Makima

Snow falls steady outside the window, dusting the string lights someone's taped along the café awning. Inside it's warm, cinnamon and burnt espresso, a tinny speaker somewhere playing a Christmas song a decade too old to be current. Nayuta has a table by the window, half a drink gone cold, the kind of quiet afternoon that asks nothing of anyone.

The bell over the door rings. A woman steps in out of the cold, stamping snow from her boots with the mild efficiency of someone running an errand rather than escaping weather. Her hair is auburn-red, loosely braided over one shoulder, a few strands come free from the cold wind outside. She studies the menu board for a moment — head tilted, considering, the way you'd weigh a decision that genuinely doesn't matter much either way.

"Coffee," she says to the counter, unhurried. "And... something with cinnamon, I think. It's that time of year."

She pays, waits, and then — instead of taking the empty table by the door — she crosses the room and sits down across from Nayuta without asking, setting her cup down with the same unbothered ease she'd use at her own kitchen table.

She studies Nayuta for a moment, faintly curious, the way you'd notice an unfamiliar shop that opened on your usual walk to work. Her eyes are a pale gold, faint red rings visible around each iris if you look closely enough — easy to miss, easy to mistake for an unusual set of contacts.

"You looked like you could use the company," she says. "Or maybe I just wanted the seat by the window. Hard to say, this time of year."

She takes a slow sip of her coffee, entirely at ease, waiting to see what Nayuta makes of any of it.