The Language of Sparrows by Rachel Phifer

twelve, she called to the back. “I’m at lunch, Ellen. Be back in thirty.”
    “Righto,” came the reply.
    She strolled into the café and sifted through the Saturday lunch crowd. A hum of voices in conversation filled the restaurant, settling the rising disquiet inside her. Passing polished tables and gleaming wood floors, she found the teacher around a corner.
    He was tapping his fork against his napkin and looking out a narrow window. He stood when he saw her and pulled out a chair. This wasn’t like any teacher conference she remembered. But then, in the not-so-distant past, teacher conferences had been easy. “She’s a pleasure to have in class,” her teachers used to say. “She excels.” Never had April thought she’d be having a conversation like this one with Nick Foster.
    A waiter came for their order. “Just an iced tea for me,” April said. Lunch could wait.
    Nick nodded. “I’ll have a Coke.”
    The waiter left, and April took a deep breath. “My daughter won’t talk to me. She’s spitting mad at me because she thinks that man is a friend. I understand why she’s mad. What I don’t get is why she was furious with you.”
    “That man is my father.”
    April shook her head to clear it. At the conference, they’d spoken of the man as if he were a danger to society, a criminal even. And Nick Foster hadn’t once spoken in his defense. “Your dad?”
    She caught the flash in his eyes.
    A shiver went up her back. “Your father’s dangerous?”
    He didn’t answer right away. “Not the five o’clock news kind of dangerous.”
    “But?”
    The noise of the lunch customers grew distant as he searched for words. “I know what Sierra sees in him. He’s read enough to fill libraries. On his good days he’s got laser insight. But, man, he’s a tough guy.” Nick shook his head. “He’ll be your friend one day, and the next, he uses words like jackhammers. He wouldn’t think about how he could scar a fragile girl like your daughter.”
    April softened. This man wasn’t even Sierra’s teacher, but he recognized her for what she was.
    “I’ve watched the way she takes it at school,” he went on. “She lets those boys intimidate her. Honestly, I’m afraid for her. Even if my father didn’t hurt her, what was she thinking? Whose house is she going to let herself be talked into next?”
    April raised her chin. “Boys intimidate her at school?”
    “If she’d just tell them to get lost, the game would be over. It’s her distress that keeps them circling.”
    Her voice shook. “The game?”
    “Bad choice of words. It’s a game to them.”
    When had Sierra stopped talking to her? Did she think April wouldn’t understand? Or did she simply want to save her mother from any more anxiety?
    April looked up. The smells of garlic and tomatoes and fresh bread drifted over from the next table. But something edged in on her attention. His name. She looked up at him. “Wait. You’re Nick Foster, right?”
    He looked straight at her. “And my father’s name is Prodan.”
    April tipped her head, curious now. “And?”
    “We came from Romania.”
    April’s mind whirled. Nick Foster had no trace of an accent. The way he spoke wasn’t particularly Texan, but his words held no hint of a European background either. He could be from anywhere in America.
    “I came here with my mother when I was four,” he continued. “My father wasn’t able to come with us at first. And then when the Romanian government offered him an exit visa, he chose not to accept it. He finally joined us when I was sixteen.”
    “And you changed your name?”
    He hunched a shoulder. It wasn’t a subject he was comfortable with, clearly. “Yes, when I got my citizenship. From Nicolae Prodan to Nicholas Foster. It’s a translation.”
    He spread his hands, European in style, but quickly put them down as if they’d betrayed him.
    She hesitated, unsure how to respond. “I appreciate your honesty, Mr. Foster. I’ll be