Page 43 of You'll Love it Here

Jane looks down on her hands. “I can respect that. I never planned things out and look where that got me.”

I look at Jane with renewed curiosity but decide against prying. I try not to think about the times I’ve heard her cry through the walls.

I nod. “I figure two more years should be enough to fully set my career path and allow myself more time on weekends and evenings for dating and stuff.”

“Did you schedule all your shits for the next ten quarters?” She gives a cheeky grin as she tucks her feet under herself.

“If I could, I would.”

A loud buzz erupts from her phone on the end table.

“Looks like it’s time to change the load.” Jane waggles her brows at me, her sense of mischief restored.

A rush of adrenaline surges through my limbs as we tiptoe our way out her door. I go straight to the back stairwell to the laundry room as quietly as possible, while Jane takes her usual route down the elevator to the basement, not worrying who hears her.

We make it to the laundry room within seconds of each other, and once Jane transfers her laundry (comprised of two weeks’ worth of undies) to the dryer, we prop up my phone on the dusty shelf, stealthily wedged between two Tide boxes that haven’t been touched since the ’80s. Nobody is willing to touch them lest the owners come back. Our plan is to wait in the “rec room” with Jane’s phone FaceTiming mine. As soon as we see the perp, she’ll start screen recording. If we catch them in anything incriminating, we will confront the perve—also on camera.

After we’ve set up our sting material, we head to the rec room. I always forget this room technically exists. I haven’t had a chance totidy (or really assess) this area yet, with all the more pressing items on my list. It consists of someone’s donated treadmill, a dusty Bosu ball that has stretched beyond use, a futon, and a pool table with a missing seven ball and broken corner pocket.

It’s not that bad, really, if you don't plan on working out or playing a game or enjoying yourself in any sort of normal way.

We spend a miserable forty minutes in the dank room sitting on the pool table discussing the possible suspects. A mouse came by at minute twenty, causing us both to yelp, before quickly disappearing somewhere behind the futon to a place I hate to think about.

Finally, the laundry machine sends out its obnoxious buzz that the cycle is complete.

Jane lets out a sigh. “Should we call it?” she whispers. “I don’t think it’s happening tonight.”

I think she’s right, but fuck. I don’t want this hour of misery to have been for nothing. “Let’s give it fifteen more. Just in case.”

“Sure.” She nods, then seems to think twice. “I do have to get up early tomorrow. My work has started tracking me and if I’m a minute late they haveJaninetalk to me.”

“Jesus, that sounds miserable.”

“Right? This one time, Herman—the team lead for us admins—tracked me down in the file room and told me that I couldn’t do my filing when the brokers were in the office, in case they needed anything. Filing is literally my whole job.”

“Herman sounds like a piece of shit.”

“A bit.” She starts to giggle and then covers her mouth, remembering we’re supposed to be quiet. “I shouldn’t complain. I’m lucky to even have this job. I don’t have, like, a ton of experience.”

“Fair,” I mutter for some reason. I’m starting to suspect Jane has recently escaped a cult, but there’s no polite way to ask such a thing.

Jane spends the next fifteen minutes briefing me on the worst people at her office and all the bullshitty things they say or makeher do. I never worked in admin, but I get the distinct impression that what she’s describing isn’t how it’s meant to be.

“Anyway,” Jane sighs, “now it’s really time to call it.” She stands from her place on the pool table. “I bet the thief is asleep. This isn’t my usual time.”

She has a point. It’s almost eleven p.m. But her words draw even more weariness into me. Once again, I’ve ended up solving nothing around this building. I try not to show the disappointment in my face. “Okay, let’s try again when you normally wash your clothes.”

The thought of doing this again isn’t at all appealing. As if reading my expression, she says, “Look, Mona, I appreciate you trying to help, but I think this might be better for the poli—”

The sound of footsteps making their way down the hallway above us interrupts Jane. It’s followed by the sound of the stairwell, then the doorway to the basement opening.

They’re coming this way.

“Hide!” I call. “Behind the pool table!”

We scramble to the area right behind the table just as the footsteps enter the hallway. I try not to remember the mouse and the possible droppings I’m up against on the ground here.

As the footsteps come closer to the laundry room across the hall, a nervous flutter overwhelms the pit of my stomach. I want to punch a hand through a wall, I’m so hyped! So alive!