By the time Lily found the second job, her feet had blisters, and her spirit was a cracked, leaking thing barely holding together.
She hadn't planned to walk so far but there was something about the steady rhythm of her steps, the forward motion, that dulled the ache inside.
When she spotted the "Help Wanted" sign taped crookedly to the window of a small café tucked between a laundromat and a pawn shop, she almost didn't go in.
She was tired of rejection, so tired of doors closing in her face.
But something stubborn, something desperate pushed her through the door.
Inside, the café smelled of strong coffee, cinnamon, and warm bread. It was small, only a handful of tables, a scratched counter, and shelves lined with chipped mugs and glass jars full of cookies.
Behind the counter stood a woman in her late twenties with wild dark hair pulled into a messy bun and tattoos curling up both arms.
She looked up as Lily entered, raising one pierced eyebrow.
"You looking for coffee or a miracle?"
Lily managed a thin smile. "Maybe both."
The woman laughed in a low, rough manner.
"Name's Cara," she said, wiping her hands on a rag. "You here for the sign?"
"Yes." Lily hesitated. "I...I can work nights. Whatever you need."
Cara studied her, and Lily had the distinct sense she was being seen, really seen in a way that felt both terrifying and unfamiliar.
Finally, Cara tossed her the rag.
"Start tonight. Close at midnight. You screw up the coffee, you clean the bathrooms. Deal?"
Relief flooded Lily so fast it made her dizzy.
"Deal," she breathed.
The night shift at Cara's Café was a different world.
The day crowd, the laptop warriors and stroller moms before was replaced by night owls, drifters, and people looking for a place to exist in the in-between hours.
There was a rhythm to it:
Make coffee.
Wipe tables.
Pretend you weren't noticing the arguments in the corner booth or the kid with the black eye nursing a milkshake for hours.
Cara didn't hover. She gave instructions in short, sharp sentences and trusted Lily to figure it out. And Lily did, slowly and clumsily. But she learned.
By ten o'clock, she was exhausted but proud, the good kind of tired, the kind that came from working for something, no matter how small.
She wiped down the counter, humming under her breath, when the bell above the door jingled softly.
She glanced up out of habit. And froze.
He was standing there, framed by the dim, flickering light of the streetlamp outside.
Tall, dark hair messy, like he'd run his hands through it a thousand times.
A long black coat that somehow made the shadows cling to him even in the brightly lit café.
But it was his eyes that rooted her to the spot.
Gray.
Cold and cutting, like a winter storm.
And yet... something softer flickered there too. Something almost wounded.
He stepped inside, the door closing behind him with a soft hiss.
The air shifted.
The few customers glanced up, then quickly away.
There was something about him that set people on edge, a kind of danger coiled tight under his skin.
Not loud, not obvious but there.
He walked to the counter, boots silent against the scuffed floorboards.
Lily's throat went dry.
"Hi," she managed, her voice thin. "Can I... can I help you?"
He didn't answer right away.
He just looked at her.
Really looked.
The way no one had in a long, long time.
The kind of look that peeled back your layers, stripped you bare without a single touch.
Lily's heart hammered against her ribs.
Her palms went clammy against the rag she still clutched.
Finally, he spoke, voice low and rough around the edges.
"Coffee. Black."
She nodded quickly, grateful for something to do.
Her hands shook slightly as she poured the coffee into a chipped mug and slid it across the counter.
He took it without a word, his fingers brushing the mug with a strange kind of grace, like he was used to handling fragile things roughly.
He didn't move to a table, he didn't sit.
Just stood there, sipping the coffee, eyes never leaving her.
It made her skin prickle, but not with fear exactly.
Something else.
Something she didn't have a name for.
Minutes stretched thin and tight between them.
Finally, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a crumpled bill.
He slid it across the counter, a twenty for a two-dollar coffee.
Lily opened her mouth to say something, to offer change, but he shook his head once, sharp and final.
Then without a word, he turned and walked out, the bell above the door jingling softly in his wake.
Lily stood frozen, staring after him.
The twenty-dollar bill sat between her fingers, warm from his hand.
And even though he was gone, she could still feel his gaze, heavy and lingering like fingerprints pressed deep into her skin.
For a long time, she didn't move.
Didn't breathe.
Didn't dare.
Because something had shifted in that moment, something deep and strange and inevitable.
She didn't know his name.
She didn't know what he wanted.
She didn't know why he had looked at her like that, like he saw every broken thing inside her and didn't flinch.
But somehow, she knew this wasn't the last time she would see him.
Not by a long shot.