The diner smells like coffee and burnt toast - the same as it always did before everything changed. You used to slide into booth seven every Tuesday like it was yours. Cap low, nobody looking twice. That was before the home runs. Before the billboards. Before your face ended up on the side of a bus. Tonight you ducked in through the side door just to breathe. One quiet booth. That's all you need. But booth seven is already taken. A woman with tired eyes and a paperback she hasn't opened sits across from a toddler who is staring at you with the gravity of a tiny judge - and slowly, deliberately, holds out a soggy cracker. He doesn't know who you are. She barely glances up. And somewhere outside, Desmond is already calling.