Mom is utterly incapable of taking no for an answer, especially if she thinks it’s for my own good. Suddenly, I’m furious, and not only because of how easily I can apparently be conned into smuggling stuff in my luggage. Yet I can’t help but run my hand along the worn binding, wondering if my memories match what’s inside. Did one of my great-grandmothers really fight off bandits, or was that a story Waipo made up? I could find out, if I could stand to open the discolored cover.
Well, Mom can give me the register, but she can’t make me read it. Sending it to Vancouver will only mean it comes back to me by return mail, so I empty the rest of the bag, place the books in my suitcase, and shove the whole thing in my closet under my summer clothes.There.I back out and slam the door to trap some of the emptiness in with the registers.
My phone rings. It’s Ana, and she sounds out of breath. “Hey, are you home from Vancouver?”
“Is everything okay at the store?” I demand.
“Yes, yes,” she reassures me. “I only wanted to know if you’re home.”
“I’ll be in tomorrow, as usual.”
“That’s great—but, Lucy, are you home at this minute?” Frustration leaks through.
“Yes? Why?”
“Good.” She sounds satisfied. “Then open up; I’m right out front.” A tap comes at the door.
When I undo the lock, the dead bolt, and the chain, it’s to see Ana standing there beaming at me. The light from the hall surrounds her with a pale halo. “Hi,” she says.
“What are you doing here? How do you know where I live?” I’m so astounded at her audacity that I don’t move out of the doorway.
She doesn’t look abashed. “I told my mother about your grandmother, and she put the fear of God in me for letting you come home to an empty house.”
“Your mom told you to come over?”
“She said she would be ashamed of me if I didn’t, so I guess.” Ana shifts her weight from one foot to the other. “She’s also right. Can I come in, or do you want me to drop the stuff in the hall and go?”
After my rudeness-and-rejection extravaganza in Vancouver, I’m too drained to do anything but acquiesce. I step aside and she comes in, shedding boxes, bags, and winter layers as she makes herself at home. Ana is dressed down—for her—with her brown curls held up in a bedazzled banana clip and a matching green velour tracksuit that makes her look like a very cozy Kermit the Frog. Her feet were bare in the boots, and her big toes sport bright-red varnish with white polka dots. The rest are painted bubblegum pink.
“How did you know which apartment was mine?”
“You put down your address when you signed the store subletting forms. Then I pushed the buttons until someone let me in. That’s a security risk, by the way.”
“I didn’t include the apartment number.”
“You didn’t have to. I went to each floor until I smelled you.” She heads into the kitchen with the bags she plucks off the couch. “Grab that box?”
I resist sniffing under my arms. “You smelled me?”
“Your candles,” she calls over the banging of cupboards. “They make the whole hall smell homey, and I walked up and down until I zoomed in on the origin point.”
Am I another stray Ana thinks needs rescuing? I can feel my expression hardening at the thought that she sees me as being on par with the foster kittens that parade through her home. I don’t need her pity.
“Are you coming or what?” She pokes her head out from the kitchen and turns suddenly serious. “I made these cookies because I was procrastinating doing some inventory, and I could use help eating them.”
“I bet Jayne would like them,” I say, wavering. Company would be nice, I guess.
She glances down. “It’s possible I wrapped some up to give her tomorrow.”
This makes me laugh, and she adds, “You’d be doing me a favor. I’ve been lonely at the shop with you gone, but I understand if you’re tired. I can leave if you want.”
Ana is so good to phrase it in a way that lets me feel like I’m being the considerate one instead of the other way around. I join her in the kitchen, and she does me the courtesy of not making a fuss. She works with cats, I rationalize. She understands skittishness.
“Weird that we’ve known each other over a year and this is the first time I’ve been here,” she says.
“It’s a furnished rental—not the most comfortable place for guests,” I deflect.
“Sure.” When she cracks open the box to reveal the cookies, the cinnamon-sugar scent chases out any lingering hesitation. Ana grinsat me. “I can’t cook worth shit, but I do make a mean snickerdoodle.”
