Chapter 1

Emma had lost track of time hours ago. The last glance at the wall clock behind her said 8:36 p.m., but that could have been ten minutes or three hours ago. She sat hunched at her desk, propping her head up with one hand while the other dragged her mouse across a sea of tiny measurements. The monitor’s white light washed over her cubicle, turning every number on the screen into a soft blur until it all blended into one big, useless smear.

She kept pretending she was still focused, but she was actually only registering the water cooler humming from across the room and the half-on fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. The kind of hum that tells you you’re completely alone. Everyone else had probably been gone for hours. She was the one still trying to hit deadlines that refused to shrink

A pulse throbbed behind her forehead every time she shifted her eyes. She exhaled sharply when she spotted her cup of coffee, still three-quarters full and cold enough to match the air outside. Her stomach twisted again, a reminder that she’d once again skipped dinner without meaning to. Food sat low on her list of priorities when work stacked up like this

She finally pushed herself upright, stretching until her spine cracked. It might have been the first time she’d moved since lunch. Standing felt wobbly, like she was trying to remember how to walk. She wandered to the water cooler, filled a paper cone, and drank. The cold shocked her awake just enough to scan the room. No surprise: every cubicle was dark and empty.

She walked across the office to the floor-to-ceiling windows, the city looked like a ghost version of itself. Snow coated the empty streets fourteen stories below, and her car sat under a fresh layer of powder. She’d forgotten they were calling for snow tonight.

“Guess I really am the only one here,” she muttered to herself.

As she made her way back to her desk, she noticed her phone was lit with a message from when she was making her way around the office.

Lesley (Blueprints):
Hey, I noticed you were still online. You’re not still at work, are you?

“Oh, come on,” she whispered.

Me:
Haha definitely not. Just forgot to log off!

She set her status to invisible and sank back into her chair. A few minutes of pretending to have new energy was all it took for the truth to slap her in the face.

“No. No. No. God damn it.” She dragged her hands down her cheeks. She’d been inputting the wrong measurements. Again.

This was the third time in two weeks. It didn’t matter that she was usually meticulous. Perfectionism worked until it didn’t, and lately it wasn’t working at all. What she always saw as her biggest strength was starting to become her biggest weakness.

“I need to go home.” She said aloud even though no one was there to hear it.

She logged out, grabbed her coat, and took the elevator down to the lobby, not stopping a single time to pick up other occupants from within the office building. Outside, the revolving door dropped her into the cold. The streetlights cast an orange glow across the snow, and her footsteps crunched as she headed toward the crosswalk.

That was when she saw it.

Down the road and across the street, a storefront glowed with warm light while every other building looked shut down and asleep. She’d heard something about a grand opening earlier that week, but she couldn’t remember what the place was supposed to be.

The air carried the smell of baked bread and cinnamon, soft but impossible to ignore. Butter, too. Rich and warm. Her stomach reacted before her brain did, and she found herself drifting closer, following the smell like a moth to a flame.

She stopped on the opposite side of the street and looked up at the sign.

“Comfort Café,” she read quietly.

The warmth inside looked unreal compared to the winter around her. She stood there for a long moment, caught between exhaustion and curiosity.

That was then she saw someone moving from inside.

A figure stepped out from the back kitchen, and paused, noticing Emma watching from the sidewalk. They both hesitated, unsure if the other had caught them staring. Then the person inside walked to the front door, unlocked it, and pushed it open.

The light from inside spilled out into the snow.

Emma didn’t move. Not yet. But she felt the night shifting. Something was waiting for her inside, and for the first time in hours she didn’t feel tired at all.