“Garrett was a billboard with teeth.”
“He was charming.”
“He stole your grandmother’s jewelry.”
“I said charming, not good.”
“And now you’re making moon eyes at a Vakutan built like a siege engine.”
“I am not making moon eyes.” I untie my jacket with too much force and nearly smack myself in the chin. “I waved. That’s called neighborly behavior.”
“In Halo, neighborly behavior is minding your business so nobody has to identify your body.”
“Wow. Put that on the brochure with the stolen tires thing.”
Darlene sets the ladle down and steps closer, and her voice drops beneath the lunch noise. “I’m not telling you to be cruel, honey. I know you. You see a wound and you start looking for bandages even when the wounded thing has teeth. But some people are wounded in ways that make them bite.”
The seriousness in her face steals some of the sarcasm from my tongue. I glance toward the front windows. Rain streaks theglass, blurring the street into silver lines and broken neon. For a second, I imagine him out there under the weather, head down, alone among people determined not to see him.
“Maybe,” I say. “Or maybe some people bite because nobody ever offered them anything except a reason to.”
Darlene sighs, long and smoky despite the lack of cigarette. “Your grandmother used to say things like that.”
“She was usually right.”
“She also married a man who once tried to fix a hovermower with a butter knife.”
“Grandpa had vision.”
“Grandpa had tetanus twice.”
I laugh, and the sound loosens something in the room. Darlene shakes her head and returns to the soup. I wash my hands, tie my apron back into place, and step to the counter as the lunch rush rolls in.
For the next three hours, I serve food, pour coffee, smile until my cheeks hurt, and pretend I am not watching the street between customers. The Vakutan does not pass again. Of course he doesn’t. Halo is full of alleys, tunnels, rooftops, and broken places where a man can vanish if he has practice.
Still, every time the bell over the door rings, my heart gives a ridiculous little jump.
By closing, my feet ache, my hair has fully surrendered from its knot, and the register total is not quite as awful as I feared. Darlene leaves after reminding me to lock both deadbolts and “stop flirting with existential threats.” I sweep the floor alone while the ovens cool and the city darkens outside.
The bakery feels different at night. Softer, somehow. The day’s chaos settles into crumbs, stacked chairs, cooling metal, and the faint glow from the pastry case I never turn off because a dark bakery feels like bad luck. I pause near the front window with the broom in my hand and look out at Halo.
The fog has returned, curling around streetlights and rusted awnings. A couple hurries past under one coat, laughing as rain slicks the pavement beneath their boots. Farther down, a patrol drone buzzes once over Rusk Street, scans nothing useful, and drifts away toward richer problems.
I wonder where he sleeps.
The thought comes quietly and refuses to leave.
I picture those scarred hands tucked into his pockets, those tired eyes startled by a simple wave, that massive body moving through the world as if he expects every doorway to reject him and every person to recoil. I know better than to romanticize damage. I learned that lesson the expensive way. A lonely man is not automatically a good man, and a sad story does not excuse harm.
But he did not feel cruel.
He felt lost.
I turn the lock, check it twice, and rest my palm against the cool glass for a moment before shutting off the front lights. Outside, Halo keeps breathing through rust, rain, and ruin. Inside, cinnamon clings stubbornly to the air.
Tomorrow, I tell myself, I will stop thinking about the Vakutan in the hooded jacket.
Tomorrow, I will worry about invoices, oven three, lunch specials, and whether I can stretch ugly citrus into something pretty enough to sell.
