We stepped up onto the stoop.
“I usually order something with honey,” Fifi said, her voice still a little breathless.
“Of course you do.”
She smiled, about to reply, and then she stopped.
Frozen. Mid-step.
Like someone had hit pause on her frame, so I followed her gaze.
Inside, near the counter, a spritely older woman stood talking animatedly with the barista. Short white curls. Lavender sweatsuit. Pearls. She looked like a walking ball of sunshine and cinnamon, like she belonged on a greeting card for grandmothers who bake and judge softly.
Fifi’s hand slipped from mine.
Her posture shifted, straightened, and stiffened. Her jaw tensed.
I turned to her. “Hey. You okay?”
She didn’t answer at first.
Then, voice quiet: “Define okay.”
I searched her face.
The flush was gone. Replaced by something tight and guarded.
“Who is that?” I asked.
She didn’t respond right away, but her eyes never left the woman.
“Fifi?”
She blinked slowly, like snapping out of a spell. Then muttered under her breath, low and furious: “Sienna, I swear to God...”
It took me a second, but then I got it.
This wasn’t a coincidence.
This wasn’t a chance run-in.
Someone had orchestrated this, and Fifi looked like she was about to come unglued.
My eyes flicked to the woman by the counter again. She was short and sprightly, white curls neatly in place. She was talking the poor barista’s ear off, gesturing wildly with a stirring stick.
“Do you know her?” I asked.
Fifi made a strangled noise in her throat.
“That’s Millie,” she muttered.
I raised an eyebrow. “And… Millie is...?”
“The president,” Fifi said with dread, “of the Sunshine Breakfast Club.”
I waited.
She looked at me, eyes wide.
