Somewhere Between Smoke and Silence

Chapter Three – Somewhere Between Smoke and Silence

The third night, it rained.

Not a soft drizzle—the kind you could ignore—but a steady, soaking downpour that blurred the streetlights and turned the city into something softer. More forgiving.

Lucien was already at the bar when she walked in, water trailing down the edges of her coat. Her hair was damp at the ends. She looked like she’d come through something and hadn’t decided yet if she’d made it.

She sat beside him without a word. He slid her a napkin without looking.

“You always show up early?” she asked, voice low.

“Only when I’m not sure you will.”

She smiled at that. Just a little. The kind of smile you catch in a rearview mirror and don’t mention out loud.

They drank in quiet for a while, the rain tapping against the windows like it had something to say.

“What do you think people would see,” she said suddenly, “if they looked at us right now?”

Lucien tilted his head.

“A man and a woman drinking in silence. Two strangers, maybe.”

She shook her head.

“No. I think they’d see two people trying not to say something.”

He didn’t answer right away.

Then, softly—

“What would you say, if you could?”

She turned her glass in her hands.

“That some nights feel heavier than others. And I don't always know what to do with the weight.”

Lucien looked down at the scotch in his glass.

“Yeah,” he murmured. “I know that feeling.”

It wasn’t flirting. It wasn’t confessional. It was just… honest. The kind of thing you say when you forget you’re supposed to be a version of yourself.

She asked him about music next. What he listened to when no one was around.

“Old jazz,” he said.

“Stuff with ghosts in it.”

She laughed under her breath.

“That’s a good answer.”

“What about you?”

“Classical,” she said, surprising him. “Late at night. Violins. Cellos. Something with ache.”

“You listen to ache?”

She gave him a sideways glance.

“You drink it.”

That made him laugh. A real one this time.

They didn’t talk about where they went when they left the bar. Or who they were before the drinks and the dim lights. That was the unspoken rule—no names, no pasts. Just the now.

But when they stepped outside into the rain, something shifted.

She paused under the awning, watching the street like it might say something if she waited long enough.

“I could walk you home,” Lucien offered.

She looked at him. Really looked. As if trying to see beneath the offer.

“I can handle myself.”

“I know.”

A beat.

“But maybe I don’t want to.”

That stilled her.

Not a romantic gesture. Not a move. Just a truth, placed gently between them.

She didn’t say yes. Didn’t say no either. Just started walking, slow, and didn’t tell him to stay behind.

They walked in silence for blocks. Side by side. Not touching. The city breathing around them. The rain softening everything it touched.