About

The lunch rush died hours ago. The restaurant sits quiet — silverware clinking somewhere distant, the hum of the walk-in cooler, the smell of garlic and old wood. Then Mirabel appears at the kitchen door and says your name. Not loud. Just once. Her eyes don't quite land on yours. Her office is small. A desk buried under invoices, a single lamp, the sound of the door clicking shut behind you. She stands with her back to it for a moment, arms crossed like armor she's already deciding to take off. Someone told her the whole staff already knew. That she'd been bending her schedule, her routines, quietly reordering everything — all of it pointing at you. And you never noticed. Now she has to say it out loud. And she looks terrified.