In front of a twenty-four-hour motel, a happy couple was saying goodbye. Standing in front of the car, a dark-haired girl in clothes as fine as her last name laughed cheerfully.

"It was an incredible night," she said. "You’re the man of my dreams. The only bad thing is that you have a girlfriend."

"Don’t you want me to take you home?" he asked, starting the car.

She shook her head. "Tomorrow is my wedding, so I’ll never be coming back to Vancouver." She smiled. "I’ll walk — I’ll enjoy my last day here."

The car accelerated, leaving her behind.

She stood on the sidewalk in front of the motel with her bag under her arm, watching the car’s tail lights disappear around the corner with indifference — yet her eyes, for some reason, wouldn’t leave the road. As if she were waiting for him to come back.

It wasn’t late. It was that in-between hour where the night has already lost its charm but the early morning hasn’t quite begun.

She hadn’t been prepared.

Her clothes were expensive. The kind of pieces you recognize not by the brand but by the way they fall — by the fabric that doesn’t wrinkle even if you wear it all day. A cream coat, dark trousers, the genuine leather bag she carried with the carelessness of someone who never had to take care of their things because they could always take someone else’s.

Like mine.

I have to give her credit — she was making her best effort to stay upright. But after a night with my man and more than two hundred dollars in alcohol, not even mammoth endurance could string together a sentence.

She wasn’t walking — she was sustaining herself with erratic steps, but with a mathematical logic impossible to calculate.

It wasn’t the classic straight line, but it was functional. In her logic.

"Hey!" she yelled at no one in particular, with a voice that had far too much volume for the hour. "This is horrible! Help me, you idiots!"

A window closed on the second floor of the building across the street.

She didn’t notice. She kept walking, kept talking, kept being exactly what she was at that hour, on that street, in that cold she hadn’t anticipated.

Nobody came out to look. Not because they didn’t hear her. But because they had done it before — many times. And it was never the emergency she made it sound like.

"Damn it," she growled, pressing her stomach. "If I stain my clothes I’m burning them."

It was in the alley where the footsteps stopped sounding double.

She stopped in front of a box beside a trash can.

"Look at a homeless person’s bed," she laughed. "As Dad always says, there’s no better place to vomit than in someone else’s helicopter." She adjusted herself. "Especially when there’s a party below."

And with that poetic and disgusting mental image, she vomited.

"Damn, my boots." She hit the wall. "Ryne wanted them so badly — I don’t know what face she’ll make when I tell her I ruined them, hahaha." But from the darkness of the alley came the sound of a can being crushed. "Who the hell is still awake at this hour...? Besides me." She started.

I only remember the edge of my knife gleaming under the moonlight.

Chapter 19: Mayo I

I woke up before the room had any color.

In front of me — not a white ceiling, but yellow lines forming what looked like an ocean. Something I hadn’t noticed the night before. It was beautiful.

The small bed in Mr. Arrit’s daughter’s room had held me well, without complaint. Surprising for an object that was almost certainly older than me.

I sat up slowly.

The room was just as clean as the night before. Too clean. But now with the dawn light coming through the window, I noticed what I hadn’t seen when I arrived.

"It was a long night." I stretched, listening to my back crack. "It’s nine-thirty — it’s not good that I slept so late."

I glanced at the corner without meaning to. Beside the small desk, a folding easel leaned against the wall. Next to it, in a wooden box with the lid slightly open, brushes arranged by size.

I got up, looking at the last painting up close.

"What a shame — they didn’t finish it," I said, studying it. It was only a black dot surrounded by yellow waves, as if only three strokes had been made. So mostly it was white.

I got ready with what I had, which wasn’t much. I looked at myself in the small mirror above the desk, adjusted my sweater, tied the purple ribbon around my wrist, and opened the door without making noise.

Mr. Arrit was already in the kitchen.

That didn’t surprise me. He was the kind of man who wakes before the sun without needing a particular reason.

He had his coffee in hand and was looking out the window. The café was right at the center of his attention.

The jam jars were still on the windowsill. The yellow one in the same spot where we had left it the night before.

"Good morning," I said from the hallway.

"Good morning, dear," he replied without turning. "There’s coffee."

I poured myself a cup, held it in both hands, and stayed in the kitchen for a moment without saying anything. There was no need.

"How did you sleep?" he asked.

"Well," I replied. "The bed is comfortable."

He nodded.

"Yesterday was a fun evening," he said. "I hadn’t played in five years."

"I had fun too." I set my cup down half-finished. "I’d love to do it again another day — but in twenty minutes I have to be at the office."

He nodded, pointing to the corner of the table. "Just like you both used to do, I made you breakfast. It’s bread with jam and a packet of sweet milk — my daughter loved that."

I smiled, taking it without thinking.

"Mr. Arrit," I called, stepping toward him. "Seventy-something years old and still can’t tie your tie." I adjusted it. "There — done."

"Ho ho ho. You scold me more than my wife did." He stroked the tie. "What do you mean seventy-something? I’m seventy-two."

I hugged him, cutting him off. "I know — it’s just that nobody besides Nolan had ever made me breakfast with that kind of care."

He let out another Santa Claus laugh, returning the hug. "It’s clear you loved him, dear. The trial for Nolan’s case isn’t far off now. Be strong until then — and I’m sure we can have more bread with jam."

"And without jam for you," I reminded him. "I wouldn’t want my father to leave too soon."

"Father?" he repeated, confused.

"I’m sorry — it slipped out." I let go. "It’s just that for a moment, I wanted to call you that."

He smiled again — in a way as wide as it was clumsy. Maybe no one had ever said that to him, and I was the first person to say it in years. Maybe that was it.

"I don’t mind. I call you daughter." He took my hand, making a cross on it. "My wife was very devout — she used to say that doing that gave all your good wishes to whoever needs strength."

"Thank you for the night, Mr. Arrit," I said. "For everything."

"Likewise, dear." He looked back at the café. "Come back whenever you’d like. The peach jam doesn’t finish itself."

I smiled, nodded, and stepped out with my bag in hand.

Feeling the cold air hit my face.

"You’re being a very happy girl," I heard, remembering her lips moving. But when I turned, there was no one there. "Did you enjoy your anniversary, friend?"

"Mayo," I whispered, remembering her name.