“Florian!” An alto voice sails through the room with much the same strength as Florian is prone to sending pucks, and a middle-aged woman in a flowered dress and the kind of auburn hair that is the product of a serious commitment to the furthering of hairdressing establishments, walks into the room.
Behind her is a middle-aged man in a tweed jacket and a young, blond woman.
“Do they know?” Florian asks me, his voice desperate.
“Know what?”
The woman towers above us. “Du bist wach.”
“Ja, Mama,” Florian says.
Mama.
I can figure out what that means.
I smile, happy his family is here.
Florian’s mother embraces him, uttering a slew of fast German.
Evidently, Florian does not get his coldness from his mother’s side.
I eye the two other people in the room: Florian’s father and a young woman who I hope is not his girlfriend.
She’s pretty, in that blond curls and bright blue eyes manner, the sort of woman who could get pulled aside by someone who wants to sculpt cake decorations for weddings and want someone who emanates perfect and beautiful and a worthy ancestor of the next twenty generations of descendants.
But then Florian looks like he could get pulled aside by a cake decorator looking for a similar paragon of masculinity too.
She’s probably his sister.
I have a sister. Sisters are something people have.
“Hi,” I say.
Florian’s father looks immediately anxious, but he straightens. “Hello.”
“Mama, du musst lassen uns hallo zu sagen,” the younger woman says.
Florian’s mother steps aside, and there’s a whole lot more German.
I assume it’s German.
I’ve never been to Europe, and they could be speaking Danish or Polish for all I know.
“I’m Mateo,” I say.
The other family members stare at me. I suppose it’s a relief to know not everyone immediately assumes I’m Florian’s boyfriend, that that assumption lies solely with Florian, and that I haven’t fallen through one of those space/time continuums that you vaguely hear about when watching various science fiction films when there’s absolutely nothing else on TV, but that has never become relevant until now.
Three impossibly tall Germans stare at me.
“Hello,” hopefully-not-Florian’s-girlfriend says to me.
Not that there’s a reason she shouldn’t be Florian’s girlfriend. I’m personally all for people matching up. Two people in the journey of life and all that.
Except… something curdles in my chest.
Still, it would make things easier if she were his girlfriend. Florian might be reminded that he’s not supposed to be squeezing my hand and looking deep into my eyes and having major heart incidents that involve beeping machines when I try to dissuade him otherwise.
“Who are you?” she asks me.
