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Rated for brief language

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CHAPTER ONE

Connie had never been bothered by people. They were always there, a part of daily life that one didn’t quite take for granted, but didn’t just ignore, either. Three ladies sat an outdoor café table, sipping coffee under an umbrella that double shaded their faces with the wide-brimmed hats. These were people that Connie liked. They filled up space in this open place of walls and storefronts that continued through the archways to the rest of the city. They were the people who moved and breathed and lived. They were the elderly gentlemen on the balcony to her left:

Of course Denport shouldn’t have been elected; he rigged the polls!

What are you a’talking about? Anyone’s better than Weber; he was a mob boss.

At least he knew what he was doing.

You heartless old bag of horse shit.

Hah. Don’t take it personally.

Cigar?

Of course.

They gave sound to her world and allowed it to swirl around her, allowed a crowd to engulf her, allowed the band next to the fountain in the center of the plaza to assimilate her as she walked up to them and released her to sit on the fountain’s edge on their other side. There were enough people in the plaza today. It was Monday, and everyone was out shopping, picking up daily goods like bread and milk, and getting other things, like flour or paper, that they’d need for the coming week.

From here, Connie could hear the train station and all the noise and excitement that accompanied it. Through the archway in the distance behind her, it was a building large enough to take up almost an entire street beyond the plaza. She watched as people threw open doors and windows in the balconies above her and as people in smart clothes walked to and from the wide steps of a gold-domed building, holding piles of papers or sealing up envelopes to be mailed.

“Constance Barker?” a voice asked. Connie stood up and nodded. The little old woman who had stopped before her was barely as tall as she was and had come to meet Connie still in her apron, a shopping basket swung over her forearm. “I’m Agatha Mills,” she said, stepping forward to scoop Connie into an enthusiastic hug. “Lovely to meet you, darling. You’ll have to excuse my appearance. Never a good time to stop working and all. Have you been waiting long?”

“No, my train only just got in.” Connie stood up, straightened her jacket and pencil skirt, and followed Mrs. Mills through the crowd.

“You had a good trip, then?”

“Yes, it was fine.” Connie straightened her hat as a mother and daughter walked into her.

“We’ll get you along to the hotel in a few minutes; I just have to pick up a few things first.” An awning feathered out from one side of the plaza, shading seven feet of the open ground from the burning sun. Connie walked next to Mrs. Mills down this corridor, watching bookshops and greeting card stores and bakeries and gift stores to her left and vendors selling fruit and candies between their doorways. Mrs. Mills stopped at a stand for strawberries and looked over a handful.

“How much, Janice?” she asked the vendor, turning a few berries over in her hand.

“For you, Ag, one-fifty lers per handful.”

Mrs. Mills laughed. “You’re too kind,” she said and scooped a few handfuls into a tin in the basket she was carrying.

“And who is this?” Janice gestured towards Connie.

“Constance Barker. She’ll be working for me.”

“Nice to meet you, ma’am,” Connie said, shaking Janice’s hand delicately.

“Pleasure to meet you too, hon. You’ll have a ball with Ags here; she was a riot back in our schooldays.”

“Oh please, Janice. Are these stories really necessary? How’s your son doing, by the way? Your oldest?”

“He’s fine. Off to school past Patorfield. Can’t imagine why the school here wasn’t good enough for him, but that’s neither here nor there now.”

“Really? Connie’s from Patorfield.”

“Well, isn’t it a small world then! I’m sure we passed through on the train once…”

Janice’s voice trailed off in the background as Connie looked through the window of a nearby shop. Flowers lined the display and balloons filled up the doorway, ready to fly off into the sky if not for the weights on the ends of them. She took a step into the shop, ducking through the balloon strings but felt someone tugging on her suitcase and pulling her back.

“Excuse me, miss, but we need to inspect your suitcase.” Two military officers stood behind her, their uniform pants tucked neatly into their shiny uniform boots, and their hats sitting low over their dark eyes.

“Oh, of course,” Connie said, setting her suitcase on the ground. They looked at the tag first, and, seeing that she was not from Brent, looked at each other meaningfully.

“We’re going to need your papers,” they said. Her papers? Connie was sure she shouldn’t show those where anyone could just run up and grab them. And the thought of being in a foreign city without identification didn't help her disposition before the guards.

She hesitated a moment and looked at each of the officers in turn. They looked back at her with soft eyes that Connie felt she couldn’t get away from. At least when a person glared, she could tell where they were looking and position herself far out of their line of sight. But with the officer’s soft eyes, she felt as if wherever she was, there would be no escaping their path of vision. She tried looking over their shoulders to Mrs. Mills, but the two men in front of her stepped closer to each other, blocking her view completely. The one who had spoken held out his hand, still with those same soft eyes, and Connie, feeling like her lungs still tried to breathe the same air already trapped in her mouth and throat, opened the clasp of her purse and slid out the file of papers.

The officers stood there a moment, reading through them. “You are Constance Barker?” the one asked, looking her straight in the eye. Connie could only nod. “You are twenty three years old and from Patorfield?” Still, Connie could only nod. She stood stone still, her one hand gripping onto the strap of her purse, even though it was swung over her shoulder anyway, and her other hand smack against her skirted thigh. It was sure to leave a sweaty palm mark later.

Finally the officers looked at each other, and then at her. “Come with us.”

Connie couldn’t think of what to say. Her mouth opened and then closed again; either way, no words would come out. They picked up her suitcase and each took one of Connie’s arms. “Mrs--!” she tried to say, but they put a hand over her mouth.

A young man around Connie’s age walked out, shoving a few bills into his wallet and clasping a bunch of flowers under his arm. He stopped as Connie and the officers blocked his way. “What do you think you’re doing, Howard?” he asked, leaning against the doorframe, surrounded by balloons.

The officer, Howard, apparently, looked at him with narrowed eyes. “What’s it to you, Bao? Not like you find these common people important.” He looked like he wanted to wrinkle his nose, but his hat, too tight, stretched the skin across his face too tightly.

“Let her go, Howard. It isn’t important.”

“Ah, look at that, Tim, pretty boy wants to be an officer!”

Bao walked up to him, and spoke in a low voice, inched from his face. Finally, Howard jerked his hand from Connie’s shoulder and stabbed her papers back toward Bao. “Let’s go,” he said roughly, shoving past the other guard.

Bao returned Connie’s papers to her. “Are you alright?” Connie filed her papers back into her purse.

“I suppose.” She didn’t know really what she was supposed to say. No other response seemed to do.

Mrs. Mills hurried up to Connie and put an arm around her shoulder. “Constance, what happened? Are you alright?”

“The officers were just giving her some trouble, Mrs. Mills,” Bao said. Something would have to be done about them soon.

Mrs. Mills nodded. “In any case, thank you, Bao. I appreciate it.” she smiled at him. “Well, we’d better be getting home, all the excitement and everything.”

“Is there anything else I can do?” he asked. “I was on my way back anyway; just picking up some flowers for my mother. She’s visiting Alice tomorrow.”

“I suppose it would be nice for you to walk with us, wouldn't it, Constance?” Mrs. Mills said, leading Connie towards an archway to exit the plaza.

Bao picked up Connie’s suitcase and followed, but she grabbed it right from his hands. “I’m not a trying invalid.” And shrugging Mrs. Mills’s arm from her shoulders, Connie straightened her back, smoothed out her gloves, and walked out of the plaza with Bao and Mrs. Mills behind her.

There were still people down this side road, looking in shop windows and stopping into stores for all kinds of things, but Connie could no longer absorb herself in the crowd. It was as if they left a circle of air around her, still enclosing her within the masses, but not consuming her anymore. In any case, Connie was never bothered by people. Except for when they spoke to her.

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