The Brightest Star in a Constellation

42: Having a Weakness to

☽ Peter ☽

In the silence, I learn a lot about Evan McKenna.

The door to his room remains locked, with the hanger turned to, 'Do Not Disturb,' so I don't pry. On the breaks in my shift, I bring him a snack from Lotus, and I leave it outside the door. And every time, when I return to his room at the corner of the fifth floor, the tray is waiting for me.

On the first day, he leaves it untouched. On the second, he takes a croissant, and by the third day, the tray is emptied.

There is a note written on his napkin. Using the periodic table of elements as a code, he spells out each letter that, when decoded, reads: I am not fine.

I sweep the tray into my hands, carrying it to the restaurant to be cleaned. I have to crack open my chemistry book to form a reply. (I want to tell him he's opening up, and that's a good thing—and I know, and that he hasn't been okay for a long time, but I suspect that might scare him off.)

At the end of my shift, I prepare a glass of ice water and a pot of coffee as options, and Lotus' cooks offer the food. The sweet, light scent of ginger and turmeric fills the room as the yellow rice dish is folded into a box.

Using the blotting black ink of a hotel pen, I reply, I don't know what to say. Some things are not meant to be put into words.

My mother comes to take over for me as I exit the elevator. She must notice that my books are strewn across the desk, since she asks, "Has a storm passed through while I was gone?"

"A lot has happened," I tell her with a short laugh. "A friend is staying here."

Her eyes narrow. She looks at the sheets of paper sitting on my textbooks, upside down, and decorated with Evan's secret code. Messages that I started and scrapped are crossed out like an unfinished homework assignment.

"A friend?" she says, dragging out the word to great lengths. Intentionally, I don't say it in French—if I did, I'd have to clarify, (une amie or un ami) and I don't have the capacity to deal with the implications.

"Yeah," I confirm, a touch too late. "In the corner room. You don't need to knock—I already took care of it for tonight."

☆ ☽ ☆

During lunch hour, Nicole twists the cap of her soda and drops her bag onto the floor. She tips the bottle over to me, and I lift my fist in midair as we both mutter, "Cheers."

"Did you get a chance to play my game?" she asks.

I nod. After my first play-through of Currently Untitled, I found that there were locations I couldn't access. I've been making my way through the dialogue options, hoping to see the different endings. "Yeah, I did. How did you make it so fast?"

Nicole shrugs. "The technology club helped. Kendall wasn't totally useless. Total shocker, I know. He was the one to suggest adding the friendship mechanism."

"I got to the end where I've run out of resources," I say.

"That's the usual ending when you spend too much time building stuff. You have to befriend the characters, Pierre. Everyone knows friendship can save a town from apocalyptic demise."