“When is that, anyway?” I say, grabbing a rag to wipe a spot in front of the blenders that doesn’t need wiping. “I just realized I’m dating a child.”
“Dating?” he says.
“Shut up,” I say. “When’s your birthday?”
“July.”
“That means,” I say, now wiping the counter next to the register right between us, “that for well over three months I will be an eighteen-year-old woman dating a sixteen-year-old boy.”
“Hey.”
“This cannot stand,” I say, and give my head a mournful shake. Then I slap both hands on the counter and declare, “We’re going to have to get married.”
His eyes go wide and so does his grin, but he’s also shaking his head and backing away. As he does, the bell over the door dings. A customer.
“Did you want something?” I say. “It’s on me.”
“Damn right it is,” calls Kyle. “No free drinks.”
I roll my eyes and smile at Lesh. “No, it’s really on me.”
He looks past me at the menu. It makes him extra adorable, because his big eyelashes flutter a little against his eyelids, and the whites in his eyes south of the pupil get extra big. I actually read someplace that women find that particularly attractive. Turns out it’s true.
“You’ll really be eighteen in the spring?” he says as he browses. The man behind him is getting impatient. “How’s that feel?”
I have to give that some thought. “Scary?”
He nods, then shuffles to the side and turns to the new guy. “I haven’t made up my mind,” he says. “You go ahead.”
“Thank you,” says the customer. He’s almost thirty, I’d say, and he doesn’t look like he just got off work anywhere. He steps close to the counter and looks at my name tag. The name tags at the juice shop are pretty distinct. They’re not printed. Instead, first thing on my first day, Mr. Hermann handed me a bucket of crayons and markers and a blank tag and told me to label it how I liked, fill it with personality. So I did. It took about twenty minutes, which I don’t think he was expecting, but it says “Lana” in beautiful, intricate script. I’m thinking of doing the rest of the alphabet and turning it into a whole font.
“Is that short for anything?” the customer asks.
“Yes, actually,” I say. “Svetlana.”
He grins at me. “That’s a beautiful name.”
“Thanks,” I say, and shoot a glance at Lesh. He’s standing right there, listening, and he shrugs one shoulder. “Do you know what you’d like?”
“Yes,” the customer says, looking up at the menu. It doesn’t do much for him. “I’ll have a Double Berry Razzmajazz.”
I poke at the keys on the register, ringing it up, and he’s giggling. “Why do they have to give them such ridiculous names? It’s so embarrassing to order.”
I’ve been working at the shop for a little bit more than a week now, and I have heard that comment no fewer than fifty times. So I’m starting to wonder myself, but I flash my practiced What-can-you-do? smile and say, “You get used to it. I think they’re kind of fun.” That’s what Mr. Hermann coached me to say.
Lesh sticks around for about half my shift. I make him a Berry Blast and a Rabbit Punch. He likes the first one; the second gets poor marks for tasting like grass. “It’s Rabbit Punch, Lesh,” I say. “Were you expecting something other than grass?”
He leaves in time to be home for supper, and I miss him immediately, especially when seven thirty rolls around and Kyle implies unsubtly that I should mop the back room.
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CHAPTER 50
LESH TUNGSTEN
It’s a long week. When Saturday finally rolls around, I just want to be back under Svetlana’s canopy, but she’s working from lunch till close. I drop by for a juice around three, but I know I won’t be able to spend any quality time with her until after she closes at nine. It’s a nice afternoon for October in Minnesota, so I sip my twenty-two-ounce AppleBerry Slush—it’s the best one I’ve tried so far—and instead of taking the bus, I walk home. I cut across Summit Avenue and head up on Griggs, toward the pedestrian bridge over the interstate. As I cross Selby, though, I hear a familiar sound: the thwap of a nail gun in bursts of three. I’m not surprised when I spot Dad’s beat-up Ford pickup and a Tungsten Garages lawn sign a block up. And there’s Dad, up on a frame, nailing in the triangles to hold up the roof.
I reach the truck and lean on the curb side—right against the big magnet Dad had printed to slap on the driver’s-side door: TUNGSTEN GARAGES, and his cell phone number. He’s an advertising genius.
I don’t say anything. When he’s working on a garage, he’s strictly in the zone. Interruptions that don’t start with things like “Mom is on fire!” or “Guns N’ Roses original lineup are going on tour!” are not welcome. So I just watch. He wouldn’t have heard me anyway. His old boom box is in the back of the pickup, right behind me and much louder than I would probably shout, if I didn’t want to embarrass both of us. It’s blasting … And Justice for All. I’m shocked the neighbors haven’t been out here to ask him to turn it down.
He’s in the middle stages of construction, and despite the slight chill, he’s worked up enough of a sweat that he’s going at it in just his wife-beater. The frame is up, except for the long triangles that make up the roof, and that’s the best part, really. It looks like a two-man job. Maybe three, even. But Dad’s got a system.
He’s got a length of blue string—special sturdy stuff they make for contractors, I guess. He marks it up so everywhere a roof beam needs to go has a bright yellow line. High contrast. That way he doesn’t have to stop to measure every time a new beam is going up. Once the beams on the front and back of the garage are on—which he does in a way you wouldn’t have thought of and I’ll explain in a minute—he connects them at their peaks with that string.
Then he grabs one of those preassembled triangles that are the beams. He leans it against one wall. He climbs the ladder, uses the slope of the top of the beam to slide it up so it’s hanging—upside down—between the two walls. Then comes the fun part: he swings the thing, back and forth, back and forth, like, ten times, getting the momentum up, until it just flips—swoosh. And now it’s point-up, like it’s supposed to be. Then he just has to make sure it’s lined up with the yellow mark on the string, nail-gun the joints, and move on to the next beam.
It’s slow work, and it looks hard as hell, but at least he doesn’t have to pay a team. If he did, trust me, we wouldn’t eat.
This afternoon I watch him swing up two of those triangles before he finally sees me—the CD ends, and he glances at the truck. He doesn’t wave, doesn’t smile. He shouts, “Put on Piece of Mind.”
That’s an Iron Maiden album—an oldie even for Dad. It’s pretty good, though. I turn around and dig through the cracked cases till I see Eddie—chained and in a padded room—and pop in the disc. I know enough to get … And Justice for All into its case too. As I lean on the truck, the familiar opening drum fill of “Where Eagles Dare” blasts across my back. Halfway through the dual-lead guitar solo, I start walking again.
Then I’m home and in my room, and it’s still hours before Svetlana finishes work. I look at my desk, where my computer sits, untouched for days. Before I know what I’m doing, I’ve fired it up. It’s been a long time; maybe I’ll just peek in and see how Svvetlana’s getting on.
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CHAPTER 51
SVVETLANA
The elf priestess kneels at the base of the tree. It is not one of the old ones, but it is still their child. She presses her palm against it, feeling its strength and love and the life force
coursing through it.
“I could fall asleep right here,” she says. Her eyes are closed, but her connection to the earth and all its inhabitants is strong. She knows instinctively that her companion Stebbins the hunter is seated not far off, and his big striped cat beside him. He is drinking wine. He is so often drinking wine.
Dewey, too, the stocky paladin, is nearby, but it doesn’t take a connection to creation to know it. He is laughing and riding his ram in circles around her. Every so often as he passes, he calls out “Nice butt” and “Nice tits,” depending on where along his circular route he happens to be.
“I’m ignoring you, Dewey,” says the priestess, but she smiles too, because though his behavior and comments once irked her, she has come to find them amusing, like one finds amusing the irritating quirks of an old house—a loose doorknob, a squeak in the floor, a sticking drawer. She and Dewey and the hunter have been through a lot together—they’ve gathered experience and gold on the seas, at the tops of snowy mountain peaks, in great caverns hidden in the farthest reaches of the driest deserts. They’ve slain demons and dragons in dungeons and woods. Dewey has been a troublesome, annoying dwarf through all of it, but he’s also saved her life more times than she could count.
She’s done the same for him. In spite of herself and her caution in the spring of her adventures, now in their winter she’s grown to care for them, even to love them.
“I’m heading to the inn,” says the paladin. “Get Vent!” And without waiting for good-byes, he gallops off. It is his way, and Svvetlana is not offended. She simply smiles and waits, her eyes still closed, knowing the hunter will be beside her in a moment. He always is, and when Dewey leaves, he moves closer still.
“Just us again,” he says. He sits beside her, facing the tree. It took him a few days to get used to her tendency to sit, rather than leaning on trees, facing them, like they were part of the circle of conversation. He puts a hand on hers, and her smile grows.
“I’ve been wanting to ask you,” he says. His cat is far off now, released to play and prowl in the tall grass. They’ve chosen the finest spot for this little repose: a wide rolling field dotted with tall silver trees, little ponds of the clear, bright water elves tend to favor, and sparkling wisps—the spirits of lost elves, come back to the woods to play. It is a corner of the elven old world, where their ancestors once walked among great cities, today only ruins and ghosts. “You never mentioned the gifts I sent.”
“Gifts?” she says. Her mind is still with the tree, with the grass, with the dew seeping through her dress.
“Mmhm,” he says, moving closer. He kisses her neck, and she shivers. “I sent you flowers.”
“Did you?” she says, and it sounds coy, but she doesn’t recall. She didn’t get flowers.
“Mmhm,” he says again. She shivers again. “And a necklace.”
She’d remember a necklace. She loves necklaces, particularly ones with blue gems, like the one she’s wearing: a long silver chain, dangling a charm, at its center a blue stone. She fingers the charm and opens her eyes. Stebbins’s face is right there—his eyes so golden and bright, she lets him kiss her.
“Not this necklace,” she says. “I’m sure I fought for this necklace.”
He smiles and kisses her cheek. “The demon boss Gal’kaelin. I was there.”
“Of course you were,” she says with a smirk. “Then what?”
The hunter leans back on his hands. “I’ll seriously kill someone if the necklace didn’t arrive.”
“Arrive?” Her heart seems to freeze in her chest, and the cold skitters across the surface of her body in a rush of frost. She turns away from him and gets to her feet. “You sent the flowers.”
“You did get them!” he says, and he jumps up as well. “Good.”
“I didn’t know they were from you,” she says. “I thought they were … I thought they were from someone else.”
“Someone else?” says the hunter. He backs away, puts his face in his hand. She’s broken his heart, it seems. “Who else has kissed you in the rain?”
“Kissed me in the rain …” She is falling now. She wants to run from him, run from this world. It’s all gone wrong. “How did you find me?”
The hunter shrugs. “It wasn’t hard,” he says. “You have a rare and beautiful name, and you live in Saint Paul, and you’re in high school.”
“My god,” she says, and her mind reels, frantically searching her memory for any inkling she might have given him: she’s in high school, she’s in Minnesota, she’s in the Gaming Club. It’s all out there. It’s all out there and he found it all. The hunter moves toward her, and she pushes him away. “I have to go. I have to go right now.”
“Have I upset you?” he says. “I didn’t want to upset you. I thought you’d like the flowers.”
“You shouldn’t have sent them,” she says. “Everything is messed up now.”
“I’m sorry,” he says. “Let me make it up to you.”
“No.”
“I’m insisting,” he says. He whistles for the cat, and it gallops toward them. In a moment, he’s mounted his riding tiger. “I’ll see you soon. I’m going to make it up to you.”
“No,” she says. “I’m not coming back. I’m leaving and I’m not coming back.”
“No,” he says from fifty yards away. His voice carries across the field like one of his arrows. “I’m going to see you IRL.”
“No,” she says. She runs after him, grabbing at his feet and his robe. “Do not do that.”
“Why?” he says. “Don’t act like you’re afraid of me now. I’m still Stebbins.”
“Please,” she says, thinking quickly. “I have to work tonight. I’m working.”
“Good,” he says. “I love juice, especially the Double Berry Razzmajazz.”
“Wait, what?” says the priestess. She feels cold and light: a cocoon of ice crawls over her skin and if she falls, she’ll shatter. “That was you. The other day. That was you.”
The hunter flashes a smile and kicks his steed. It breaks into a gallop. “I’ll see you there, Lana.”
He rides off, and before he reaches the horizon, he vanishes into the shimmering mist at the edge of the sea.
“Stebbins,” she calls. She shouts it. “Stebbins!”
<
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CHAPTER 52
LESH TUNGSTEN
Mom’s working. Dad’s got at least five beers in him and a sixth one in his hand. Short of calling Weiner or Jelly for a ride—not going to happen—I’m stuck waiting for a bus or riding my bike.
I’d run if I had to.
The garage door has no opener—aside from me, I mean. Dad’s got old gear in there—ladders he doesn’t touch, a lawn mower that spends two-thirds of the year plugged in to get ready for the six times I have to push it around the yard. And hanging from one wall on a red-rubber-coated hook is my mountain bike. It was my thirteenth birthday present. Deel got a BMX thing, and we rode them like crazy for about twelve seconds. The tires are low on air and I don’t care. I think I heard flattish tires are better in the rain anyway. Did I mention the rain?
As I ride through our back alley and then onto Griggs Street, the rain is pouring over me in sheets. I’m soaked to the skin in seconds and University Avenue is like a blur of color, like a runny painting, the red-and-white lights of the cars and the streetlamps and the red and green and yellow of the traffic signals reflecting in the deep running puddles along the curbs. It’s Saturday night, and the drivers don’t see the brainless boy in all black as he struggles to cross. Finally I have to dismount and run across, pushing my bike beside me.
Over the interstate, the wind picks up. I feel like it might blow me over the high fence and down to the road, where a semi doing seventy can flatten
me. I don’t want to die, but at least I wouldn’t have to explain this to Svetlana.
Past the high school and the park next door, the world is greener, the houses cleaner, the cars newer. It’s quiet, aside from the sound of the rain in the trees and hitting my back and the street around me. It’s almost beautiful. Svetlana would think it was beautiful. Svvetlana would too.
I push up Summit Avenue and take a dangerous left from the bike lane, across two lanes of car traffic, and down a side street. The juice shop is close now. I just hope Stebbins had a longer way to go, because I don’t want him to beat me there. Please don’t let him beat me there.
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CHAPTER 53
SVETLANA ALLEGHENY
I’ve got both elbows on the counter next to the registers and am leaning on my fists, watching my closing coworker/boss and well-regarded night manager Kyle sweep the front of the store. It’s very small, and I don’t think he quite trusts my skills with a broom just yet, so he’s doing the sweeping. I’ve already done the part where my arms are bicep-deep in alternating tubs of scalding soapy water and then ice-cold water and bleach to wash all the myriad of funny-looking pieces of equipment we use here at the juice shop.
I’m also wearing a green-and-orange baseball cap with my braid pulled through the hole in the back.
“Any big plans after work tonight?” Kyle says as he pushes the broom. “Say, why don’t you fill the mop bucket?”
“Nope,” I say, “and okay,” and I go into the back and turn the tap marked “scalding,” then slip the big yellow wheely bucket under the flow and add a squirt of soap. Then I resume my leaning, except now it’s on the edge of the sink instead of the counter.
“Lana!” calls Kyle from the front. “You’ve got a customer.”
I peek out from the back and there’s this guy in a suit and holding a bunch of flowers. He’s looking around the place, examining the flyers on the wall next to the register, looking at the posters in the window, flipping through the nutritional information notebook tied to the counter. “Just a second,” I call out to him, and he jumps at my voice. I hurry back to turn off the sink, then head to the counter, drying off my hands as I go.
Guy in Real Life Page 26
