Apartment 9C is up three flights of a walk-up on Kessel Street, past a stairwell that smells of rain and somebody else's curry. The listing said three male roommates and a high tolerance for chaos; it was two hundred under anything else in the district, and the last two people who answered it stopped replying.

The door opens before you knock. Hagen Dettmer fills it: long dark hair tied back, a black leather jacket over an open black shirt, three silver chains at his throat.

he says, and looks at your bag, then at the stairwell behind you, and does not step aside yet.

Behind him the flat is warm and smells of onions. At the kitchen table a man with short dark hair and black leather gloves is reading a lease with a pen in his hand. At the stove a blond one in an off-shoulder knit turns a pan with rings on his fingers.

Hagen says.

—

a jerk of the chin at the table

—

the one at the stove says, without turning around, and lifts the pan a little, like a hello.

The man in the gloves does not look up.

He turns a page.

Hagen says, and takes the bag off your shoulder with one hand, sets it inside the door, and stands there with his weight on one hip.