An Odyssey

Ulysses was tired, and it was only 3pm, local time. He was very far from home and he was jet-lagged. It was already the third day of his business trip but his body and mind still hadn't caught up to him. Despite that, with the powers of coffee and confidence combined, work was going well. He'd already given his presentation twice, and by his count he'd only made a handful of minor mistakes.

He would have liked nothing more than to head back to his rental for a nap. If Ulysses worked for a big fancy corporation, he would have a crisp, modern hotel room close to downtown. Instead, he worked for a start-up that was not yet big or fancy. (That's part of why he was halfway across the world in the first place. Gotta make those connections. Get a foot in the door. Shake some hands) The best his boss could afford for an extended stay abroad was a quaint AirBnB located a short cab-ride outside the city limits. It was nice enough - it was actually pretty cozy - but it didn't come with wi-fi, and the cell service was less than reliable. Ulysses had one appointment left for the day, and he was going to need a stable connection.

A bell jingled as Ulysses opened the Starbucks door. Nobody turned to look. A small crowd was impatiently waiting for their drinks around the counter, while the dining area was practically empty. The line to the register was long, but Ulysses didn't mind. He needed the time to put together the words to order a venti flat white, sub coconut milk, with two pumps of hazelnut syrup and two of vanilla in a language he'd only been studying for a month. Behind the register was a lanky young person in a green apron with an expressionless face. Their hair was parted in such a way that their right eye was completely hidden behind long bangs. The left eye was emphasized by heavy black eyeliner. Ulysses wondered for a moment whether this person bothered to make up both of their eyes if only one would show.

"Yes?" they said flatly.

He blurted out a long phrase that he was 85% sure accurately described his favorite drink. The employee didn't react. After an uncomfortable pause, Ulysses tried again, this time incorporating gestures and pulling up images on the Starbucks app. The employee flared their nostrils and began writing on a venti cup. They had just been messing with him, apparently.

Ulysses joined the crowd at the end of the counter and waited for his drink. And waited for his drink. After a few minutes, he realized the employee never asked for his name. He took a deep breath and starting mentally repeating his order so he'd hear it when they called it out. More minutes passed. Customer after customer grabbed their drinks and scurried out the door, opening up spaces for new bodies to occupy. Eventually, Ulysses heard something resembling his order. He looked around and didn't see anyone else moving to grab the drink, so he snatched it up.

"Hey!" It was the employee with the bangs. "No. Not your drink." They urgently gestured for Ulysses to put it back on the counter. He did so, and put up his hands in apology. Ulysses was flustered. It would have been hard for him to find words in English to navigate the situation, let alone the local language. The employee stared him down, and Ulysses decided it was time to find a seat. He could try for his drink again in a minute.

Ulysses found a table and began to set up his laptop. There was still some time before his scheduled call, and he'd planned to spend it sipping espresso and catching up on the news. But before he could settle in, a burly man wearing a black apron approached. The manager loomed over the little table with crossed arms.

"You were rude to my worker."

Ulysses blinked. "What?"

"You gave my worker a hard time. I don't tolerate rudeness here."

"I didn't do anything!" Ulysses looked around for the employee from earlier. They were standing some distance away, watching. Their eyeliner was running, but their nostrils flared again above a slight smirk. They made a brief "boo-hoo" gesture.

Ulysses looked the manager in the face. "Look, I don't know what that kid's problem is --"

"No problem."

"-- but I don't want any trouble."

"Good. Then leave." The manager stepped aside as if to show him the path to the door.

Ulysses didn't have time for this, and he was pretty sure this guy could kick his butt if he really wanted to. He put the laptop back in his bag and left without another word.

---

His search for public wi-fi and an electrical outlet didn't go well. The other cafes in the area were small businesses that didn't stay open as late as an international chain like Starbucks. If anyone still needed a coffee this late in the day, Starbucks was the way to go. Ulysses tried asking at a few restaurants, but the language barrier was a problem. The few people who figured out what he was asking turned him down. One doesn't just go to a local eatery and camp out with a computer around here.

The minutes ticked by, and Ulysses was starting to lose hope. He wasn't exactly a social butterfly. All of this running around trying to communicate with strangers in a strange land was seriously draining. At the same time, the thought of missing this call was daunting. Should he keep forcing himself through the awkward, broken conversations with strangers who couldn't care less? Would it be easier to admit defeat?

Ulysses tried to quell the panic welling up in his gut. He leaned against a wall and closed his eyes. He was between a rock and a hard place. Between the devil and the deep blue sea. Between Scylla and Charybdus. Between --

"Something wrong, mister?"

Ulysses nearly jumped out of his skin. It was a little girl, maybe 6 or 7 years old. She wore denim overalls with the legs rolled up to the knees. Her legs were dirty from a busy day of play. She held her hands behind her back and rocked on the heels of her sneakers.

"You okay?" she asked again.

"Long day, and I really need to get online to take a call."

The girl tilted her head.

Ulysses couldn't tell whether or not she'd understood. He tried a few words in her language before falling back into English. "I need Internet. Wi-fi? Do you know where?"

She lit up. "Oh, wi-fi! Yeah."

He could hardly believe it. "Wi-fi? Where? Can you show me?"

The girl nodded and motioned for him to follow. She started at a run, but seeing that Ulysses didn't try to match her pace, she decided to skip instead. They walked for several blocks. Some of the streets he'd already been down. Ulysses began to get anxious that perhaps the kid was lost, or taking a long way around for fun.

Eventually, they came to a small playground in what had once been an empty lot. The girl skipped over to a jungle gym and threw her hands up with a, "tada!"

Ulysses waited for an explanation. He didn't realize he was holding his breath.

"This is our house! We have wi-fi."

"Our house...?"

"Uh-huh! You're the husband, and I'm the wife, so you have to do what I say. And this is the kitchen. And this is..." She climbed around to different parts of the playground equipment describing the layout of the "house."

Ulysses had stopped listening. He checked his watch. It was nearly 4:30, local time, which meant it was getting late back home. And for the second time today, he let a kid prevent him from making his call. Granted, this little girl wasn't malicious, probably, but still. It felt as if some gods out there were conspiring against him, and Ulysses was at a loss.

At that moment, a car parked on the road behind him. A woman got out of the car and headed straight for the child. "Callie!" Ulysses didn't understand a word of the lecture that followed, but he could guess. He'd probably flip out if his kid ran off to keep some stranger captive, playing "house." It was a pretty harsh scolding. Callie pouted and sniffled a little, prompting the woman to hug her.

The woman led the girl by the hand back to the car and put her in the back seat. She turned to Ulysses and began what sounded like an explanation or an apology. Ulysses was running on empty and he just nodded blankly. After a moment, the woman caught on. "Oh. Do you speak English?" Her accent was thick, but she seemed as comfortable in one language as the other.

"Yeah. Yes," Ulysses managed to say.

They introduced themselves. The woman's name was Minerva, and she was Callie's mother. She laughed a tired-mom laugh and apologized for any trouble her runaway child caused. Ulysses assured her that he understood. Her demeanor put him at ease, at least enough to vent. He gave her a summary of his afternoon adventure in search of an Internet connection to make an important call.

Minerva nodded. "I'm not surprised. The manager at that Starbucks is..." she shrugged and lowered her voice. "He's kind of a racist asshole." The frank assessment put a smile on Ulysses' face. "I can give you a lift, if you don't mind. There's another Starbucks in another part of town. It should still be open but it's too far to walk after the day you've had."

Ulysses accepted, with a huge sigh of relief.

---

Another bell jingled as Ulysses opened another Starbucks door. This store was less crowded than the previous one, but still fairly busy. Ulysses found a table, unpacked the laptop, plugged it in, and sunk into a chair. He felt eyes on him. Turning his head, he made eye-contact with a woman in a black apron. He pulled up the Starbucks app on his phone and turned it to show her, to indicate that he was going to order from his phone. He gave a questioning thumbs-up, and the manager returned the gesture.

A few minutes later, the same manager politely delivered the drink to his table. Ulysses made a mental note to hit the tip jar on the way out.

He connected his headset and clicked on a name. Penelope. The "phone" rang in his ear.

A beautiful woman in a nightgown answered the call, groggily. "Hey, honey! Jesus. Do you know what time it is? I literally just fell asleep."

"I know, and I am so sorry. You wouldn't believe the day I've had."

Penelope yawned and straightened up in bed. "I was starting to think you weren't gonna call tonight."

Sipping his hot espresso and taking in the smile of his lovely wife, Ulysses felt like a new man. "I wouldn't miss this for the world."