Holding her hand out for a cigarette, which Sam so graciously passed to her, along with the matchsticks, she took a long drag, the smoke temporarily obscured her face behind a thin white veil. Then, she sighed as she exhaled, the smoke curling above her head and blending in with the forming cloud of cigarette smoke. She knew Sam was right, and it hurt to swallow her pride.

“What did you expect me to say? To sit back and take it like I'm some damned whore? How was I supposed to react? Because I would have rather put his bloody eye out with my steak knife than listen to him prattle on about how he's going to make me choke on his cock.” She spat angrily, trying to keep her voice low so as the guests in her flat wouldn't overhear.

“You're right, Sam. Maybe I did react out of line. Maybe, just maybe, if things get worse, we’ll have to put me outside of city limits.”

       Meanwhile, as Silas shifted nervously, he finally took a seat in a lounge chair near the fireplace, rubbing his hands together in earnest than the need for warmth. On occasion, his aunt would mumble something under her breath, sometimes Silas would translate, and the other times he would turn red around the ears. On one such event, Silas blurted out her apparent question.

“Ah, she wants to know if Vera and you… are together? She says this place smells like passion.” To which his aunt, looked up with a smile on her lips and patted Shay’s freshly bandaged shoulder.

“Look Sam, why don't you give me some time alone to myself until we visit the Von Goethe's? Maybe my nerves will calm after the pipe...and thank you for that, the pipe I mean. I know it was too dangerous to go back so soon to my flat. So… Thank you.”