Escrow closed quickly, and she took possession right away. She bought two beds—an optimistically big one and a small one—and the mattress company delivered. There were no bookshelves in the house, but her father would help her build some. She drove her few boxes there by herself and was happy to be unpacking, making the beds, imagining her new life. Hattie would play in this yard and learn to climb the sycamore. Eleanor would get a swing set for the yard and hide Easter eggs in the spring, like her parents had done for her. She might even meet someone now, if she wasn’t living at home. She was bringing in another box, thinking about what that someone might be like, when she saw an enormous rat staring at her from the front lawn. It gazed at her as if she were the intruder. “No,” she said. But still the rat stared. She took a threatening step forward, and it darted away. She carried the box up the walk, haunted by the appraising way the rat had looked at her, and saw another toast-colored blur disappear along the side of the house.
