Chapter 16: Lara Lefort’s Worries
EVERY day was filled with happiness for Lara once she began living on the second floor of the goat barn behind Soup Forest.
The first reason for this being she could have her fill of delicious food. The owner of the restaurant, Olivia, was also very kind. And so was her husband, Arthur. Their big black dog, Rob, was so clever and friendly.
“I never knew life could be like this,” Lara said to herself.
While she may be a member of the family under Count Lefort, she’d lived her life as a servant for as long as she could remember. This restaurant, this home, was like heaven compared to that.
“On top of all that, Olivia works so hard. Where does she get all that energy?” she wondered aloud.
Lara was confident in her own hardiness, but she didn’t come close to beating Olivia in how hard she worked. Lara knew Olivia got up at sunrise because smoke from the stove and a delicious smell would waft all the way to the outbuilding shortly after dawn. Lara was starting to wake with hunger at that tantalizing aroma. The lights also never went out in the main building before Lara put her lamp out in the evening, either.
Whenever Lara got up and went to the main building, Olivia would, without fail, say with a smile, “Oh, you could’ve had a bit of a lie in.”
But Lara thought she couldn’t possibly do that. Olivia was already taking care of her. Lara had to work, but Olivia wouldn’t really put her to work.
This particular morning, Olivia quickly boiled the kettle and poured Lara a cup of tea, saying, “Here you go, a cup of tea to wake you up. It’ll still be a little bit until breakfast. Want some dried chestnuts to tide you over?” and she set a small dish on the table. Atop the dish were two round…things.
The chestnuts resembled walnuts, hard and wrinkly. Lara, who had never eaten a dried chestnut before despite her age, looked at them and thought, How do I eat these?
“Oh, you’ve never had dried chestnuts before?” asked Olivia.
“No, this is my first time.”
“Pop one in your mouth and suck on it like a hard candy. The flavor will slowly, slowly creep across your tongue. I rehydrate them and use them in soup, too. There are a lot of customers who say they prefer dried ones since the flavor is stronger.”
Lara picked up a crinkly dried chestnut between two fingers and stuck it in her mouth, then took a sip of tea.
At first, it didn’t taste like anything. But then, after a short time, an intense sweetness and the flavor of chestnut spread slowly in her mouth. Her teeth couldn’t dig into it no matter how hard she tried, but the wonderful flavor only got stronger and stronger.
“It’s sweet,” she said.
“It is, isn’t it? They’re so simple to make for storing; you just boil then dry them, but they’re so nice.”
“Huh…”
When she lived at home, she ate whatever was left over after the family finished eating, along with the other servants. She’d never be able to relax and sip a cup of tea. It was a given that the only thing she drank when thirsty was water. If she’d boiled water in order to make herself a cup of tea, she was certain her stepmother would have yelled at her and told her not to waste firewood.
But that was completely different here.
There was tea made just for her. Soup put out just for her. A warm, clean bed prepared just for her. A kind smile and words just for her.
Lara sucked on the sweet, dried chestnut, then said exactly what she was feeling before she could think. “Olivia, I never knew you could live this way. If this is how normal humans live, then I haven’t been a human for fifteen years.”
Olivia froze in the middle of stirring the huge pot of soup, then she turned to look at Lara with a troubled expression. Her lips were pressed together in a frown and the tip of her nose was red.
“Huh?” said Lara. “What? What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Lara, you are human. And right now, you’re my valued guest. No, actually, if I’m being completely honest, you’re more like a much younger sister to me. Don’t ever think you weren’t human.”
“You’re totally right. Oh no, oh no, Olivia, why are you crying?”
Olivia bit her lip, and tears welled in her eyes. “I just…was reminded of me, from a long time ago. I don’t cry anymore when I think about my past, but when I think about you feeling the same way…I just can’t stand it. It hurts so much. I wish I’d met you sooner, then I could’ve kept you from ever feeling that way. I would’ve taken you in, protected you, raised you here.”
Heavy drops fell from Olivia’s eyes as she talked.
Lara jumped to her feet and moved over to Olivia, uncertain of whether or not she should rub her back. If she ever even accidentally touched people in her own family, they yelled at her and told her never to touch them.
“Olivia, can I rub your back?” she asked.
“Yeah,” said Olivia.
Still hesitant, Lara gently rubbed Olivia’s back.
“Thank you,” said Olivia. “You’re ten years younger, but so much more like the older sister out of us.”
“My mom would always make me feel better when I was crying because my half siblings bullied me. All she did was rub my back, but somehow, that was enough to make me forget how much it hurt.”
“Yeah… You seem to have a lot of good memories with your mother.”
“I do. She might’ve seemed timid, but she was a strong person. But she died when she got really unwell after catching some nasty cold…”
Olivia pulled Lara into a tight hug, then turned back to the stove. With her back still to Lara, she started to talk. “My parents weren’t mean to me. I remember them raising me with care. But there was a rule that I wasn’t allowed out of my room if there were any guests. I’d spend my time alone, listening to their conversations and laughter… It has been that way ever since I was little, so I thought it was normal, at the time. I was so lonely. When I came to this house and started living with my grandparents, I realized how lonely I’d been the whole time.”
“Why would your parents do that?”
“I said a lot of strange things when I was a child. People thought I was odd in the head. I think my parents were embarrassed of me. They wanted to hide me. Not that there was actually something wrong with me.”
“Really? There’s obviously nothing wrong with you.”
“No. I hope someday I can tell you all about it.”
Then Olivia went quiet and started stirring the soup.
Lara had a feeling she shouldn’t ask more questions, so she sat back down, her mouth filled with the powerful sweetness of the chestnut.
Lara couldn’t believe someone as kind and gentle as Olivia had a past like that. It made her angry. It was clearly her parents who had something wrong with them.
In her anger, she bit down hard on the chestnut. So hard that the nut cracked with a pop and was as sweet and tasty as a boiled sugar candy.
I only got to eat candy on New Year’s Eve, but this dried chestnut is way better than that. There’s good food in this house every day. I want to learn how to cook while I’m here. And I want to learn about medicinal herbs. But I can’t stay here forever. They’ll start to think of me as a nuisance if I do.
Though, her next thought was, Olivia’s so nice, though, she’d never tell me to get out.
And that was why she decided she needed to leave before Olivia started to think of her as a nuisance.
I can’t just sit here getting pampered forever.
Lara wanted to stay here, but she also didn’t want Olivia to think she was taking advantage of her. The two desires tugged her back and forth.
It was only when Lara was uncertain what to do but unable to ask anyone for advice that Olivia would look at her with an expression that said she wanted to say something. Lara was curious what it was, but she could never bring herself to ask. She was too afraid that if she did that the response would be, “So, how long are you going to stay here?”