Beautiful Beast (Gypsy Heroes)

‘You’ll regret it.’

Laughing, I follow him to his kitchen. It is done up in warm tones of honey and yellow.

‘What will you have to drink? Milk? Juice? Water?’

‘Juice will be nice.’

‘Orange, apple, or—Liliana’s favorite—mango crush.’

‘I’ll try the mango crush then.’

He takes a glass out of a cupboard and pours a thick orange-red liquid into it.

A cat comes to rub its face on my legs. ‘You have a cat,’ I exclaim, surprised.

‘Yup. That’s Suki,’ he says, scooping rice into an opaque plastic cup. He pours it into a silver colander.

‘Do you need some help?’ I offer.

‘Let’s get the rules clear right from the start. This kitchen is my domain,’ he states.

‘Good, because I can’t cook to save my life,’ I say.

Sipping my drink, I watch him rinse the rice under the tap, drain it, and pour it into a pot. He pours bottled water onto it, salts it, puts a lid on it, and leaves it to cook.

‘You sounded happy when you rang my bell,’ he says, fishing out a live lobster from a pail of water with ice cubes floating in it.

‘I was,’ I say distractedly as I stare at the lobster. Its claws are tied, but all its little legs are waving frantically. ‘I mean, I am. I received some good news this morning.’

He picks up a big knife and puts the lobster on the chopping board. ‘Yeah?’

My eyes widen with horror. ‘You’re not going to kill that lobster and eat it, are you?’

His hands still. He looks up at me. ‘Yes, why?’

I puff air out of my lips. ‘I mean, it’s alive. Wouldn’t you feel bad to eat something you’ve killed with your own hands?’

He rubs his jaw with the edge of the fist that is holding the knife. ‘Don’t you eat lobster?’

‘Yes,’ I admit uncomfortably, ‘but I couldn’t eat it if I saw it alive a few minutes before.’

He laughs. ‘We all have to die, Snow. This guy has had a good life at the bottom of the ocean, and I’m giving him a quick death. I wish my death could be so quick.’

‘I just can’t get my head around it.’

He grins. ‘That’s because you’re a hypocrite, Snow. You’ll eat it after someone else kills it for you, arranges it neatly on a Styrofoam tray, pulls a bit of cling film over it, and sticks it on a supermarket shelf.’

‘Afraid so.’

‘Right. Look away now. I’m about to say his last rites.’

I turn my head and hear a crack then a squelching noise before the knife hits the chopping board. I turn back, and the lobster has been neatly halved lengthwise. Some of its legs are still waving. Then they all slowly stop. Something about its still body makes me remember when I wanted revenge so bad I wanted to kill, and not just a lobster, but human beings. When I could have killed with a song in my heart.

‘Shane?’

He looks up at the different tone in my voice. ‘What?’

‘Could you kill a human being?’