Summer Cowrite Dorian, his mother and sister stood by the fireplace, ready to welcome their guest. As Tatya spun out of the fireplace, Dorian stepped forward, ready to offer a supporting hand if she needed one. And, once she was steady, offered her a hug and a kiss on each cheek. He brought her over, introducing his mother and sister.
“Privet, Tatiana,” Émilie greeted her with a smile, “Dorian try to teach me more than this mais je ne me souviens jamais. He says I have no patience. But he says you also are like this,” she offered amicably, the implication in her own mind being that this adequately explained her lack of Russian whilst providing pleasant common ground.
“I did not say it like that,” muttered Dorian. He had long since held the opinion that Émilie and Tatya were near identical in their personalities. He had never before considered how wise it was to combine that with itself, and end up with two of them side by side.
“But you must have some,” Émilie continued, as if she had not heard her brother, “parce que tu parle français et zhōngwén, n’est pas?”
“Un peu, mamahuhu,” said Tatiana in response to the claim that she spoke French and Chinese. She raised an eyebrow at Dorian but otherwise let the claim that she had no patience pass; it was, after all, true. “Wode zhongwen buhao. Once I tell Dorya that good people drink bunny,” she offered, figuring this anecdote might be amusing to Émilie and help break the ice of unfamiliarity a bit.
“Oh no. No being bad to bunnies. That is the worst crime to Dorian. Is he very cross with you?” she asked laughingly.
“Nǐ shuō dé hǎo,” his mother smiled encouragingly, “Nǐ xiǎng hē chá ma?” she asked slowly and carefully, assuming that her son would have taught any friend of his such essential vocabulary as being offered tea, “Or some other refreshment?” she asked, switching to English as she was not sure the broader question would be so easy to understand.
“Wo xiǎng hē chá,” said Tatiana, smiling, as close to shyly as she got, at Madame Montoir. “Merci, Gospozha - Madame. Èluósī rén shuō ‘gospozha.’ Èluósī rén hē chá.” This was with a look of intense concentration, so she did not say ‘Russian people are in the air’ or something even more scrambled and off the mark instead of ‘Russian people say’ and ‘Russian people drink tea.’ Her accent didn’t, she think, allow for perfect tones, but she tried her best and hoped Madame Montoir would recognize the gesture of respect.
“Your Russian word is nice,” Dorian’s mother smiled, “I am happy if you like to call me like this.” People worried a lot about manners, and what to call each other, but she felt the intention behind the action was more important. She trusted Dorian’s friend to call her whatever was her own version of polite, and that would be easier for Tatiana than adopting a Chinese word and worrying she was using it wrongly, or feeling strange doing so. “Dorian says you like strong black tea, with sugar, yes?” she asked.
“Oui, s’il vous plait,” said Tatiana when her tea preference was described.
“She is…. Go- She is called that word. What am I?” Émilie asked curiously, as her mother went off to fetch tea.
She contemplated Émilie’s question. “I do not know,” she said slowly. “To be sure - We have name Emiliya. You are less big than me, so in home I would say Mila. You can say Tatya,” she added.
“Merci,” Émilie smiled, pleased at both receiving a nickname and permission to use the one she knew Dorian used for Tatiana.
They continued to exchange small talk (or rather a chaotic magpie mix of Émilie wanting to know this and that, and making jumps in topic which made no sense to Dorian but which seemed not to phase Tatya in the slightest) until Mrs. Montoir returned with a small tray. She liked to prepare the tea for her guests herself, to ensure it was done properly, and because choosing the right pot and the right leaves felt like a fine art. She had debated between teapots for a while. Part of her wanted to select one of her Xinjiang pots, as the far Western part of China bordered Russia and had the most potential for overlapping with something that was familiar to Tatiana. They were pretty enamel pots, one with flowers and one with geometric designs that she thought of as tending towards the European in their style. However, she knew how hard it was to get someone else’s culture right - there was probably a world of difference between her Western Chinese pots and what Tatiana thought of in her mind when she heard the word ‘teapot’ - to the extent that she might not even recognise the nod to her own origins. Instead, she had opted for a set with nice greens and blues in it, having noticed them in Tatiana’s necklace and, knowing from her son that the girl was fond of her jewellery. She knew that this too might go unnoticed by her guest, but it pleased her to feel that she had chosen well.
Tea selection had been a little problematic. It pained her to think of sugar being dumped into any of her blends. Of course, she could have not asked Tatiana what type of tea she wanted, and then picked a tea that fundamentally did not go with it, but that would have involved pointing out to the girl that it did not, and that the selection had been made to, essentially, manipulate her. That was not a kind thing to do under any circumstances and especially not via tea, which represented the utmost in being a civilised human being. It was also impolite not to let Tatiana choose her type of tea. In some ways, her choice mitigated itself. Some of the strong but plain black teas were amongst the lower classes of leaves she had - she would not have been able to serve Tatiana any such thing as bad tea, regardless of whatever butchery she planned to commit, both because it went against her morals to do such a thing to a guest, and because she simply did not own any tea that she regarded as such. Why would anyone?
“We can take tea outside,” she suggested, returning with the tray bearing its small pot, a jug of hot water to top up the pot, four small straight cups and the absolute anomaly of a sugar bowl, which had been charmed to match the rest of the set.
“Bei cha...c’est belle,” said Tatiana, stumbling over words as she tried to remember how to say ‘tea set’ in any language other than Russian, came up with what she was fairly confident was Chinese for ‘tea cup’, and then said it was beautiful in French, taking a guess at the grammatical gender of anything involved - in Russian, a tea glass was masculine, but ‘cup’ was feminine - whether she drank ‘chay’ or ‘chaya’ at home depended on the vessel. She hoped the gist got across, anyway, as she gratefully nodded to the suggestion they take tea outside and followed along - thank goodness tea was a universal language unto itself, and thank even more goodness that she was familiar with multiple ways of taking it now, so she thought she would struggle less once they were actually taking the tea. Not least because she could justify some silences by sipping.
“Xièxiè,” Dorian’s mother smiled. She was not so used to Tatiana style Chinese as her son was, and between the accent and the tendency of her tones to be all over the place, she was not entirely sure what had just been said. She thought the teaset was the most likely thing to be called ‘pretty’ but that was chájù. Her best guess would have been that she meant white tea was nice, which it indeed was, and that she just pronounced báichá strangely with that accent of hers, but they were not drinking white tea. But she recognised a compliment when she heard one, and effort when it was being put forth. Tatiana seemed like a lovely girl, and Mrs. Montoir was very keen on her sons bringing home lovely girls, and on not frightening them off.
Taking the tray, she led them out onto the terrace where they could take tea overlooking the lawn.
*
Tea with Mama had been rather amusing from Dorian’s perspective. He knew his mother’s different smiles, and recognised the fake and frozen one she used when in social situations that she was obliged to simply get through. This one had appeared as Tatiana deposited sugar into her tea. When Dorian and Tatiana took tea at school, he was more strict with her, and she seemed willing to strive for authenticity. He repaid the favour by letting her approximate Russian tea for him. To him, and he thought to her as well, it was as logical to correct each other and insist on the thing being done properly as it was to pick up on each other’s errors during language study. Often, they simply had tea together by doing so in parallel, each with their own version of the drink. He supposed it was different when Tatiana was a guest - in the same way that they did not overtly drill or correct each other in day to day conversation, though they might rephrase something the other had said. Day to day life operated by different rules than study sessions, and as this was the former, and she was a guest, Tatiana seemed to have the freedom to ruin tea. Outside of this, his mother’s smile had softened into its more genuine form, especially when Tatya tried out her Chinese, and they had talked pleasantly enough over their tea. He was fairly sure Mama thought well of her, in spite of the sugar.
“We shall take a walk in the garden?” he asked, once they had had their fill of tea, knowing both that Tatya was likely to enjoy it and that Matthieu (who often occupied the garden when he was at home) was safely out of the way at the park. This was met with agreement by both girls, and they prepared to leave the tea table.
“Nǐ de màozi!” Mrs. Montoir reminded her daughter in an exasperated tone, waving her wand so that a large sunhat flew out from the house and jammed itself firmly onto Émilie’s head. “Dorian’s nice friend does not forget putting on sunhat,” she pointed out, ignoring the fact that Tatiana had arrived holding the garment and been ushered straight outside, not really having an opportunity to neglect its use, “Tatiana not go around being a worry and getting bad skin. You follow good example, stop being xiăo huài dàn!”
Dorian, who was conveniently rubbing suntan potion onto his nose, was spared having to make eye contact with either his sister or Tatya, whom he was sure would be quite amused at being held up as a good example.
Émilie followed them down the steps to the lawn wearing her hat and a mullish expression.
Tatiana, trying to suppress a smile under her own sunhat - she was very bad about allowing them to fall off, so she was not a very good example, however it might look right now; it was hard not to laugh just at the idea of what expression her mama would have if she heard Tatiana, of all her daughters, called a good example to anyone - looked to Dorian. “What she call?” she asked, assuming she was botching tones again based on the two words she thought she recognized.. “Little egg what?”
“Little bad egg,” Dorian confirmed with a smile. “Good listening. It is… friendly insult? Mèimei is not really in trouble,” he added, aware that the level of insult carried by words was very difficult to read in a foreign language.
“Ce n'est pas si amical,” Émilie muttered, her choice of language partially habit and partially reflection of who she was annoyed at, even though their Mama was out of earshot. But the sulk slid from her face as rapidly as it had come, moods passing over it as clouds on a windy day, and having gained the freedom of the outside world and an interesting new companion, one about whom she had long been curious, she quickly brightened.
“Moya papa says I malen'kiy kolibri - many colors, is never quiet,” said Tatiana, nodding to the idea of a friendly insult. “Eh - je suis petit colibri, pardon - Russian not have ‘suis.’” Westerners apparently found this strange, though Tatiana judged them less for it since learning that Chinese didn’t have ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ Then French and Russian had almost the same word for hummingbird. Languages were so frustrating that no-one would ever, Tatiana thought, learn them if they weren’t also so interesting. “Moya sestra Katya, he just call ‘malen’kaya’ - this is just ‘petite.’ So j’aime petit colibri.” Small emeralds and sapphires on a pendant around her neck glittered as if to emphasize the point, contrasting with her much more outing-suited straw hat, shapeless, only slightly more than knee-length skirt, sensible shoes, and pullover thin tennis sweater. “What we do today?” she asked the siblings, looking between them.
“You may choose,” Dorian replied, “I thought maybe you would like to be outside, see around the garden. Inside we have music. Little Chinese books from when we are small, you may study if you wish.”
“Many photos of Dorian when he is small, you may study if you wish,” added Émilie with a cheeky smile. Dorian shrugged indifferently. The house had always been covered in photographs, and he was more than used to visitors being able to track their childhoods. He didn’t find the photos particularly embarrassing.