When Nolan leaves, the café changes.

Not dramatically — not like when the lights go down in a theater. It’s more subtle than that.

The air loses its coffee scent, leaving only the spices. His aggressive cooking and his melodious jazz music disappear. Only I remain, the sole pillar holding up the sanctuary.

I’ve done it for twenty-four months straight. "So let’s not exaggerate."

I don’t do it every day — only four days a week.

"But tomorrow is our anniversary," I remembered, marking the calendar. "So Thursday we’ll have the day off."

Only on weekends are we together all day.

But the bell interrupted me mid-thought. The regulars had arrived and it was my moment to attend to them.

"Mr. Arrit!" I greeted him, waiting at his table and pulling out his chair. "What a pleasure to see you so early!"

"Likewise, dear," he scratched his beard. "Give me a cof—"

"Black coffee, no sugar, strong, in a ceramic cup, not too hot so you can drink it right away," I interrupted, smiling.

He settled his hat on the chair, laughing his Santa Claus laugh. "What a memory you have, dear — you didn’t have to memorize this old man’s order."

"Don’t say that, Mr. Arrit." I showed him a paper note from a year ago. "You used to love your coffee with extra milk and sugar — I think about it every day and it makes me sad you can no longer drink it."

He looked at the old paper with a smile. "I’ve never liked the young girls who’ve worked here before, but you, Ryne, are something special."

I nodded and went to get his cup. He waited patiently for the two minutes it took me, and when I handed it to him, he smiled.

"Mr. Arrit, may I ask you something?" He nodded. "Why do you smile when you drink that coffee, if you used to like it very sweet?"

He held the cup between his hands for a moment, his wrinkled lips turned toward the window, and then opened to give me an answer.

"I come to this place every day — I’ve been doing it for four years." He took a sip of his coffee. "Not because I like coffee with or without sugar." He turned his gaze back to me, showing me the teeth he had left. "I come every day because every day they make me feel special."

"Arrit," I whispered.

"Besides you all, the only one who remembered how I liked my coffee was my wife." A laugh came through his nose. "Coming to this place makes me remember her — especially looking out at the street where we met."

The window had always been there. I was just the one who had never noticed.

"Forgive me, dear — you didn’t have to listen to this old man’s nonsense." He scratched the few hairs on the back of his neck, but the tears were already falling. "Dear?"

"Mr. Arrit," I said, trying to wipe my own tears. "Your story is beautiful."

His love transcended time, space, and reality. It was beautiful to see his stains — the stains that woman had left on him even without being present. 𝚏𝕣𝐞𝗲𝐰𝕖𝐛𝐧𝕠𝕧𝚎𝚕.𝐜𝚘𝗺

Acts as simple as drinking coffee while watching a street made his love come alive again. "I want a love like that too" — an eternal one, where I dedicate my whole life to him.

"And you’ll have it, my dear." He took a sip of his coffee. "With sugar and love it doesn’t matter how bad the food is — or at least that’s what my wife used to say."

I stood for a moment with my hands on his table.

"You always say exactly the right thing, Mr. Arrit."

"I’ve had seventy-two years of practice." He straightened his tie with a simple gesture — something I noticed, something he noticed, and for some reason it made him smile. "This old man had to learn something."

I couldn’t hold back the laughter at his words. "Thank you, grandfather."

That’s how the afternoon went. Mr. Arrit with his black coffee, two neighbors who ordered something to go, a young student couple eating on their break. My neighbors each ordering a coffee to start their workday.

Everyone with their own routine.

I wiped their tables with each goodbye. I moved the chairs that someone had shifted off their marks. Everything had to be exactly the same for when he came back — everything had an order and a place to respect.

I looked at the clock — twenty minutes to three. Nolan was about to return.

But someone else was about to arrive. The bell revealed the exact moment that parasite with legs and a face came into my territory.

I didn’t look up right away. I finished arranging the cups on the shelf — one by one, handles facing right — before turning around.

Mrs. Miclan, punctual for once. Let’s hope it stays that way.

I’ll give her this — she always tried to change her style. Today she didn’t have that makeup that tried to make her look fifteen years younger than a primary school student. Today she at least looked her age, or at least appeared to.

"And I told the butcher guy, if you want these little bones, first give me those little bones, and he did give me the ribs!" She laughed — more like screaming than laughing.

She was always like that: wearing clothes with the tags still on, renting handbags, and telling stories each worse than the last. She thinks she’s someone valuable, but the most valuable things she has are the time and silence she steals from others.

She arrived in the neighborhood four months ago, and since then she’s been nothing but a leech on my neighbors. They only put up with her because she watches the child, but her work hours ended — let me remember — in four hours.

She didn’t look at the menu, which meant she wasn’t here for coffee, or she was here for the complimentary one.

Behind her, her companion of the day. Gray hair tangled, with those knots that form when someone stops brushing for forty-eight hours.

A floral blouse with a stain that had been in that fabric longer than I’d been in Vancouver. The two of them sat at the center table — the worst possible location from my perspective, because from there they could see me and I couldn’t avoid hearing them.

Mrs. Miclan is the sister of my fourth-floor neighbors. She doesn’t study, doesn’t work, and doesn’t look after the child with any consistency I’ve ever observed.

Her husband left her for a younger, more put-together girl; since then she’s been installed in her sister’s apartment. "Poor thing" — I said it about the sister.

I brought them the complimentary coffees. Nolan had already scolded me enough times for refusing to even mention we had them.

"Good morning."

"Good morning, sweetheart." She took my hand, just as I was setting down the cup. "You look so pretty today, Ryne, you’re gorgeous. How do you manage to look so young?"

I tried to free my hand. "Mm, I don’t know. My diet is basically just vegetables and water."

She screamed again — laughed, I mean. "Look at this beautiful girl, she doesn’t eat meat because she feels bad for the animals, sweetheart!" She squeezed my hand. "How adorable you are. You know, I couldn’t last a weekend without my double burger with extra bacon."

"Oh yes, I can imagine that," I managed to free my hand. "I have to get back to work, I’m sorry."

"But don’t go, dear," said one of her friends, shifting over to offer me half a seat — ignoring the floor marks completely. "Come, sit down and talk to us. You have to teach us how to look like a ten... fifteen — how old are you?"

"Twenty-two," I tightened my jaw.

"Better yet, tell us how things are going with your boyfriend," said Mrs. Miclan. "How is he? Still studying?"

"Yes," I answered, opening the sugar for them. "He wants to improve his cooking."

"How dedicated," said the other one, in a tone that brushed against mockery. "And you here alone all day waiting for him — how sweet."

"I’m not alone," I said. "I actually work."

Mrs. Miclan looked at me for a second, deciding whether that was rudeness or simply a response.

"Of course, of course," she waved her hand. "Hey, Ryne — and you, don’t you study anything? Don’t you have some course, something?"

"I don’t study — I watch some pastry videos," I said quietly. "And it’s Ryne, not Ryme."

"Oh, how nice," she answered without listening.

I turned back toward the bar. I grabbed the cloth. But she wasn’t finished.

"And how long have you two been together?"

"We’ve been together just over a month," I answered. "But we’ve known each other for almost two years."

"One month!" repeated one of her clones, as if it were an alarming figure. "So young. And are you already thinking about something serious? Any plans to live together, get married...?"

"I don’t know," I cut in.

"Well, at this age boys aren’t thinking about that yet," her companion chimed in, stirring her coffee with a spoon she hadn’t asked for. "First they want to see the world — and other people. Right?"

I didn’t answer.

"Especially the handsome ones," added Mrs. Miclan, with that little smile of hers. "The handsome ones always have more options. That’s just reality."

I wiped the bar from left to right, with the same tension as always.

"Ryne, would you stay with someone who wasn’t faithful?" asked Mrs. Miclan.

"What kind of question is that?" I said, trying to make her stop.

"Of course, of course, nobody would want that," she nodded. "But sometimes you don’t find out until it’s too late, right? Life has so many twists and turns."

"Excuse me," I said, setting the cloth on the bar. "I need to check something in the kitchen."

I walked away without waiting for a response, feeling their gazes on my back like two knives. Every step away from them was less noise.

And then, just as my hands touched the kitchen door handle, I heard it.

Clear, clean, without any effort to conceal it.

"So pretty and innocent," Miclan began. "She has no idea she’s being cheated on."

I stopped for half a second.

Just half a second.

Then I pushed the door open and went in.

Chapter 6: Purple Handkerchief I