After a few more minutes, the lovely serving lady walked out and brought her a plate of Stollen: a big, steaming pile of German fruitcake, “Yum” Lena ruefully thought to herself. She glared near-audibly at the internationally reviled log of candied… erm, age-loaf… and really hoped that this wasn’t what she was supposed to actually eat once her little spy-ritual was over.
“How does it look, dear?” the woman asked.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Lena said, “you forgot the salmon.”
“Oh, gracious me,” the woman said, “I’m so sorry. I’ll bring that right out!” With that, she turned and headed back towards the kitchens, leaving Lena alone and afraid with her only company this worthless stump of candied horse puck. Somehow, despite its radioactively-fluorescent coloring, it still managed to look pock-marked and diseased—like a leper in food form. As if sensing her hatred, it glared back at her, daring her to be hungry enough to try it. The joke was on the fruitcake, however, as no one could possibly be that starving.
As Lena waited, her senses were assailed by more chewing, more spitting, and more wailing from a crowd hell-bent in the sport of public eating. By the time the woman brought out her food, Lena had decided that being the poster-child for domestic espionage wasn’t nearly worth this.
“Heeeere you go,” the woman said, as she plopped down a huge plate of delicious-looking wurst, “I think you will really like the recipe. Let me know if you need a to-go box.”
“Oh this looks amazing, but I don’t think I can eat it all,” Lena replied, salivating.
“Well, most folks your size ask for to-go boxes,” the lady said, winking.
“I’ll… I’ll, uh…” Lena stammered, before thinking better of it and saying, “I’ll let you know when I’m ready to leave. Wouldn’t want to miss out on the experience.”
“It’s good to enjoy the ambiance,” the woman smiled. “Do you want me to leave the fruitcake or murder it behind the dumpsters?”
“You can take it. I don’t like the way it’s staring at me,” Lena said honestly. The woman understood. Yet somehow, Lena suspected that another one of Mrs. Schroeder’s spy network had played a tiny practical joke on her. “First they name me ‘Sunshine’, and now this?! Ugh!!”
For nearly a half hour, Lena wasted time attempting to appear normal. She instinctively knew that leaving too quickly would be unnatural. Then again, her being here would be unnatural as well, which is why Lena had honored Mr. Collin’s instructions and made a point to regularly visit Gustavo’s every day or so since leaving Mrs. Schroeder’s apartment. She knew she had made the right choice. Yet as she looked about at the truly disgusting display of gluttony around her, well… this really was the hardest part of the job.
“Why can’t they pick locations with real people?” Lena boggled. Silently, she resigned to picking at her food as she returned to people-watching. Here, a tourist-looking couple; there a tourist-looking couple; everywhere she looked, there they were, with rear-ends proudly escaping from pants and underwear alike, all ablaze with swampy sweat. Perhaps Lena would resolve to eat less of her wurst than she had originally planned. That, or maybe she would become a vegetarian.
She scanned the crowd some more, taking note of the very few regulars she had seen in previous visits. All of them looked about the same as everyone else. However, as Lena scanned, she looked over at a table in a corner. A man and a woman sat, drinking coffee and talking quietly. There was nothing about them that really stuck out in the least. As a matter of fact, the more Lena looked at them, the more she took notice of how perfectly ordinary they looked, and the more it niggled at her.
Sure, there were people of all shapes and sizes at Gustavo’s—most of them just inclined towards a more… family-sized… physique. This pair, on the other hand, seemed reasonably fit. No worries there. The bland-looking clothing, perhaps no worries there. It just looked, well, grayer than normal. The haircuts seemed… well, actually, most everything about them seemed very hygienic and well-manicured.
She decided to apply some of Patrick’s training: the point-scale designed to detect law-enforcement agents. They were both well-manicured and hygienic; just one point, but a point, nonetheless. Bland clothing; perhaps two or three points. Still not a lot, but worth mentioning. But now that she thought about it, the haircuts seemed just a tad specific; so maybe that was two points. The fact that they were in a restaurant and hadn’t ordered food; two points. The fact that they didn’t gesture or emote all that much, and kept to themselves; maybe a half a point. But the occasional looks around the room? While that was just one minor point, it brought the lack of gesturing or emotion up to a solid two points. This wasn’t even accounting for the set of the man’s jaw. He wore a tense, determined stare, and the muscle on the side of his jaw was constantly flexing; three points for sure.
Now this couple officially had her interest, so she watched them more intently. She noticed that both of them—despite their reasonably business-casual attire—wore comfortable sports-shoes; four points. However, they were really black, clashing slightly with the general neatness of the slacks. “Maybe five points,” Lena thought. The black leather belt the man wore; just one point. But the fact that the woman wasn’t dressed like a woman; well that was another three points. “Actually, make that four points for the belt,” Lena thought, as she realized that the belt had a girth to it—possibly designed to hold both a concealed firearm and extra magazines.
Lena had been taught to get antsy around ten points, but she was always one to exaggerate at the best of times, so, maybe fifteen would be better. However, many points they were up to now, though, it was far past that.
All was confirmed, however, when the man leaned forward to grab his drink and Lena made out a hard crease in the back of his shirt, signifying that he was indeed wearing a concealed firearm, “That’s almost five points right there,” Lena gasped. And the small watch the woman wore, with the face on the inside of her wrist; ten points immediately… and not just because women never wore watches (and the rare times that they did, it certainly wasn’t a black nylon band): she wore it on the inside to avoid glare in darkness. Lena didn’t even have to take into account how perfect their teeth were (signifying expensive, government-provided dental care), which would have tacked on another two points.
These people weren’t mere informants or assets, they were Stasi surveillance officers. Lena was sure of it. Suddenly, she felt very afraid. She had gotten so used to the idea of working for the HVA that she had grown slightly lackadaisical in her approach. Oh, she needed to bail immediately. But how to get out of this naturally?