Chapter 3: The Fat Lesbian
The door to ‘Mironov’s’ exhaled a wave of warm, garlic-heavy air as Jennie entered, the little bell above her head jingling a chealer sound. She adjusted the basket on her arm, the checkered cloth covering her carefully iced shortbread cookies. The afternoon light was thin and tired, slicing through the front windows to illuminate floating dust and empty vinyl booths.
It was a quiet, hollow kind of place. The silence felt used up, replaced by the low hum of coolers and the distant, metallic clatter of pans from the kitchen. Her eyes scanned instantly, a predator’s sweep. An older couple in a corner. A solitary man at the bar. No young women. Her pulse, which had been a frantic bird in her throat since she woke, settled into a steady, watchful rhythm.
Then she saw him. Leonid was leaning against the service counter, a metal tray in one hand, his other rifling through order slips. The fluorescent light washed the color from his skin, making his tattoos stand out like bruises against the pale canvas of his arms. He looked tired, but when he glanced up and saw her, something in his face softened. It was a small thing, a slight relaxation around his mouth, but she caught it. It was hers.
“You came,” he said, straightening up. His voice was a low rumble under the ambient noise.
“I brought cookies,” she said, lifting the basket, her smile effortlessly radiant. She was performing, but for him, the performance was fused with genuine worship. “For you and your friends.”
He came around the counter and kissed her forehead, a brief, dry touch. “Is good. Come. Nikolai is in back. His sister, she is here also, bothering him for lunch money.”
He led her past the empty dining room, through a swinging door marked ‘Staff Only.’ The atmosphere changed abruptly. The smell of old food deepened into a greasy, decaying warmth. The hallway was narrow, lit by a flickering bulb, the walls lined with stacked boxes and discarded cleaning supplies.
Leonid pushed open a door to a cramped office. The scene inside was a still life of neglect. A battered desk was buried under paperwork and a half-eaten burger. And there, leaning against a humming mini-fridge, was a woman.
Jennie’s entire consciousness sharpened to a single, evaluative point.
The woman was tall, almost as tall as Leonid, with shoulders that strained the fabric of her bright yellow polo shirt. Her hair was that same venomous blonde, but it was pulled back in a severe, greasy ponytail. Her face was broad, with a strong, almost mannish jawline currently working on a piece of gum. She had large hands, one holding a cigarette, the other shoved into the pocket of her stained kitchen trousers. She smelled sharply of fry oil and sweat.
Next to her, a mountain of a man with a shaved head—Nikolai, presumably—was counting coins from a tip jar.
“This is Jennie,” Leonid said, his hand a warm pressure on the small of her back.
The blonde woman’s eyes, a pale, watery blue, swept over Jennie. They held no warmth, no curiosity, only a flat assessment. “Hey,” she grunted. Her voice was a surprise—deep and raspy, like gravel in a tin can.
“Jennie, this is Anya. Nikolai’s sister,” Leonid added.
Anya. The name was too soft for her. It didn’t fit.
“It’s so nice to meet you!” Jennie chirped, her voice an octave too high, the perfect sound of polite delight. She extended the basket. “I made cookies. Leonid talks so much about how helpful Nikolai is.”
Anya glanced at the basket as if it contained soil. She didn’t take it. Instead, she took a long drag of her cigarette, the ember glowing bright in the dim room. “Sweet,” she said, the word devoid of any meaning. She exhaled smoke toward the water-stained ceiling.
Nikolai mumbled a thanks, taking a cookie with a shy nod.
Jealousy, that sharp, green poison, had been coiled tight in Jennie’s stomach. Now, as she watched Anya smudge ash onto the desk with her thumb, it didn’t dissolve. It mutated. It curdled into a cold, viscous contempt. This was the source of the blonde hair? This crude, lumpen creature with the grimy nails and dismissive eyes? She looked at Leonid, at his elegant slouch, the intelligent weariness in his face, the beautiful lines of his inked skin. The idea that he would ever look at this woman with anything but professional tolerance was ludicrous. It was an insult.
Anya was speaking to Leonid in a choppy mix of English and Russian, complaining about a delivery driver. Her laugh, when it came, was a booming, startling sound that shook her broad frame. It was entirely without femininity.
A profound sense of superiority, cold and clean, washed through Jennie. Her smile became easier, more genuine in its falsity. “You work in the kitchen here, Anya?” she asked, tilting her head.
“Dish pit,” Anya corrected, stubbing out her cigarette on the burger wrapper. “Temporary. Until my band gets a real gig.”
“A band! How exciting.” Jennie’s eyes were wide, fascinated. Inside, she was etching the details: the grime under the nails, the faint darkening of hair on her upper lip, the way her polo shirt stretched tight over a soft, heavy chest. Every detail was a mark of grotesque, safe, distance.
“Yeah. Metal. You wouldn’t like it,” Anya said, her gaze finally locking with Jennie’s. There was a challenge there, a recognition of otherness. You are a delicate, decorative thing. I am solid, real.
You are nothing, Jennie thought, her smile never wavering. You are grease and noise. You are not a threat. You are barely a person.
Leonid shifted, a subtle signal of his discomfort with the tension. “We should let them work,” he said, guiding Jennie back towards the door.
“Of course! So nice to meet you both!” Jennie trilled, allowing herself to be led away.
In the hallway, the door swung shut behind them, muffling Anya’s voice as she launched into another complaint. Leonid leaned against the wall, running a hand through his curls. “See? I told you. Boring.”
Jennie wrapped her arms around his waist, pressing her face against his chest. She could feel the steady thump of his heart through his thin shirt. “I’m glad I came,” she murmured. And she was. The monster in her chest, the one that had been pacing and snarling since she found the hair, had been shown a mere shadow. It had lain back down, pacified but not asleep. The visit had been a success.
Yet, as she held him, the clean contempt for Anya began to frost over with a new, more intimate anxiety. This woman saw Leonid every day. Heard his voice. Existed in his space. She was a blemish, an ugly stain on the periphery of his world. And Jennie’s world, by the violent logic of her love, needed to be perfect for him.
The thought was a quiet, settling chill. The basket in her hand felt suddenly very light. The cookies inside were for a threat that didn’t exist. But the visit had served its purpose. It had given her a face, a name, a category.
And categories, for someone like Jennie, were where things were sorted. Where decisions were made.