Thursday night, Remy was in gold – under the stage lights, her sequinned dress winked rainbows of reflected light at the audience, pulling them in her song. They were all enraptured. The band behind her, but for the flash of metal every now and then, blended into the darkness. Remy’s hand came up to gently cup the microphone. Something about the movement brought to mind the image of a girl lifting a rose bud to her face, sniffing deeply-

“She looks good, doesn’t she?” Sekani murmured.

Ailsa started. She had forgotten him and felt disturbed all of a sudden. She felt him glance at her out of the corner of his eyes, waiting for a response, and so she nodded quickly.

“Mm,” she agreed. Satisfied, Sekani crossed his arms and leaned back slightly.

Ailsa settled back into her reverie. It was strange that over all the noise – the rattling cutlery, the boisterous laughter, the din of many voices speaking at once, Remy singing could create a notion of peace, like a pocket of calm in a sea of turbulence. Sekani hadn’t spoken that loudly, and yet Ailsa had heard him clear as day.

She cast her gaze over the few people sitting by the bar. A woman balanced precariously over a stool was talking excitedly to her male companion, a bottle of gin between them. Every so often the woman would throw her head back and exclaim loudly – at something in her own story no less. Her stool would rock slightly, and Ailsa would hold her breath, willing the seat to stay in place. The man, perceiving the danger, was now keeping his foot firmly on one of the bars of her stool; although it only held half his attention. The rest was split between trying to follow whatever the woman was trying to say and her bosom, which was only just being contained by her ill-fitting shirt.

A couple of stools down, a trio of middle-aged men in sports jerseys nursed their drinks over mumbled, half-drunken laments about the government. Once again, Ailsa wondered if they had bonded in their drunkenness or were indeed friends. On the far side, a man in a dark coat slumped over his beer. When he looked up, his drink-worn face and watery eyes spoke of a man carrying the weight of the world. The more he drank, the more he shrunk into himself, his fingers poking at the crisps spilled before him on the bar.

“That man tried to kill himself you know,” Sekani said, following Ailsa’s gaze.

“Which man?”

“The one sitting alone, with the dazi.” Sekani lifted a hand to his head to indicate a bald patch.

“Who told you that?” Ailsa asked, after thinking for a moment.

“It was all over,” Sekani said. “It was all over some months ago.”

Her eyebrows rose slightly. Sekani sidled closer.

“What happened? Shouldn’t he be in prison for attempted suicide?”

“He had an argument with his brother… He’s very rich, his family paid off the police or something. They wouldn’t let him die.”

Ailsa watched the man for a while longer, as though expecting him to make a sudden move. When none came, she looked at Sekani, who shrugged and turned back to the stage, eyes on Remy. Every now and then her eyes would find the suicidal man.

At last, Ailsa’s eyes wandered back to the man, and she let them settle on him. Aside from slumping lower, he had not moved. A wave of pity settled over her. Noticing Ailsa’s attention was still on the man, Sekani volunteered more information.

“They say his mother keeps him in a glass bottle,”

“What?”

“His mother keeps him in a glass bottle,” Sekani repeated. “His family is involved in witchcraft… his mother keeps him in an empty coke bottle, to control his life. They know that if she dies, all the money will go.”

The precariously perched woman raised a limp hand to beckon Sekani over. He ignored it.

“Doesn’t he have children?” Ailsa asked, eventually. “Someone on his side,”

“One child I think… but it’s the whole family, you know?”

“Excuse-!” interjected the precariously perched woman.

“She’s drunk too much already,” Sekani mumbled, but he set off towards the woman.

Ailsa had heard of this sort of thing before – people being kept in “coke bottles” – but it had always been in the context of old wives’ tales, or jokes people would make about men head-over-heels in love with their wives. She didn’t know if she believed in such superstitions. Her mother, had always warned her not to – for to believe was to give them power. She didn’t know what to do with the information Sekani had provided, and so she shrugged it off.

Either way, she thought, that man should have been getting help with his mental health, not sitting at a bar.

She set off from the bar and towards the podium by the entrance to check on her phone, which was charging in a small drawer. Expecting to get a few minutes to herself to text and browse, she clambered onto the seat.

Momentarily, the music stopped, and all there was was the sound of people talking and eating. On stage, one of the band members strummed his old acoustic guitar, adjusted the keys and lead Remy into the next song.

Ailsa recognised it immediately. Her head jerked up of its own accord.

Neria.

It was her aunt’s song.

“I can always listen to Oliver,” Her aunt used to say. “Always.”

Her aunt had developed a predilection for referring to the Zimbabwean singer by his first name, and would speak of Oliver Mtukudzi as though she knew him personally. There was a time when Ailsa was young, and with naivety only a child could muster, had asked her mother when the oft-mentioned Oliver would come to their house and visit. Ailsa’s mother only laughed.

“Don’t listen to your aunt’s stories!” her mother had said. “She doesn’t know Oliver Mtukudzi.”

Remy’s voice did not rasp as Oliver Mtukudzi’s did, and the song was a little less soulful for it, but Ailsa listened raptly. It was just Remy and the guitar, until the chorus came, and the rest of the stage band harmonised softly.

Throat tightening, Ailsa slipped down from her stool, disappearing into the bathroom.

When the song was over, and she had made a show of inspecting the bathroom for herself, she made her way out.

As she rounded the corner into the bowl of the restaurant, she almost collided with someone.

“Woah,” they said. Their hands came out in front of them, forestalling the impending collision.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, stepping back. She looked up and was surprised to see that it was Andrei.

He smiled openly. “It’s all right.”

They stood there for a moment.

“Well - Hello!” Ailsa piped, remembering herself.

“Hey, hello!” he stepped towards her and she took a half-step back, before realising he was leaning in to hug her. He went right and she went left and they almost collided. She went right too.

Quite unexpectedly, he hugged her.

He’s a hugger, Ailsa thought.

Her arms came up a second later to reciprocate. He smelled good; something mildly spicy but clean. It took her a moment to place the smell. Imperial Leather soap. Her dad used to use it when she was younger. Now, when she found it in a shop, she would hold it up to her nose and inhale deeply, conjuring memories of her dad holding her when she was still small enough to be held.

It smelled different on Andrei. There was the familiar comforting smell, but it was layered with something else, something heavier, but not unpleasant… perhaps a body spray or aftershave with sandalwood undertones. She supposed his pheromones also contributed in some way.

Nevertheless, what surprised Ailsa was not the smell, but the hug itself. It was a proper hug. Not one given at arms-length as most social hugs were.

They released each other, and he seemed to study her face. Her eyes still held that bright, starry look eyes had after crying, she suspected.

“Are you okay?” he asked, when his eyes had finally settled on hers.

“Yes, how are you?” she responded, smiling warmly.

“Good,”

“That song always makes me emotional. It’s so beautiful,” she offered quickly.

“Well, I don’t blame you. You can’t beat a good Mtukudzi song,”

Unable to mask her surprise, Ailsa’s eyebrows rose. “You know Oliver Mtukudzi?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh,” she said simply. Andrei pushed at the sleeves of his black shirt, which had been rolled up to his elbows. He was in all black, she noticed.

“So” he started after a beat, “I thought you weren’t here. How come you aren’t up there?” he nodded back at the stage.

“Oh, I left it to the professionals.”

“From the way you sang the other night, I would’ve thought you were one of them.”

She laughed, feeling a little warm at the compliment. “No, but thank you for saying that.”

“You’re welcome. But I mean it.”

“Thank you.”

This was turning into a rather long conversation. Ailsa made a point of glancing over his shoulder at the restaurant, as though expecting to be called away at any moment. If he noticed, he made a point of ignoring it. She felt rather exposed, thinking that surely, surely, he could see that she had been crying.

“You know, I thought I saw you in Chipiku the other day,”

She felt her cheeks warm, and was grateful not to have a visible blush. “Oh really?” she responded, keeping her voice light. “I don’t think I saw you.” Perhaps it only sounded unconvincing to her because she knew it was a lie.

She had seen him. Her mother had sent her to the shops to get a few things, and it was just as she stood comparing the prices for the different brands of powdered milk that she he’d walked into the supermarket.

…Ha-ha… are you following me?

- Ailsa could already hear the stilted conversation they would once again, feel obligated to have. She had turned on her heel and crept as stealthily as one could around the other shoppers, and towards the registers to pay.

The cashier had been slow, with dark skin, and a stony, triangular face. Her expression rested in something of a sneer – a sort of knowing sneer, as if she knew all a manner of sordid little secrets. Perhaps she did.

Her eyes slid from Ailsa to the items she scanned interestedly, her sneer deepening with every beep of the cash register. Ailsa had greeted her politely, but now wondered who this cashier thought she was, sneering at her like that with her cashier job and stiff helmet-wig hybrid. To Ailsa’s frustration, the woman had taken forever to hand Ailsa her change.

Leaving the warehouse, Ailsa hadn’t risked glancing back to check if Andrei had seen her.

Clearly, he had.

Moreover, Ailsa’s hasty exit had come at the cost of buying her mother’s favourite jam, a box of tea bags and sausages, as requested. It had all been for nothing, and she had had nothing to say when her mother had asked her about the missing items upon her return.

“Ah.” He nodded once. “What happened though? You were supposed to text me.”

Ailsa couldn’t keep herself from giving him a sheepish smile.

“I forgot,” she admitted.

He shrugged it off.

She waited. Perhaps this was her opportunity to leave. She promised herself that she would do so, if he didn’t speak in the next couple of seconds.

“There’s a boutique hotel in town,” He said. “There’s some jazz thing they’re doing tomorrow and a few people from our year thought it would be nice to meet up.”

Ah. Here was the answer to her little mystery. There was a mini-reunion being planned. Hadn’t her mother run into one of her other classmates recently? It was another parallel-line personality in Ailsa’s life, surely. But for once, they were all here in Lilongwe. The timing was ideal for a meet up. It all made sense.

Her excuse was at the ready.

“If it’s at night-” Ailsa started.

“It’s in the afternoon,” Andrei supplied. “I know you probably have to work.”

Ailsa paused. She’d turned him down that first night, forgotten to text him, avoided him in Chipiku (quite noticeably at that), and no longer felt she could reject him again.

Albeit reluctantly, she said, “Okay.”

She could always come up with an excuse tomorrow, if she really wasn’t up to it by then. She’d go, say hello to everybody and duck out. Who cared if she had gained weight? There wasn’t much to be done about it now.

Behind Andrei, Mada seemed to be approaching.

“Text me.” Andrei said.

“I will,” Ailsa promised.

*

For the reunion, Ailsa decided to wear an off-shoulder tent dress. It was mustard yellow, so it made her skin glow. Coupled with the flirtatious (but not immodest) length, the overall effect was quite pleasing to her. If she was going to be appraised by her former peers, this was the best dress for it, she thought. Even if she had gained weight, (and had already been a big girl to begin with) she looked good. The dress was complimented by simple accessories; a gold necklace and small gold studs, with tan sandals. Her hair framed her face in loose curls, and her make-up was carefully applied.

It was the sort of effortless look one achieved with a great deal of planning. Ailsa had been desperate to pull it off, and felt, with relief, that she had. She stood in front of her mirror, turning herself this way and that to admire her outfit. She further reminded herself of the fact “traditionally built” women (as Mma Ramotswe so often put it) should always be confident of themselves and their bodies.

She drove towards the venue with her windows down, taking her hands off the steering wheel in turns to allow her palms to dry from their nervous sweating. She could already hear the music from the short drive up to the parking lot of the boutique hotel, growing from a tinny distorted cry into the full, round bellows of soft jazz.

Ailsa took one last look at herself in her rear-view mirror, snatched up her purse and climbed out of the car. It was a short walk into the reception and into the restaurant, which opened into an outdoor seating area. The band was on a raised platform in the grass, wearing tailored shirts of chitenje-material.

She looked around for faces she knew from high school. She hadn’t thought to ask Andrei who was going to be there. For a long minute, she saw none. A slight panic set in and she thought she had been mistaken, or deceived in some way until-

There. A hand rose, and she followed the hand to its arm and the arm to its shoulder until she found a face. It was Andrei. He smiled kindly, and she smiled back, sidling over to the table.

“Hi,” she called.

“Hi,” he rose to hug her. She felt somewhat comforted by the Imperial Leather smell. She stepped away and looked around.

“Am I early?”

“No, you’re right on time.”

“Where’s everybody else?” she asked, looking around. Her eyes searched for a familiar face in the other diners, but none came. No one walked up to them with arms extended, ready to say hello.

There were only two seats at the table, she realised, and Andrei had already occupied one of them.

“Everybody else?” Andrei repeated.

There was a long silence, during which Ailsa blinked at the table, scanned the room again and finally turned to Andrei. The penny was dropping quite visibly, and she wasn’t sure of how to hide it.

“Um,”

Her thoughts raced in every direction.

He had invited her here? - Alone? Why?

What would they talk about?

Why had she come? She could’ve made up an excuse in the morning.

How was she unaware it was going to be just the two of them here? Hadn’t he said “we” when she had texted him yesterday about it?

She pulled herself out of her thoughts and sat down. He sat too and she offered him an embarrassed smile.

“Who is everybody else?”

“No one. Nobody. I was just…” her words died in her throat. She covered the silence with another smile, but couldn’t quite meet his eyes.

She didn’t know what to do with herself.

“You look nice,” he said.

“Thank you.”

Another silence fell.

She could feel him looking at her and so she looked around at the band, at the tables next to theirs, at the waiters – she almost cried with relief when one came striding up to their table to take an order for drinks.

As the server walked away, she chanced a glance at Andrei. He was dressed simply, as always, in a white V-necked shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows.

Perhaps he’s wearing jeans, she thought. She hadn’t really gotten a good look at him earlier. His hair looked wet, at though he had taken a shower or been swimming shortly before he had arrived. His hair was longer now than it had been when they were still at school, but it suited him.

Ailsa’s eyes remained fixed on Andrei for a moment too long, and she felt her cheeks warm as she looked away. She felt almost as though he had caught her looking! She shouldn’t have, but the whole thing made her feel silly.

What was she doing here anyway?

To Ailsa, they both seemed to be searching for things to say. However, her thoughts stubbornly remained fixated on the situation at hand, and she could think of nothing else.

“I’m sorry, I thought this was going to be some high school reunion thing,” she blurted. “I thought there would be other people here. Didn’t you say other people were coming?”

Andrei’s only response was to look quizzically at her, and she felt more ridiculous as she spoke.

“My mum ran into someone from our class recently I think… and- and you said you had been invited here-” she broke off. After what seemed like an eternity, Andrei spoke, his lips slipping into a sheepish smile.

“I think I’ve let the joke go on a little longer than I should have,” he said.

It took Ailsa a moment to connect the dots.

Andrei’s smile slipped, and he begun to look unsure of himself.

“I was only joking,” he explained.

There was a beat, and then they were both laughing. Ailsa more so with relief.

“I’m sorry. That was a bad joke. I’m awful with jokes.”

“It’s okay,” She said, quickly. “Well it isn’t,” she added, “And I might have to get you back for that sometime, but it was funny in the end.”

I think.

“Are we early?” she asked.

“Um, no…” He smoothed his hair back. She had seen him do this before, but on this particular occasion, it struck Ailsa as a nervous gesture. “It really is just me. The other two guys cancelled.”

The first of the group; Ailsa had never been particularly close to Nudar. She was probably the smartest student in their graduating class and always seemed to be laughing at something or the other. It was possible she could have been laughing at the rest of her year group, because they were all munchkins in comparison. This was not purely in reference to her intellect; Nudar had towered over them all physically as well. Ailsa had always thought she could’ve been an amateur model, for Nudar naturally smouldered and smized in a way that would’ve brought Tyra Banks to tears.

Nudar’s twin sister Nasreen, was less humorous than her sister. In Ailsa’s mind she had a more natural, wholesome beauty compared to her sister; but this was exactly the problem. Tired of constantly being compared to her sister, she had developed into a rather jaded person. Nasreen had once caught Ailsa having a good day, and when Ailsa had smiled at her, Nasreen gave Ailsa a look of such banality Ailsa’s smile had immediately melted away.

Andrei informed Ailsa that the twins had to leave suddenly for Blantyre, where a relation close to their family had died that morning.

The third person, Rhys, was an athletic boy with dark hair and a smattering of freckles over a too-large nose that was not unattractive. Ailsa remembered him having a friendly smile that bordered on flirtatious, and an easy-going personality. By some divine coincidence, they often ended up sitting next to each other in classes. French, history and the odd music lesson. They weren’t particularly close but had kept in touch since they had left high school. He had since dyed his hair a stark white colour, grown it until it fell halfway down his back and taken to dressing in varying shades of grey. The effect was that he looked somewhat faded, like an old photograph. But, like his nose, the effect was not altogether unpleasant.

Rhys was under the weather, and so had been unable to come.

This left Phil. He was the son of a rather vocal politician who was known for his womanising ways. If Phil had inherited his father’s knack for picking up women it was yet to manifest itself. Ailsa remembered him as a somewhat awkward but kind guy. She hadn’t shared too many classes with him, but he did get along quite well with Andrei.

It seemed Phil had either chosen not to attend or had been unable to do so. Andrei was unsure of which it was. That left the two of them. Rhys had cancelled at the last minute, and assuming Phil would turn up, Andrei hadn’t cancelled.

The six of them group would’ve been a random assortment of people, but Ailsa believed they could have managed to make conversation. She had always liked her graduating class. It wasn’t fraught with animosity and drama like some other year groups; everybody liked each other. Everybody got along. But here she and Andrei were. It was just the two of them… out for lunch.

To the casual watcher, it was the picture of romance - two people, a meal, soft jazz…

Ailsa smarted at the thought, but felt she couldn’t leave.

“So,” he said, slowly. She pulled herself out of her reverie. “You wouldn’t have come if you had known it was just me?”

His question caught her off guard. She fought to do several things at once – to come up with a response, to mask her surprise at the question, to apologise in advance if her answer was going to cause offence, to keep her features from betraying the honest answer –

Andrei smiled suddenly, and it took her a moment to realise he was only poking fun. It was a genuine, kind smile, and she laughed with relief.

“I’m sorry,” she said, bringing herself out of her thoughts. He waved off her concerns.

“Don’t, it’s kind of funny,”

She laughed. “I’m glad you think so. I guess I was surprised that you wanted to hang out with me. I mean, we weren’t really close friends in high school.”

Andrei watched the band, mulling over her words. “Have you ever met someone and you just wanted to skip the awkward getting-to-know-you phase?” he asked, finally.

“Sometimes the getting-to-know-you-bit is the best part,” Ailsa contended. “And we already know each other.”

“Not well though,” he interjected.

“No, not well,” she agreed.

The waiter arrived with their drinks, and they busied themselves with getting settled. Ailsa had ordered a vodka-cooler. She wasn’t a heavy drinker, so it was enough to loosen her up just enough for her to act interesting, and not let her inhibitions and many thoughts get in the way of their conversation.

Had the others shown up, she probably would’ve looked back and seemed a little over-animated to herself. She would’ve laughed a little too-heartily, agreed a little too eagerly and spoke a little too loudly. Not over the top by normal standards – but just a bit more than usual. She would’ve wanted to seem fun and dynamic and interesting, so that they would come away with regret for not having taken more of an interest in her in high school, particularly Andrei. Perhaps they would tell the friends they were still in touch with about it. They would say that she was an interesting person, and then she would no longer be a space filler in their world. She would become someone who continued to exist even when they weren’t thinking of her.

She would’ve thought she would never get a chance like that again – this select group of people probably wouldn’t hang out again, would they? She had nothing to lose. It would have been the performance of her life.

With just Andrei, sitting across a table from her, she felt less pressured to be the better version of herself.

“So,” he said, after the waiter had gone. “What’re you reading these days?”

Ailsa looked up from the menu, where she had been eyeing some pork ribs.

“What if I’m not reading anything?” she asked.

He thought for a moment. “Impossible.”

“Oh?”

“My aunt still asks about you, you know. I think you’re the only student she ever allowed to sign books in and out of the library for her. So, it’s impossible for you not to be reading a book.”

Ailsa smiled. Andrei’s aunt had been the librarian at their primary school. Ailsa hadn’t seen her in several years, but held on to the memory of the woman’s kind smile and motherly encouragement of Ailsa’s love for reading. Being entrusted with something as important as signing books out for other students while Mrs. Antonopoulos’ went to the staff room to make herself a coffee was one of the most exciting things that had happened to Ailsa when she was pre-double digits in age.

It said, you are trustworthy. You are responsible and mature. Such a small thing meant a lot to someone like Ailsa. Her parents had raised her to have a healthy respect for authority, and here were the rewards. It was funny how a small thing like that could make an impact on a person.

She was also pleased Mrs Antonopoulos had remembered her out of all the other students she had come across. It seemed that to some people, she wasn’t overlooked.

“Things Fall Apart,” Ailsa said.

Andrei nodded slowly. “What do you think of it?”

“It’s funny. Maybe a bit slow… I think the jacket is misleading.” Don’t talk too much Ailsa, she thought. “Have you read it?” As if to stop herself, from saying any more, she pressed her lips closed.

Andrei nodded, and she did her best to mask her surprise. “Why do you think it’s misleading?” he asked. How could she keep from talking when it was just the two of them there to make conversation?

“Well, I’m over halfway and he hasn’t killed the clansman. Isn’t that what it’s all about? How things change after he kills the clansman and is exiled?”

Andrei pauses for a moment.

“It is, but maybe the build-up was the whole point too. Letting the reader see how good Okonkwo’s life was – according to him, before this one thing happened. Then you see how it changes after and you appreciate why he felt things could not be salvaged. The fact that things happen so quickly – killing the clansman and getting exiled etcetera, maybe it was a reflection of how quickly things really fall apart once they start-” he stopped abruptly. “Wait. That was like a spoiler or something wasn’t it?”

Ailsa shook her head. “I hope I agree with you when I get to the end.” Ailsa says, drawing her eyes away. “Maybe Chinua Achebe saw that his story was going nowhere and decided to end it quickly and dramatically.”

Andrei laughed. “Maybe, yeah.”

“What’re you reading?”

“Nothing right now. Maybe you could give me a recommendation?”

“I don’t know what you like,”

“So, give me something that you like. You were always great at giving book recommendations. I remember that.”

“You do?” it was difficult for Ailsa to mask the surprise this time. “Did I ever give you one?”

“No. But I think you gave Nasreen and Nudar recommendations. And Rhys… too. They were always spot on.”

“Oh,” Ailsa said. It was all she could manage. She didn’t know why Andrei had noticed this about her, but it made her feel strange. So, used to being the watcher; it felt uncomfortable to know she had been watched.

She suggested a few titles, just as the waiter came back to take their orders.

“I’m sorry,” Andrei said. “We were so busy talking we didn’t really look at the menu.”

Visibly disgruntled, the waiter backed awa from the table. Ailsa made a show of opening her menu and carefully inspecting the dishes, in case the waiter was watching.

He had walked away with a rather sour expression on his face after Andrei told him they hadn’t decided on their orders yet. The waiter had not introduced himself, so Ailsa did not know his name, but in her mind, she christened him “Nkhope ngati ka mbuzi komwa mikodzo”. It was an expression that her mother and aunt were fond of using, and simply translated to “face like a goat that drinks urine”. It was a rather mean expression, and Ailsa thought it was somewhat unkind of her to call someone by such expressions, even if it was only in her mind.

But, she reasoned, that is what he looked like making that impatient expression of his. He looked just like a little goat that had drunk urine.

Mikhail, Ailsa thought, would never have hired such a rude waiter. Although perhaps he hadn’t seemed mean when he was being interviewed for his post, and only let this side of him slip out once he had secured his position.

Nkhope ngati ka mbuzi komwa mikodzo.

To Ailsa, it had always been a funny expression. She suppressed a laugh, looked down at the menu, and allowing herself a small, secret smile instead. Ailsa’s mother was fond of using peculiar expressions like these. Looking over the menu, she thought of one more.

Ichi chakoma, ichi chakoma pusi anagwa chagada!

- This is delicious, this is delicious, the little monkey fell head over heels! Everything on the menu looked delicious. Ailsa was the little monkey; she had fallen head over heels and was spoiled for choice. But then again, there was another funny expression; the Chewa version of all that glittered not being gold –

“Ailsa?”

“Mm?” She would have to follow this train of thought later.

“Have you made a decision yet?” Andrei asked.

“Um…” she scanned the menu once again.

“I think our waiter is getting impatient,” Andrei said.

“The Schnitzel sounds good,” Ailsa said after a moment. It wouldn’t be too messy to eat, and it came with a side of sweet potato fries, which she loved.

Andrei beckoned the waiter over and they gave him their orders. He sauntered away. And Andrei turned to Ailsa.

“What were you smiling at just then? When you were looking at the menu.”

She thought for a moment before responding. Her natural instinct would be to say “nothing” and move on, but this response would work against her in the long run. They had already discussed what they had been up to since they had graduated, and would have to find something to talk about while they were here. Ailsa believed she might as well tell him. At the very least, he would find it interesting.

“The waiter made a face when you asked him to give us more time to order. It reminded me of something - of a saying my mum has,” she felt herself about to laugh again. “I just want you to know, they aren’t my words so please don’t judge me.”

“Okay,” Andrei said.

She told him about the expression and what it meant. For a moment, Andrei looked surprised that Ailsa could think of something so mean, but then he chuckled, his eyes crinkling at the corners in a way that Ailsa found she liked.

Much to Ailsa’s surprise, the lunch ended up being quite pleasant. They made conversation well enough - it wasn’t a conversation marked by depth in thinking or feeling. Rather, it was the type of conversation that would take place between people who did not really know each other that well, but were still both talkative enough to carry a decent conversation to while away the time. When silence depended on them, they sipped their drinks, or ate another mouthful and looked around at their surroundings. They were in the middle of city centre, so there was plenty to see.

Ailsa thought the restaurant must have looked nice on a warm summer night, with the outdoor lights strung up in the trees. Andrei agreed.

She found out that he didn’t read books anymore, but rather, listened to audio books, because he could do so while engaged in different activities. Ailsa preferred to read books on her tablet or phone. When she listened to audiobooks, her mind would wander, and instead of being lost in the book, she would become lost in her thoughts.

“I noticed,” Andrei said. “You’re very pensive.”

“Well, I don’t know about pensive…” Ailsa responded. “It’s not always serious and deep. Perhaps I would say…”

“Day dreamer?”

“No,”

“A… Ponderer?”

“I don’t think that’s a word Andrei,” she laughed. “Let’s just say I like to mull things over.”

The conversation changed, and she found that he was staying at his uncle’s house, just a ten-minute walk from Ailsa. Andrei too had seen the pond, but had never been.

“You should go, Ailsa said. She described it for him, thinking however that there was a chance Andrei wouldn’t see the beauty in it. He had seen white sandy beaches and clear blue waters that stretched as far as the eye could see. Did one become immune to beauty? She wondered. Perhaps Andrei would find the water dingy, when compared to the many golden beaches he had seen in his travels, and would not care about a small pond in the suburbs.

All the same, Andrei promised to go, and to tell Ailsa about it when he had. He probably wouldn’t, she thought, but it was nice that he cared enough to say that.