Paper Love

by Jae

  She slid the semi-transparent curtain closed and went to get herself a new bowl of muesli.

  “Meow!” The plaintive sound drifted after her, followed by the soft thump of a paw against the glass. “Meeoooooow!”

  With a groan, she rested her forehead against the fridge. “Be strong.” She was here to do a job, not to make friends—not even with a cat.

  “And then she dragged Nobby into the office, and I didn’t see much of her for the rest of the day, thank God!” Anja paused in the middle of the footbridge across the lake and waited for Miri’s reaction.

  Gino, her friend’s shaggy mutt, used the opportunity to sniff out the love locks people had placed all over the railing.

  Something splashed in the water below them, but in the darkness, Anja couldn’t see what it was. Maybe a swan or a turtle?

  “Thank God?” Miri repeated. “What would have been so bad about seeing more of her? I thought you said she was hot.”

  “Hello? Didn’t you listen to a word I just said? She’s a total snob. Waltzes in there with her ruined five-hundred-euro shoes and thinks she can take over just like that! Besides, I never said she was hot.”

  “Did too.”

  “Did not.”

  A passing jogger with a headlamp chuckled at them.

  Now Anja was grateful for the darkness that hid her blush.

  Miri didn’t seem to mind that he had overheard part of their conversation. When the jogger had disappeared around a bend in the path circling the lake, she asked, “So is she? Hot, I mean.”

  “I guess she’s marginally good-looking.”

  Miri guffawed. “Marginally good-looking? Now I know I’ve got to visit the store and check her out!”

  Anja grabbed her sleeve. “Don’t you dare. I’m in enough trouble as it is. I think she doesn’t like me.”

  “What’s not to like?” Miri growled like a mama bear whose cub had been attacked.

  Her instant defense warmed Anja despite the cool January wind. She wrapped one arm around her friend and squeezed while they continued to walk. Despite their height difference, their steps matched, probably because they had done this same walk around the lake almost every evening for the past fifteen years.

  Anja lowered her gaze to Miri’s favorite salmon-colored sneakers that were practically glowing in the dark—probably just like her ears. “She thinks I’m not comfortable around gay people.”

  “You?” Miri shortened Gino’s leash for a second as they reached the end of the bridge and someone on a bicycle whizzed past them. “Why would she think that?”

  “Long story.” After the day she’d had, Anja didn’t have the energy for long explanations. “She misunderstood the way I looked at her when I found out who she was.”

  “So if she took it personally, I take it she’s part of the rainbow family?”

  “Yeah, out and proud, according to Nobby. Having a lesbian niece is probably part of why he took it so well when I came out as bisexual to him.”

  Miri let out a low whistle that made Gino bark once. “So she’s hot and gay.”

  “Forget it,” Anja said forcefully.

  “What? It was just an observation.”

  “Sure. Just an observation. Like that time you tried to set me up with the guy from the ice cream parlor who thought being bi meant I’d be eager to have a threesome with him and another woman.”

  “Hey, how was I supposed to know he’d be such a creep? He seemed nice.”

  “Well, Susanne Wolff is anything but nice, so forget it.”

  Miri laughed. “Her name is Wolff?”

  “What’s so funny about that?”

  “Wolff…Lamm…wolf…lamb…” Miri pointed back and forth between Anja and some imaginary person. “Don’t you get it?”

  “Yeah, well, this lamb is not going to get eaten by the big, bad wolf.” Anja kicked a piece of wood out of the way and watched as Gino chased after it until the leash reined him in.

  “I want you to know that I’m heroically abstaining from making a suggestive joke about what you just said.”

  Anja’s cheeks heated. She hadn’t even realized the double meaning of her words. “Thank you.”

  “But seriously, you should be more open toward meeting new people.” The humor was gone from Miri’s voice.

  Not this again. “I’m meeting new people in the store every day.”

  “I’m not talking about customers. You need more than Paper Love. You haven’t been on a date, much less had a relationship since the Stone Age. There’s this woman I’m friends with on Facebook who—”

  Anja groaned. “No Facebook. You know I’m not on any of that social media stuff. If I decide to ask a woman out, I’ll do it face-to-face.”

  “Talk about the Stone Age,” Miri muttered.

  Anja ignored the comment. “Besides, maybe you’ve spoiled me for other women.”

  “Oh, please. We kissed exactly once, and that was enough to nearly convince you that you’re not bi after all.”

  Anja chuckled. “It wasn’t that bad.”

  After a beat of silence, they said at the same time, “Yes, it was.”

  Their laughter rang through the darkness.

  They had met a year after Anja had left the tiny little town where she had grown up and moved to Freiburg. She had been curious to explore that part of her sexuality, but she hadn’t worked up the courage to go to one of the few gay bars or parties in the area, and joining the queer sports club hadn’t been her thing either. She and Miri had finally met at the Lesbian Film Festival.

  They had instantly hit it off. After the third date, Miri had kissed her. Nothing. No fireworks, no butterflies. It had been like kissing her sister, and that had confused Anja for a while. She had needed some time to figure out that just because she was attracted to women didn’t mean she was attracted to all women.

  And she definitely wasn’t attracted to Susanne Wolff.

  They paused when they reached the fork in the path where Anja had to go right, while Miri and Gino would head left.

  “So are you sure you don’t want me to come by tomorrow?” Miri asked. “Not to check her out or anything like that. Just for moral support. I could pose as a customer so you can impress her with your amazing sales skills.”

  Anja laughed but shook her head. “No, thanks. I don’t even want to impress her. She’s just here to help out for a while, not to take over.”

  “Are you sure about that? Nobby is what…? Sixty-two? Sixty-three?”

  The veggie Yufka they had eaten before their walk suddenly sat like a slab of mud in Anja’s stomach. “You think…?” She clamped her mouth shut, not wanting to say the words, as if that would make them more likely to happen.

  Miri shrugged. “Maybe his niece is sniffing out the store to see if she wants to take over once he retires.”

  Anja had been dreading the day Nobby would retire for years, but he had repeatedly assured her that she would always have a job at Paper Love, even if that happened. But with his niece at the helm, Anja wasn’t so sure about that—and neither was she sure that she’d want to work for Susanne Wolff.

  For the first time ever, she was not looking forward to going to work in the morning.

  Chapter 4

  Susanne was starting to understand how the cat that had visited her last night must have felt—like an unwelcome intruder.

  Anja Lamm stood behind the cash register and watched her every move while pretending to flick through a magazine with a red-and-gold fountain pen on its glossy cover.

  God, get over yourself. I’m not trying to steal your precious notebooks or pens. I’m here to help! Susanne tried to ignore the gaze following her as she went from product to product, entering data about prices and other details in a note-taking app on her iPhone. So what if Frau Lamm didn’t like her? She didn’t care. In her old job as a business consultant, she hadn’t always been greeted with open arms either. When she had been sent out, it usually meant the company was in trouble, so very few peop
le were warm and fuzzy toward her.

  But somehow this seemed different—more personal—and that was why working with family members or someone you were close to was a bad idea. Her mother wouldn’t listen, though, and her uncle was obviously just as bad.

  Why the hell was he paying someone to stand around and read a magazine? Granted, she was good with customers. Susanne admitted to herself that she wouldn’t have been so patient with the people who took forever to check out every item in the store or asked endless questions, only to leave with a couple of cheap ballpoint pens.

  The amount of money they made from sales like that didn’t even justify having an employee.

  Susanne picked up a leather-bound notebook from the center island to look for the price tag. When she found it, she nearly dropped her phone. A hundred euros for a journal? No wonder they hadn’t sold any of them all day!

  When she carefully put down the expensive notebook, an almost inaudible sigh of relief drifted through the store.

  God, the woman really made her feel as if she were out to harm her beloved notebooks. “Is that price tag correct?” Susanne asked, pointing at it.

  “If it says ninety-nine euros and ninety-nine cents, it is.”

  At least she seemed to know the prices of the products they sold by heart, so she wasn’t totally useless.

  “It’s refillable,” Frau Lamm added in a defensive tone.

  “So is my smartphone,” Susanne muttered. With a shake of her head, she moved on to the display case of fountain pens. She leaned forward and peered through the glass to make out the tiny price tags placed near each pen. The tag next to the pen in the middle—a midnight-blue-and-silver pen with engraved letters of alphabets from all over the world—caught her attention.

  Two thousand euros? What the hell? She whirled around.

  Frau Lamm quickly averted her gaze as if she’d been caught doing something forbidden.

  Had she been checking out Susanne’s ass? Nah. She stammered like a scared little girl when she found out I’m a lesbian. No way is she gay. She had probably just watched her to make sure she wouldn’t smudge the glass she’d polished earlier.

  “Could you put down your pen porn and explain this to me, please?”

  “P-pardon me?” Frau Lamm stuttered.

  Susanne bit her lip. Hell, her professionalism really was slipping. Would she have said something like that if this had been any other job? Probably not.

  It pissed her off that she’d been sent to Freiburg to rescue another family member who was completely inept as a businessman. Her mother had charged in like the cavalry to save her husband’s struggling businesses more than once when Susanne had been growing up, even taking out a loan for him and nearly ruining her own business in the process.

  Susanne had been forced to watch helplessly, and she now realized that she’d let that old, pent-up anger color her interaction with Anja Lamm. From now on, she would try to treat her time in Freiburg like any other job.

  “That magazine.” She pointed. “Could you put it down and come over here…please,” she added after a second.

  Frau Lamm carefully put down the magazine and walked over with the expression and posture of a prisoner being led to her execution.

  “Who sets the prices around here?” Susanne asked.

  Frau Lamm folded her arms across her chest, which drew Susanne’s attention to the bit of smooth skin revealed by two open top buttons on her blouse.

  Annoyed with herself for even noticing, she tore her gaze away.

  “Nobby and I decide together, based on what we pay our suppliers and what the competition asks for similar items,” Frau Lamm answered.

  Okay, that was a reasonable strategy, but still… “Two thousand euros for a single pen seems a bit excessive.”

  “It’s a Montblanc Meisterstück Solitaire LeGrand 146.” At Susanne’s blank look, Frau Lamm added, “A special edition from one of the best fountain pen makers in the world.”

  “Still. Who would spend that much when a pen for a couple of euros would get the job done just as well?” Susanne pointed to the cheap pens in the corner.

  Frau Lamm sighed. She opened her mouth, then closed it again. When she finally spoke, she asked, “What kind of car do you drive?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “What kind of car do you drive?” she repeated more slowly, as if Susanne had problems processing the question.

  “A BMW.” Revealing this tiny bit of semi-personal information made her feel as if she’d said too much, probably because she was used to fiercely guarding her private life against her homophobic boss and his good old boys’ club. “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “Why spend that much on a car? Why not just get a used Ford Ka or a little Fiat that would take you from A to B just as well?”

  “Because I love cars. Driving a car isn’t just about getting from A to B. A car is… I don’t know… A lifestyle. A personal expression.”

  “And a status symbol,” Frau Lamm added.

  “Yeah, maybe that too. People wouldn’t be very impressed if their business consultant showed up in a dented, cheap little car.”

  Frau Lamm waved her hand in a there-you-have-it gesture.

  “You want me to believe that fountain pens are like cars?” Susanne eyed her skeptically.

  “Maybe not for you. But they are for the customers we target. Personally, I prefer a bicycle to a BMW, but if I made that kind of money,” she gestured at the price tag, “I wouldn’t hesitate to spend two thousand euros on this beauty.” She gave the pen a loving look and trailed her finger along the glass in a sensual caress.

  Susanne’s mouth went dry. Probably just because she hadn’t been drinking enough while working. Maybe she should get herself another coffee. She cleared her throat. “So how many of these BMW-type pens have we sold this year?”

  “It’s only the middle of January.”

  “Meaning none.”

  Frau Lamm wrapped her arms even more tightly around herself, but she refused to avert her gaze, even though she had to raise her head to make eye contact. “January isn’t a good time for pens. We sell more of them around the holidays, and sales will probably pick up again as we get closer to Valentine’s Day.”

  If things continued like this, they’d be out of business by Valentine’s Day.

  “Is there a specific reason why you’re asking all these questions, Susanne?”

  The casual use of her first name took her by surprise. No one had ever attempted such a familiarity in her old job. If she didn’t deal with it right away, she could have a situation on her hands down the road. “Frau Wolff.”

  “Pardon me?”

  “This is a workplace, Frau Lamm. I don’t think calling each other by our first names is appropriate.”

  Frau Lamm’s big eyes widened even more. With her elfin features, she looked so vulnerable that Susanne wondered if she’d been too harsh.

  No. Don’t doubt yourself. You can’t save a business by coddling the employees. You know that.

  “B-but your uncle and I have been on a first-name basis for years, and we manage to work together just fine.”

  The way her uncle managed his business was what had gotten them into trouble in the first place. “My uncle makes his own decisions, but I, for one, would prefer if you called me by my last name.”

  “Very well, Frau Wolff.” She gave Susanne a stiff nod. Her brown eyes, which shone so warmly whenever she interacted with customers or with Uncle Norbert, were now shuttered.

  Susanne steeled herself. She had never shied away from doing whatever was necessary to get the job done, and she wouldn’t start now. If that meant hurting Frau Lamm’s feelings, so be it.

  Anja went back to her magazine and tried to find new products that could be of interest to their customers, but even reviews of the newest Diamine inks couldn’t capture her attention now.

  She turned the page with a little too much force, nearly tearing the glossy paper. Her body vibrat
ed with tension. How the heck had her wonderful, fun workplace become this stiff, no-first-names-please situation? The nerve of this woman!

  Susanne—Frau Wolff—had been nitpicking all day long, running her critical gaze over every centimeter of the store and documenting any perceived issue. Anja wasn’t surprised to see her use some app on her smartphone instead of pen and paper.

  Not that she had anything against phones and other digital devices. She owned one too, but for her, it was strictly a tool of communication, or she used it to quickly look things up online. If she needed to capture important thoughts, however, she used her traveler’s notebook. At least that never ran out of battery, and the slower writing speed helped her think more clearly. How could Nobby invite a person like his niece, who clearly didn’t get the appeal of a fine ream of paper or a leather-bound notebook, to work at Paper Love?

  Granted, Susanne’s long fingers looked pretty elegant tapping the screen of her smartphone, but that wasn’t the point. Just because she was easy on the eyes didn’t give her the right to look down on them. Every little thing about the way they ran the store seemed to be wrong in her opinion. Anja hated this new atmosphere and feeling as if she constantly had to justify herself. Did Nobby know what his niece was doing?

  Maybe she should let him know. He’d been locked away in his office all morning, so he probably had no clue that his niece was basically trying to take over before he had even decided to retire.

  But before she could head into the office to talk to him, Susanne apparently had the same idea. Gripping her cell phone as if it were a box full of discriminating evidence, she strode past Anja’s position behind the cash register and stepped into the back rooms. With a cool glance over her shoulder, she pulled the door closed behind her.

  Oh, come on! They rarely closed that door. What was she telling Nobby that Anja wasn’t allowed to hear?

  Curiosity bubbled up inside of her. Should she…? She glanced toward the street. Since people’s lunch break had ended a short while ago, foot traffic outside had slowed. No potential customers approached the store or turned the carousels outside to pick a card.