Chapter 35: Things Happen Fast
"I'll be in touch," Andrew said, showing the bald man out. "Thanks for coming by."
He closed the door and leaned against it for a moment.
The second bedroom had been listed for rent for just over two weeks. In that time he'd fielded somewhere north of a hundred phone calls, screened those down to seventeen or eighteen actual viewings, and come away from every single one of them with a reason to keep looking.
His requirements weren't complicated. He'd written them out plainly in the listing: looking for someone around his age, normal schedule, no pets. That was the whole list.
And yet.
The parade of people who'd come through his door in the past two weeks had included: a guy who'd mentioned his two cats on the way in the door after explicitly saying on the phone he had no pets;
a woman who'd brought her boyfriend and seemed surprised Andrew hadn't assumed they came as a package; three night-shift workers whose "night shift" had been explained to him, on follow-up questions, in terms that made the nature of their employment fairly clear;
a man who'd stood in the second bedroom for five minutes telling Andrew everything wrong with it; and the bald man who'd just left, who had walked in without being invited, immediately started opening cabinet doors, and spent twenty minutes explaining why Andrew should lower the rent.
The apartment was in a genuinely good location — central, near the commercial district, a hospital within walking distance, office buildings on two sides. Places like this didn't sit empty. Andrew was aware that he was the problem, or rather that his standards, minimal as they seemed to him, kept eliminating candidates faster than candidates appeared.
He went back to the couch and closed his eyes.
Three knocks at the door.
He sat there for a second, debating whether his body was willing to get up again. It was. He pushed himself off the couch, straightened his shirt, and opened the door.
The man in the hallway was young — mid-twenties, easy posture, the kind of unhurried manner that suggested someone comfortable in most situations. He was dressed simply and looked like he might work in something creative.
"Hey. I'm Eric — I called this morning?"
Andrew noticed immediately that he'd stopped in the hallway and waited to be invited in, which put him ahead of at least six of the previous visitors without saying another word.
"Andrew. Come on in."
Eric stepped inside and took in the apartment with the measured look of someone who was actually assessing it rather than performing assessment. "Just want to ask upfront — this hasn't been rented yet?"
"Not yet. Still deciding."
"Good." Eric smiled slightly. "I looked at a place yesterday — the guy told me it was mine, then rented it to someone else this morning. Wanted to make sure before I got too interested."
"That's lousy," Andrew said, and meant it. He walked Eric through the second bedroom — the size, the closet, the shared bathroom situation, how utilities would split.
Eric nodded through all of it. Then: "I should tell you what I do. I'm a photographer — I work with models, mostly for men's lifestyle magazines. I'd sometimes have people over during the day for shoots. Would that be a problem?"
"Day or evening?" Andrew asked. "I keep a pretty regular schedule. Late nights would be an issue."
"Days, almost always. Evening work happens at the studio — the lighting setup is better there." Eric paused. "The magazines I shoot for are on the more adult end of the spectrum. So the models are—" He made a small gesture that completed the sentence.
Andrew processed this.
Men's lifestyle magazines. Adult end of the spectrum. Models coming through during the day.
He kept his expression neutral through an act of genuine will.
A roommate who occasionally brought back women who were professionally attractive and professionally comfortable with being photographed, coming through during afternoon hours, not disrupting the evening schedule—
"Also," Eric added, with the tone of someone mentioning something incidentally, "my sister's in the same industry. Acts in films. We get together most weekends — sometimes at her place if you ever wanted to come along."
Andrew looked at him.
He thought: this is the most perfect roommate situation anyone has ever described to another person.
He thought: stay calm.
He thought: wait.
He looked at Eric — the name, the profession, the sister in the industry — and felt the very specific sensation of a puzzle piece falling into place with a sound he could almost hear.
Eric. Joey. Chandler's roommate. The one Chandic didn't get.
Which meant Joey had arrived in the city. Which meant the timeline was exactly where he'd calculated it was. Which meant the bar was about to become a coffee shop, probably within days.
"I think you're going to be a great fit," Andrew said, with more composure than he felt. "Assuming nothing comes up, I'd like to go with you."
Eric looked mildly surprised at the efficiency of the decision, then smiled. "Yeah? Great. I think we'll get along well."
They shook on it. Eric left with the easy energy of someone whose afternoon had gone better than expected.
Andrew closed the door.
He stood in the middle of his living room for approximately fifteen seconds of complete internal chaos — the kind that comes with the sudden realization that a situation is substantially better than it had any right to be — and then found a notebook, crossed out every other name on the list, and sat down.
There was no other choice.
There had never been any other choice.
He was still sitting there, composing himself, when three more knocks came at the door.
Andrew checked the time. Eric had been the last appointment. He wasn't expecting anyone else. He straightened up — he'd been sprawled on the couch during the fifteen seconds of chaos and his shirt was wrinkled — and went to the door.
He opened it.
Standing in the hallway, backpack on her shoulders, looking at him with an expression that was carefully calm and carefully hopeful at the same time, was Christie.
Andrew stared at her.
"Uncle," she said, in a small, steady voice. "Can I stay here?"
Evening. The bar.
The place had the subdued quality of a last night — not officially, nobody had announced anything, but the staff knew and the regulars could feel it in the air. Andrew had played his set and was packing up his guitar when Gunther came over.
"I'm sorry, Andrew." Gunther looked like he'd been carrying this conversation around all day waiting for the right moment. "It went through. Construction starts day after tomorrow."
"I know." Andrew zipped the guitar case. "I figured it was coming."
He had figured it. When Eric had appeared at his door — the wrong Eric, the pre-pilot Eric, the one who meant Joey was somewhere in the city — the remaining timeline had compressed to days. The Central Perk story was starting. He'd had two weeks' warning and he'd used them.
Gunther reached into his shirt pocket and pressed a business card into Andrew's hand with the focused sincerity of a man delivering something he'd gone out of his way to obtain. "Bar not far from here. They're looking for a house musician. I talked to someone. If you're interested, call that number and go by."
He gave Andrew's shoulder one firm pat and walked away before Andrew could say much in return.
Andrew looked down at the card.
McLaren's Bar
He turned it over in his fingers. A new place. New regulars, new staff, new acoustic situation to figure out. More change in a season that had already been full of it.
He put the card in his jacket pocket, picked up his guitar, and headed home.
Christie was asleep on the couch when he got in, a blanket pulled up around her shoulders that he hadn't left there — she'd found it herself, which meant she'd been comfortable enough to look for it, which meant something.
He turned off the living room light and went quietly to his room.
He'd figure out the details in the morning.
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