work, but could not bring herself to abandon the mysterious pair.
Finally, just when she was about to tear herself away, they headed
back to the Promenade. Right before they came upon the store where
she worked, they veered into a narrow alleyway she had never
noticed before. She followed, but they vanished.
Leona walked down the narrow labyrinth, an alley without
windows, trash cans, or people. The concrete walls bounding it were
sheer and sand-colored. She felt like a mouse in a maze, with the
stark blue sky overhead as the only escape. Though she had not
walked far, her journey seemed to have taken an improbably long
time.
Then, like some massive concrete and wood non sequitur, there
was a coffeehouse. In front was an extremely low doorway she had to
duck under to get in. Leona wondered if this was a place for children.
Or perhaps elves.
There was no one inside the dim room. It was decorated
pleasantly and seemed to be stocked for a clientele that could not
possibly ever arrive. She called out “hello” but no one answered. Back
through the main room she was surprised to find a small garden.
Despite its modest size, she found herself unexpectedly charmed.
Never had she encountered a garden so magnificently eccentric. It
was decorated in some style vaguely oriental that she could not place.
There were colorful flowers and reddish stone statues of gargoyles, a
perfectly manicured moss lawn, and what looked like a miniature
doll house in the corner. Sandalwood incense burned upon it, along
with a bottle of Coca-Cola. She noticed that there were some odd
bushes lining the perimeter of the garden, one with berries, another
with large floppy leaves. Impulsively, she tasted one of the berries
and spit it out. It was astringent and slightly bitter.
Strange music that sounded like perfectly tuned bells of all
pitches thrummed from a hidden sound system, and as she turned
around to see where it was coming from she noticed that the garden
led right to a small house. All at once she realized that she was
standing on someone’s private property, eating from their plants,
and how stupid she would look if she was caught. She decided to
leave.
Spinning around, Leona collided with something heavy and
yielding. It was the smaller of the two men. He lay naked before her
on the ground now, his towel having fallen from his waist. The other
one came out of the house with no towel at all, drinking tea, wholly
ABYSSINIA
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