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jq37 · 5 years

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A Slight Miscalculation

Summary: In which Georg Accidentally Ruins Christmas and Does Damage Control (OR The One Where Amalia Does NOT Take the Reveal Well).

Don’t be fooled by the fact that I’m posting this right in time for the holiday season and think I’m on top of things in any way. I actually just got lapped by the entire rotation of the planet because this was supposed to be done like a year ago. So, really, the joke is on all of us.

I also posted this on Ao3 if you want proper formatting all the way through. Tumblr is just...you know.

In the end, it takes Georg three words to ruin Christmas. Or, if you take the long view, it takes him thousands of words followed by three words at the exact wrong time to the exact wrong person. Which is especially unfortunate because they were meant to be at the exact right time to the exact right person.

But the specifics don’t matter. All that matters is that Amalia is standing with her back to him in the middle of Maraczek’s, shoulders shaking. And for one, stupid, naive moment, he actually thinks it’s with excitement. He thinks she’s going to turn around, eyes shining and melt into him and kiss him and cue the violins.

That fantasy is quickly set aside when she turns slowly, meets his gaze, and reverses his declaration at him. “You’re Dear Friend?”

And that’s when Georg realizes two things: He has made a huge miscalculation and he has never actually seen Amalia truly angry before now.

Sure, he’s seen her upset. Really upset. Really really upset. But only ever over relatively small things like his teasing and...well mainly just that. It was always superficial anger, with shallow roots. If she’d really hated him as much as she’d seemed to, a small favor like bringing her ice cream and a few kind words wouldn’t have been enough to earn him a clean slate.

But now? Back at the Cafe Imperial, she’d wished the fires of hell onto him. Now, it feels like she’s about to personally fulfill that threat.

“I...ah--” He hasn’t prepared for this. He scrambles for a response before settling on answering her clearly rhetorical question. “Yes. I am.”

Amalia closes her eyes and presses her lips together in a tight...smile? Smirk? She taps her fingers against her lips and Georg thinks she’s gathering her thoughts. Tap, tap, tap. He braces for her response, but is caught completely off guard when she snatches her hat off of her head and chucks it at him.

“How dare you?”

Georg doesn’t bother to dodge the hat. “Amalia, I--”

“How long have you known?” she demands.

“Not the whole time. I--”

“How long, Georg?”

“Since the day at the Cafe,” he answers quickly. “I saw you through the window with the book and the rose and I put it together.”

His candor has the opposite of the intended effect on her. She crosses her arms and--yeah, it’s definitely a smirk. “Oh, I see. You saw me sitting there and you thought, ‘You know what would be hilarious?’”

His hands go up instinctually, as if he can physically shield himself from the accusations. “Amalia, no! I--”

“You thought, ‘I’ll get her defenses good and down.’”

“I didn’t--”

“‘I’ll pretend to be friendly with her.’”

“That wasn’t--”

“‘And right when she thinks we’re friends--’”

“We are friends!” he finally gets out. His first full sentence in what feels like ages and he can’t stop saying words because he feels like he won’t get another chance to speak if he does. “Of course we’re friends. Amalia, please, I just…” He can feel himself getting hysterical and he stops himself.

Amalia seizes the beat of silence.

“Do friends lie to each other?”

“Lie to you?” Sure he didn’t tell her about the letters but lie? “When did I--” His mind calls up the memories that answer his own question.

“He certainly seemed well fed,” he hears himself say. “That's not so unusual in a man his age.”

Mentally, he curses himself. “Why did I say that?”

“Why would you say that,” she almost echos, “except to tease me?”

“I--I was just--”

Amalia clicks her tongue at him. “Oh come on Georg. Or is it Dear Friend? I know you’re more eloquent than that.”

“A joke!” he finally gets out. “It was just supposed to be funny.”

“For who?” she explodes. “For the woman you just saw crying her eyes out? You have a sick sense of humor, you know that Mr. Nowack?” He winces at the deliberate use of his surname. “And to think. Tonight at dinner, I was going to…” She stops.

Georg waits a beat before asking, “Going to what?”

“I guess now you’ll never know will you?” She strides past him, going for the door but, with his long gait, he catches up quickly and reaches the door just a second after her.

“Amalia, wait!” He goes for the handle as she does and his hand lands atop hers. When she turns and glares at him, he jerks his hand away.

“You know,” she says, “after you came to see me, I thought to myself, ‘Say. Mr. Nowack sure has some similar opinions on classic literature to Dear Friend. Could he possibly be Dear Friend?’ And then I thought, ‘Amalia, you’re not being fair. Why would he not tell you after that pitiful display? No one’s that cruel.’” She laughs, but there’s no humor in the sound. “I stand corrected. Goodbye Georg,” she says with such an air of finality that it stops any attempts at an explanation or an apology dead in his throat.

And with that, she’s gone.

Georg locks up and then walks away. Not home. Just away from the shop and the backdrop of his big disaster and, he hopes, the voice in his head yelling, “YOU IDIOT,” at full volume but that doesn’t go away. He wonders if it ever will.

He’s been walking for a few minutes when he hears a cheery voice say, “Georg! You decided to join us after all.”

He looks up, startled, and sees Mr. Maraczek and Arpad. When he looks around and sees where he is, he realizes that he’s walked halfway to Webers without meaning to.

“I suppose I have,” Georg answers.

“Excellent,” says Mr. Maraczek. “The more the merrier. Though, and correct me if I’m mistaken, I thought you had plans with Ms. Balash.”

“I did,” Georg says, hating how pathetic he sounds.

“I see,” says Mr. Maraczek, knowingly. “Well, we’d better get inside. This sounds like a conversation that calls for wine. And lots of it.”

They order wine. Lots of it. And Georg describes the situation with Amalia. Belatedly, he realizes that Amalia might not want her coworkers to know any of the details of her love life, but at that point the deed has been done and he doesn’t think it’s possible for her to hate him more than she already does. As he finishes his third glass of wine, he feels like a terrible influence on Arpad, but he doesn’t stop Mr. Maraczek from pouring him another glass.

“Wow,” says Arpad. “She sounds really mad.”

Georg is tipsy enough that he finds that funny. “Arpad, mad would be an improvement.” Then he sighs. “She is never going to talk to me again.”

Mr. Maraczek slaps him on the back. “Don’t say that. We’re intelligent men. I’m sure between the three of us we can come up with a plan to help you out of your predicament.”

And, a glass and a half of wine later (Mr. Maraczek cuts him off after that), they have.

~.~

For the first time in her life, Amalia is glad when Christmas is over.

She usually loves to wrap herself in a cocoon of love and peace and goodwill towards men but, the way she’s feeling, it’s hard to not take every proclamation of Merry this and Happy that as a personal slight.

Of course, the relief is brief. Christmas ending means she has to go back to work which means she has to go back to seeing Georg--Mr. Nowack. She can’t think about him without either boiling over with rage or bursting into tears. Although, she has to admit that, now that the initial shock has worn off, she’s tending more towards tears.

Because, at the end of the day, she’s only really mad about one thing and sad about twelve. And by the time she has to go back to work, even the anger’s turned back towards herself. She berates herself as she trudges to her first day back to after the holidays. How could she be so stupid? So trusting? So naive? How could she invite a scorpion onto her back and then be surprised when she got stung? And now that he’s back in Mr. Maraczek’s good graces, he has more power than ever at work. Anything she might do or say would be--

Amalia stops short when she realizes that she’s reached her destination more quickly than she’d expected to. She shakes her head to clear it and does her best to make her face placid but not stony. Not calm enough for anyone to realize that it’s a careful, calculated mask.

When she looks up, mask in place, she notices what she didn’t before: the store is empty. The lights are out. The snow hasn’t been cleared. She tugs on the door handle to test it. Locked.

And then she notices something else. A pink envelope wedged in the door, about a foot above her eye level, as if someone significantly taller had put it there. Her mind supplies an explanation instantly but she refuses to believe it until she gets into her tiptoes to retrieve the letter and sees “Ms. Balash” written on the front in very familiar handwriting.

She immediately rips it into four neat pieces, throws the pieces onto the floor, and grinds them under her heel. But, as soon as her flash of anger dissipates, her curiosity overtakes her and, after glancing around to make sure no one is watching her, she crouches down, gathers up the letter pieces, and does her best to bring them together so that they’re readable.

Ms. Balash,

I know that’s not how I usually address your letters but I’m not sure if you see me as a non-combatant right now, let alone a friend.

That this letter is longer than the two words it takes to say, “I’m sorry” is terribly self indulgent of me so, if you want to stop reading and crumple up this letter after this next line, you’ll be well within your rights. I’m sorry.

I told you that I lied to you as a joke but, I’ve thought about it and I don’t think that’s why I did it. I think--no I’m sure. The reason I lied to you is that I wanted to see how you’d react to Dear Friend not being what you expected. I thought that if you could handle him being old and bald and fat then maybe you could come around to him being me.

It still wasn’t right. I never should have done it, especially since I could see how emotionally vulnerable you were. But I hope you believe me when I say I wasn’t being intentionally cruel.

Now, as you can see, the shop is closed today. I convinced Mr. Maraczek to keep it closed one more day to give us all an extra day to recover from the holidays. Don’t worry about missing a day of work. I’ve made sure you’ll still get paid for today, out of my salary. It’s the least I can do.

Your day is free so I hope you enjoy it. Catch up on your sleep. Take a walk. Burn me in effigy. Whatever makes you happy. And, on the off chance you despise me even slightly less than the last time we spoke, I left something for you at the library. It was supposed to be your Christmas present but I ruined that. Still, you should have it, if you want it. The fact that I was terrible shouldn’t deprive you of a present.

Again, I am so sorry.

Very Sincerely,

Georg Nowack

She reads it through three times like she thinks the words are going to change on the page.

If it wasn’t clear that Georg was Dear Friend before, it is now. This letter is a perfect blend of the letters she’s been reading for months and the kinder, gentler (devious, traitorous) version of Georg she’s been getting since after the night at the cafe. She’s almost mad at herself for not trusting her instincts and fully putting it together herself. She wants to be mad at Georg too but, based on the amount of self-flagellation in the letter, he’s doing a better job at that than her.

At the thought, she pauses and frowns. Why is she taking the letter at face value? He’s been lying to her for weeks. Why would this suddenly be the truth?

And yet, she can’t help feeling genuineness from each word on the crumpled, torn up page. As much as she had wanted to cast Georg as a Machiavellian mastermind in the days following his confession, once she’d calmed down she had to admit that there was no way he could have orchestrated the entire series of events solely to humiliate her. Which meant that the letters he’d sent before he found out at least must have been genuine. And this one feels just as real.

Which does nothing to help her sort out her feelings.

A cold blast of air makes her pull her coat closer around her and she remembers that she’s standing outside in the middle of winter which is less than ideal. She has to get inside.

“The library is inside,” a part of her brain helpfully suggests. And, for some reason, she can’t think of a single counter argument to that statement even though there are a dozen places she could stop between where she is and the library, including her own house.

It doesn’t help that she’s curious, in spite of herself.

So she walks down the street, across the bridge, and past the Metropole Cinema until she finds herself standing in front of the impressive facade of the public library. She usually finds the building elegant but, for some reason, it feels a touch imposing as she enters.

Once she’s inside, she realizes that Georg’s note didn’t actually say where in the library he’d left the gift. She’s about to check it again to see if she missed something when someone calls her name from the reception desk.

When she looks up, she sees John--a librarian--flagging her down at the check out desk. John only started working at the library a few months ago--about the same time she started at Maraczek’s--but she’s visited the library and chatted with him often enough that they’re on a first name basis.

“Hello John,” she says, momentarily forgetting her task. “How was the holiday?”

“Great. You?”

“Ah...it was fine.” She knows her skills at lying leave something to be desired so she moves on quickly. “John, did someone happen to leave a package--” Before she can finish, he pulls a wrapped box from under the desk and presents it to her.

“For me,” she finishes belatedly, taking the box. “Thank you.”

Someone comes over to check out a book so Amalia moves off to the side to open the package. It’s wrapped in the same way they’ve learned to wrap boxes for work. Same paper too. Amalia can almost picture Georg in the back room, cutting the paper, tying the ribbon, hiding the box until Christmas Eve…

She shakes her head and rips through the wrapping.

She’d been half-expecting a book, even though the weight of the package wasn’t right. But that’s not it. When she tears away the wrapping paper, she can see that she’s holding a stationary set. The outside of the wooden box is engraved with a stylized A, for Amalia she guesses. Inside the box are sheets of pink paper, envelopes, a fountain pen, an inkwell (and, for some reason, a book of matches?), all designed to not just be functional, but beautiful. It’s nicer than anything she could ever justify buying for herself, but the exact thing she would look at wistfully in a shop window.

Amalia thumbs through the paper in the set, looking for an accompanying letter or note, but she doesn’t find one. She finds herself oddly disappointed. Not that she particularly wants to hear anything from Georg right now--despite the beautiful gift--but she’d been expecting it. That was it. She’d just been expecting it.

She gathers up the wrapping paper and goes to tell John goodbye. Or, at least, that’s her intention. When she opens her mouth, the words that fall out are, “Did the person who left this leave a note or a letter or--”

Again, before she can finish her thought, John’s hand reaches under the desk and comes up with an item. This time, it is a book.

“Or something.” Amalia takes a good look at John. He looks full to bursting with excitement. In fact, he’s almost vibrating. She narrows her eyes. “John, what’s going on?”

“Nothing,” he says, nudging the book towards her. He’s almost as bad of a liar as she is.

“Then why are you shaking?”

“It’s January? The library is drafty?”

“Hmm,” she says unconvinced, but she takes the book from him. It’s a copy of Treasure Island and, sticking out, is another letter. She wonders why John would choose to store the letter in that particular book as she slides the envelope out and opens it.

Dear Ms. Balash,

John was under strict instructions to only give you this letter if you specifically asked for it but I know he can get ahead of himself so, if that’s the case, feel free to burn this.

(She remembers the out of place matches and smiles, slightly.)

In any case, this is the present I meant to give you on Christmas Day. I thought about getting you a book--maybe a first edition of one of your favorites--but I know how attached I get to my old, well-worn copies so I decided to go in a different direction.

I hope you enjoy this set, no matter who you choose to correspond with in the future.

And, for the record, I would have put one of those ridiculous “candy boxes” on my mantle if you’d given it to me. Really.

Speaking of candy, I left something for you at the candy shop near the park if you want to pick it up. It should be done by the time you get there, if you choose to. If not, I want to offer you a very belated Merry Christmas and another sincere apology.

Very Sincerely,

Georg Nowack

By the time she gets to the end, she realizes that the choice of book to hold the letter in wasn’t random. It was part of the message. A letter that sent her to a location which yielded another letter with another location. It’s a kind of treasure hunt and he’s letting her know upfront.

It seems...planned. Well, obviously it’s planned. These things don’t just materialize from thin air. But it’s more than that. There’s a certain preciseness to the actions. To not having John present her with the letter before she asked for it. To not just leaving the gift at her door when he knows where she lives.

He's giving her space, she realizes. Giving her complete control over how much or how little she has to interact with him, even indirectly. It's careful. It's measured. It's…thoughtful. Her mind almost trips over the word. Thoughtful. Sure it's thoughtful, but to what end? "Well?" John asks, bringing her out of her thoughts. "Huh?" "Well, what are you going to do?" She looks at the note again before tucking it into her coat pocket and turning to leave. "Goodbye John." She ignores his cajoling pleas for information as she heads out the door and towards the candy shop. When she talks to the woman at the counter, she produces a box of chocolates. "Custom made," she says, conspiratorially. Amalia opens the box and sees that the chocolates inside are indeed customized with her initials on each one: AB.

Before she even tastes one of the chocolates, she asks for the letter she’s almost certain came with the package. The woman hands it over and Amalia reads it as she pops one of the chocolate pieces into her mouth.

Dear Ms. Balash,

I know you like sweets and even you have to admit that it’s a little cold for ice cream right now so this is the next best thing.

This should be enough chocolate to last even you the time it will take to get to the next location. If you recall, I owe you a significant amount of wine.

Truly,

Georg Nowack

There are two places he could have bought her wine in town, but only one of them is near her apartment and she bets that that’s the place he would have picked. It will give her a chance to drop the bottle off at home before she goes on to the next location.

The next location.

She feels a shiver of excitement. Or maybe it’s the cold. Either way, she’s honest enough with herself that she can admit that she’s at least curious to see how far this goes.

The answer to that question turns out to be, pretty far. For the next two hours, she’s sent from one side of the city to the other, finding letters, some left with people, some wedged someplace conspicuous and marked with her name or her initials: AB. Usually attached to some kind of small gift or trinket. Nothing as fancy as the stationary set. Nothing that can be mistaken for a bribe.

At first, they all start the same: Dear Ms. Balash. But then, the one at the cinema starts: Dear Amalia. The next couple are like that. And then she gets to the flower shop.

By now, it’s late afternoon. When she walks in, still holding the pink envelope from the last location, the man behind the counter sees it, smiles, and immediately hands her a single rose, attached to an envelope. She takes it and thanks the man, but she’s thrown. So far, she’s had to ask for almost every letter. Why would this one be different?

But then, she opens it and she knows. It’s the shortest one yet. Only four lines.

Dear Friend,

Dinner at 8?

Yours,

Georg

In hindsight, she should have seen it coming. A do-over, with her in the driver’s seat this time. It’s the most natural endpoint for this game they’re playing.

She twirls the rose between her fingers, careful not to prick herself on the thorns. Dinner at 8. Dinner at 8.

~.~

Georg waits. He waits all day in fact. Once everything is set up there's nothing to do but wait, first at home and then at the cafe. He gets there a full hour before the time Amalia is supposed to meet him. Or not meet him. One or the other. He honestly has no idea how his plan is going. He thought about following behind her and asking his co-conspirators for updates, but it would defeat the entire purpose of giving Amalia space. And, besides, he made Amalia wait for him until closing without any idea of what was going on. This is the very least he can suffer by way of penance. He happens to run into the head waiter when he walks in--literally run into him, making the waiter spill an armful of menus and Georg drop his copy of Anna Karenina. Georg makes an attempt at hiding his face with his hat when he remembers the last conversation with the fussy waiter, but when the man picks up the book and sees the wilted rose tucked into it, recognition sparks in his eyes, and that's before he even looks at Georg's face. When he does, he shakes his head and pulls the rose front the book. "We can do better than this," he says, before replacing his rose with a fresh one from a display. "There. And no running off this time. Or yelling." He leaves Georg slightly confused about the depth his knowledge about his love life and very grateful that he hasn't been put on some kind of no service list. He gets seated, orders wine, and resists pouring himself more than a single glass. Even when Amalia doesn't show up at 8. Or 8:15. Or 8:30. Georg is about to resign himself to closing out the night with the staff when finally, finally she shows up, practically at the stroke of 9. She’s wearing his rose in her hair and Georg thinks that he would gladly deal with the inflated winter rose prices all season if it meant she would always wear them like that.

As she approaches the table, he awkwardly gets up to pull her chair out. In his haste, he bangs the table with his knees and makes the silverware clatter. He quickly pulls out her chair before he causes more chaos and summons the head waiter.

For her part, Amalia ignores his clumsiness and takes the seat. He hurries over to the other side of the table and sits. Carefully.

They sit in silence for a few moments. Georg thinks up and discards about a dozen openers before Amalia speaks.

“I got here on time you know.” He doesn’t know how to respond to that, so he doesn’t.

“Stroke of 8,” she continues. “And I watched you. Through the window. On and off for an hour.”

“To punish me,” he says, hanging his head. “I deserved it.”

“No. Well, yes. But no it wasn’t to punish you. I wanted you to know how it felt. Sitting. Waiting. Not knowing whether I would show or not. I was going to make you wait longer but...I didn’t have the heart.” She pours herself a glass of wine, takes a sip and then says, “I won’t lie to you. Today was fun. I had a lot of fun. But I have to know. What exactly was your goal here?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, was this an apology and nothing else or do you have ulterior motives? Because I feel a little like a frog in a pot of boiling water right now.” That makes two frog metaphors in one day, she notes and, before she can ascribe any meaning to that, Georg quickly cuts in.

“It’s nothing like that. We just--”

“We?”

He pulls a face before saying, “Mr. Maraczek and Arpad helped me to come up with this plan. The idea was to give you space. You could go as far as you wanted to, or not at all. I wanted to invite you to dinner right away but Mr. Maraczek suggested some kind of buffer and Arpad suggested chocolates. Considering what happened last time I invited you to dinner, I thought they had a point so…” He holds out his hands in a “ta-da” gesture. “This is what I came up with.”

He looks so awkward, Amalia thinks. He doesn’t know if he should drop his hands or not so they just hang there, uselessly, as he half smiles, half grimaces. It’s so pathetic it’s almost adorable. She feels the strong urge to put him out of his misery.

She reaches across the table and hits him.

“Ow!” he says, more out of surprise than anything else. The swat was pointed, but weak. “What was that for?”

“If you were going to play games with me before you told me, why weren’t they like this, huh? Something nice that didn’t leave me second guessing our entire relationship. Relationships, plural. And now that I know you were going to-- ” She abruptly stops.

Georg waits for a second before pushing. “I was going to?”

She seems to weigh her options for a few moments before saying. “I know you were going to propose.”

“Yes,” he says, too surprised to dance around it. “Did Ladislav--?”

She shakes her head. “I didn’t know for sure until just now, but I figured it out earlier. Everything you arranged for today was marked with my full initials. AB. Amalia Balash. But the stationary set you bought earlier only had an A, for Amalia. If I changed my last name, the monogram would be wrong." He stares at her for a few seconds, eyes going soft. “What?”

“We’re here. We’re talking. You’re smart and gorgeous and not yelling at me. This is how our date could have gone if I hadn’t ruined it.”

Amalia snorts, gracelessly. “No, it wouldn’t have. If you hadn’t ruined it, I would have. I wasn’t exactly your biggest fan at the time, if you remember.”

“And now?”

She raises her glass to her lips and takes a sip. A long sip. A very long--

“You’re enjoying this aren’t you.”

“A little,” she admits, with a small smile. “See? Teasing, fine. Keeping crucial information away from me for two weeks while I have an existential crisis? Bad. You might want to write that down for future reference.”

Future reference?

“Does that mean...are we...did you...is this a clean slate?”

“No.” Georg’s spirits sink until she adds, “That would be starting from scratch. I don’t want to start from scratch. I like you Georg. More than like you. In fact, I was seriously considering picking you over Dear Friend at dinner. You know, because of the lying. And then you told me and it sent me in a tailspin but it wouldn’t have if I didn’t like you. A lot. I mean, you’ve read my letters.”

“And you’ve read mine. So, what do we do now?”

Silence.

And then, violin music.

From the other side of the room, the head waiter catches Georg’s eye and winks.

“Well,” says Amalia. “I say we finish this bottle of wine. Then we order another one and drink that. And then we go from there. How does that sound?” She reaches a hand across the table and, for just a second, he sees a trace of uncertainty flash across her face. He can’t tell if it’s uncertainty in herself, in him, a combination.

It doesn’t matter. He takes her hand without pause, hesitation, or thought.

“Music to my ears.”

#she loves me #amalia balash #georg nowack #here's my yearly addition to the tag #s/o to amaliabalash who has been reading this in short bursts for like a whole ass year now #sorry my writing schedule follows no rhyme or reason #anyway #I constantly say that Georg got INSANELY lucky that amalia took everything so well #she could have been FURIOUS #he pushed it pretty freaking close #the fact that he got off w/ zero grovelling is honestly kind of miraculous #also head waiter wingman #that kinda just happened #it wasn't part of my outline in my head but as soon as I started writing that scene #shrug #it felt right

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