Forest Green

When Illya was a boy, perched on a stool in his boba’s safe kitchen, he had been served tea. It was proper tea; strong and black, moderated for his tiny boy’s mouth with honey and milk. She served the tea, and the hot, hot buttered bread he had with it, on her china painted with mysterious forest glades in green.

Illya saved one lone plate from the wreckage the Nazis made of her cottage.

In New York, in their apartment, in their kitchen, Illya put the cap on the tube of glue he had purchased only this morning. He scrutinised his handiwork; his repairs after Thrush’s invasion of their privacy, and looked at Napoleon who nodded seriously. It would have to suffice.

There was a labyrinth of fine lines through the forest glade, but it was whole, complete, and still so mysterious.