Eighty Days Amber by Vina Jackson

scribbled note on the kitchen top telling me he had to go away at short notice, didn’t know how long he would be, but assuring me that he loved me to the moon and back. I smiled. It was an expression we’d heard someone on a TV series say and we had both burst out laughing at the same time. It had become a private joke between us ever since, though I was beginning to feel the truth of it.
    In the note he suggested I stay on and look after the apartment while he was away. Big deal, I thought, annoyed that he could leave me so easily. To cool my frustration I walked all the way to my job on Bleecker and straight into the fierce argument that led to my losing it.
    My savings lasted just three weeks and without a visa getting another job was far from easy. And there was still no sign of Chey. I had no alternative but to relinquish my sublet in Brooklyn and move my few belongings into Chey’s Meatpacking District apartment, somewhat fearful of what his response would be when he found out. But still, six weeks later, there was no sign or word from him and his phone was no longer taking messages even.
    One morning I had scraped together some change I found on Chey’s desk and was having a coffee at the nearest Starbucks, gazing ahead at the rusting steel columns of theHigh Line and pondering my limited course of action, when someone called out my name.
    ‘Luba!’
    It was Chey’s fat Russian friend, the one who had deliberately spilled the coffee over my blouse. His name was Lev and, when we had been introduced by Chey a few months ago, he had profusely apologised for his earlier behaviour. He was visibly scared of Chey, who held the upper hand in what I assumed was their business relationship. We never spoke together in our native language and Lev had a pronounced East Coast accent.
    I greeted him with a distinct lack of enthusiasm, my anger at Chey’s absence colouring my attitude to his acquaintances.
    ‘So, how are things?’ he asked me.
    ‘So, so,’ I replied. ‘You wouldn’t know where Chey has decamped to, would you? Or how much longer he will be away?’
    ‘He never tells me anything,’ he said.
    ‘Typical.’ I swore under my breath.
    Without being asked, he sat himself across from my table. I glanced over at him. His shirt was bursting at the seams, its front buttons screaming in agony as his stomach forced itself forward and was barely contained by the material. How could such a lump of a man be associated with Chey?
    He misinterpreted the scorn on my face for sadness.
    ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked me, with a look of concern.
    ‘Your friend Chey; that’s what’s wrong,’ I replied. ‘One day here, the next day elsewhere, without a single word of warning. It doesn’t make things easy,’ I protested.
    I then explained what had happened at the patisserie andhow I’d lost my job and was now in a precarious position. He offered to let me have a few hundred bucks, but I just couldn’t accept them. Not from Lev. He would expect a return payment in one way or another, and that was something I was unwilling to give him. Instead, I brushed off his offer and told him that I had to find a job, and why it wasn’t as easy as it appeared.
    A broad, goofy smile illuminated his face.
    ‘I’m illegal too,’ he declared, as if it was something to be proud of.
    ‘Congratulations!’ I exclaimed bitterly. ‘I’m proud to be a member of the same club . . .’
    ‘But Chey, he tells me you are a wonderful dancer. You trained in Russia, didn’t you?’
    ‘I did. But that was a long time ago now. And I wasn’t that good, not technical enough.’
    ‘What’s technical about dancing?’
    ‘I don’t think you’d understand,’ I pointed out, taking a sip of my rapidly cooling coffee.
    ‘If you wanted to dance again, for a job, you know. I think I could help. Until Chey returns, if you want.’
    ‘Tell me more,’ I said, although I already suspected it wouldn’t be at the Lincoln Center or with the New