3. Elena
3
ELENA
“ I ’ll take you to meet Ivy,” Lorne says, rolling off the bed, tugging down his untucked shirt, and smoothing his hair in a haphazard way.
“Let me get her gift.” I kept it safe in my purse in case my suitcase got lost on the journey.
I take out my father’s old camera first, wrapped carefully in my favorite soft shirt for sleeping. Thank god I could bring that at least, even if I had to give up my library.
“What’s that?” Lorne says as I inspect the old Canon carefully for damage, even though it rode most of the way on my lap. “An antique?”
“It still works.”
“As what, a paperweight? Don’t they have cell phone cameras in Ukraine?”
“A phone can’t take a picture like this can.”
“Right, ‘cause it would actually be in focus,” Lorne snorts.
I get why he thinks this camera looks like a hunk of junk—it’s older than I am. But it takes beautiful pictures with a tone and grain unlike anything digital.
Also, it’s the only thing I own that belonged to my parents.
“It’s sentimental,” I say.
Like he just remembered, Lorne notes, “You said you like photography.”
I don’t just like it. I need it.
But I don’t want to explain that right now, so I just smile and nod.
The gift for Ivy isn’t much—a sketch pad and some watercolor pencils. It was the prettiest notebook we had in stock at the bookshop, the sort that’s leather-bound with rough-cut edges and a cord to bind it shut. But maybe Ivy would have preferred something designed for a child, purple and glittery with unicorns on it.
Lorne didn’t give many useful suggestions when I asked him what Ivy likes. He said, “She plays outside a lot. But she doesn’t really play, not with a jump rope or a ball or anything. She just kind of sits out there. And reads sometimes. Or draws.”
I get the sense that while Lorne is an attentive father, he finds his daughter slightly inexplicable.
As I’m gathering up the gift, he says, “Don’t be offended if she doesn’t talk.”
“What do you mean?”
“Sometimes she won’t speak. It’s why I had to take her out of school and homeschool her instead.”
“That’s okay. I was a late talker, too.”
“She can talk,” Lorne says, frowning. “She just doesn’t want to.”
What I really meant was that speech doesn’t come so easily to everyone. Even now, sometimes, it feels like my tongue is a cold lump of meat in my mouth and the thoughts in my head have nothing to do with words.
Lorne says, “Her mother’s family had all kinds of health issues, all sorts of things wrong with them. Sometimes I think she’s just not very smart.”
“Ivy?” I’m a little surprised to hear someone talk that way about their kid.
Lorne shrugs. “You’ll see when you meet her. She just kind of…stares off into space.”
None of this is making me any less nervous to meet Lorne’s daughter, especially since I have almost zero experience with kids. I’m an only child, and Mina and I were the youngest of our cousins.
“What have you told her about us?”
“I said I met you on a work trip. She knows we’re dating, but I haven’t told her we’re getting married yet.”
I nod. That’s probably for the best, not dumping too much on the poor girl at once. Let her get to know me first before she finds out I’m her new stepmother.
The “work trip” is our cover story.
In Ukraine, there’s no stigma against marrying a foreigner. If anything, it’s celebrated, especially since the war started—anything to get out, even for those of us who live on the west side of the country, farthest from the fighting.
But I already know from my reading that there’s a long history of prejudice against “mail-order brides” in America. They think we’re a bunch of gold-digging Barbie dolls, and maybe that’s true for some. But a surprising number of the women at the romance tours are also educated professionals looking for a real relationship as well as a better life.
That’s what I hoped for—even if I’m neither educated nor professional.
I want real love. And why shouldn’t that be with Lorne? My grandmother always told me that any two people could fall in love if they treat each other kindly.
Lorne is kind. He’s smart, successful, funny…the feelings will come, all the feelings.
It just takes time. Once I’ve been here a few weeks, I’m sure I’ll feel a lot more comfortable. With Lorne and with Ivy.
“I can’t wait to meet her,” I say, pasting on my biggest smile and clutching the sketchbook tightly to my chest.
Lorne uses his key to open Ivy’s door without knocking. Her room adjoins his, two floors down from mine on the opposite end of the hotel.
As soon as we step inside, an uptight-looking woman, skinny and angular with her hair pulled back in a painfully tight bun, says, “Thank god you’re here; she’s been a nightmare all morning.”
She jerks her chin in the direction of a small blond girl sitting close enough to hear every word.
Ivy, perched in the window seat looking down over Main Street, is so silent and still that it’s hard to imagine her moving, let alone behaving as some sort of nightmare.
But Mina also looked sweet and innocent as a kid, with her big brown eyes and cherubic face, while she could have beat the devil himself when it came to trouble.
“And this must be Elena.” The woman looks me up and down, mouth pursed, chin thrust forward. “Long flight, was it?”
I haven’t had time to freshen up after twenty hours of travel. I’m sure I look like shit.
As if she summoned it into being, a wave of exhaustion rolls over me, and I sway on my feet. It’s one o’clock in the morning in Lviv.
“This is my housekeeper, Mrs. Cross,” Lorne introduces us. “She watches Ivy.”
“Taken years off my life, that one,” Mrs. Cross says with another jerk of her chin toward the silent Ivy, who gives no indication that she’s heard a word being said, or even noticed that two more people have entered the room.
I don’t like how this woman keeps talking about Ivy like she’s not there. I cross the small space, sitting down on the ornate, high-backed chair nearest to the window seat.
“Hello Ivy. I’m Elena.”
She finally turns her head, regarding me with an enormous pair of pale green eyes, round and unblinking. Her lashes are as white as her hair, and her eyebrows nearly disappear on her face. She’s wearing a dress that looks pretty fancy for a Tuesday, like she’s going to a birthday party later.
She doesn’t respond to what I said, staring at me in a slightly eerie way, so I hold out the sketch pad and pencils.
“I brought these for you—your dad told me that you like to draw.”
She regards the objects but doesn’t take them. Her hands lie in her lap, pale and still as two dead doves.
I set the gift on the nightstand instead, gently turning it toward her. Her eyes follow the sketchbook. There’s no expression on her face. After a moment, her gaze returns to me.
“Do you ever sketch outside? There’s a pretty garden behind the hotel…maybe we could see if there’s any plants to draw?” When she still doesn’t respond, I add, “I like to take photographs. But I haven’t taken any here in Grimstone yet.”
Lorne answers for his daughter, probably because that’s the only answer I’m likely to get. “Another time—Mrs. Cross is going to take Ivy back to the house with her, and I’m sure you’d like to take a shower and nap or something.”
“If somebody doesn’t keep an eye on those workmen, they’ll never finish,” Mrs. Cross says with relish, as if she’s anticipating cracking the whip over the sluggish construction crew. “Let’s go, Ivy, hurry up.”
After a pause, Ivy slides off the window seat, slow and dreamlike, and follows Mrs. Cross out of the room.
Lorne lets out a breath of relief. “See what I mean?”
I do, sort of…
Ivy is certainly odd. But I don’t get the impression that she’s lacking in intelligence. Her pale green stare was unsettling but far from vacant.
“I like her,” I say, and by saying it out loud, I find that it’s true. I’m curious about this quiet little girl. I’d like to see her sketches.
“That’s good,” Lorne says, squinting like he doesn’t quite believe me.