Jason

 

 

Lena is standing in the kitchen, peeling and slicing oranges, when I return downstairs. She's no longer wearing her waitress uniform, but instead, she has changed into black yoga pants and a grey oversized, hooded sweatshirt. Her dark brown locks are flowing down in waves over her shoulders, framing her delicate face. The icy blue color of her eyes stands in stark contrast to her dark hair when she looks up at me.

"Felling better?" she asks.

"Yes, very much. Thank you."

I sit down on one of the high-backed chairs at the counter opposite to her. We're facing each other just like we did in the diner.

"I thought we could use something warm to drink," she says. "So I'm making mulled wine."

She points at two bottles of red wine standing next to a big cooking pot on the stove behind her.

"Mulled wine?" I ask, knitting my eyebrows.

She chuckles. "It's hot red wine with spices. Kind of sweet. You'll like it. Most people do."

I shrug, eyeing the oranges she's cutting.

"Those go in there, too?"

She nods. "Yes, sir."

Sir. Why did she call me that? Our eyes meet for a split second, and I can tell that she's curious about my response, too. She's checking my reaction to her words.

"That sounds a bit odd," I say. "Oranges and red wine."

She smirks at me.

"Oh, it gets better," she says. "There's also cinnamon, cloves, some rum, and sugar, and anise star."

I grimace at her description. That doesn't sound enticing at all. Why would anyone drink that?

"You Americans are such philistines," she sneers upon seeing my reaction.

"You Americans?"

She casts me a shy smile, but doesn't reply. Instead, she turns around to the stove, reaching for one of the red wine bottles and opening it. It's a screw-cap, probably cheap wine. She takes big gulp from it before pouring the entire bottle into the big cooking pot. I don't know if she's trying to impress me, or if she just couldn't care less what I think about her. Either way, I find her demeanor oddly endearing.

"I've been wondering about that accent," I say, watching her back as she pours the second bottle of wine into the cooking pot. Her ass looks fine in those tight yoga pants, juicy but firm. I bet she's a runner.

"Where are you from?"

"I live here," she says simply without turning around.

"That's not what I asked."

She throws me a quick look over her shoulder. "Take a guess."

"Just answer the question," I press, growing impatient. "I'm too tired for games."

She doesn't say anything, but turns on the stove and turns back to face me, the hint of a smile on her pretty face.

"Germany," she says. "Happy?"

I nod. "A straightforward answer. That's all I was asking for."

"And you got it," she says. "Being straightforward comes naturally to me. Must be the genes."

"So, what's your story?" I probe.

She picks up the plate with the cut-up oranges and turns away from me once again to add them to the pot.

"Pretty simple," she says. "My father was American, my mother German. I was born in Germany and we lived there until I was fifteen."

She stops and clears her throat, stirring the wine and adding the spices to it that she has lined up next to the stove.

"What happened then?"

"My parents died."

Her words, spoken so matter-of-factly, strike me like a hit to the chest.

Fuck.

"I'm so sorry-"

"It was an accident," she cuts me off, turning back to me. "A car accident. So mundane. My father's mother was the only relative I had left, so I was sent here to live with her."

"I see."

I don't know what else to say. Her story touches me more than it should. I imagine her, a young teenage girl, going through a stage in life that's hard to begin with, and then losing your parents at that age and being sent to live in a foreign country.

"That must have been hard."

I feel dumb for not being able to come up with anything else to say.

But she's very forgiving.

"I loved my Oma," she says, smiling softly. "It's not like she was a stranger to me, nor was this place. We visited her quite regularly. In fact, we often spent Christmas here."

She's smiling, but her face is overshadowed with deep-seated sorrow.

"As tough as it was to lose my parents, I was happy to be sent here," she adds, sounding as if she wanted to comfort me. "Oma and I had a good life together. She was there for me. We shared our grief, and we got over it together. Being sent here was the best thing that could have happened to me."

It almost sounds as if the death of her grandma was the bigger tragedy of the two that hit her young life, but the apparent pain may also be due to how recent that loss was. She has only been living here by herself for less than a year, so the wound is still fresh.

I watch as she turns back to the stove, stirring the wine again before she picks up a smaller spoon to taste it. She shakes her head and turns back to me.

"So, what's your story?" she asks. "You know mine, so I think it's only fair if I get to hear yours."

I give her a half shrug. "Not nearly as interesting as yours."

She twirls her hand, beckoning me to continue.

"I live on the island of Manhattan-"

"The island of Manhattan," she mocks me.

"Yes, born and raised," I confirm. "Pretty boring, huh?"

She shakes her head. "Not at all. I love New York... Manhattan, I mean. To be honest, I've never been to any other borough."

"You don't have to. Manhattan is where it's at."

"But I want to see Brooklyn one day, and Queens, and New Jersey, too," she lists. "All of it, really."

She dreamily stares into the distance. It's odd for me to hear someone talk about New York as if it was some far-away wonderland. She's not living that far away from it, and considering she's already crossed an ocean to get here, you'd think it would be nothing but a tiny step to move on and explore the city if she wanted. "How come you've never visited those places?"

The expression on her face changes, and she exhales. "I don't know."

"I mean it's not that far, and-"

"I don't know," she cuts me off, her voice louder this time. "I just haven't, okay?"

Her shoulders tense up and her blue eyes narrowed when she glances over at me. I raise my hands in mock defense, before she turns her back to me once again, diverting her attention back to the pot on the stove.

"So, your parents live in Manhattan, too?"

She asks without turning around to me, but I nod nonetheless.

"My father does," I say. "My mother died before I started school."

She turns around now, throwing me the same look that I’ve given her plenty of times. "I’m sorry to hear that."

It feels wrong to be given solace by her, given that her tragedy outweighs mine by far.

I want to give her the same response she gave to my condolences, but am interrupted by a sudden rattling coming from the corner to my right. I jump up from my seat in surprise, unable to locate the source of the noise at first.

But then I see it. I didn't notice it before, but there's a box in the corner, about three feet high and two feet wide, covered by a blanket.

And it's moving.

"What the f-"

"Oh, relax," Lena interrupts me, stepping between me and the rattling box that turns out to be a cage.

I take a step back as I watch her remove the blanket.

"Are you hungry?" Lena pipes out in a high-pitched voice, leaning down to the cage.

She reaches inside, producing a little furball that's curled up in her palm when she turns back to me. At first, I see nothing but reddish-brown fluff, until a head peaks out and looks at me through black pearls of eyes.

"What is it? A hamster?"

Lena brings the little creature close to her chest, shielding it with one hand while holding it in the other and looks up at me, her brows knitted.

"It's a squirrel," she says in an accusing tone. "Can't you tell the difference?"

"Well, it's pretty small," I defend myself. "And the color is weird, too."

"She's still a baby," Lena explains. "And she's an American red squirrel, not your common grey one. Look."

She moves her hand away and carefully opens her palm, leaving more leeway for the animal to unfold its body. Now I can see it, the rat-like face, the long and bushy tail, the claws. It really is a squirrel, albeit a small one, with a coloring I've never seen before.

"Why the hell do you have a squirrel in your house?" I ask, instinctively taking a step back when she holds it up to my face so I can have a closer look.

She laughs. "Are you afraid of it or something?"

I hurry to shake my head. "Of course not. I've just never met anyone with a pet squirrel."

"She's not my pet," Lena says. "Squirrels are not meant to be kept as pets."

My brows are drawing together as I watch her fondle the little creature in her hands. The squirrel seems lively and curious, but for some reason, it barely moves and doesn't jump away or climb up on her, as one would expect.

"She was brought to me with a broken leg, see," Lena says, carefully grabbing the animal and turning it so I can see the bandage on one of its forelegs. "I'm taking care of her until this is healed, and then I will bring her back into the wild once the worst of winter is over."

"Why?"

She looks at me as if I'd just posed the dumbest question she's ever heard.

"Why?" she repeats. "Because she needs me!"

I don't know how to reply to that, so just watch her as she walks back to the cage and places the animal on top of it instead of putting it back inside.

"Shouldn't you lock it up?" I ask when she moves away, heading back to the stove, where faint steam is now rising from the hot pot.

"Her name is Risu," Lena says. "And she can barely move. No reason to be afraid."

I glance at the squirrel, never letting it leave my sight as I move back to my seat from before.

"I'm not afraid," I repeat. "Just wouldn't want it to jump on the stove."

Lena huffs. "Yeah, right."

The squirrel sits up on the roof of the cage, turning to me and casting me a look that I would call hostile if I didn't know any better.