My Father's Widow Friend

The first time I saw Mrs. Helena Blackwood, I knew I was in trouble. It was a humid August afternoon, the kind where the air feels thick enough to chew, and I was hauling the last of my cardboard boxes up the winding driveway of her Victorian-style home. My father had arranged this—some old colleague from his university days, a widow with a massive house and a spare bedroom, willing to take in a struggling grad student for a fraction of what I'd pay for a studio apartment in the city. "Marcus, be grateful," Dad had said over the phone. "Helena's doing us a favor. Her husband passed two years ago, and she's rattling around in that big house alone.…