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Amara's hand moved steadily, the familiar rhythm of needle through fabric calming her as always. Her mind was quiet, focused, not wandering too far beyond the thread in her grasp.
Then the door opened.
She looked up slowly.
It was him again.
Xavier.
The man who had now become… something of a regular visitor.
His tie was loose this time, the top button of his shirt undone, sleeves half-rolled as though he'd pulled them back without much thought. There was a softness to him today, like the sharpness he usually carried had been left somewhere else.
"You again?" Amara said flatly, setting her work aside with a faint sigh.
Xavier offered a half-smile. "Yeah… I was passing by. Figured I'd drop in."
"Passing by." She didn't sound convinced. "You know this isn't the only tailor shop in the city."
"True. But this one's different."
"Different how?"
Xavier shrugged, stepping further into the shop. "Feels… less noisy here."
"Less noisy doesn't mean it's welcoming," she pointed out, resting her elbow on the table, chin in hand.
He chuckled. "I've noticed."
There was a short silence between them, filled only by the quiet hum of the ceiling fan spinning lazily overhead.
Amara broke it first. "You're coming from a meeting."
"Yeah." He glanced down at his shirt as if noticing his own disheveled appearance for the first time. "Didn't realize I looked this undone."
"You do." She returned to her stitching, her voice detached. "Most people wouldn't want to be seen like that. Especially someone like you."
"Someone like me?"
"Rich, polished, soon-to-be-married." Her needle moved quickly, efficiently. "People like you always care about appearances."
"Do I really look like I care that much?"
She didn't answer. She didn't need to.
Xavier let out a soft laugh and leaned against the nearest shelf. "You're not like most people, are you?"
"I don't try to be."
"I can tell." He crossed his arms. "You always talk like you're expecting people to leave."
"Because they usually do."
"That's a pretty lonely way to think."
"It's a realistic way to think," she corrected, sharp but not angry. "People come into your life for a while. They leave when they're done. It's how it works."
"Is that what you think I'm doing? Just passing through?"
She didn't look up. "Aren't you?"
"I don't know." His voice softened, his smile losing its usual confidence. "Is it okay if I don't have an answer to that yet?"
Amara paused in her stitching, her fingers lightly pressing the fabric. "You're free to stay or go. I'm not invested in the outcome."
"You say that, but you keep letting me in."
"Because I have no reason to turn you away." She kept her tone neutral. "But don't mistake convenience for attachment."
Xavier chuckled, rubbing his jaw thoughtfully. "You're really something."
"I get that a lot."
"Do you?"
"Not always as a compliment."
"Well, this time it is."
There was something about the way he spoke that didn't sit neatly in the boxes Amara liked to put people in. He wasn't supposed to be… this. Not kind. Not curious.
Not consistent.
She should've expected him to eventually drift away like the others. But each time he came back, it unsettled her a little.
And yet, she said nothing to stop him.
They drifted into small conversation—about the fabric she was working on, about the faint rain that had fallen earlier, about how most people chose white flowers over red.
Xavier listened more than he spoke, asking questions not because he had to but because he genuinely wanted to know her thoughts. He made comments that made her pause, observations that caught her off guard.
But through it all, Amara stayed carefully distant.
When he joked, she gave him little more than a glance. When he complimented the neatness of her stitching, she brushed it off like it was nothing.
She wouldn't make the mistake of believing someone like him would stay.
People don't stay.
And Xavier, despite his warmth and persistence, would be no different.
Or so she told herself.
The bell above the door hadn't rung again.
The conversation lingered, stretching longer than she would've allowed with anyone else.
But she let him stay.
She stitched, he talked, and somewhere in that quiet exchange, something unknown and delicate was threading itself between them.
She would not pull at it.
She would not examine it.
But she would let it be—for now.
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