Room for Rent

January 2nd, 2019

"Jennifer! You said you'd play with me!"

"I said I'd think about it," his big sister replied without looking up from the book she was reading.

"That's the same thing!" her younger brother said back loudly enough that it caught their mother's attention.

"Jonah? Do you want to come help me?" she asked cheerfully and with a warm smile.

She was hoping that even at the age of seven, her son could still be distracted by something that simple. She was already on overload, and the last thing she needed was more stress.

"Help you with what?" he asked, suddenly interested and having taken the bait.

"I need someone big and strong to go up in the attic and see if there's a large trunk somewhere up there."

"I'm big!" he told her as the thought of getting to go up in the attic, a place he'd only been in twice before and loved, had his full, undivided attention.

"Yes, you are! So how about you go get your shoes on and I'll be right there, okay?"

"Okay, Mom!" he happily replied having forgotten all about his sister's promise to play with him.

Once he was gone, she sat down by her nine-year old daughter and forced herself to smile again.

"Jennifer? I know your brother gets on your nerves, but you did promise to play with him."

When she didn't respond, her mother said, "I know you're too old to play the games he likes, but you did promise."

Jennifer knew she couldn't get away with saying she'd only promised to think about it, because her mother heard her say it less than an hour ago.

"Okay. Fine. I'll play with him," the nine-year old said with a hint of attitude in her voice.

"Thank you, honey, and you know that when you try and get out of a promise, it's not right."

Her daughter knew that lying was the number one rule in their house, and she knew why. She was now old enough to know that what she did was lying, and no amount of soft-pedaling could change that fact.

"Yes," she quietly said.

"Telling the truth is extremely important. If we lie, people won't trust us. And if people can't trust, they..."

"They won't want to be our friend," her daughter said finishing the sentence she'd heard many times.

"That's right. So once Jonah gets done helping me, spend some time with him, okay?"

Her daughter finally looked at her, but she still refused to smile, so her mom leaned her way a bit and said, "Even if it KILLS you!"

Her antics earned her a smile and even a little laugh, so her mom hugged her and told her she loved her.

"I love you, too, Mom," Jennifer said, causing her mother to have to blink hard several times before letting go.

Henley Lesco had never been an overly emotional woman, but since her husband left her just over a year ago, she'd worn her emotions on her sleeve with sadness and self-pity being the ones she most often felt.

She was stilling using his last name, mostly for the kids' sake, even though it was the same name as a brand of lawn fertilizer, and the thought of returning to her maiden name of Price was something that crossed her mind quite often.

She was well aware that there was often no rhyme or reason why one person in a marriage strayed, but in this case it was downright baffling. She'd done everything a wife could possibly do to make a husband happy from learning to cook or bake almost anything to staying fit and reasonably slim, even after having two children, to being the kind of woman in bed nearly any man would dream of. And yet it hadn't been enough.

When he told her late one night that he'd been having an affair it hit her so hard she not only couldn't speak, she couldn't even feel. She sat there...numb...unable to even move as he went on and on about how sorry he was, how he never meant to hurt her, that it 'just happened', and that he'd pay child support on time every month, and not take a penny more than half of what they jointly owned.

Her 42-year old ex-husband—as of exactly one week ago—was an associate professor at Kansas State University in their hometown of Manhattan, Kansas, and the new 'woman of his dreams' was a 21-year old undergrad named Chloe, another name she now hated. It was petty in the extreme, but Henley was okay with allowing herself to be a little bit petty after all she'd been through.

She'd never cared much for her given name, either, while growing up, but as time went by she loved having been named something outside of all the trendy names parents gave their kids in any given year. Yes, it was the name of a man's three-button shirt, but it was unique, it was hers, and now, at the age of 39, she was very proud of it.

As awful as the affair had been on her, the hardest thing to take had been watching the way their two children reacted to the news when their father tried to explain why he wouldn't be living at home anymore.

Even now she wasn't sure which child had been hurt the most as both had been devastated by the news. Jonah had always been quiet, but his way of coping became acting out. He was still a good kid, but he was a very different little boy.

Jennifer, on the other hand, had always been happy, pleasant, and outgoing. Now, she was quiet, introverted, and preferred staying home and reading books. The reading part was wonderful, but it, too, was such a change that Henley's heart went out for her daughter every time she saw her in her room reading, and even more so when two or three weeks would go by with no contact from her father.

Making matters worse, even with child support and her own full-time job, there was rarely any money left over for the kids after paying the bills. She and the children continued to live in their four-bedroom house, and one of those bedrooms had only ever really been used for storage. The kids had their rooms downstairs, and the 'spare bedroom' as they all called it, was upstairs and down the hall from the master where she slept. Alone.

Living near a college town meant she could easily find someone to rent the room in a matter of a day or two—especially with the second semester of the academic year getting ready to start. The problem was finding someone she could trust in her house, and more importantly by far, trust completely around her two children. She'd resisted renting it out during the first semester for that very reason, but she was now at a point where she either had to do so or take a second, part-time job. And because being away from her children any more than she already needed to be was completely unacceptable, the proverbial handwriting seemed to be on the wall. Selling the house and moving into a smaller place was an option, but this was the only house her children had ever lived in, and she saw that as a last resort.

"What do you see, buddy?" Henley called out to her son who was up in the attic with a flashlight looking around.

"Um...lots of stuff!" he hollered back.

His mom knew he was fascinated by the spooky room above the house, so she let him explore for a couple of minutes just to have some fun, a thought that also made her feel sad because fun wasn't something they had very often. At least not if it required spending money.

"What color is it?" Jonah eventually asked.

It had been up there longer than he'd been alive, and Henley needed it to put things from the spare bedroom in it. It didn't need to be in good shape, it just needed not to be falling apart.

"It's blue, honey," she called out as she climbed up the collapsible ladder high enough to see her son who shined the light right in her eyes.

"Sorry, Mom!" he said as he turned it on the trunk.

"Yep. That's the one. Are you big enough to drag it over here to me?" she asked with a smile.

"Of course I am!" he told her.

The trunk was huge but it was empty and it only weighed about 20 pounds, and Jonah was able to slide it close enough to the opening in the ceiling so that his mom could bring it down.

But it wasn't until she had it stuffed with...stuff...that she realized she couldn't get it back up there by herself. That was the bad news. The good news was that the bedroom was now uncluttered and could be cleaned in order to rent out.

KSU had a website, and one of the pages was for advertising. Rooms for rent off campus were always in demand, and with the second semester of the school year starting in a few days, Henley felt pretty sure she could find a responsible, quiet tenant in short order as most returning students would already be back in town.

The only remaining issue was price with the amount depending on whether or not she planned to include meals and or laundry service, and that caused her to wonder if she would have to actually prepare food three times a day or just make it available. Because she had a job, she couldn't possibly be there to make lunch during the week, and her own children were in school anyway, so it seemed like a better idea to offer only the room. By not including board with the room, the price could lower and hopefully attract someone immediately.

After revising the ad several times she ended up with:

"Private room with access to private bathroom in clean, quiet home. Tenant must also be clean, quiet, and responsible. Asking $300 per month rent. Tenant is responsible for meals. Please call..."

She provided her cellphone number and her name with a request to call between 9am and 8pm.

Satisfied, she hit 'post' and saw that it didn't which made her wonder what she'd done wrong until a page appeared that said, "Your advertisement is being reviewed to see if it meets..."

There was a series of three-letter abbreviations with the only one she knew being EOH which stood for Equal Opportunity Housing. She checked back a few hours later, and there was her ad. Now all she had to do was wait. Or so she thought.

A little after 11pm, a time when she was always sound asleep, her phone rang.

"Hello?" a sleepy Henley replied.

"Yeah. Hey. You still got that room?" a loud voice said over a lot of noise in the background that sounded like a party.

"What time is it?" she asked as she tried to see the alarm clock.

"I don't really know. I think it's like still pretty early, though," the voice replied.

Henley noticed it was 11:07 at night and sighed.

"No, sorry. It's been rented," she said without thinking.

"Total bummer!" the male voice said before hollering, "the bitch gave it away already," to someone else.

Henley looked at the phone then hit 'end call' and went back to sleep.

When she got up the following morning she checked her phone which she'd put on mute, and to her great relief, no one else had called. But somewhere around noon she received a second inquiry.

This time it was a young woman who sounded responsible over the phone, and Henley agreed to meet her that evening at 7pm. During dinner, the phone rang again, and another a young woman also asked about the room, and she agreed to stop by at 7:30, more than enough time to show the first person and get ready for the second.

Dinner was over, the dishes were put away, and by 7 o'clock the house was reasonably clean for one in which two small children lived.

The doorbell rang at 7:18, and when Henley opened it, a girl with purple hair and several facial piercings was standing in front of her holding a cigarette.

"Hello," she said as the girl took a final drag on the cigarette before crushing it out on her front porch and leaving it there.

"Hey," the girl said. "Nice house."

"Thank you," a very-concerned Henley said as she invited her in.

The kids had been asked to stay in their rooms, but both of them were just around the corner waiting, and when the saw the 19-year old walk in, both of them started giggling.

"It's like...really quiet in here," the girl said as they headed upstairs. "Do you ever like, you know, turn on some music?"

"Oh. No. Not very often," Henley told her knowing she never turned on any music. She had an iPod she occasionally listened to while working out on her elliptical machine, but that was about it.

"Is it okay if my boyfriend like hangs out here with me sometimes?" she asked after taking a quick look in the room.

"How often is...sometimes?" Henley asked.

"Like...just at night and stuff," the girl said. "We need a little privacy—if you know what I mean—and this would be like way cool."

"Oh. I see," Henley said before letting her know visitors weren't okay. "Because of the children."

The girl gave her a puzzled look then said, "You can't shelter them forever. I mean, they gotta learn about sex sometime, right?"

Henley thanked her for stopping by as she escorted her downstairs and out the door with a promise to let her know soon.

"Don't wait too long, because we're like checking out like a whole bunch of places, okay?" the girl cautioned before Henley closed the door and shook her head in disbelief.

It was just after nine when the doorbell rang again. She'd just gotten Jennifer to bed and couldn't believe the 7:30 appointment could be showing up that late.

But when she opened the door and saw two girls and two guys about the same age as the first girl, she knew it was.

"It's...a little late," Henley politely said.

"Late? What're you talkin' about? It's not even nine o'clock yet," one of the young men sarcastically informed her.

"But we agreed on 7:30."

"We? I didn't agree on nothin'," he told her as his buddy laughed.

"Darren. Be nice," one of the girls said.

She smiled at Henley then told her, "We uh, we got a little delayed."

"Because we were totally partying!" the other young man said before the first guy made some kind of loud noise like maybe a wolf or some other animal which caused the other male to join in.

"Have you been drinking?" Henley asked.

"Just a little," the second guy said, using his thumb and index finger to indicate a small amount.

And that's when the heavy smell of alcohol from the entire group hit her.

"I'm...I'm really sorry, but I...I already rented the room," she told them, hating herself for doing what she often told her children was inexcusable.

She told herself she was doing it for the sake of her kids, and the truth was, that was correct. But there was no way she was going to allow any of those four people to live in her house let alone let it be used as a brothel.

"You could've at least called us so we didn't waste our time, you know?" the other girl told her with a serious case of attitude.

"My apologies," Henley replied as she shut the door again and leaned up it against it while taking a long, deep breath.

After an even longer sigh, she turned the deadbolt and the doorknob lock as she wondered if this was such a good idea after all.

After a third such encounter the following evening, she was ready to pull the ad. But she really needed the income, so she decided to let it run another day.

It was around five o'clock when her phone rang, and to her dismay, it was a male voice.

"Good evening, ma'am. I'm calling in regard to the room you're advertising on the campus website."

"Oh. Yes. I uh, I was..."

She knew better than to say she was only willing to let a female live there, but that's what she'd been hoping for all along.

So she stopped thens told him, "It's still available if you'd like to take a look."

"I would. Very much. What time would be convenient for you?" he asked.

"Well, is 7:30 okay?" Henley asked.

"That sounds perfect. I'll be there at 7:30 sharp."

She almost told him she'd believe that when she saw it, but he sounded so polite she was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt in spite of her previous interaction with the youth of America. But when it came to letting a 20-year old male live in her home, she wasn't sure that was something she could live with. But there was no harm in showing it to him, and that would reduce the chance of him filing a complaint for gender discrimination.

When the doorbell rang exactly at 7:30, Henley was more than a little surprised.

When she opened the door and saw a very clean-cut young man smiling at her, she was even more surprised.

"Good evening, ma'am," the young man said. "Thank you for allowing me to have some of your time."

"Oh, um...of course," she said as she asked him to come inside.

"I'm Trevor," he told her with another smile.

"Trevor. Hi. My name is Henley."

"It's a pleasure, Mrs. Henley," he said.

"Oh. No. Sorry. Henley is my first name," she informed him.

He laughed politely then told her he should have known that from the ad and explained the mixup.

"I actually have two first names. Trevor and Michael. As in...Trevor Michael."

"Yes. Okay," she replied a little nervously, not sure why she was feeling that way. "My last name is Lesco. Like the fertilizer."

Trevor laughed again then told her he'd heard of it.

"I've done landscaping work during the summers, and Lesco is quite possibly the best fertilizer out there."

Henley then said something she couldn't believe she said, but it came out of her mouth before she could stop it.

"It's actually my ex-husband's name, so I kind of think of it as...fertilizer...of a different sort."

Trevor got it immediately and laughed.

"That's actually very funny," he told her, as she realized why she was feeling so out of sorts.

Trevor was a very handsome young man with short, dark hair, bright, blue eyes, and a very fit body. It was too cold outside to actually see it underneath the jeans and jacket, but she could tell he was in very good shape.

"So I take it you don't smoke?" she asked as they headed upstairs.

"No. Never. And I rarely ever drink, either," he assured her.

"So what do you like to do, Trevor?" she asked as nonchalantly as she could.

"I hope this comes across the way I mean it," he began.

"I'm very focused. I was in the Army for four years, and I'm a semester away from going back in—as an officer—so school is my #1 priority with fitness and nutrition a close second."

"Really? Well, thank you for your service, and I think that's a very admirable goal."

"Oh, thank you, ma'am. It was my privilege and I'm very much looking forward to serving my country again."

They were at the room, so Henley invited to look in or walk around.

"It's perfect," he said within five seconds. "Is it still available?"

Trevor could tell there was something she wanted to say, so he asked her to just give it to him straight.

"I...I have two small children," she explained just as they heard giggling a few feet down the hall. "As in...those children."

Trevor smiled as their mother said, "Jennifer? Jonah? What are you doing?"

"Sorry, Mom," the young girl said as she stepped into the hall, a big grin on her pretty face.

"We wanted to see him!" Jonah told her as he jumped into the hall right behind his sister.

"Hey, guys!" Trevor said to them with a smile and a wave.

"I'm Jonah!" the boy informed him.

"Hello, Jonah. My name is Trevor," the tall, young man said as he walked over and stuck his hand out. Jonah pumped it hard and Trevor laughed before turning to the shy, young girl and quietly asking her name.

"Jennifer," she told him without looking at him.

"It's nice to meet you, Miss Jennifer," Trevor told her.

"You, too," she replied very quietly.

He turned to Henley then said, "They're wonderful. How old are they?"

"Jennifer's nine and Jonah is seven."

"But I'll be eight on my birthday!" the little boy informed him.

Trevor chuckled then said, "Yeah. That's how that works, isn't it?"

Henley had no idea how big her smile was, but it was nothing short of huge.

"They...they won't be a problem?" she asked.

"What? Are you kidding? I think..."

Trevor bent down a little and did his Tony the Tiger voice.

"I think...they're GREAT!" and a got a laugh from both of the kids.

"Me, too," their mom said as she walked over and stood between them.