Progress

I was making good progress over the next few days, but was it enough?

"Goden Morgen," I said as the first sunlight hit the bedroom. Nela mumbled something, still asleep. I let her be, and instead, went through the room again, mumbling sentences to myself.

"Ik bün waak," I said. I am awake.

"Ik stah hier." I stand here.

I stretched.

"Vagel." Bird.

"See.” Ocean.

"Sünnlicht." Sunlight.

"Baven, nedden, rechts, links." Up, down, right, left.

"Bitte, danke, hallo, tschüss." Please, thank you, hello, goodbye.

I took a big, indulgent bath before I got ready to meet Meike in the kitchen. Just when I was at the door, I turned around to Nela once more. She looked peaceful, surrounded by her pillows. I smiled, and burned the image into my memory. Something has to give me strength through the day, I thought.

"Tschüss," I whispered. "Bit later."

I knew 'Bit later' meant something like 'see you later', but I couldn't exactly match the words. There were still some phrases that I understood—through context and Nela's explanations—but I didn't truly understand how it all worked. I stretched, and went down the halls.

Nela was truly strange. Most people were already awake, working in the first few hours of sunlight, so that they could enjoy an early evening. Nela was the first night owl that I encountered here.

By now, people actually ignored me. Sure, there were still some that stared at me, but those I could ignore myself. I had better things to do. But being able to almsot go through life undetected was great. I slipped into the kitchen, and went to our usual meeting point.

Meike was already there, her arms crossed, and staring at me as if she had been waiting hours for me. I closed the door behind me. For today, I would try to speak as much as I could.

"Let us start," she said.

It was getting easier to match the words, to understand what she said. Which, I was sure, was also because she tried to match my level of understanding.

"Alright," I answered.

As long as the sentences were easy, and said with proper speed and pronunciation, I was getting better at understanding her and Nela. Still, my head spun with everything I had to learn in these past few days.

I never put in this much effort at school, I thought. But I guess this is a hidden talent of mine?

I would have never guessed that I would be able to speak another language this quickly. Well, it wasn't really speaking it—just parroting what I heard. But that was still better than doing nothing.

Meike tapped on the table. "Begin."

I took a deep breath.

"First, the Vorspuppelöffel," I said, pointing at the second smallest spoon. "For the Vorsuppe."

Meike nodded, and I relaxed, but only a little. This was a test, after all. One I had failed too many times already.

But I was getting the first few motions down. Just why did a dinner have to be so formal? When Nela and I ate our dinner, you could be happy if we even used cutlery. I blushed at the thought. Maybe I shouldn't compare that to a formal dinner, I thought.

"Focus," she reprimanded me.

"I'm sorry," I said, and Meike rolled her eyes.

Right. She didn't want to hear how sorry I was, she wanted to see my progress with this. I took a deep breath and refocused.

I made it through the Vorspeisen, or starters, without much hassle, but then the main courses came. Here was where I struggled the most.

"And then, uhhh..."

I looked between two forks. I had to decide. One was for now, the other for later. But which one was which?

"This one." I pointed at the bigger one.

"Wrong." Meike shook her head. "Again."

I sighed, and pointed at the other one. "This one?"

Meike shook her head again. "Wrong."

Huh. Did I really mess up this badly? I pointed to a third one. "This one." That had to be it.

She shook her head again, and I could see on her face the same frustration that grew in me.

"What?" I asked in lieu of "which one", which escaped me in the moment.

"Here. This." Meike pointed at the remaining fork.

I rolled my eyes. Well, that would have been the next one I would have pointed to!

"Urgh, this is doch hööplos," she muttered.

Great, and now she used words I didn't understand. That made it so much better, clearly.

"I don't understand," I shot back.

It was probably the sentence I knew best by now. There was so much I still didn't understand - not only when it came to dinner etiquette. I was working hard, but for some reason, Meike only saw my mistakes. She glared at me, but by now, the expression had lost its effectiveness. Now it only annoyed me, instead of intimidating me.

"Du büst so nutzlos," she said, "Kannst di nix marken un dat sünd al teihn Daag vergangen! Du warrst Prinzessin Nela bloot stellen, wenn dat so geiht. Ik verstah nich, wat se in di sütt., du Dööskopp."

I narrowed my eyes at her. She could insult me all she wanted, but dragging Nela into this was really too far. And what was a Dööskopp? It sounded like an insult, but I didn't know how severe it was. We were locked in a glaring match as suddenly the door burst open.

"Hallo!"

Nela strode in with a tablet of food in her hands. "I got you food. You have to be quite hungry."

She set it down on an unoccupied corner of the table and sat down. "Na, how is it going?"

Meike and I looked at her, and answered at the same time.

"Good."

"Bad."

Nela laughed. "I don't believe you, Meike. Leo is doing great!"

But Meike shook her head. "Today, he schon wieder die forks vertauscht! Wie gestern und vorgestern auch!" She shook her head. "Das ist kein Fortschritt, das macht mich nur wütend."

I glared right back at her. "I'm doing my best."

Nela smiled at me, as if she trusted every word I said. It was nice to know that I had at least one person believe in me. I sat down at the table, grabbed a fork, and started to eat.

"Thank you," I told her.

"No problem. Übrigens, I spoke with my brother."

I nodded. That had been her plan, but I still wasn't sure why he would help me. But Nela beamed at me as if everything had cleared up. "He will help us!"

"Thank you,” I said once again.

"Oh!" Nela looked outside, and got up. "I have to go!"

She waved at us, before vanishing. I knew she had a lot of responsibilities herself, but I still wished that we could spend more time together.

After that engagement party is over, I thought. We will have all the time in the world. And then we can game as much as we want.

But for that, I had to give my best. I lowered the fork, and looked at Meike.

"I know," I said, thinking for a moment, "You don't like me. That's okay. But..." I stopped again, thinking of the words. "I like Nela. You like Nela. Please, be good."

I wish I knew more to say "don't be an ass" but I hoped I got my message across. Meike looked like she wanted to say something, but she nodded.

"You are right. I like Nela. You like Nela," she said, repeating my words back at me, "Also lass uns das jetzt nochmal üben. Es muss perfekt sein bis zur Verlobungsfeier."

I groaned. "perfekt" didn't sound like something I could achieve in that timeframe, but I would give my best.

We started with the forks again.