Mrs. Mets wasn't in the shared hallway when I ran upstairs less than a minute later, but she'd found her way again by the time I'd retrieved Spencer's box of stuff from my car.
"What's that?" she asked, blocking my advance in the hallway and pointing at the top of a litter pan.
Something in the back of my head warned me that Mrs. Mets did not care how Spencer destroyed Frankie's home and couldn't be left alone, which meant I had to break the "no pets" part of my lease. Frankie didn't scare Mrs. Mets. Nothing scared her.
"Oh this? It's a... litter box." I desperately grasped for a reason, but a sneeze hit my nose, and trying to hold it in became my biggest concern.
Mrs. Mets huffed and tapped the pan. "I know what it is. Why do you have it?"
I sneezed, rattling the entire box of stu
