On the Corner of Lace and Hendrix

“Mom! You can’t do this to me- to us!”

Verona shouted as she was lead down the steps, out of her own house. Her younger brother, Keagan, sighed and shook his head slowly. It was hopeless, and he wasn’t sure if she was aware of that yet.

“It’s okay, Verona. They want us to leave. We’re leaving.” Keagan nodded towards his mother’s new boyfriend, who had just thrown them out of the house. Why he was nodding, he wasn’t sure. All he knew was that the man seemed reasonable enough. Nicholas was his name. Keagan had just arrived from university, and had no idea what was happening when a stranger and his older sister stomped out of the house, yelling at each other while his mother stood by and watched. That stranger turned out to be his new stepfather.

The only one who really had to leave was Verona, but Keagan decided to go with her, just to make sure she survived on her own. Even at 24 years of age, she could barely make a grilled cheese sandwich. Keagan had mentioned this to his culinary arts professor, who couldn’t believe that his best student’s older sister couldn’t even do that. Anyway, the whole point of him leaving was to be with Verona, with her best interest in mind.

After packing up their things (which took only an hour, thanks to his organizing skills), Keagan looked out the window at his pouting sister and sighed sadly. He usually had so much faith in people, but now, he was beginning to think that Verona would never change. Not that it really mattered anyway, because he would never mind taking care of her. Society said that older siblings should be the ones to take care younger siblings, but he never listened to society before, so why start now?

He trudged down the 3 front steps of their bay-and-gable styled house. Living in Seattle, it was easy to find these since it was so close to British Columbia. They both got into Keagan’s car, and he put on a small smile.

“So, sis, where are we going? There are some apartments near this neighb-“

“I don’t want to be anywhere near here.” Her eyes narrowed. “Let’s go across town. Anyway, welcome back. Sorry this had to be your returning party, but Mom got this boyfriend and he’s not like Dad was at all. He didn’t want to bring me out for ice cream. I can’t stand him, Keagan. I can’t.”

As stupid as this would have sounded to anyone else, he understood how she could be upset. Their father brought them out for ice cream all the time, even as teens. They never grew out of it. It was a tradition. Anyone else would have thought she was getting angry over something as childish as ice cream, but it wasn’t just ice cream, it was symbol of the casual lifestyle that was taken away from her- taken away from them. He understood perfectly why she was angry and couldn’t help but agree with her argument. Keagan turned on the ignition and started the car, pulling out of the driveway and onto the street.

“Yeah, I know. It’s okay. The house would have gotten stuffy anyway. We aren’t little anymore, so 4 people would be a lot to stick in one little house, no matter how nice it is. You know. I’m kind of glad we’re leaving. Aren’t you?” He smiled and glanced at her.

Verona nodded idly, looking out the window at the houses passing. “Yeah.”

Keagan had no idea how long they had been driving, but each time they stopped to see where they were, Verona would give him a disapproving look that said ‘not far enough.’ It turned out that, when she was finally pleased with the distance from their starting point, they were nearly at the Canadian border, in Clearbrook. The younger sibling could only tell this by the green ‘WELCOME TO CLEARBROOK’ sign on the side of the road. He glanced over at Verona, and she nodded, but he soon realized that she had no idea how far they were from home either. Keagan drove on until a small brick building came into sight. He squinted to see a gold and black marble plaque at the front of the building.

Primrose Thicket Apartments

A quaint, pet-friendly, and charming apartment complex with rooms open!

Again, he looked over at his older sister for approval. Her expression was a mix of curiosity and hesitance.

“This looks alright.” She shrugged, glancing back at him with a bored look. That wasn’t exactly what he was hoping for, but it would do for then. Keagan smiled softly and pulled into the building’s parking lot. Maybe this would work. He had some hope for the future at the least.

The girl at the front desk smiled at them warmly. She had curly, soft-looking, honey-coloured hair and green eyes. She looked like she was good at her job. Verona liked her because of that. Keagan thought she was pretty, but he wasn’t very interested at all.

“Hello.” The young woman began in a soft voice. It matched her appearance in a perfect way, Verona mused. “My name is Ariel, is there any way I could help you?”

Keagan opened his mouth, but his sister was faster than he was. “Yes, in fact, there is. We would like to buy an apartment. We have the money right now, and it would be preferable that we get our room soon. As in, sometime today.” Ariel laughed quietly.

“That is a tall order, but I’m sure I could work out something for you. You have the money, you say? A room in this particular building would cost around $1,550 per month. Does that sound alright with you?”

Keagan could now tell that she was foreign. “Yes, that sounds fine. I’m just wondering, where are you from, Ariel?” Verona glared at him as if he was trying to flirt with the front desk clerk.

“Oh? I’m from Kolding, Denmark. I moved here 5 years ago. Thank you for asking.” She nodded and smiled shyly at Verona, who sputtered, turning away from Ariel’s candy apple doe eyes. Keagan stared at his sister incredulously. He knew she preferred girls, but a high school girl crush at age 24? He supposed that Verona was, in fact, more childish than most, so in the end just shrugged it off. However, Ariel seemed to be innocently amused by the building’s newest resident reacting so dramatically. Danish girls, Keagan thought, rolling his eyes and tugging Verona’s jacket. She jerked, as if suddenly awoken by cold water.

“Hey, welcome to the world of the living, sis. We have to do all of the paperwork.” He gestured to the clipboard and pen Ariel held, covering her mouth with the other hand to hide the fact that she was giggling.

Verona pulled away from him and glared, then walked over to the desk, grabbing the board and pen exasperatedly. The whole room smelled nice, kind of like coffee, but as she drew closer, she realized it was mostly Ariel. Verona shook her head.

She’d have time for flirting when they got moved in.