Maxinni hadn't slept for three nights.
It wasn't the restless insomnia of someone who thinks too much. It was something deeper, more treacherous. Her body begged for rest, but every time she drifted close to sleep, something pulled her back — as if closing her eyes were far too dangerous.
On the third dawn, she gave up.
She left the house before the sun rose, feeling the silence of the street weigh less than the silence of her own living room. The house… the house always seemed to be watching her. Too organized. Quietly wrong.
She didn't plan to go to the café.
She simply realized she was there.
The place was small, old, displaced in time. Large windows let in the cold morning light, and the interior smelled of strong coffee and aged wood. There was no music. Only natural sounds, alive, real.
Maxinni took a deep breath.
The tightness in her chest eased.
She chose a table near the window, dropped her bag on the floor, and rested her elbows on the table, feeling strangely safe. As if that space had been… prepared.
— Good morning.
The voice came from the counter.
When Maxinni looked up, the world seemed to lose half a second.
The woman watching her had nothing extraordinary about her — and yet, everything about her felt slightly out of place. Her features were too fine, too harmonious, as if they had been designed with excessive care.
The eyes… the eyes were the problem.
Light-colored, deep, attentive in a way that made Maxinni shift in her chair.
— Good morning — she replied, her voice coming out lower than she intended.
The woman tilted her head slightly.
— First time here?
Maxinni nodded.
— Yeah… I was just passing by.
A lie. But she didn't know why.
— I see — the woman said, with a small smile. — That happens quite often.
She stepped a little closer to the counter.
— What would you like?
Maxinni opened her mouth to answer, but the woman spoke first:
— Black coffee. No sugar.
Maxinni blinked.
— How did you—
— Sorry — she interrupted quickly, the smile faltering for an almost invisible instant. — A guess.
Too accurate a guess.
Maxinni felt a slight dizziness and placed a hand on the table. The air felt… warm. Not stifling. Dense.
— Are you okay? — the woman asked, already moving in her direction.
— I am. I just… didn't sleep well.
— Insomnia?
The word was spoken with excessive care.
— Lately — Max replied. — Since the hospital.
The silence that followed was wrong.
The woman stopped for a moment too long. Her eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly.
— Hospital? — she repeated.
— An accident — Max said, too quickly. — Nothing serious.
Another lie. She realized it too late.
The woman watched her for a few seconds, as if trying to see something beyond her face.
— I'll bring the coffee — she finally said, stepping away.
As she moved, Maxinni felt something strange: the sensation of being watched wasn't coming from behind her, like it usually did. It came from the space between them. From the air.
When the cup was placed in front of her, Max noticed her hands were trembling.
— Thank you — she murmured.
— Elowen — the woman said suddenly.
— What?
— My name. Elowen.
Maxinni looked up.
— Maxinni.
The names hung in the air for too long.
— Beautiful name — Elowen said, and this time it didn't sound casual.
Maxinni took a sip of the coffee.
The taste was different. More intense. More… real.
For a second, everything aligned. The fatigue eased. The inner noise fell silent.
— This is good — she said, surprised. — Really good.
Elowen smiled faintly.
— I'm glad.
She leaned against the counter, in no hurry to move away.
— Do you usually avoid going back home? — she asked, far too casually.
Maxinni let out a short laugh.
— Is it that obvious?
— To some people — Elowen replied. — Yes.
— And you're one of those people?
Elowen hesitated.
— Maybe.
The silence returned, but now it was different. Not uncomfortable. Charged.
Maxinni felt again that sensation from the hospital. The warmth in the air. The gentle pressure in her chest.
— Have you ever had the feeling — Max asked suddenly — that you're living a life you didn't choose?
The question escaped before she could stop it.
Elowen froze.
For just a second. But it was enough.
— Sometimes — she replied. — I think everyone feels that way.
It wasn't true. Neither of them believed it.
Elowen looked away, tightening the cloth between her fingers. No, she thought. This doesn't make sense.
She shouldn't feel that. Not there. Not with an ordinary human.
But the air… the air was wrong.
— You can stay as long as you like — Elowen said, in a tone almost too careful. — The café tends to be kinder than most houses.
Maxinni nodded slowly.
— I think that's why I came.
Neither of them smiled.
Neither spoke about the shared dizziness.
About the warmth that existed only between them.
About the sense of a flaw — like an invisible crack in reality.
Elowen returned to the counter, repeating to herself that it was imagination.
That she was just tired.
That there was nothing special about Maxinni.
Maxinni watched the steam rise from the cup, trying to ignore the unsettling certainty that this woman awakened something she had been denying since the hospital.
I'm imagining things, she thought.
They were both wrong.
And precisely because of that, Maxinni returned to the café the next day.