Page 12 of Atmosphere

Joan knew who it was before she saw her face. She also knew there was a scientific explanation for these moments in which she felt she could sense the future. Information was being received at such a rapid speed that it felt as if the reaction was coming in before the stimulus. But the sensation was eerie, nonetheless. She understood why people got confused sometimes, started calling things fate.

“Hi,” Vanessa said.

“Oh.” Joan put away her book. “Hi. I’m Joan. I’ve seen you around, but I don’t think we’ve officially met.”

“Vanessa.”

Joan looked at Vanessa and tried not to stare. Vanessa’s eyes were light golden brown, almost amber. Her hair was such a dark shade of brown it was verging on black. And there was so much of it, the curls taking up so much space.

“It is nice to formally meet you,” Vanessa said.

Vanessa seemed more stoic than Donna, less high-strung than Lydia. Joan started to wonder what she must seem like to Vanessa.Bookish.

“No one has really introduced themselves to me,” Vanessa said. “But you all seem to know each other already.”

“Oh,” Joan said. “It’s because we all met about a week and a half ago. We moved into the same apartment complex.”

“The one right next to campus?” Vanessa said, nodding. “Makes sense.”

“Where do you live?”

“A bit further out.”

“Didn’t want to bunk with the rest of us?”

“No, it’s not that,” Vanessa said. She smiled out of the left side ofher mouth and then laughed. “Or maybe it is. I like my privacy. Not sure I’m going to be good at this whole ‘living in a fishbowl’ thing.”

Joan laughed as the bartender brought her salad and put it down in front of her. “Thank you,” she said to him.

Vanessa leaned forward, gestured to the bartender. “Can I have a glass of cabernet and a steak, medium rare?”

Joan’s salad seemed so boring now.

“I really am sorry none of us have spoken to you,” Joan said. “It wasn’t on purpose, but I regret it.”

Vanessa sat back on the barstool, waved her off. “It’s perfectly all right. I figured it was up to me to say hello. So, hello.”

“Hello,” Joan said. She speared a piece of romaine on her fork. It was disarming—a little confusing, maybe—to think of Vanessa as in want of company. She was the sort of woman who seemed like she could have any friend she wanted. Didn’t the world revolve around women like her? She was tall and lean, with big eyes. Her hair was so shiny. That way she smiled out of the side of her mouth—certainly that pulled people in.

“Settling in okay?” Joan asked.

Vanessa shrugged as her glass of wine arrived. “I mean, it’s hot as hell out here. But otherwise, it’s going okay.”

Joan nodded. “July is the worst of it. The humidity is brutal. You get used to it.”

“Do you?”

Joan laughed. “No, I don’t know why I said that. It’s miserable.”

Vanessa chuckled and sipped her wine.

This made no sense at all.Vanessa was the one who had come up to her and said hello. But now, somehow, it was Joan leaning toward her, as Vanessa sat there, cool in every sense of the world.

Detached. Effortless. Aloof.

Joan thought about Paul Newman inCool Hand Luke—and got the sense that it would not end well for her if she challenged Vanessa to eat fifty eggs. If she challenged Vanessa to anything at all.

“How about you?” Vanessa asked. “How is it for Miss Popular over here?”

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