The Last Minute Boarder, Chapter 1, Scene 2: 28 A Street

Anni dropped the brush in the empty can and looked around once more at her future. She conjured glimpses of her childhood spent on this quiet street hidden away on the outskirts of an old Kansas town. She never thought she’d come back, but Max had given her little choice. Her shoulders felt the weight of his memory and what he had done to her. To them.

A light flicked on in one of the upstairs rooms. Lena. Making one last round, checking to make sure nothing had been forgotten, herding all the ducks into a row for tomorrow morning. Like Anni’s grandmother, Lena would be the rock in this house of hungry souls. She would feed them, clean their rooms, make them tea and tuck them in at night. The mother of 28A Street. For Anni she was that and a friend too.

Lena had appeared at the open door one morning in August. She stood on the front steps, blonde curls escaping from her pink cap, blue-eyes, broad shoulders beneath a rose-print cotton dress, and well-worn, low-heeled shoes. A brown suitcase sat on the porch beside her. She wasn’t much older than Anni, about thirty-five, but fresh off the bus it seemed.

“Hello,” she said and pushed the folded paper, open to the classifieds, out in front of her. “I’m here to help you.”

For a month Anni had ripped out crumbling carpet and broken cabinets, sanded layers of paint off baseboards, and pulled wallpaper from uneven 19^th century plaster walls. By herself and with no skills—unless a BS in journalism from Northwestern University, class of ’53, counted. Turned out it didn’t. She’d made a mess of the place, and that morning she’d dropped down in the middle of the rubble and cried. Until she heard Lena’s voice calling from the doorway.

Anni greeted her in overalls dusty with sanded paint, a bandana tied around her short brown hair, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. She was surprised by the big German girl who stood up straight despite the Kansas wind at her back, a tentative smile on her full lips. She needs this job, Anni thought. And heaven knows I need her. She would have hired Lena without a question but thought maybe she ought to at least pretend to interview her.

Lena was so different from Anni, whose small frame and flat chest made her look like a teenager; well, almost. Anyway, she was sure she hadn’t gained a muscle since she turned fifteen—not at all strong, but determined. Lena was both. She had a soft face but hard-work hands, and when she walked into the large torn out kitchen and dining room that first day, her eyes shone. “This will be a beautiful gathering area,” she said and touched every space in the room as though knighting it, describing what must go here and must go there. Instead of interviewing or even leading the tour Anni followed her through the house, scratched out notes on a paper bag of how the various rooms should be situated and hired Lena straight away. That was three months ago and they had been together for most of every day since.