"Climate change such a b*tch ,its already getting pretty chilly," Rose muttered, mostly to herself.
She pulled the hoodie tighter across her chest with one hand and dug the other into her pocket, fingers closing around the familiar weight of her lighter. She flicked it twice. The small flame caught and she leaned into it, lighting the cigarette tucked in the corner of her mouth.
She exhaled.
The smoke drifted up lazily and disappeared into the pale late morning air. Around her the street was alive in that unhurried weekday way. People running errands. A woman with a stroller negotiating a curb. Two old men outside a shop with nowhere particular to be, talking about something with great conviction. The sun was out but it wasn't doing much, the kind of weak late autumn sun that shows up purely out of obligation.
Rose walked with both hands back in her pockets, cigarette in the corner of her mouth, blue hoodie doing approximately sixty percent of what she needed it to do temperature wise. The pants weren't really helping either. She had dressed optimistically and the weather had different opinions.
She wasn't late. Not yet. The kind of not yet that required a certain pace and didn't leave much room for dawdling, which was unfortunate because the cigarette disagreed with rushing.
Thankfully the shop was only twenty minutes from home, which left a ten minute grace period if she kept moving. She took a long drag and let her mind wander.
Tonight she was finally going to finish that game. Probably. Her friend Kaia had lent it to her two weeks ago with the specific warning that it was difficult, the kind of difficult that made you question your own intelligence at a fundamental level. Rose had laughed it off at the time. She was not laughing now. She was on her fourth attempt at the same boss and the save file was starting to feel like a personal insult.
Eastern studio, Kaia had said. Small team apparently.
Rose exhaled slowly.
She wasn't lying, she thought. Those guys are actually insane. Like genuinely what are they eating over there. Pregnancy robots. They invented pregnancy robots. They are quietly taking over seventy percent of the global gaming industry. Their convenience store sandwiches are architecturally superior to most buildings in this city. And somehow in the middle of all of that they still found time to make a video game that has humbled her personally and specifically.
She took another drag.
And what's the response to all of this. Tariffs. Just. Tariffs. A man looked at the full breadth of human innovation happening across an entire continent and said you know what, import tax. That'll sort it. Rose genuinely could not decide if it was funny or not so she had settled on both simultaneously which was its own kind of exhausting.
She flicked the cigarette butt into the bin at the corner without breaking stride.
The warm smell of coffee hit her before she even reached the door. She pushed it open, the small bell above chiming once, and stepped inside out of the useless autumn sun and into the familiar noise of the morning rush.
She was two minutes early.
She considered this a personal victory.
But coming early didn't matter much if there wasn't a job to come early to.
The owner, Mrs. Hana, had asked her to come to the back office before the shift started. Rose had assumed it was about the schedule. Maybe a double shift over the weekend. She had sat down in the small chair across from the desk with her hoodie still on and her bag in her lap, completely unprepared for the look on the woman's face.
Mrs. Hana was a good person. Rose had always thought so. The kind of small business owner who remembered her staff's birthdays and kept a spare umbrella by the door for customers caught in the rain. She was looking at Rose now the way good people look at someone when they have already made a decision they feel terrible about.
She folded her hands on the desk. Then unfolded them. Her foot tapped once against the floor, twice, a small restless rhythm she probably wasn't aware of. She wasn't meeting Rose's eyes. Not fully. Every time she got close she found somewhere else to look, the desk, her own hands, the small framed print on the wall behind Rose's left shoulder.
There was a thin bead of sweat at her jaw that she hadn't wiped away.
She cleared her throat.
"Rose," she started. Her voice came out quieter than her normal speaking voice, slightly muffled, like the words had been rehearsed somewhere private and were losing confidence on the way out. "I'm going to have to ask you to... please. Quit working here."
Rose looked at her. The tapping foot. The sweat. The eyes that still wouldn't land anywhere settled.
She leaned back in her chair slowly and looked up at the ceiling. Just for a moment. The kind of moment where you are not actually looking at the ceiling so much as giving yourself somewhere to put your face while you absorb something.
Then she leaned forward.
Her voice came out quiet. Measured.
"Are you scared?"
Not an accusation. Not angry. Just a question with steady eyes behind it, delivered the way you ask something you already know the answer to and simply want confirmed.
Mrs. Hana's foot stopped tapping.
She didn't answer. She looked down at her hands instead and said, again, softer this time, "Please quit." A beat. "I know you're a good girl. I do. And I'm sorry. I just..." the words stacked up, pressing against something she couldn't push past. "If you had only been hon..."
The chair scraped back hard against the floor.
Rose was standing.
"Don't." Her voice was flat and final, the kind of flat that had nothing underneath it because everything underneath it had already been dealt with a long time ago. "I don't want excuses. Have my papers ready tomorrow. And I want my resignation salary for this month."
Mrs. Hana nodded once, small and guilty.
Rose picked up her bag. She was almost at the door when she stopped. She didn't turn around. Just stood there for a second with one hand on the frame, the muffled noise of the morning rush bleeding in through the walls.
She exhaled.
"Thanks for letting me work here."
She left before Mrs. Hana could say anything back.
The bell above the door chimed once as she stepped back out onto the street.
The cold hit her the same as before, indifferent and unhelpful. Rose stood on the pavement for a moment and looked down at the cigarette butt she had flicked into the bin on the way in.
"What a waste," she said to no one.
She scratched the back of her head, fingers dragging through her hair once. Then she reached into her pocket, pulled out the box, and lit another one. The flame caught. She snapped the lighter shut and took a long drag, looking up at the pale useless sky.
She grinned. Small. Mostly to herself.
"Guess I'll head back for today."
She turned and walked in the opposite direction of home.
The street carried on around her the same as it had twenty minutes ago. Same errands. Same weak sun. Same two old men outside the same shop still going at it with the same conviction. Rose walked at an easy pace, cigarette in the corner of her mouth, both hands in her pockets.
One.
She drifted slightly at a fruit stall without stopping.
Two.
Past a newspaper stand.
Three.
She finished the cigarette and dropped it without breaking stride.
Four.
She turned into an empty alley to her left. The noise of the street fell away behind her almost immediately. She didn't stop. She kept walking, deeper, past a dumpster, past a rusted drainpipe, until the alley bent and she followed it around the corner and stopped.
She rolled her neck once.
"I can handle that much," she said quietly.
Then turned around and waited.
"Come out."
Silence.
Then footsteps. Hurried and uneven, the kind that come from people who had a plan that is no longer going the way they planned. A muffled curse. Then another.
Rose was already running toward them.
She cleared the corner fast and spotted them immediately. Three girls. One ahead of the other two by several steps, which was unfortunate for her. Rose closed the gap without slowing down, grabbed her by the collar and yanked her back hard. The girl's feet went out from under her and she hit the ground on her bottom with a sound that echoed off the alley walls.
The other two froze.
Rose straightened up and looked at them. Unhurried. Hands loose at her sides.
"Ashley." Her eyes moved. "Brittany."
Neither of them moved.
"Move," Rose said pleasantly, "and I will beat her so bad the last thing any of you will have to worry about is the hospital bill." A beat. "And we all know hospital bills are absolutely terrible. Trust me on that one."
Nobody moved.
Rose looked at the third girl. She didn't recognize her. Younger looking. Scared in the specific way of someone who had been told a story about a person and was now standing in front of that person and finding the story suddenly very believable.
Rose looked at her for a moment.
"You can go," she said.
The girl blinked.
"But call the police," Rose continued, her voice dropping just slightly, "and you're dead. I have a very good memory." She tilted her head. "And I'm sure your dear friends here have already told you enough about me for that to mean something."
The girl looked at Ashley. Then at Brittany. Then back at Rose holding grace by her collar.
She nodded. Small and hesitant, like her neck wasn't fully cooperating.
Then she turned and walked quickly toward the street, then faster, then broke into a run the moment she hit the pavement and disappeared into the noise of the city.
Rose watched the spot where she had been for a second.
Then turned her attention back to the two remaining girls, who wore the expression of people who had just been very loudly betrayed and were choosing, with great reluctance, to stay quiet about it.
Here is the scene:
Rose looked at the two of them and tilted her head.
"So how's it been since high school sophomore year?" She tapped her chin thoughtfully. "Brittany. Are you still dating that pig, what was his name." She snapped her fingers. "Jerald. Ha. What a stupid name. Jerald." She paused. "If I remember right he slept with Ashley while you two were still together."
Brittany turned to Ashley so fast her hair swung.
"What!?"
"She's lying I didn't!" Ashley shot back.
"You absolutely did you were at his place the night of Kacey's party I saw your—"
"That was not what it looked like and you know—"
"Oh my god you actually did!"
"Keep your voice DOWN—"
They were fully shouting at each other now, completely absorbed, the alley forgotten, Rose forgotten, the entire situation forgotten. Rose watched them for a moment with mild interest.
Then she turned to the girl still on the ground.
She looked down at her, fist loosely raised, and raised her eyebrows.
"Let's get their attention back, okay Grace?"
Grace looked up at her from the ground with the expression of someone deeply reconsidering every decision that had led to this moment.
Rose's fist connected with her face.
"HEY!" Grace shouted.
Ashley and Brittany kept arguing.
Second punch.
"HEY!" Louder this time, her voice cracking slightly at the edges.
Still arguing. Brittany was pointing now.
Third punch.
"WILL YOU TWO LISTEN—"
That one did it.
Ashley and Brittany stopped. Turned. Took in the sight of Grace on the ground sobbing her nose broken and swolen bleeding , Rose crouched beside her, completely calm, fist still loosely raised.
The alley went quiet.
Rose stood up slowly and brushed off her hoodie. She looked between the two of them with a pleasant, unhurried expression.
"Now." She smiled. "Who was it that told my boss about my past?" She glanced down at Grace briefly then back up. "Talk and you reduce the medical bill considerably." The smile stayed. "Okay?"