Inked

future, then how does this war end?”
    “Well. And that’s all I’m going to say about it.”
    She gave me a cold look. “I don’t like this. I don’t even know if I should believe it.”
    “You’re a spy,” I said, matching her tone. “You should be used to a lot of things you don’t like or believe.”
    She stared. And for one moment stopped being my grandmother, becoming simply, Jean: a young woman alone, with her whole life ahead of her. Dangerous, maybe—but vulnerable, too. Flinching, as Dek and Mal freed themselves from my hair, slithering down my arms.
    Her gaze hardened again, though. I would have been worried for myself if I had been anyone else.
    “Be careful where you say that,” she said, her voice deathly quiet.
    I tilted my head. “You use those children to help you?”
    Her hand balled into a fist. Before she could reach me, both Zees tumbled from the sofa, standing in her way. She stopped. I did not move a muscle. Still as stone, radiating calm. Maybe I was as good an actress as she.
    Around us, shadows moved, glinting with sparks of red. Aaz appeared—mine, I thought, though I could not say why. He carried two plates filled with a delicate shrimp salad. Raw swung a basket of rolls and butter.
    My grandmother and I stared at the food, and then each other.
    “Don’t think this is any less bizarre for me,” I said quietly.
    She looked away, and reached up as if to rub the back of her neck. Except her hand was still balled into a fist. She uncurled her fingers, one by one, so stiffly I almost rubbed my hand in sympathy.
    “Well,” she said in a low voice, and took the proffered plate of salad. “Come on.”
    I did not move. “My name is Maxine.”
    Again she flinched, swearing softly to herself, and then sat down hard on the sofa. Dust particles flew into the air around her, and I backed up a step, trying not to sneeze, watching her through watering eyes. Her head remained ducked, shoulders bowed, toes turned inward toward each other. Like a kid.
    I hesitated, took my own meal from Aaz, and perched gingerly in one of the red chairs. Raw placed the basket of rolls on the floor between us.
    My grandmother picked at her shrimp. Seemed like a crime to eat so well with people starving around us, but I forced myself to take a bite. Tasted good, but not enough to distract me from watching the play of emotions across her face. Anger, still; and grief.
    “Hey,” I said softly.
    “Maxine was my mother’s name,” she whispered, and shoved a forkful of salad into her mouth.

    I had to call her Jean. Grandmother was out of the question. She had not asked how many generations removed we were, and I did not want to tell her. Less I talked the better.
    “I was almost eight when we left the States,” Jean said, over an entire apple pie, still warm and placed on the spare chair, which we had dragged close. Each of us held a spoon, taking turns digging directly into the tin. The crust was buttery and flaky, the apples full of cinnamon. Guilt and odd circumstances aside, it had become a lovely meal.
    “It was after the market crash. I don’t know why we left. But we landed in France, traveled through Germany, and then took a winding path through Yugoslavia, Greece, down into Turkey. Finally ended up in Iraq. I was thirteen by then. My mother had never been to China, but she made friends with people who had family there. Sephardic Jews, big-business types. By then, there were rumbles coming out of Germany. My mother remembered the first war, and wanted us far away from it. She thought China would be that place.”
    Jean stabbed the pie a little harder than necessary. “I’ve been here ever since. Got tied up when the Japs did their number on Pearl Harbor, and then the damn Krauts had to get involved because of that fool Hitler. Someone needed to play cloak-and-dagger on this side of the Pacific. Better me than anyone else.”
    Her mother could not have been dead that long. “So you pretend to be Jewish.”
    She shrugged. “Dark coloring is all the same over here. Makes you one way, even if you’re not.”
    “You can’t be fooling the people in this neighborhood.”
    “Only the baojia stick their noses in business that doesn’t belong to them. Jewish tattletales, hired by the Japs. Some of them are stand-up, though. Especially if you pay them.”
    “You missed an appointment with one tonight.”
    Jean went silent, studying me again. I debated telling her about meeting Ernie, but she