Liz did her best to act the part of the weary, indifferent diner waitress. Her posture was a practiced slouch, her face set in a mask of benign boredom. But the moment her eyes landed on Meki, truly saw the tapestry of raw grazes and drying blood overlying the anti-recognition makeup, her façade shattered. Her professional smile vanished, replaced by a tight line of maternal worry. She leaned in close, her voice dropping to a hushed whisper meant for us alone.
"Darling, your face…"
"It's all good!" Meki burst out, their voice a shade too loud, a performance of bravado for the nearly empty diner. They slapped a hand on the sticky tabletop for emphasis. "A Drop Inn with the works, I am famished! And a chocolate shake."
The order was a declaration of normalcy, a desperate attempt to pretend this was just any other late-night snack.
Liz's eyes, sharp and knowing, flicked between us, taking in our dishevelled state, the dust ground into our clothes, the adrenaline still buzzing in our tense limbs. The waitress was gone, and the guardian was back.
"Does Dad know you're home?" she whispered, the code laced with genuine anxiety. "He's been worried."
Then, seamlessly, she shifted back into her role, her voice rising to a normal, customer-service tone as she turned to me. "And you, dear?"
I leaned forward, meeting her in that intimate space of whispered confidences.
"Yes, he knows," I assured her quietly.
Then, leaning back, I mirrored Meki's false normalcy with my own.
"I'll just take the vanilla protein shake."
It was my standard. Everyone always rhapsodized about the rich, decadent taste of a chocolate shake, but not me. There was a clean, predictable simplicity to vanilla that I craved, especially now. I watched Meki from the corner of my eye, marvelling at their ability to even think about food. My own stomach was a tangled knot of nerves. I swear they could eat a full-course meal even if their throat was cut.
The moment of raw concern passed as quickly as it had come. Liz straightened up, her waitress smile clicking back into place like a shield.
"A Drop Inn with the works, a chocolate shake, and a vanilla shake, darlings. Is that all?" she asked brightly, the mask firmly back in place, protecting us all.
As Liz waddled back toward the kitchen, the brief shield of her concern gone, the space she left behind felt charged and empty.
Meki immediately reached for the grimy sugar dispenser, a cheap glass shaker crusted with old residue. With deliberate, almost ceremonial slowness, they poured a small, glittering mound of white crystals onto the sticky Formica tabletop. Then they extended a finger, tracing a lazy pattern in the sugar before licking it clean.
"So, Nimble," they said, their voice shifting into a mock-serious reporter's cadence, "how does it feel to be the saviour of the human race?"
My first instinct was to bite back with equal force.
How does it feel getting your face smashed in?
But the words died in my throat.
My eyes darted toward the snoring drunk, the oblivious couple. This was how you got caught, letting the high of the chase make you sloppy.
Instead, I leaned forward, my voice a low, sharp hiss that cut through their performance.
"Not in here."
Meki's eyes glinted with mischief, utterly undeterred. They took their middle finger, still damp from their mouth, and made a show of sucking it wet, their lips forming a perfect 'O', their gaze locked on mine in a blatant, crude imitation of a blow job.
A hot, unwelcome flush crept up my neck. I loved them best like this, when they were trying, and failing, to act sexy, the absurdity of it all a strange and potent turn-on.
They then plunged the whole finger back into the sugar mound, coating it in a thick, crystalline shell, before sucking it clean with an exaggerated pop. Finally, they presented the finger to me, not in a lewd gesture, but popped straight up into a perfect, defiant fuck you sign.
I shook my head, a reluctant smile tugging at my lips. I have never met anyone else like Meki, who could, in ten seconds, make me feel completely at ease and yet want to strangle them and fuck them against the vinyl booth, all at the same time.
Before the chaotic energy could escalate further, Liz returned, balancing our shakes on a small tray. The glasses were beaded with condensation, a small promise of normalcy.
"There you go, darlings," she announced, setting them down with a clink.
As she placed Meki's chocolate shake before them, she leaned in, her voice dropping into a hushed, maternal command that brooked no argument.
"And I'm looking at that face of yours when you're done eating."
Meki just grinned, a flash of white in their bloodied, sugar-dusted face and replied in a loud, clear voice:
"Yes, Mum!''
The word hit the air like a gunshot.
My foot connected sharply with their shin under the table, a jolt of pure panic.
We were never to use that code name in the open, not even as a joke. The carefully constructed wall between our two lives had just developed a hairline crack, and in our world, that was all it took for everything to come crashing down.
The arrival of the food was a salvation and a curse. Meki finally got the message, or rather, their burger was planted like a greasy flag in front of them, breaking the awkward spell. For the next ten minutes, they were a study in focused consumption, wolfing down the double patty, fries, and all with a primal, unselfconscious gusto.
And I hated them for it.
I hated them for what they did to me.
Even with a mouth crammed full of food, a smear of ketchup on their chin, and grease glistening on their cheeks, I wanted them more than anything in the world. In those unguarded moments of simple hunger, the sharp, androgynous edges of their face softened, and the fierce intelligence in their eyes was replaced by pure animal satisfaction. It was a raw, unvarnished humanity that made my chest ache.
Every messy, joyful bite was a magnet, pulling at a desire I could never act upon.
It was the saddest truth we all knew in our crew, an unspoken rule as fundamental as "Sandman home."
Meki talked the talk with a silver tongue: flirting, teasing, weaving a web of charged possibilities with a wink and a clever line.
But they never, ever walked the walk.
They were a fortress of charming deflection, and I was a sentinel forever stationed outside the walls, knowing I would never receive the signal to enter.
When Meki finally polished off the last fry and slurped the dregs of their chocolate shake with a loud, final rattle of the straw, the silence in the diner felt absolute. The young couple had departed, leaving behind crumpled napkins and the ghost of their intimacy. Only the snoring drunk remained, his ragged breath a metronome counting down the seconds. The coast was as clear as it was going to get.
Without a word, we slid out of the booth. The vinyl sighed as we stood, a sound of release. We exchanged a glance, all pretence and performance now set aside and made our way toward the beaded curtain and the humming, pixelated sanctuary of the back room.
We moved single file down the narrow aisle, a canyon walled in by the hulking, beeping forms of bygone machines. The air hummed with the low, wasted electricity of a dozen sleeping screens, their glow painting the darkness in sickly shades of green and amber.
My eyes, against their own volition, were drawn to the left to the Sonic the Hedgehog cabinet. It stood like a tombstone, a handwritten "OUT OF ORDER" sign taped crookedly across its screen. The art was faded, Sonic's once-cocky grin bleached by time and neglect.
I tried not to look, but the habit was a pull as strong as gravity.
That cabinet was a lie.
Behind its dead screen and coin slot was a built-in Faraday cage a silent, digital snare that now held both mine and Meki's phones and watches, isolating us from the searching world outside.
We didn't pause, didn't feign interest in the other games. Our path was a straight line to the back of the room, to a door as worn and tired as everything else here. A battered sign, its plastic yellowed and cracked, read: TOILETS. Tacked beneath it was a small, laminated sticker, the kind you'd get from a label maker, its letters precise and unforgiving:
GUESTS ONLY
We ignored the warning and pushed straight through, the door swinging shut behind us with a soft, final click. It led not to a restroom, but to a small, windowless hallway that smelled of stale bleach and old wiring.
Three more doors faced us: one for WOMEN, one for MEN, and a third heavier-looking door made of scarred steel.
A professional engraved plaque on it read:
STAFF ONLY
That was our destination.
It had always been the third door I took in life.
Tonight, with the scent of grease and near-capture still clinging to us, was no exception.