the joint account."

I stared at the message.

The account was empty because he had emptied it.

I typed an answer and deleted it.

I typed another and deleted that too.

Then I put the phone face down on the windowsill next to Luca's coffee cup and closed my eyes.

At eight thirty there was a knock.

Luca stood in the hall with a folder and a second paper bag.

"Eggs," he said. "And I called a friend in the aid office. They'll see you at nine, before the line."

He held out the folder.

"She said to bring everything. Every paper you have about your parents and your money."

I took the folder.

"I don't have any papers," I said. "They're all at the house."

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