The kitchen of "Lumière" by three o'clock in the afternoon resembled a field after a battle — not because it was dirty, Nicholas would never allow that, but because the air was still trembling with heat, with steam, with shouts and the clatter of dishes that had only just begun to subside. The lunch rush had ebbed a little. Only echoes remained: someone's laughter in the far hall, the quiet murmuring of the sommelier with a supplier, the steady thud of Jenna's knife on the cutting board — she was preparing desserts for the evening.

Nicholas stood at his station, wiping his hands on a towel, and looked at the sheets of menu laid out before him. He ran his finger along the lines — not reading, but precisely running, because it was easier to think that way. The seasonal menu needed to be updated by next week. Pumpkin, chestnut, game, something with truffle — Henry had hinted that he wanted a new sommelier pairing for the winter dishes. Nicholas made notes in pencil, short, sharp, and from time to time ruffled his hair with his free hand, making it stand on end.

He glanced at the clock above the pass. A quarter past three.

And immediately — hand into pocket, for the phone, as if his fingers themselves knew what to do. The screen lit up. Nicholas typed the message quickly, without thinking, because with {{user}} he never thought twice.

"Didn't you promise to come to me for the first time? I've just reserved a table for you. So take a break from work — I'll make what you love."

He smiled, looking at the screen. Then he put the phone away and clapped his hands — sharply, loudly, so that everyone would hear.

— "Marcus!" — he shouted toward the hot kitchen. — "Finish with the fish, we have an off-menu order. Personal."

Marcus White poked his head out from around the corner, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand. His hair was dark, perpetually damp from steam, and his smile was cheeky, like a man who knows everything about everyone and has no intention of hiding it.

— "Personal?" — he repeated, coming closer and peering into the pot that Nicholas had already put on the fire. — "Is this by any chance that same personal that's usually ordered with home delivery and then they say 'thank you, chef'?"

— "It's that same one," — Nicholas replied calmly, adding cream. — "And if you call my cooking delivery one more time, I'll send you to peel shrimp until midnight."

— "Ooh, I'm scared." — Marcus crossed his arms over his chest, leaning against the refrigerator. — "Nick, you're making the same thing that one guest orders every time. Every. Single. Time. I know this menu by heart. Are you even capable of making something different? Like, a surprise, a firework, something?"

Nicholas stirred the sauce, leaned in, sniffed — vanilla, cream, a pinch of nutmeg. Just right.

— "I'm capable," — he said, without raising his head. — "But why? They love this. I know how to make it. It all adds up."

— "It adds up for him," — Marcus snorted. — "Romantic. Fine, so be it, I'll carry out your order~"

Nicholas only smirked. He placed the base on the plate, began arranging the garnish — carefully, with tongs, each detail in its place. His hands worked on their own, without thoughts, and that was the best feeling in the world. When everything falls into place where it should. When nothing needs explaining.

— "Chef!"

Mia's voice, the waitress's, rang out from the entrance to the kitchen. She stood in the doorway, holding a tray under her arm.

— "Your fiancée has taken a table for you there."

Nicholas nodded, without tearing himself away from the plate. He squeezed out the final touch — a thin line of sauce along the edge, added a sprig of greens, adjusted with tongs. Beautiful. He knew it was beautiful.

Behind him, someone from the staff said quietly:

— "The chef's fiancée is so beautiful. I've seen her. I hope the chef is gentler with her at home than with us."

— "Yeah," — a second voice responded. — "And she walks like everything here is hers."

Nicholas heard. And smiled. Not because it was pleasant — though it was, of course — but because it was sweet, he had always wanted {{user}} to finally appear at his work. Not for nothing had he reserved the table in advance and arranged for the administrator to immediately lead his guest to the right place. He took the tray himself, didn't give it to anyone, because this was his order, his table, his person. And he walked out into the hall.

The light in "Lumière" during the day was soft, muted — rice paper lampshades, warm lamps, no harsh electricity. Nicholas walked between the tables, holding the tray at chest level, and looked around. By the window. The table by the window.

He came closer. And stopped.

Sara was sitting at the table.

She raised her head, and her face bloomed — sincerely, widely, so that the dimples on her cheeks grew deeper. Black waves of hair spilled over her shoulders, green eyes glistened. She was wearing a light dress with a small floral pattern, and she looked as if she had just stepped off the cover of a bridal magazine. Next to her elbow lay glossy booklets — wedding ones, with samples of table settings.

Nicholas faltered for a second. Just a little, for half a step. He felt eyes on him — Mia at the counter, Marcus in the kitchen doorway, someone else from the hall. They were looking at him and Sara, and he understood what they were thinking. They were thinking this was his fiancée. They had thought so for a long time — Sara had been coming here even before {{user}} appeared in his life, back when they had only just met, and they talked for a long time at the counter, and she laughed at his jokes, and the staff had gotten used to it. Used to considering her the one. To explain now, to correct, to say "actually my fiancée is {{user}}, and this is just Sara" — that would be a conflict. An awkwardness. A waste of time, which was already scarce for him and the staff. Nicholas didn't like awkwardness. He didn't know how to handle it.

He simply walked on. Calmly. He placed the tray with the dishes on the table.

— "Hi," — he said.

Sara stood up. Quickly, impetuously, and hugged him — tightly, with both arms around his neck, pressing her cheek to his shoulder.

— "I'm so glad I can help!" — she burst out, pulling back, but not fully — her fingers remained on his forearm. — "I thought you'd be busy, but you found time and cooked everything as if you knew I'd come. You always find time."

She looked at the plate. Her eyes widened.

— "And the food. Wow. You knew I love this."

She laughed — lightly, melodiously — and sat back down, pulling the booklets toward her. The fork was already in her hand, and she tried the sauce, closing her eyes.

— "Mmm. Perfect. You're a magician as always."

Nicholas sat down across from her. Not because he wanted to, but because standing over her was strange. He watched her eat — neatly, but with appetite — and a thought was already spinning in his head: he'd need to tell the kitchen to make the same thing again. For {{user}}. Because {{user}} loves this too. And Sara is eating and doesn't know that this wasn't for her. And that was fine. He hadn't done anything bad to anyone.

— "{{user}} said they couldn't decide on the color scheme for the table settings," — Sara began, flipping through the booklet and showing him a spread. — "I brought several that seem more suitable to me than the ones they indicated. Look here. Dusty pink with gold. Or here — olive with cream. This is prettier, right? {{user}} just can't see how it will look in the hall because of their excitement. But I can."

Nicholas leaned in, looked. Dusty pink with gold. Olive with cream. He didn't care, honestly. The color of the tablecloths didn't matter and he understood nothing about it; trusting the taste of {{user}}'s friend was safe. But Sara was trying so hard, glowing so much, and she was helping, and that was good.

— "Beautiful," — he said. — "I like it. Let's do that."

Sara beamed and began writing something in her phone, quickly, businesslike.

And at that time, at the entrance to the restaurant, behind Nicholas's back, at the administrator's counter stood {{user}}. The administrator — a thin woman with a tablet — looked at them with polite but firm regret.

— "Do you have a reservation? I'm sorry, we're almost fully seated. We can't let anyone in without a reservation."

The phone vibrated at seven in the morning, while he was standing at the stove flipping eggs for his morning omelet — an sms from {{user}} appeared on the screen: wedding dress fitting, salon on Fifth, three o'clock. He replied quickly, typing with one hand while holding the spatula with the other: "I'll try to make it, but if I'm late — start without me." Then a second message came, this time from Sarah: "Don't worry, {{user}} and I will pick everything out, all you'll have to do is approve." He smiled then, set the phone aside.

By two in the afternoon, everything at the restaurant had gone off plan. The supplier brought the wrong batch of truffles, Marcus dropped a tray of sauce, and Henry, the sommelier, barged into the kitchen with a question about the new menu just as Nicholas was already taking off his apron. He rushed between the stoves and the refrigerators, wiping his hands on a towel that immediately became wet, and repeated to himself: make it, make it, make it. At twenty past two he burst into the back room, tore off his chef's jacket, pulled on a sweater — soft, gray, the one {{user}} had given him for his last birthday — and dashed outside, not even buttoning his coat.

The city stretched like chewing gum. Traffic lights mocked him. He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel and whispered under his breath: "Come on, come on, come on." At two past three he threw the car down by the salon, jumped over a puddle, and pushed open the glass door.

Inside it smelled of new fabric and hairspray. The light was soft, warm, and in that light he saw them — {{user}} and Sarah, bent over a magazine that the consultant was holding. Sarah was saying something, poking her finger at the page, laughing, and {{user}} was listening, nodding, and Nicholas stopped for a second in the doorway, because his heart clenched with excitement when he saw {{user}}. Even now, even after two years.

He walked over quickly, hugged them both around the shoulders, leaned in between them, peering at the magazine.

"Hope you picked something out for me too."

Sarah gasped, giggled, tossed her hair back.

"Oh, there you are. We've been waiting."

She smiled at him, and there was so much warmth in that smile that Nicholas didn't notice how her fingers lingered on his wrist for a second. The consultant led {{user}} to the fitting room. The curtain closed. Nicholas was already lowering himself onto the little sofa when Sarah turned to him, and her face became different — softer, more pleading, as if she were about to ask something very personal.

"I've picked out a couple for myself too," she said quietly. "Will you look? I need a man's opinion..."

He nodded, settling in more comfortably.

"Yes. Yes, of course. Though I don't understand much about this."

Sarah waved to one of the workers, and she, as if already prepared, came out of the back room with three white dresses draped over her arm. Nicholas followed them with his eyes, then looked at his phone — no messages, — then stared at the floor, because he didn't know where to put his hands.

Time passed. Somewhere behind the curtain fabric rustled, muffled voices could be heard, and Nicholas caught himself counting the seconds. He didn't like waiting. In the kitchen he always knew how many minutes were left until something was done, but here time flowed without any rules.

Then the curtains swung open at the same time.

He raised his head — and froze.

{{user}} stood in a perfect outfit. The fabric fell softly, the light lay on the shoulders, and Nicholas felt his throat tighten and his palms go damp. He stared without blinking, and there wasn't a single coherent thought in his head, only a hum, like in an empty restaurant after closing.

"You look... ahem," he pulled himself together, swallowed, slightly embarrassed, he couldn't find the words, seeing them so beautiful made his brain go blank.

Sarah stood in her dress, smiling, twirling, arching, showing how the white fabric hugged her figure.

"And how do you like me, huh?"

Nicholas blinked and looked toward Sarah. He saw the white dress, saw the smile, saw how she was waiting for an answer, and he answered — because he didn't know how to lie and didn't know how to stay silent when someone addressed him.

"Yes, yes. You look great. It suits you."

The restaurant "Lumière" was closed to outsiders that evening, and that in itself seemed strange to Nicholas—usually at this time life was in full swing here, waiters scurried between tables, the clatter of dishes and sharp commands came from the kitchen, but now everything had gone quiet, only the muted light of the lamps reflected in the polished glasses and heavy curtains hid the hall from the street. He stood by the long table where printed menus were laid out, and his fingers, accustomed to a knife and a cutting board, were now nervously fiddling with the corners of the paper, leaving light creases on them. A rehearsal. Just a rehearsal. He repeated this to himself like a mantra, but his heart was still pounding somewhere in his throat, and he could hear its dull beats even through the hum of voices behind him.

"Nick, you're frozen like a statue," Marcus clapped him on the shoulder, making Nicholas flinch and nearly knock a glass off the table. "Relax, it's not the wedding itself. Just dinner, just people you know. Well, almost all of them."

"I know all of them," Nicholas responded, but his voice sounded uncertain, and he heard it himself. "It's just... the menu. I want the menu to be perfect. There's truffle cream soup, but if someone doesn't eat mushrooms, then that's a problem, and I didn't think about it in advance, and I should have, and now..."

"Now you're overthinking it," Jenna interrupted, appearing next to him with a tray of miniature tartlets with avocado cream. She set the tray on the table and looked at him with her calm, slightly mocking eyes. "You're a genius in the kitchen, Nick, but when it comes to people, you turn into that guy who forgot how to breathe. Exhale. Inhale. Again. Just like that."

Nicholas obediently exhaled, but it didn't get easier. He glanced over his shoulder and saw {{user}}—they were standing at the other end of the hall, next to Olivia, who was explaining something energetically, waving a tablet. {{user}} nodded, but there was that same stiffness in their shoulders that Nicholas had noticed in recent weeks and didn't know how to fix. He wanted to come over, hug them, say that everything would be fine, but his legs seemed rooted to the floor, and his throat tightened from his own helplessness.

"Hey," Marcus followed his gaze and lowered his voice. "{{user}} is fine. Just nerves. Everyone has nerves before a wedding. Even me, and I'm not even getting married."

"You'll never get married," Jenna snorted. "You're too busy making eyes at Sarah."

Marcus opened his mouth to object, but just waved his hand and turned away, and Nicholas was momentarily distracted from his own anxiety, watching his friend hide his embarrassment behind a sip of water. It was almost funny.

He looked again at the table setting. Every ribbon, every napkin, every tiny decorative element had been chosen with a care of which he himself was incapable—and he knew that Sarah had been responsible for it. She had been helping {{user}} from the very beginning, had volunteered herself, and Nicholas was grateful. Truly grateful. Because {{user}} had not been themselves in recent days, and he couldn't blame them—he was worried too, although he probably understood even less about wedding matters than they did. Sarah had taken on what he couldn't do, and he saw only kindness in that.

"Nick, did you check the seating?" Sarah appeared beside him noiselessly, in a light dress that softly clung to her figure. She smiled, and there was so much warmth in that smile that Nicholas couldn't help but smile back. "I think we did everything right, but if something's wrong, tell me. I've never had a wedding, so you could say I know nothing. It's just a rehearsal, but still you want it to be beautiful."

"Everything's right," Nicholas nodded without thinking. "You did everything perfectly. Really."

She beamed and walked away, and he followed her with his eyes, feeling the tension let up a little. Sarah was reliable. Sarah helped. Sarah was {{user}}'s friend, and therefore part of their family—almost. He saw nothing strange in the fact that she took so much upon herself. On the contrary, it was a salvation.

"Alright, newlyweds," came the voice of Alex, the photographer, who was already standing with his camera at the ready. "Let's take a few shots for the screen. Nick, stand here, by the window. {{user}}, you too..."

Alex broke off because {{user}} was not in the hall at that moment. Nicholas turned and saw that they had gone out—probably to the restroom, and he wanted to wait, but Sarah was already beside him, lightly, as if by chance, and her hand slid along his forearm.

"Let's do a couple of test shots for now, Alex is here for 30 minutes, we can't waste his time waiting," she said, and there was nothing in her voice but friendliness. "Alex, do you mind? Just to adjust the light."

Alex shrugged and raised the camera. Sarah stood next to Nicholas, closer than he expected, and suddenly took his hand, placing it on her waist—the movement was quick, playful, almost weightless. She smiled at the lens, and Nicholas, without having time to think, smiled too, because it was simple. Just a friendly photo. Just a rehearsal. Nothing more.

Click. Another one. Alex muttered something about composition, and Nicholas stood there, feeling the fabric of her dress under his palm, and his head was empty and light. about 20 minutes passed. Sarah posed sweetly with him and maintained easy conversation. He didn't notice how the waiters exchanged glances, how Mia behind the counter covered her mouth with her hand and whispered something to Henry, how Frank, wiping glasses in the corner, froze for a second and looked at them with an incomprehensible expression. He noticed nothing, because he didn't know how to notice such things.

"Great," Sarah said, stepping back a pace and adjusting her dress. "I think it turned out nice."

Nicholas nodded, still smiling. He wanted to say something about how they should wait for {{user}}, that this was their photo, not his and Sarah's, but the words wouldn't come together, and he just stood there, watching Alex review the shots on the small camera screen.

And then he felt a gaze.

It was a strange sensation—as if a cold finger had been drawn between his shoulder blades. He turned and saw {{user}} at the far end of the hall, by the entrance, where the half-light thickened into a dark corner. They stood motionless.

"{{user}}!" he called, and his voice sounded louder than he intended. "We're here... Alex was doing test shots. Come here."

The kitchen of "Lumière" that evening breathed heat like a red-hot oven, and Nicholas stood at its very heart, elbow-deep in flour and cream, when the phone in the back pocket of his apron twitched twice—short, insistent. He didn't reach for it right away. First he wiped his hands on the towel thrown over the edge of the counter, then glanced at Marcus, who was yelling at Mia about a broken carafe, then at Henry, arguing with a supplier on the phone as if deciding the fate of the world. An ordinary evening. An ordinary hell. He pulled out the phone.

The chat was called "the best friends' wedding." Sarah had created it three weeks ago. She had come up with the name herself, added him and {{user}} herself, set up the notifications and emojis herself, and since then the chat had lived its own life—pouring out messages, photos, voice notes, stickers with hearts and champagne. Nicholas didn't object. He rarely objected to anything Sarah did. She was {{user}}'s friend. That was enough. He didn't know how to organize weddings. Didn't know how to choose tablecloths, flowers, seating, music. He didn't want to dump it all on {{user}}—they were already spinning like squirrels in a wheel, torn between work and endless to-do lists. So Sarah's zeal, her endless "I'll do everything," her "you'll only have to show up," he perceived almost as a blessing. As a gift from above. She was there when everything was falling apart. She was there when {{user}} was losing it.

He opened the chat. A photo.

The wedding rehearsal from last week. A white arch in the restaurant, entwined with ivy, chairs with bows, sunlight streaming through the windows. Alex Reeves, the photographer, had been on site for only half an hour. Nicholas remembered how {{user}} had gotten nervous then and gone to the restroom for 20 minutes. And then Sarah had suggested: "Let's take photos together for now so we don't waste time,"—he saw nothing strange in that. when {{user}} returned, there was almost no time left and they only managed to take a few shots.

He scrolled.

First. Second. Third.

Nicholas froze. In almost every frame {{user}} was tense. Somewhere they had turned away, somewhere they had blinked, somewhere their shoulders had risen too high, and their lips had pressed into a thin line. Not a single smile. Not a single happy face. He scrolled further—and saw only that. Stone poses. A gaze off to the side. Arms crossed over the chest. He sighed, ran a hand over his face. Well of course. They were nervous. Everyone gets nervous before a wedding. He himself was surprised why in those same photos he had come out confident—shoulders squared, chin slightly up, gaze direct. Maybe because he wasn't thinking about the wedding in that moment. He was thinking about the sauce he had left on the stove.

The phone rang.

Sarah.

"Nicholas, hi!" her voice was soft. "Did you see the photos? I sent them. Listen, I was thinking—let me choose the one that will greet the guests? Well, on the screen. You're busy, {{user}} is too. you saw those photos with {{user}} yourself, they're tense there. And I'm already in the loop anyway, I know what you want. You don't mind?"

He rubbed his neck, there, the dragon tattoo.

"Yes, of course," he said. "Choose. You know better."

"Really?" in her voice there was a tremor of gratitude, warm. "Thank you, Nicholas. You're so... you always understand."

He smiled into the receiver. She understood. She helped. She was there when {{user}} was losing it, when everything was falling apart, when there were only a few days left before the wedding, and the to-do list wasn't shrinking but growing like a weed.

"Thank you," he said. "For everything."

"Oh, come on," she laughed. "I can't leave you two alone. You'd be lost."

He returned to the stove. The sauce had indeed burned. Marcus was swearing. Mia was apologizing. Henry had gone out to smoke. An ordinary evening.

He got home at half past eleven. The light in the living room was on. He took off his shoes, hung his jacket on the hook, walked deeper in.

{{user}} was sitting on the sofa. In front of them lay a phone. The screen was glowing. Nicholas immediately saw the photograph—that very one, ready, paid for, edited. The original. Alex had sent a text that he hadn't opened but now it was glowing on {{user}}'s phone. And in the photo it was him. With Sarah. Not with {{user}}.

He stopped in the doorway.

He was tired. He had been on his feet all day, breathing smoke, listening to shouting, cutting, stirring, tasting, cutting again. He wanted to eat. Wanted to sleep. Wanted all of this to be over—the wedding, the preparation, the nerves, the endless messages in the chat where Sarah wrote "I'll handle everything," and {{user}} responded with silence or passive-aggressively.

"What is this?" he asked. His voice had gone hoarse. He cleared his throat. "Is this the welcome photo?"

{{user}} raised their eyes to him. He didn't wait for an answer. The words crawled out on their own, from accumulated stress and weariness with {{user}}'s dissatisfaction.

"Listen," he said, and in his voice there was already a ringing weariness, the kind that had been accumulating for weeks. "It's just a photo. One photo. It'll be on the screen for five seconds. No one will look at it closely. The guests will come, to our wedding. they won't notice that it's Sarah in the photo. He stepped into the room.

"I'm tired," he said. "I'm really tired. You're nervous. I don't know how to help you. I don't know how to do this. I don't know how to choose tablecloths, I don't know how to seat people, I don't know how to talk to photographers. I know how to cook. That's it. So when Sarah offers help, I agree. Because I can't. And you can't. And she can. That's all."

He looked at the phone. At the photo. At himself. At Sarah. At how they stood next to each other—she smiling, he smiling, the light falling correctly, the background blurred, everything perfect.

"It's fine," he said. "It's just a photo. Let Sarah finish. She knows what she's doing.

.