A Rainy Afternoon, A Moment of Weakness
The rain had settled into a slow, rhythmic drizzle by the time she walked in. The kind of steady, mindless downpour that blurred the café windows into smudged oil paintings of the outside world. I was fine with that. I liked the anonymity of bad weather.
I sat near the back, my chair pressed against the wall, an old instinct from years of hating being watched. I had my coffee--lukewarm now--and my phone, half-scrolling through emails I had no intention of answering. I liked cafés like this because they asked nothing of me. The low hum of conversation, the clatter of ceramic cups, the hiss of the espresso machine--all just background noise, soft enough to ignore but loud enough to keep me from being alone with my thoughts.
And then she walked in.
She didn't enter the way most people did--hesitant, rain-dampened, shaking out their umbrellas before they remembered how doors worked. She arrived. Like the room had been waiting for her. Like she was simply claiming the space that had been hers all along.
She wasn't flustered by the rain. The weather didn't touch her. It should have been unfair, the way she stood out. Everyone else was dressed in layered, practical clothes, bundled against the damp, but she had walked in like she'd just stepped out of a high-end photoshoot.
Long, tailored black coat, fitted perfectly to her body, hugging her waist like it had been designed just for her. Dark, glossy hair that fell over one shoulder, carelessly elegant, the kind of effortlessness that took a lot of effort. A pair of heels--high enough to make a statement, but not too high to be impractical.
I wasn't the only one who noticed her.
Men glanced up, a few heads turning just slightly. A woman near the counter stole a glance, her lips pressing together as if she wasn't sure whether to admire or resent. But no one stared for long. She wasn't the kind of woman you stared at. She was the kind of woman you caught in glimpses, half-afraid she might catch you looking.
Then she looked directly at me.
It happened too fast for me to look away. One moment I was just another blurred reflection in the café window, and the next, I was caught in the gravity of her gaze.
It wasn't flirtation. It wasn't the accidental, fleeting kind of eye contact strangers make before they both pretend not to have noticed. It was deliberate, sharp, assessing.
I wasn't supposed to be noticed. Not by her.
My brain stuttered over the moment, tripping over itself. Did I know her? I was sure I didn't. I would have remembered.
Then she smirked.
Not a polite smile. Not the kind you give when you make eye contact with a stranger. Something else. Something sharper.
And then, just as easily, she moved.
Towards me.
The Moment That Changed Everything
I almost knocked over my coffee.
There were at least four empty tables she could have taken. Five, if you counted the wobbly one by the window that no one ever seemed desperate enough to sit at. But she chose mine.
She pulled the chair out smoothly, shrugging off her coat, draping it over the back of the chair like she had done this a thousand times before. Like it was her seat all along, and I had just been keeping it warm.
She hadn't even asked.
I should have said something. Maybe a stammered Oh--was this seat taken? as if that would make a difference. As if this was a normal situation, and I wasn't already struggling to remember how to form coherent thoughts.
But she spoke first.
"You don't belong here."
The words settled into my chest, warm and slow, like a drink that burns going down.
I blinked, unsure if I had misheard. "...What?"
She didn't answer right away. Instead, she tilted her head slightly, studying me the way a scientist might study a petri dish. There was something unnerving about how casually she assessed me, like she was already figuring out what to do with me.
"You don't look like the kind of guy who sits alone in a place like this," she said finally, her voice smooth and unhurried, as if she had all the time in the world to dissect me. "You're too tense. Too self-aware."
She took her coffee--when had she even ordered it?--and lifted it to her lips, watching me over the rim of the cup.
"People who belong here don't think about it so much."
I shifted in my seat, suddenly aware of every inch of my body. My shoulders, hunched slightly forward. My hands, fidgeting around my cup. My jaw, tightening because I didn't know how to respond.
I cleared my throat. "I just... like quiet places."
Her lips quirked slightly, something just short of amusement.
"Do you?" she murmured, stirring her coffee. "Or are you just waiting for someone to notice you?"
My stomach dropped.
I didn't know how to respond to that. It wasn't entirely wrong, but it wasn't right either. It was just--too precise. Too close to something I didn't want to acknowledge.
She didn't press the question. She didn't need to.
I should have asked for her name. I should have asked what she wanted. I should have done something other than sit there, trapped under the weight of her gaze.
But she was already ahead of me.
She tilted her head, like she had already grown bored of waiting for me to catch up. "What's your name?"
I swallowed. "Stan."
She repeated it once, softly, like she was testing the feel of it on her tongue.
Then she smiled. And I knew--I was done for.
"Nice to meet you, Stan," she said. "I'm Bella."
And just like that, she reached across the table--without moving at all.
A Game I Didn't Know I Was Playing
She left shortly after that. No goodbye. No phone number. Just an amused glance as she pulled her coat back on, as if she was satisfied with what she had learned.
I should have left it at that.
I should have walked out of that café and forgotten about her.
But I didn't.
Because the next day, she was waiting for me.
Same café. Same smirk.
As if she already knew I'd come back.
And I did.
And this time?
I didn't even try to look away.
A Return I Pretended I Didn't Plan
I told myself I wasn't going to go back.
That I had work to do. That I had better ways to spend my lunch break. That I wasn't the kind of man who let a single conversation stick under his skin like a splinter he couldn't dig out.
I told myself a lot of things.
Then, without thinking--without planning, without consciously deciding--I was pushing open the café door again at exactly the same time as yesterday.
And she was already there.
Same table. Same smirk. Like she had been waiting. Like she had known.
I froze, halfway through the threshold, gripping the door handle just a second too long, as if my body hadn't quite committed to this yet. The bell above the door chimed its ridiculous, cheerful little jingle.
Her eyes flicked up from her coffee, locking onto me. And just like that, the café rearranged itself around her.
She had changed today. A slate-gray blouse, silky, almost metallic in the dim café lighting. Her nails--red yesterday--were black today. Long and glossy, fingers curled loosely around her cup, nails tapping lightly against the ceramic. A metronome keeping time to a song only she could hear.
For a split second, I thought about turning around. Just stepping back out into the street, pretending I hadn't seen her, hadn't just proven exactly how predictable I was. But before I could move--before I could even decide--she tilted her head and said,
"Took you long enough."
Not a question. Not a tease. Just a fact.
Something hot and uncomfortable curled under my ribs. A feeling I couldn't place. Somewhere between embarrassment and thrill.
I tried to force out a laugh, but it came out thin, weak. "I--uh--I didn't know you'd be here."
She arched a brow, stirring her coffee slowly, her spoon clinking against the porcelain in a rhythm so deliberate it made my teeth clench.
"Didn't you?"
She gestured to the seat across from her, watching as I hesitated.
She liked that. The hesitation. The way I hovered just long enough to make it clear that this wasn't normal for me. That I wasn't the kind of man who sat down with beautiful strangers two days in a row.
"I won't bite, Stan," she murmured. "Not yet, anyway."
I sat.
And just like that, I lost something I didn't even know I was gambling.
The First Test
It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize she was studying me.
She never broke eye contact for long, her gaze too steady, too patient, like she was cataloging me. Taking inventory of what made me twitch, what made me shrink.
"So," she said finally, voice soft, measured. "What did you tell yourself?"
I frowned. "What?"
She rested her chin on one hand, nails tapping idly against the cup. "Last night. After you left. Did you convince yourself you weren't coming back?"
I swallowed, shifting in my seat. "I didn't--"
