Milost City of Grace: Chapter 3

“So, I don’t think either of us is going to find our alcoholics tonight. Fancy a coffee?” The strange, tall man stared down at me with perfect innocence. I stared back incredulously. I was too off-guard to think up a good response and I found myself accepting his invitation. “Sure, sounds good.” How lame was that? “Great.” He and I walked to a nearby coffee shop, not the one that I had been in earlier. I ordered tea. “So, is the woman in the black skirt your younger sister?” He asked me casually as we took a couple of leather seats in the corner. He certainly didn’t mince words. I took a sip of my tea before answering. “She’s older than me actually, and she was my foster sister.” His face wore the classic foot-in-mouth expression. “Oh, umm, sorry about that. She just looked kind of … umm.” Instead of being offended I laughed. “Yeah, I get it. Let’s just say you thought her style was a little… juvenile.” I offered him up an excuse. He smiled sheepishly, his wide lips pulling up attractively. “Candy’s always been like that. She loved being seventeen. You know, that blissful existence before real life catches up to you.” He chuckled. “So, you must still live together then, if you’re driving her to meetings.” He made another assumption. “No. Candy lives with a boyfriend. I just drive because he works days, and can’t make it to take her. I live close enough to check on her every once in a while, but not close enough for her to be constantly crashing at my place when Ernie’s fridge is empty.” “Smart. I had to make my alcoholic move in with me. Figured it was the only way to be sure he was cleaning up. He always says to me: Carter, if I wasn’t so stuck on getting sober, I would get up right now and tell you to get a life.” His face had turned a tad serious. “You two must be pretty close. Is he a friend or….” I let the sentence trail off suggestively. This was Portland after all. “Hahahaha!” Carter’s face pulled into a full out laugh. “No, no. Jared is just a friend, more of a colleague actually. Nothing romantic. Away, that’s not really my area.” I blushed. “Sorry.” I apologized, once again embarrassed. “Don’t worry about it.” His amused smile lingered. “So what kind of work do you do, if you and he are colleagues?” I tried to put a positive spin on the conversation topic. “Well, officially speaking, I’m a cartographer. Jared is kind of a jack-of-all-trades. We’ve worked on several projects together when I have to map somewhere remote. We met in the Australian outback. I was mapping plateaus and Jared was in charge of the free-climbing squad. We worked together again when I was mapping large ice floes in the arctic. Jared was working as a dog-sled driver that time.” He said the whole thing nonchalantly, which impressed me. As if free-climbing cliffs and dog-sledding over ice-caps was just another every-day occurrence. “Sounds like thrilling work. But, Carter the cartographer, it’s a bit of a tongue twister. Carter the accountant or Carter the builder would be much easier to say.” I teased him. His smile was warm. “I suppose so, but I kind of like it.” We reached a lull in the conversation, and I took a sip from my earthenware mug. The shop we were in was a tiny, hole-in-the-wall kind of place, but with plenty of personality and pizzazz. There were elaborate rugs hung on the red walls and all the furniture was mismatched and harmonious. “So what do you do?” he asked me seriously. I sighed. There was no way I could compete with ice-caps and plateaus. “I’m a waitress.” I was evasive. “But that’s only temporary. I’m going to school to get my degree in linguistics.” “Really?” He looked genuinely interested. “What kind of linguistics? Do you have a focus for your studies? Do you want to be a translator or something?” “I have a focus, but the only people who I could translate for are dead.” I laughed. He looked bemused. “My focus is in dead languages.” I explained, “Latin, Aramaic, Church Slavic, Langobardic, you name it.” I was pleased with the clearly impressed look on his face. “That’s so intriguing.” He commented. Just as he was about to say something else, a voice called from across the shop.