Monkey Wrench by Terri Thayer Page A

place.
    Perfect. Now I had a real reason to be on campus.
    San Jose State campus was eerily quiet. Whatever the task force had done, it had done swiftly and left behind little evidence. So many of the students were over at the park that the campus felt deserted.
    Now that I was away from the noise, I thought about the Twitter response. Granted my Quilters Crawl customers were not totally wired-in college students, but I didn’t need thousands of participants. Even another fifty would add to our bottom line. The Twitter promotion could be phenomenal.
    I found Sonya’s office in the art department after taking a few wrong turns. The door to the cramped, dark office was open. A wooden desk faced front with a laptop open. Shelves of books filled the two side walls. Drawings and sketches covered every empty space. Ceramics lined the small window in the back.
    There were three names on a small card on the door. I was in the right place. Sonya shared this office with two other teachers. I waited in the hall. She’d said she would be here. With the door open and the laptop in full view, she wouldn’t have gone far.
    A cluttered bulletin board sat to the right of the door. I was surprised to see that some kids still used it to communicate. Seemed pretty old school. Write a message on a piece of paper, pin it to the board, hope the right person sees it. The notices were eclectic, someone looking for a ride to the Inland Empire for Columbus Day, another offered tutoring services. A tortoise for sale. Helpfully, he came with his own tank.
    A bright green paper caught my eye. The brochure was the do-it-yourself kind, printed on 8-1/2x11 paper, folded into thirds. A graphic of a smiling young man behind a lawn mower adorned the front.
    The headline read: Need a GrandSon? I held the brochure open. Inside was the pitch.
    Do you have an extra room in your house? Are you old enough to have a real grandson? Our GrandSon will mow your lawn, run your errands, take out the trash. Give him his own room, and provide one meal a day. He’ll never ask you for money or to bake his favorite pie.
    What an appealing idea. Genius, really. The older women I knew weren’t sick, they didn’t need full-time care. They needed someone to change light bulbs, or clean the fireplace flue. Keep up the honey-do list that had died with their husband. Having someone living in their houses, even a college kid who came and went at odd hours, would be better than living alone.
    Before Buster, I’d lived alone. My house was tiny, so having a roommate had been out of the question. After college and sharing a house with three others, I’d been ready to be on my own, but I hadn’t been prepared for what that really meant. How quiet the house could be. How staggeringly difficult changing the smoke alarm battery could be in the middle of the night. How long the nights were when all of them were spent alone.
    I tried to imagine what it was like for Pearl and others like her. Women who’d been married for decades. Who’d raised kids, and tended to husbands. How empty their houses must feel.
    Pearl might benefit from someone living with her. Vangie visited, but she still lived at home.
    I helped myself to the brochure.
    “Smart, right?” A petite woman came up next to me. I could see a door down the hall swing shut and heard the flushing of a toilet. “Some grad student came up with the idea. I think it was his thesis. He has a stable of young men needing to rent a room near the school. For reduced rent, they do light chores and keep the owner company.”
    “What an appealing idea. Genius, really. I know a lot of older women,” I said. I pointed to my chest. “Quilt shop owner.”
    “Ahh. Sonya Salazar. I think you’re looking for me,” she said, holding out her hand to shake.
    I took it. “Dewey Pellicano, from QP.”
    Sonya led me into her office. Her waist-length black hair swayed, nearly overwhelming her frame. She was dressed in complicated layered pieces.