The Keys to the Kingdom

The River

Charles was his name, and he acted as a barrier between Peter’s world and the other. Very little of importance lay on the other side of the Charles: BU was there, as was Fenway and the rest of Boston outstretched. Emily and Sheldon were out there, and Federico’s friends whom Peter had met over the summer on an excursion to Machine, but they crossed over often enough. “Stay there,” he seemed to say as he washed down his muddy banks toward elsewhere. “Safe. There. Home.” People jumped off the Weeks Bridge to prove something—jumped into the Charles. Every time Peter passed the river, his heart shivered, temporarily submerged in the chill of the surging water. He remembered how Virginia had done it.

The House

The room was perfect, but they needed a calendar. Raquel would buy one from Staples tomorrow, like the one the girls downstairs had pinned up last year—large, with a floral border that reminded Peter of church programs. Two common rooms, seven bedrooms, one connecting bathroom between the common spaces. Gabriel screamed as he ran between the rooms, Snapchatting voraciously, “Welcome to paradise!” While Samson and Michael were searching for poster gum, Peter snuck into the bathroom and twisted the nozzles of both showers. Water flowed plentifully, to his giddy delight, and he kept it running for a few minutes. It was wasteful and eccentric, but he wasn’t in California anymore, Toto.

“N+2 housing,” a friend would explain to them later. “As sophomores? Fucking fantastic!”

“The best thing about living here is that you don’t have to look at it,” another would laugh, pouring Fireball into a shot glass shaped like a camera lens. Peter felt the gravel-lined window of his single. His window looked out onto the courtyard, at its centerpiece: The large tree encircled by a hexagonal bench. Over the next few weeks, the leaves would all change from deep green to vibrant red. The crown jewel of the house was a ruby.

Noah

Peter sat in the hammock pretending that he didn’t recognize the limp red futon being transferred across the courtyard towards the elevator. Sam Spade was being implicated by the police yet again, and Peter was desperately interested. He pretended not to notice that Noah’s mom had dyed her hair in another attempt at disguising her graying roots. He pretended not to realize that his father was probably still at home recovering from knee surgery. He pretended not to make eye contact with Noah. Peter swung and forced himself down the whale’s throat, skin sticky from the September heat, into the intrigue of Maltese falcons. There was an entire department at this college formed around the concept that, if we don’t learn from it, history is bound to repeat itself. Peter thought of the many nights he spent in high school staring at an open APUSH book, too tired and removed to comprehend it. Repetition is the highest form of flattery, he thought to himself.

The Text That Evening

Noah: Hey, sorry, I was getting settled so I didn’t have time to say hello, k? Talk soon.

Peter: (two hours later) Did you move in today? I thought juniors couldn’t til tmoro. Anyway, welcome back to campus!

Babel Storage Co.

Delilah and Uriel were the last to arrive—on the same flight from New York. They stood in the center of the common room and marveled at their luck, ignoring their towers of storage boxes. It’s so big! We have couches! Three more years! Both women went around the room hugging the other five roommates, who had all congregated in the common room. As they disassembled the towers, their excitement built into a single cacophony. Language did not matter now, only their oneness.

“Watch the the doorstop,” Peter shouted over Delilah’s box. “The bedroom doors lock if you close them.”

“Peter,” Delilah said, turning and looking up at him through warm, hazel eyes. “I’ve missed your voice so much.”

Keys to the Kingdom

“Can you grab my keys? They’re in front of my mirror.” Raquel quietly tapped her boot on their door. The other four were already at the restaurant. Peter ran upstairs, struggling to get his arm through his jacket, stretching his open palm and the dangling crimson lanyard towards her. “Actually, can you hold them? These pants don’t have pockets and I’d like not to bring a bag.”

“Sure, as long as we’re coming back together—”

“Women’s pants are dumb,” Uriel announced, ascending the final step. “We should just wear slacks, always.”

“I can hold your keys too.”

“Would you?”

“Shall we?”

4 A.M., Two Weeks Later

Peter entered and saw them first in the steamed bathroom mirror. Her hands were full of his hair. The water was running. Peter dropped his keys.