Big Swiss(71)

“You know any Spanish?” he asked.

Greta cleared her throat. “I only know one phrase.”

Don’t say it, lady. Not here, not tonight. Just—control yourself. But it was too late—they both looked at her expectantly.

“Sacame la leche,” Greta said.

Luke blinked. “?‘Take my milk’?”

“Cum,” Greta said. “?‘Take my cum.’?”

Luke blushed deeply. Big Swiss shrugged and looked out the window.

“Well,” Luke said slowly. “If all goes according to plan, Flavia will, uh, sacame la leche in Ecuador.”

“Pardon?” Greta said.

Big Swiss gave Luke a punishing look, which bounced right off him.

“We’re trying to get pregnant,” Luke said shyly.

Greta immediately stuffed bread into her mouth.

“With twins, Flavia hopes,” Luke said. “Twins run in my family.”

“Oh wow,” Greta said, chewing slowly. “Wow, wow. Cool, very cool.”

Now Big Swiss gave Greta the same look she’d given Luke, which affected Greta like kryptonite.

“Twins run in my family, too,” Greta said weakly. “My mother was a twin. My grandmother had five kids under the age of five, and then totally lost her mind.”

Luke smiled politely.

“Was she institutionalized?” he asked after a moment.

“No,” Greta said. “She had three more kids and several miscarriages.”

“Oops,” Luke said.

Greta smiled and wondered what the fuck she was doing here. They were clearly very married. And very broody. Dinner had been Luke’s idea, ostensibly, but why had Big Swiss agreed to this? She watched Luke tear into a fresh baguette. He broke it apart with his handsome hands and passed the heel to Greta, which seemed appropriate.

“Use a knife,” Big Swiss snapped. “She doesn’t want your fingers all over her food.”

Luke sighed. “Do you mind?”

“Not at all,” Greta said, and looked at Big Swiss. “You know, I think you might be slightly allergic to alcohol? That’s why you get so… agitated.”

“Ooof,” Luke said. “Careful, Rebekah.”

Greta carefully scratched her scalp. It had started like any other itch, but it occurred to her now that this was the itch, the unbearable crawling sensation at the back of her head, the curse of her adolescence. Phantom lice. Scratching released serotonin, she’d learned long ago, which in turn made the itch worse. Otherwise, she recalled nothing from the few weeks she’d experimented with habit reversal therapy (HRT). Her first impulse was to stab herself with a fondue fork. Instead, she scratched behind her ear like a dog.

“You’re being glared at,” Luke said to Greta, “by Little Miss Icy Veins.”

Greta stopped scratching and sat on her hands.

“Mrs.,” Big Swiss corrected him. “And there’s nothing little about me. Or icy.”

Pedantic seething—not Greta’s favorite, but it was Big Swiss’s number one hobby.

“Do you think I’m icy?” Big Swiss asked Greta.

“You have cold hands,” Greta said quickly, looking past Big Swiss at the lake.

“But do you consider me distant and unfeeling?”

“Nope,” Greta said.

“Liar,” Big Swiss said.

Greta shrugged.

“The dreaded Swiss stare,” Luke said ruefully. “Still raises the hair on the back of my neck. Not always in a bad way.” He smiled and tugged at his collar. “Have you been to Switzerland, Rebekah?”

Greta smiled and shook her head. The phantoms whirled like dervishes. She hadn’t experienced a flare-up in years, but it was all coming back to her now. Pain was the only way out. Pain interfered with the itch, and if you inflicted enough—on yourself, of course—the itch subsided altogether.

“Can I tell you what goes on there?” Luke said. “I mean, are you curious at all?”

“She already knows,” Big Swiss said.

“Go ahead,” Greta gasped, digging her nails into her palm. “Please.”

“Okay, so, you’re on the train, right, minding your own business, and suddenly you feel that you’re being watched, so you look around. It’s the old Swiss woman sitting across from you. She’s calm and serious and staring hard at your chest, so you look down at yourself, expecting to find a mustard stain, but there’s nothing. Now she’s staring at your sleeve, now the buttons on your shirt. Her eyes linger on your collar. You think, Okay, she’s moving up to my face. When she sees my face, she’ll look away. Nope. Her eyes slip down to your stomach. They travel over your crotch. Your pant legs. You can see her making little judgments and appraisals. Meanwhile, you’re just waiting for her to look at your face, because you want her to know that you’ve caught her staring. Well, the joke’s on you, because guess what? She doesn’t care. She shamelessly evaluates your face, too, even though you’re giving her a look of death. She doesn’t even register your expression. She looks you directly in the eyes, but she doesn’t see you.”

“Yikes,” Greta said. “What’s her deal? Does she hate tourists?”

“No. Swiss people were never taught that it’s rude to stare,” Luke said. “They’ll stare at anyone. It’s like, socially acceptable to stare at a stranger on the train or anywhere else, and they stare at their friends, too.” He looked at Big Swiss. “Like how you’re staring at Rebekah right now, babe.”