A Trespass in Time Read Online Free PDF Page A

“What time is it there?”
                “Three in the afternoon.”
                “Wow. It’s nine here. My day is already over.”
                “How was it?”
                “My German is so bad, Rowan. I found a very cool little grocery store around the corner but that bit about how everyone in Germany speaks English is a lie.”
                “Well, that’s partly why you’re there, isn’t it? To not speak English?”
                “Yeah. It’s just a little uncomfortable in practice. Plus, I didn’t expect to miss you so much.”
                “Wow, thanks a lot,” he said. “Me, I knew it was going to suck.”
                “I think about you all the time,” she said. “When I’m not trying to figure out how to cross the street. They do it differently here.”
                “Well, you know it’ll get easier with time.”
                “The streets or missing you?”
                “Both.”
                “I hope so,” she said. “I hate feeling this way.”
                “What way?”
                “Needy.”
     
                The next day, she rode the tram to her office in the center of town.
                The office building her work was in was a modern one with wide sweeping staircases blanketed in marble studding an expansive lobby. The building was new and modern, and her office was on the third floor. She got off the elevator to be greeted by a large sign welcoming her by name: Willkommen, Ella Stevens .
                That’s nice , she thought as she walked to the receptionist’s desk. A beautiful woman with long blonde hair looked up and smiled.
                “You must be Ella Stevens,” she said.
                “I am,” Ella said, smiling back at her.
                “I am Heidi, and we are so excited that you are here.” Her accent was strong but her English was excellent and Ella felt herself relaxing. At least work would be a place where she would know what to do.
                “You are settled in your apartment?” Heidi asked. “I heard you were over on Kleinschmidtstrasse?”
                “That’s right. I love it. I took the tram this morning but I think I’ll walk as a rule.”
                “It is a beautiful neighborhood in Heidelberg,” Heidi said. “Very old.”
                Wow, Ella thought. That doesn’t make it different from most other sections of Heidelberg that she could see.
                Heidi led Ella to a large corner office with a view of Bergheimer and Rohrbacher streets below.
                “Oh, this is fabulous,” Ella said, putting her briefcase down in one of the leather visitor’s chairs. She walked over to the window to look out. “I had a cubicle at my last job,” she said.
                “We have been looking forward to your arrival,” Heidi said. “When you are settled, there is a meeting at nine o’clock with the managers. If you like, I would love to go to lunch with you today.”
                “That’d be awesome, Heidi. Thank you,” Ella said.  
                After Heidi left her, Ella sat down at her desk and turned on her computer. Her first official email went to Rowan. Since it was two in the morning in Atlanta, she assumed he wouldn’t get it for hours, but it felt nice to have him be the first person to hear about her new office.
                It only took a few hours to nail down the specific duties of her new job. Ella could tell immediately that the job would not be challenging but that was fine with her. Now that she was living in a foreign country, she had all the challenge she could handle just ordering a meal or buying groceries.
                At lunchtime, Heidi showed up in