She saw not an all-powerful magnate, but a confused, broken man. In his eyes was genuine plea. «Okay,» she said after a long pause.
«Ten minutes. No more. My sister is waiting for me.»
The small cafe was almost empty. At one table sat an elderly couple, at another… A young guy read a newspaper. It smelled of fresh baking and strong coffee.
They sat at the farthest table by the window. Richard awkwardly removed his expensive coat, not knowing where to put it on the simple wooden chair. Lucia sat opposite, folding her thin hands on the table.
She didn’t remove her old jacket. The waitress brought two coffees. Richard ordered without asking and now berated himself for this old habit of deciding for others.
«I don’t understand,» he began, not daring to raise his eyes from the cup. «How? How did you learn all these languages? Did you have the best teachers? Private schools?» Lucia took a small sip. «I had the best teachers,» she said slowly.
«They were called mom and dad.» Richard raised his gaze to her. «Were they teachers? Linguists?» «They were diplomats,» she answered.
«My father, Samuel, worked in our country’s embassy. And mom, Amina, was his assistant and translator. She knew twelve languages.
Compared to her, I’m just a student.» Richard froze. «Diplomats.
Not janitors, not workers, not beggars from slums.» Something clicked in his head. One detail fell into place, but the whole picture became even more incomprehensible.
«Your country?» he asked again. «Yes. We’re from Haiti.
It’s a small country in the Caribbean.» He nodded, pretending to know where it is. In fact, he could hardly find it on a world map.
For him, only countries where he had business interests existed. «We moved a lot,» Lucia continued, looking somewhere through the glass at the night street. «I was born in Paris.
My first word wasn’t ‘mom,’ but ‘merci.’ When I was three, dad was transferred to Beijing. I learned to speak Mandarin faster than read in native French.
Then Cairo. Arabic sounds like music if you learn to listen. Then—Berlin, Moscow, Lisbon.»
She spoke, and images flashed before Richard’s eyes that he couldn’t even imagine. A little dark-skinned girl chattering with Chinese kids in a courtyard well, reading Arabic tales with mom, playing snowballs with Russian children. Her childhood was richer and brighter than the life of any of his millionaire friends who boasted trips to the same expensive resorts.
Parents believed the best way to understand a country is to learn its language. Not just memorize words, but understand how people think, what they feel. «Language is the soul of a people,» dad said.
He bought me books in the language of the country where we lived. He asked me to talk to locals, sellers at the market, kids on the playground. For me, it was a game.
The most interesting game in the world. I didn’t have one home, but I had the whole world. She fell silent, and in that silence Richard heard unspoken pain.
«Well, what… what happened next?» he asked in a whisper. «Why are you here? And why…» He didn’t finish, but she understood. Why she, daughter of diplomats, mops floors at his receptions.
Lucia lowered her eyes and looked long at her hands. Four years ago, we came here. Dad was appointed to the embassy here.
We really liked this city. It seemed so alive, so full of opportunities. We lived here almost a year.
It was the happiest year of my life. We were all together. And it seemed it would always be so.
She paused to sip cooled coffee. Then they went to a reception at a country residence of an important person. It was raining.
Very hard. A truck flew toward their car. The driver was drunk.
He survived, but my parents… didn’t. Richard felt cold run down his spine. He wanted to say words of sympathy, but understood how false and empty they would sound.
He just stayed silent. And that silence was the only right response. We were fourteen, Lucia continued quietly, speaking more to herself than him.
Me and my twin sister Ayana. We had no one left. Distant relatives in Africa, but we hardly knew them.
The embassy helped with the funeral. They paid a small insurance. But all parents’ accounts, all savings were frozen due to legal complications.
We were left alone in a foreign country. In her voice was no self-pity, only dry, suffered truth. They wanted to send us to an orphanage, separate us.
But Ayana didn’t allow it. She was always the older one, though born ten minutes later. She said we’d manage ourselves.
She found a job, first one, then a second. I also went to work after school. As a janitor, dishwasher.
Whoever would take? We rented a small room in the district where you met me. We had to survive. Now everything fell into place.
Every detail of this monstrous mosaic. And from that, Richard felt physically ill. He recalled his humiliating remark about her future.
He said it to a girl who survived what he couldn’t endure a day. Shame burned him inside like hot iron. «But why? Why do you continue learning languages?» he asked, just not to be silent.
«You have so many worries.» She looked him straight in the eyes for the first time in the conversation. And in her gaze he saw incredible strength.
«And what else do I have left?» she asked. «Money ran out. Status disappeared.
Friends from past life scattered or forgot us. All I have is what’s inside. What mom and dad gave me.
When I speak French, I hear mom’s voice reading poems to me. When I go over Chinese characters in my mind, I see dad teaching me to write them with his big, warm hand. When I speak Russian, I remember how we all together made a snowman in Moscow.
Languages aren’t just words. It’s my memory. It’s my parents.
If I forget them, I’ll betray them. I’ll lose them a second time.» She turned away to the window.
«And also… I do it for others. Many people come to the library, lost like we once were. Tourists who can’t find the way.
Immigrants who can’t fill important papers. Children who miss fairy tales in their native language. When I help them, I feel I’m doing something right.
Something my parents could be proud of. I can’t change my life, but I can make someone else’s life a little easier for a few minutes.» The cafe sank into silence.
The elderly couple left. The young guy with the newspaper was long gone. The waitress wiped the counter, trying not to look their way.
Richard Salazar, a man who could buy anything, sat before a 14-year-old orphan girl and felt an absolute bankrupt. All his millions, power, influence— all that was nothing compared to her wealth. Wealth of spirit, memory, and compassion.
He himself was a second-generation immigrant. His grandfather came to this country with one suitcase and founded a small workshop that over time became an empire. But Richard forgot about that.
He forgot roots, hardships, what it means to start from scratch. He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and thought it was always so and should be for everyone. Lucia taught him in one evening what life couldn’t teach in 40 years.
«I…» he began, but his voice failed again. He cleared his throat. «I can help.
With money. I can pay for better housing for you. Hire the best lawyers to sort out your parents’ accounts.
I can provide education for you and your sister. Any university you want.» He spoke quickly, fervently, wanting to somehow atone for his guilt, buy forgiveness.
Lucia slowly shook her head. «We don’t need your pity, Mr. Salazar. And we don’t need your money.
We manage ourselves. Yes, it’s hard. But we’re together, and we’re free.
We owe nothing to anyone.» «But it’s not pity!» he exclaimed. «It’s… justice.
You shouldn’t live like this. You deserve more…» «Everyone deserves more,» she answered calmly. «But not everyone gets it.
You can’t help everyone.» «But I can help you.» «Why?» she looked him in the eyes again.
«To clear your conscience? To feel all-powerful again?» «Thanks, no. The only thing you could do for me, you already did.» «What?» he didn’t understand.
«You heard. You came and listened. Most people in your place would just pass by, but you returned.
That’s more than enough.» She stood. «I have to go.
Sister is probably going crazy with worry. Thanks for the coffee.» Richard jumped up too.
«Allow me at least to drive you. It’s late.» This time she didn’t argue, just nodded.
They went out to the street. His luxury car with personal driver stood at the curb, shining in lantern light like an alien ship among gray, dull houses. The driver rushed to open the door, but Richard stopped him with a gesture and opened the rear door for Lucia himself.
They drove in complete silence. The car glided noiselessly through night streets, carrying them from the poor district toward the center. But to Richard it seemed the opposite.
That he was leaving the world of real values for his gilded cage filled with falsity and emptiness. When they drove up to her home, an old, shabby building with dark windows, Lucia said… «Stop here, please.» She turned to him.
«Goodbye, Mr. Salazar.» «No,» he said firmly, «not goodbye. I’ll find you, Lucia, not to give money, but to… to learn.»
She said nothing. Just got out of the car and disappeared into the dark entrance. The car moved.
Richard looked through the window at the receding house, and something terrible and saving happened in his soul. The foundation of his world was destroyed to the ground. And on those ruins, in that ringing emptiness, for the first time in many years, a tiny, barely noticeable spark of meaning dawned.
«Are you in your right mind, Richard?» Alejandro’s voice on the phone rang with icy bewilderment. «My driver saw your car late last evening on the outskirts. In the dirtiest district of the city.
What were you doing there? Looking for cheap adventures?» Richard silently looked at the panoramic window of his office. The city lay at his feet as always. But for the first time, he didn’t feel its owner.
He saw not neat rows of skyscrapers, but countless anthills, in one of which lived the girl who turned his world upside down. «I was busy, Alejandro,» he answered evenly. «Busy?» a chuckle sounded in his friend’s voice.
«What can you be busy with in the slums?» Checking asphalt quality. «Richard, don’t fool around. The whole city is buzzing.
They say you’re obsessed with some janitor. The same one from the reception. Do you understand how it looks?» «I don’t care how it looks.»
Silence hung on the line for a few seconds. Alejandro obviously didn’t expect such an answer. He was used to Richard always caring about image more than anything.
«Listen,» Alejandro’s tone became more serious, almost threatening. «We all go a little crazy, I understand. Midlife crisis—all that.
But there’s a line you can’t cross. You are Richard Salazar. Your name is a brand.
And now you’re smearing it in street dirt. Maybe this dirt is cleaner than the world we live in,» Richard said quietly. Silence again, this time longer and heavier.
«I see,» Alejandro finally said. «So the rumors are true. You’ve really gone…
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