What a Girl Wants

by Angie Coleman

  “What time do you think you’ll be back this evening, Gil?” she asks before I go out.

  “More or less like yesterday, Grandma. Do you need something?”

  “No, nothing. But try not to tire yourself out too much. This morning I have some shopping to do in the area, I was thinking of stopping by the shop around noon. We could go to lunch someplace together before you go to Mr Clancy’s, what do you think?”

  “I’d love to, but I don’t know if I have time for an actual lunch.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll prepare something and we’ll go to Kennedy Park. A bit of fresh air will do you good,” she admonishes me with a smile. I’m afraid she’s hiding something, but she’ll never admit it before she’s got me where she wants me, so I’ll have to wait ‘till noon to discover the mystery.

  “Ok, I’ll see you later then,” I give her a kiss before I leave the house.

  “See you later.”

  Once I step outside, I am greeted by a warm spring sun and that is enough to make me smile. I am about to get on the bus when the ringtone of my cell phone forces me to start rummaging through the purse I have slung across my shoulder. As usual, what I am looking for is buried under everything else, so I risk missing the bus before I am able to retrieve the darn thing. It’s my sister Lillian. I wonder what she wants at 7 a.m.. She’s never been an early bird.

  “Hello?” I answer, almost alarmed.

  “Good morning Gil, it’s me,” she greets me.

  “Good morning… has something happened?”

  “No, why?”

  “I don’t know, you never call at this time of day…” I point out, in case over the years she hadn’t noticed she is never fully functioning before 9 o’clock.

  “Not at all, I just wanted to see how you were doing. You began working on the shop yesterday, you must be tired,” she deduces, as intuitive as Lois Lane when facing Superman.

  “A little bit, but the shop is nice and big, with a good view of the street. It’s worth the effort.”

  “Is there a lot of work to do?”

  “Well, it’s been a while since anyone’s set foot in there. It needs to be freshened up, but nothing too demanding.”

  “Great. Do you need a hand? ‘Cause during the week I’m a bit busy at the vet’s, and Father can come only on Sundays, so I was thinking that if you need me I could take a few days off next week,” how sweet she is when she goes into big sister mode!

  “Oh, no, Lillian, don’t worry. I’ll manage fine. You just started your job, it wouldn’t make a good impression if you asked for days off after less than a month,” I remind her. When she managed to get hired as a receptionist at the veterinary practice, she was so happy she could barely believe it. I think she likes the job; it’s turning her into a more cheerful, and above all, more helpful person: she would never have offered to help me a month ago. And she would never have dreamt of getting up so early in the morning.

  “Are you sure? Father thinks you’re underestimating the amount of work the place needs.”

  “I’m sure. And tell Father I haven’t underestimated anything. I just have to finish cleaning the walls, and then I’ll begin painting. If everything goes smoothly, in a month or so I should be done,” I sum things up for her. I have everything under control.

  “If you say so,” now I recognize her. “Anyway, I was thinking of coming with Father to see you next weekend, so I get to see this magnificent shop and we’ll see if you can really handle it on your own. I doubt people in town are as accommodating as they are here, little sister,” the worldly woman points out. In fact, I had expected the aloofness typical of big cities, but now that I’ve met Ernest and Jane, it feels like I’ve landed in a small oasis of a community, Jared aside, and I don’t mind it a bit.

  “Ok, I’ll expect you on Sunday then. Now I’ve gotta go, I have a fair amount of work to do and if I don’t hurry, I won’t finish before the next full moon.”

  “Ok, I had better go too, Zach wants me on the job by eight. That man is too much of an early bird, it’s not like his job is all about roosters. Enjoy your work, little sister!” she sighs almost dejectedly.

  “You too, big sister,” I say, hoping I can refrain from laughing.

  Because of the time of the day, the bus is full of people, and the sardine effect throws me a little off balance. I’m not used to it and I have to admit I don’t like it much, but the ride is short, so it is a small sacrifice I willingly accept. And then, when I set my eyes on the red brick building with white columns that is to be the home of my future hand-made hat shop, my good mood reaches an all time high and I can’t help but smile.

  I hurry inside and instead of going for the entrance to the shop, I run up the stairs to Jared’s apartment. I glance at my wrist watch, it’s only seven thirty, but I don’t have much time and can’t waste any of it in hesitation, so I ring the bell. As usual, you can’t hear a thing from behind the door, but I’m sure he’s in there, so I ring again, adding a couple of knocks for good measure. After a minute and a half, I finally hear something: a muffled thud followed by confused muttering. A moment later the door opens and Jared appears, his eyes half closed, a pair of deep circles under his eyes that don’t become him at all, his dark hair ruffled, the usual ripped jeans and crumpled t-shirt, this time a light blue one.

  “You’re an ordeal,” he mumbles, lifting his still bandaged hand to his face and squeezing the base of his septum. I have to admit he has beautiful hands: slender but strong fingers, with prominent veins on the backs.

  “I am here to ask you for today’s schedule,” I explain with a dazzling smile. The hope of infecting him with some cheerfulness never dies, though right now it seems more like wishful thinking.

  “What?” he struggles, still half asleep. He seems not to understand.

  “You said the times may not always be the same,” I hurriedly remind him before he loses his patience, “so I’ll come every day to ask you when I can make noise without bothering you. It’s a way of meeting halfway,” I feel I need to point that out, to avoid him making a scene. He is still looking at me as if I were speaking a different language, his good hand gripping the door, the other hovering uncertainly over the shadow of a beard covering his cheeks.

  “Well?” I try to shake him, but nothing. Obviously words aren’t very useful first thing in the morning, at least with him. I need a new strategy. I take advantage of his temporary befuddlement to step around him and enter the apartment.

  “What the hell are you doing?” he is alarmed. Well, at least he responds to stimuli.

  “I’m making you coffee, you need caffeine to wake up, it seems. You look like a zombie.” He hovers near the entrance for a moment while I cross the living room shrouded in semi-darkness and reach the kitchen. I look for the switch to shed some light on the room, because there’s no way I’m going back and opening the curtains: I’ve reached the vanguard and I’m not relinquishing my position. Oh, here it is. I flip it and find myself in a room it would be an oversimplification to describe as uninhabited. There’s nothing – not a cup, not a glass, not a plate in the cupboard, and there’s no coffee machine either. With a last desperate attempt, I reach the refrigerator and open it. The most total desolation: a lone bottle of water, a box of take-away Chinese food, and a jar of mustard – I think. Yesterday I had noticed the many mostly still sealed boxes piled in the living room and the trash overflowing with pizza cartons here in the kitchen, but I hadn’t imagined such a desperate situation.

  “When the hell did you move here?”

  “When the hell will you mind your own business?” he retorts with irritation as he joins me in the kitchen. “Please get out of my place.” His tone is peremptory, but in his emerald eyes I don’t see only fury: there is also a flash of frustration mixed with embarrassment and this is what makes me insist.

  “You haven’t told me today’s schedule yet,” I reply with feigned nonchalance. Jared sighs and seems torn between the idea of kicking me out and bein
g reasonable. How do I know? Easy, I suspect he is similar to me in some ways: he is impulsive like me and like me he is aware of it. At first we want to do one thing, but sometimes we manage to turn our brains on a moment before we do it and try to think before we act. It’s what I imagine he is trying to do now.

  “I need to sleep now,” he finally says with a sigh. I think that if I don’t want to exasperate him, for now I had better beat a retreat, though I’m aware that in this fashion I will more or less waste an entire morning of work.

  “Ok, I’ll scrub the windows this morning and put off the serious cleaning to this afternoon.” There’s no way I’m getting all dusty since I have to go to Ernest’s later. I display all of my diplomacy with a smile, which he, of course, does not return. Rather, he stands there looking at me with an expression of mingled amazement and curiosity. At least I can say that I’m leaving him more awake than I found him, even without the help of caffeine.

  I leave his apartment and return downstairs to the shop. I’m increasingly convinced there’s something strange in Jared’s lifestyle. According to Jane he moved in at least four months ago, but if that is the case, why does it look like he hasn’t unpacked? It’s as if he’s just arrived, jetlagged, from another country and hasn’t recovered yet. He sleeps in the morning and maybe even through the afternoon. He doesn’t eat anything that hasn’t been ordered from a take-away. I got the impression he’s not been shopping and for sure he’s not equipped with the bare essentials to inhabit a house. I may be the strange one here, but I don’t think he’s normal.

  Kennedy Park is delightful and today’s warm sunshine makes it the perfect place for a companionable lunch break. Grandma Natalie joined me, as promised, at 12 o’clock sharp with a picnic basket hanging from her arm. A woman of her word. We reached the park in about ten minutes in her sky blue car, some kind of Beetle, too old for me to recognize the actual model, and settled on a yellow blanket spread on the grass under a tree. Grandma Natalie opened the basket, pulled out some sandwiches, a couple of bottles of water and an apple pie I suspect she baked this morning. Starving, I take one of the sandwiches and unwrap it while she watches me with satisfaction.

  “So, Gil, isn’t this better than a sandwich gulped down by yourself?” she asks, with those hazel colored eyes always so attentive, as if she didn’t already know the answer.

  “Absolutely, Grandma,” I give her the confirmation she seems to be looking for before I bite into my sandwich. Egg and tuna: delicious.

  She imitates me, takes a sandwich, unwraps it and begins sampling it. I’ve already finished mine and am reaching for a second.

  “I haven’t seen Lillian in a while. How is she?” she suddenly asks.

  “Good, why?”

  “No, nothing, it’s just that your father told me she’s got a new job.”

  “It’s true. She’s the receptionist for Rochester’s vet, Zach.”

  “Oh,” she says with feigned casualness, as if I’d believe the lack of interest on her part. “And what’s this Zach like?” she says his name as if there were something negative in being called just Zach.

  “His name is Zacharias Lorenz, Grandma, he’s thirty-five and is a qualified veterinarian. Remember the Lorenzes? The owners of the butchers shop? He’s their eldest son. I don’t know him very well because he went to Cornell, so he was away for a while. He worked there for a bit, then he decided to come back to Rochester and open a practice in town. He needed some-one to help him with the accounting and the appointments, so he hired Lillian.”

  “The son of Lorenz the butcher, the one near the flower shop, right?” she reflects enigmatically.

  “Um-hm” I nod as I bite into my second sandwich. Salad and crunchy bacon, also delicious. At this rate I think I could eat them all. Work makes you hungry, no kidding.

  “And how does Lillian like it?”

  “She likes it. She just has a hard time getting up early in the morning, but aside from that she seems to like it.”

  “And is Zacharias Lorenz married?” Her hazel eyes pin me down, attuned to spotting the merest hint of a lie in my expression.

  “What’s worrying you, Grandma?” At this point I’d like to know, too. I know Lillian falls in love easily, but not this easily. Besides, even if she did fall in love with Zach, I wouldn’t see any harm in it.

  “Don’t beat around the bush, Gil, answer my question: is he married?” she insists relentlessly.

  “No, not that I know of,” I hurriedly satisfy her curiosity.

  “So you’re not sure?” she insists.

  “What do you mean I’m not sure? I’d say I am – if he were married we’d know about it, don’t you think? Rochester is small, it’s hard for a piece of news like that to slip by us.”

  “You never know,” she is still reflecting thoughtfully.

  “Will you tell me what’s up?” I stop eating my sandwich and stare at her in the hope that she’ll tell me what’s bothering her. Because something is for sure, I’m certain of it. This morning I suspected that the purpose of our lunch wasn’t just to keep me company. She doesn’t answer and continues to pick at her sandwich whilst gazing at the landscape around us. Grandma Natalie has always been this way, careful and reserved, and to someone who knows her as well as I do, it is evident that she has discovered something that worries her and she wants to get to the bottom of it.

  “What errands did you run this morning?” I ask in the hope of revealing the mystery.

  “Nothing special, Gil. I just did some shopping and paid a couple of bills,” she explains mildly. That may well be, but it doesn’t convince me.

  “I know there’s something that’s worrying you. If you don’t want to tell me, that’s ok, but tell me if I can help you in any way.” Grandma Natalie focuses her gaze back on me and her thoughtful expression softens.

  “Tell Lillian to be careful,” she says simply, resuming picking at her poor sandwich. Ok, I’ll have to talk to my sister and figure out what’s up. Better wait ‘till Sunday, she could tell me all sorts of lies on the phone and it would be hard to catch her out without having her there in person.

  Work at Ernest’s was fairly relaxed today. I was able to tidy up a microscopic area of the shop and I left satisfied. To an outsider it may look like nothing much, a small difference compared to the whole job, but to me it is exactly the opposite: it is the first accomplishment in a job that has turned out to be much bigger than I had expected, and accomplishments should always be celebrated with substantial amounts of self-satisfaction. So before I went back to my store, I indulged in an ice-cream along the way, vanilla and chocolate, very traditional and quite good.

  “Good afternoon, dear. How is the work going?” Jane surprises me as I am about to set foot on the first rung of the ladder and resume sanding the wall, which I wasn’t able to do this morning.

  “Hello, Jane. Very well, thank you. In a couple of days I will be able to say goodbye to the dust,” I bestow a polite smile on her, setting the sandpaper down on the floor and joining her in the center of the room. Today she is wearing dark grey, a wool dress that comes down to just below her knees with a pair of large side pockets and a pearl colored shawl that makes her skin look even more diaphanous. Her hair is perfect as always, held up by a white comb camouflaged in the wisps it pins to the left side of her head.

  “If I’m not mistaken, you were at exactly this point yesterday evening.” Ok, we’re getting a bit too shrewd for my taste.

  “Yes, that’s true, but this morning I decided to do the windows so I wouldn’t get to Ernest’s all dusty,” I let drop with the limited imagination that sometimes inhabits my mind.

  “The windows? Wouldn’t it have been better to leave them till last? This way they’ll be dirty again in no time at all,” she remarks decidedly. As if I didn’t know. They won’t revert to the indecent state from which I salvaged them this morning though. At least now you can see through them. They may not be perfect, but you can’t say I wasted my time.

/>   “When I’m done I’ll have to clean them again, but I thought I’d get rid of most of the grime so I’d get a little more light in here.”

  “I see. Listen, dear, I came down to ask you if tomorrow you would like to come and have lunch with me. I enjoy a little company every now and then – Ernest is always at the shop and never comes back before six. As if he went there to work, the lazy bum. I’ll introduce you to Margherita, who lives upstairs, and you could have something more wholesome than the usual sandwiches,” she offers fervently. It seems that it’s truly important to her. Jane knows how to make me feel at home, as if I were still in Rochester, where everyone knows everyone and going to lunch at your neighbor’s is perfectly normal. Even when she badmouths Ernest, she does so affectionately. She must really love him.

  “Of course, why not?” I accept with enthusiasm. I’m curious to meet the only other woman in the building. Besides, I could take advantage of the opportunity to garner information about Jared.

  4

  Since I haven’t been able to figure out Jared’s eccentric schedule, this morning I am standing in front of his door once more – knocking and knocking and knocking. He never opens at my first attempt and I’m afraid he’ll be in a foul mood again today. I’m about to give up when the door opens and I find him standing before me, dark circles quite eloquent as to how he’s spent the night though not totally capable of dimming the intense green of his eyes. His dark hair is tousled, as if he passed his hands through it a billion times, and he’s still wearing yesterday’s rumpled clothes. One side of the bandage covering the wound on his hand is lifted and a piece of the tape that was supposed to keep the gauze in place is gone.

  “Is it going to be like this every morning?” he asks dispiritedly, struggling to keep his heavy eyelids open. He’s almost endearing, despite his gruff manners.