AI The drizzle clung to Rory’s shoulder-length black hair, leaving cool beads that trickled down the nape of her neck under the bun she’d slapped together that morning. She tucked the empty delivery bag under her arm, the plastic crinkling loud against the hum of Soho traffic, and rubbed at the ache in her left calf where her scooter's footrest had rubbed a blister that afternoon. The crescent scar on her left wrist peeked out when she pushed her sleeve up, a faint silver line that had followed her from Cardiff’s cobblestone side streets to this flat above the green-neon glow of The Raven’s Nest. She’d clocked out an hour ago, but she’d stopped to grab a pack of mint gum from the corner shop, and now she was finally heading home, after a 10-hour shift hauling dumpling and chowder orders across West London.
She’d been avoiding this block for three months. Ever since she’d signed the lease on the studio above the bar, ever since she’d heard the soft thud of a limp through the floorboards and recognized the rough, quiet voice of the man who’d knocked on her door on moving day, offering her a free pint and a warning not to scratch the vintage jukebox’s vinyl inserts. Silas Blackwood, the bar’s owner, had vanished before she could say thank you, and after that, Rory had stuck to the back alleys when she came home late, skirting the green neon sign like it was a landmine. She’d heard him through the ceiling some nights: low, clipped conversations with people who spoke in coded phrases, the clink of crystal glasses, the soft scrape of a chair being dragged across the scuffed wooden floor. She’d never gone inside.
Until tonight, when a plume of mint and tobacco smoke billowed out from the bar’s back alley entrance, and a woman leaned against the brick wall, cigarette between her fingers, head tilted like she was waiting for someone she’d been waiting years to see.
Rory stopped short, her gum packet slipping from her grasp and plopping onto the wet pavement. She stared, and for a second she was back in 2012, sitting on Eva’s bedroom floor in Canton, painting each other’s nails neon pink, Eva laughing so hard she snort-laughed when Rory accidentally dabbed a blob of polish on her own knee. The woman in front of her had cropped auburn hair, the same tight curls that had once tangled in Rory’s bike basket when they’d ridden to the seaside two summers in a row, a tiny silver moon charm swinging from a thin chain around her neck, and a nose ring that glinted in the neon green light. She’d gotten a tattoo on her left wrist, a thin crescent mirroring the faint scar on Rory’s own, and her faded black jeans were fitted tight over her hips, instead of the high-waisted denim overalls she’d worn every day to school. A silver stud peeked out from her earlobe, next to a tiny hoop, and her lips were painted a deep red, nothing like the clear gloss she’d slathered on every morning in Cardiff.
“Rory?” the woman said, her voice hoarse, like she hadn’t spoken in a week. She flicked her cigarette into the gutter, and stitched her hands together in front of her, a nervous habit Rory hadn’t seen since the day she’d tried to tell Eva she was dating Evan.
Rory’s throat closed up. She’d spent five years avoiding this, five years pretending that the girl in Cardiff had stayed there, that she hadn’t left a trail of broken promises and silent goodbyes behind her. “Eva?” she said, her voice coming out smaller than she meant it to, like she was afraid the woman would vanish if she spoke too loud.
The woman blew out a cloud of smoke, and her eyes widened —bright brown, the same color as the day she’d shown up at Rory’s dorm with a carton of fish and chips, crying because Evan had yelled at Rory for forgetting their third anniversary. “Is that actually you?”
Rory nodded, and Eva stepped forward, and they hugged, tight, like they were afraid the other would disappear. Eva’s shoulder was hard from carrying heavy bartender trays, and her hair smelled like peppermint and cigarette smoke, but it was still the same girl who’d sat with her in the hospital after she’d fallen off her bike and gotten the crescent scar, who’d held her hand while the doctor stitched her up.
“I didn’t know you were in London,” Rory said, pulling back, and wiping at the tear that had slipped down her cheek.
Eva laughed, a sharp, dry sound that didn’t reach her eyes. “I moved here six months ago. Got a job at this bar— Silas hired me. Didn’t think I’d ever step foot in a place this fancy, to be honest. Back in Cardiff, I was working at a bookstore that smelled like old paper and cat litter, and I couldn’t afford a coffee that didn’t come from a gas station.” She nodded at Rory’s uniform shirt, the red and gold embroidery of Golden Empress peeking out under her frayed denim jacket. “What about you? Last I heard, you were pre-law at Cardiff. You were gonna follow your dad’s footsteps , make him proud.”
Rory’s face heated up. She’d never told Eva that she’d dropped out of pre-law, that she’d packed her backpack in the middle of the night and left Cardiff without a word, that she’d run all the way to London because Evan had found out where she was staying with Eva’s cousin. “I— I didn’t follow the plan.”
“No shit,” Eva said, and then she winced, like she’d said too much. “Sorry. I just— I waited. For three years. You promised you’d call every Sunday. You even wrote it on a sticky note and stuck it to my fridge, right after you left Cardiff. Said you’d text me every week, no matter what. Then one day, the note was gone, and you didn’t answer any of my texts, and I thought you’d dead, or— or that you hated me.”
Rory’s throat tightened. She’d forgotten the sticky note. She’d forgotten that Eva had put it on her fridge, that she’d stared at it every morning until the day Evan had shown up at her cousin’s flat in Roath, screaming and slamming doors. She’d grabbed her laptop and her backpack and run out the back gate, leaving her phone behind, leaving all of her notes and clothes and the sticky note behind. She’d thought she’d never see Eva again, but here she was, standing in front of her, with a crescent tattoo on her wrist and a nose ring and a life in London that Rory didn’t even know about. “I didn’t hate you,” she said, her voice breaking . “Evan found me. He tracked me to Eva’s cousin’s place. I had to leave. I didn’t have time to grab my phone, or your number, or— anything. I didn’t even know how to reach you.”
Eva’s eyes softened, and she reached up to touch the crescent scar on Rory’s wrist. “I got this tattoo after you left,” she said, tapping the crescent on her own wrist. “Told myself I’d never forget the best friend I had. I thought you’d left me for dead, Rory. For a guy who made you scared to breathe.”
Rory shook her head, and she leaned against the brick wall next to Eva, and they both watched the traffic pass by. “I never left you. I just— I was scared. I was scared he’d find me again, scared he’d hurt you if he found out where I was, scared I’d let you down by not being the pre-law student my dad wanted.” She laughed, a bitter, tight sound. “I’ve been working delivery for Golden Empress for three months. I live in a flat above this bar, the one with the leaky faucet in the bathroom and the broken window that faces the alley. I haven’t told my dad anything. He still thinks I’m in pre-law in Cardiff.”
Eva’s face fell, a little. “You never told him? He’s gonna kill you.”
“I know,” Rory said, and she ran a hand through her bun, pulling at the hair tie. “I’ve been putting it off. I don’t know how to face him. He always wanted me to be a barrister, just like him. I let him talk me into pre-law, and then I realized I didn’t want that life. I didn’t want to be in a courtroom, arguing with people for money. I just wanted to be safe.”
Silas’s voice cut through the quiet, and they both turned to see him standing in the bar’s doorway, his grey-streaked auburn hair pulled back into a loose bun, his neatly trimmed beard dusted with a little rain, his silver signet ring glinting on his right hand. He leaned against the doorframe, his slight left limp making him favor the wall a little. “You two should come inside. It’s raining harder, and I’ve got a bottle of Irish whiskey hidden behind the bar, the good stuff. Brendan’s favorite.”
Rory’s eyes widened . “You know my dad?”
Silas smiled, a faint, tired smile. “Brendan and I worked a few cases together back when I was still in MI6. He came to me a year before you left Cardiff, worried about you. Said you were dating a guy who had a temper, who’d been hitting you. I told him I’d keep an eye out. When you moved into the flat above the bar, I recognized your last name. I figured it was you. I didn’t say anything because you asked me not to. Figured you’d come around when you were ready.” He nodded at the bar’s entrance. “Come on. It’s slow tonight. I’ll make you both a drink. On the house.”
Eva glanced at Rory, and she nodded, and together they followed Silas inside the bar, the green neon light fading behind them as the door clicked shut. The walls were lined with old maps of London and black-and-white photographs of people Rory didn’t recognize, mostly men in suits, holding guns and smiling for the camera. The air smelled like roasted nuts and malt whiskey , and the jukebox in the corner was playing a slow, soft folk song that Rory recognized, one that Eva and her had listened to on repeat in Cardiff.
Silas pulled two glasses from the shelf behind the bar, and poured a generous amount of Irish whiskey into each, handing one to Rory and one to Eva. “So,” he said, leaning against the bar, “tell me everything. From the moment you left Cardiff.”
Eva slid into a stool at the bar, and Rory sat next to her, and for the next hour, they talked. Eva told Rory about her divorce, about how she’d moved to London to start over, about how Silas had hired her after she’d de-escalated a drunk customer who’d refused to pay for his drink by matching his bourbon order and listening to his war stories until he calmed down. Rory told Eva about leaving Evan, about living in the flat above the bar, about working delivery, about how she’d lied to her father every week about her “crime seminar” and her “library study sessions.” Silas listened, quiet, sipping his own whiskey, and occasionally added a detail that Rory had forgotten, like the night she’d called him from a payphone outside the bus station, crying, because she’d lost her wallet and her scooter had broken down.
Rory had forgotten that call . She’d thought she’d never talked to anyone from her old life again, but here she was, sitting in a bar she’d been avoiding for three months, talking to her best friend and the man who’d helped her without even knowing it. For the first time in five years, she didn’t feel like she was running . She felt like she was home .