The Goode Girls of Maple Lane

Chapter One

I t’s just past midnight on a Friday, I smell like questionably sourced pepperoni, I’m pretty sure the blister that keeps forming on my left heel burst again, my phone is burning a hole in my pocket with five unanswered texts from my well-meaning but boundary-averse mother, and the man in the elevator with me is carrying a houseplant so large, he’s not only edging me into a corner, he’s completely hidden behind the plant from the waist up.

He’s also grunting a little from the weight.

I’d worry he’s sneaking into the building using a tactic he picked up from a cartoon, but I recognize his blue corduroy pants and faded red Converse low-tops.

Also, this is the third time in as many weeks I’ve seen him haul a hefty houseplant up to his apartment at an unusual hour.

Assuming his apartment is a similar size to mine, I’ve begun to wonder where he fits a bed.

I also wonder where he makes his late-night foliage runs. And why.

Naturally, I’ve dubbed him Plant Guy.

Unimaginative? Sure. But Bespectacled Midnight Philodendron Smuggler is a mouthful.

Also on my floor: a couple really into PDA (The Lovers); a girl who never looks up from her phone, somehow intuiting when she’s reached her floor (Phone Girl); a guy who’s always awkwardly but apologetically cramming his bicycle into the elevator (Cycle Guy); and a middle-aged woman who carries her tiny black-and-gray Yorkie-poo around in her purse (Dog Lady).

Six apartments. Six twentysomethings and one fiftysomething who all live here because the rent’s cheap and the location’s convenient.

It’s certainly not for the character or the views of the narrow alleys that flank the building, though we have a few modern amenities, like the elevator, a parking garage, and an intercom system that lets us buzz friends in from our phones, the last of which I’ve had depressingly little reason to use.

Everyone on my floor but Plant Guy has been here at least as long as I have—a little over a year—and I have yet to learn anyone’s actual name.

I haven’t made the effort, though in my defense, no one has attempted to learn mine.

The dog’s name, however, is Pilot.

Something tickles my ear and I swat it away.

Leaves, apparently.

“Sorry.” Plant Guy edges farther into his corner.

“It’s fine.” I edge farther into mine.

This comprises the entirety of our conversation on our slow ascent to the sixth floor.

If I wasn’t so tired from a long day of classes and a five-hour shift at the pizzeria, I would’ve taken the stairs.

I hate this steel box. Not only do I have to stand near strangers and pretend I don’t feel a weird pressure to make small talk, but no one ever scrapes away the blackened gum wads, the overhead fluorescents flicker like they’re prepping us for a jump scare, and I swear, I could’ve solved an entire New York Times Friday crossword by the time the doors ding open.

Plant Guy lets out a quiet grunt as he adjusts the weight of his new roommate in his arms. I’m not sure if he’s waiting for me to exit first or if he can’t see what floor we’re on.

“Need a hand?” I ask, realizing way too late that I should’ve asked sooner.

“Nope. Good. Just. Doors,” he says in a strained staccato.

I step out and reach a hand back to prevent the elevator doors from closing.

He shuffles past me, eking out a “Thanks. Night” as he heads to his apartment at the opposite end of the hall from mine. Nothing strange here. Just a man and his plant.

“Night,” I call after him, following his lead on the dropped good before doing a quick tally. Thirteen words from start to finish. As elevator conversations go, it’s practically a record.

My sneakers are off as soon as I enter my apartment, tossing my keys onto the sideboard and dropping my bag on the futon I drown in blankets and throw pillows, lest it become a daily reminder that I could barely afford to furnish this apartment, and everything in it is the absolute cheapest version I could find.

While slipping out of my jacket, I flip through the mail I grabbed on the way in.

Two charities seeking donations, a new food delivery company trying to drum up business, and a more formal envelope from Cornell’s bursar’s office.

I toss the first three in my recycle bin and put the fourth on a growing stack of Things to Look at Later.

Once my student loans hit six figures, the number became oddly abstract.

It’s already an amount I can’t imagine paying back in my lifetime.

Why not add another $60K? At this point, they might as well send one of those cards that open up to a laugh track. Or maybe the sound of a falling anvil.

I grab the sole remaining cider from my fridge, which is a wasteland other than a few bruised apples, a partial loaf of bread, a carton of oat milk—I’m never sure which “milk” I’m supposed to be drinking these days—and a dozen half-empty condiment jars and bottles in the door.

I like to cook. I just don’t have the time and energy. Not when cereal’s ready in seconds.

As I close the door, I tap the photo of our family’s golden retriever, Lady Marmalade, where I’ve pinned it to the door with a pewter paw magnet.

It’s a habitual gesture, and one that still chokes me up, even though she died three years ago now.

I’ve never been good with people, so Marmie was my best friend while I was growing up, and her loss hit me hard.

I’ve done my share of ugly-crying, scrolling old photo albums, and watching heart-tugging videos of dogs leaping into water after tennis balls, one of Marmie’s favorite activities.

As with all forms of grief, some days are easier than others, and sometimes the sadness surprises me, like when I find a blond hair on an old sweater or when a dent in a throw pillow is about her size, and the sadness drags me under before I can take precautions against it.

On the anniversary of her death last year, I was so bereft, I got wasted and spent the night filling in applications with shelters and fostering agencies, noting that I had a particular interest in golden retrievers.

Thankfully, no one called and I didn’t have to backpedal.

Of course they didn’t call. At the time of application, my only assets of note were my enthusiasm and my recent entry into vet school, which were unlikely to offset my shortcomings.

A single grad student living in a five-hundred-square-foot apartment with no yard, no caretaking help, no free time, and a laughable monthly income that only partially covers her current living expenses is hardly an ideal pet parent.

They know that. I know that. Even the dogs I’ll never meet would know that.

One day, when I finish school— if I finish school—and I knock at least one zero off my loan statements, and I live in a space that doesn’t make my aggressively utilitarian undergrad dorm look elegant by comparison, I’ll get a dog.

Until then, it’s me, the cheap futon, the empty fridge, an impossible mountain of studying, and an even more impossible mountain of debt.

I raise my bottle to Marmie’s photo. “Living the dream, huh, girl?”

She smiles back in that way only dogs do, with their entire bodies, nose to tail.

Slumping onto the futon, I reach out to the one friend who’s stuck by me since childhood, even though she moved to the UK when we were in eighth grade, and seems to have no intention of returning since she’s still over there, currently pursuing a law degree.

At least I can text her late at night and know she’s up and probably on her tenth or twelfth mile of a morning run.

She does Ironman races. She never would’ve taken the elevator tonight. But since I did...

CAMERON: Good morning. Thought you should know. Plant Guy strikes again!

HANNAH: Another one? Was it pot this time? Please tell me it was pot

CAMERON: I think it was a philodendron

HANNAH: You sure that’s a plant?

CAMERON: According to the straight A’s I got in bio classes...

HANNAH: Whatever. It still sounds dirty

CAMERON: There’s a bush joke in here somewhere but I’m too tired to find it

HANNAH: Long day?

CAMERON: Long week. Long month. Long year

I take a hefty swig of cider and feel my body start to relax.

HANNAH: Still having second thoughts about vet school?

CAMERON: Try third or fourth or a thousand and fiftieth

HANNAH: But you’ll be SUCH an amazing vet

CAMERON: I don’t know. The grind is getting to me. And being a vet is so much more about dealing with people than I thought it would be back when I was bandaging teddy bear legs and diagnosing the family cats with catatonia and cataracts

HANNAH: You just made me spit-take my Gatorade

CAMERON: How many miles this morning?

HANNAH: Only ten. I’ll do a long run this weekend

Only ten , I think as I prod the raw spot where my blister popped. I can’t even imagine.

HANNAH: Maybe you should shake things up? Ask Plant Guy on a date

CAMERON: Pretty sure I’m not his type

HANNAH: Green?

CAMERON: Fun

Hannah sends me an angry face emoji. I reply with a shrug emoji. This is a long-standing argument and I appreciate her perennially generous view of my personality, but I know myself. I’m not exactly the life of the party. I rarely even attend “the party.”

CAMERON: Also, pretty sure PG’s habit of sneaking large houseplants into his apartment in the middle of the night is a major red flag. Don’t you think it’s a little weird?

HANNAH: It’s the greenest of green flags. And I thought you liked weird

CAMERON: I like

I stop there and delete the text, unable to complete it. It’s probably not a good sign that I can’t identify what I like, let alone rally the energy to pursue it, but I know this much. I don’t have room in my life for dating. I barely have room for a daily shower.