Page 30 of Rise
His brows lifted and a quiet breath escaped his lips, like a laugh that didn’t fully arrive. “You sure?”
She nodded, eyes wide and shining with a silent plea. “Seems fair, don’t you think?”
Beck leaned back, his hands now folded loosely in front of him. His gaze drifted away, landing on the window before them, tracing the movement that continued on outside.
“I talk to my sister,” he admitted, eventually. “Not as often as I should, but more than the rest.”
Hazel waited, knowing there was more. Knowing that he needed to take his time getting there.
“She’s older, been in my business since I was born. The kind of person who makes lists about other people’s problems and how to solve them.”
There was fondness in his voice, but also something quieter and more complicated.
“She used to call every day and show up at my house a lot, too, when we still lived in the same state. Especially when I first got back.”
Hazel tilted her head. She couldn’t help herself. “Back from where?”
He didn’t look towards her, that familiar distance he often held settling over his eyes. “The military. Overseas.”
Hazel didn’t say anything right away, but in the space between his words and the quiet that followed, something shifted in her. A handful of small details, things she’d noticed but hadn’t quite named, started falling into place. The way he moved, deliberate and considered, like someone who’d learned to calculate every step. The limp he didn’t try to hide. The quiet gravity he carried with him, the way he made a space feel steadier just by standing in it. His hands, always rough, always busy, like he needed them to be doing something. Like stillness was something he’d had to learn to settle into again.
She thought about how he watched the world like someone who knew how fast it could change, like someone who’d once been dropped into the worst of it and had clawed his way back. And still, somehow, came here. For coffee. For quiet.
It hit her low and deep, an ache and an understanding, all at once.
“She meant well,” he continued, softer now. “But she got so focused on fixing me that she forgot how to just be my sister. Everything felt so… forced. Like I was a project.”
Hazel’s throat tightened, emotion clawing at the back of her throat. “That sounds exhausting.”
“It was. That’s why I moved out here.”
They fell quiet again. Not awkward,neverawkward, but full of something just beneath the surface. Something warming, expanding.
Hazel watched him for another long moment, studying his side profile while he studied the world beyond the window.
Then, without warning, the espresso machine behind the counter let out a sharp hiss of steam— loud and sudden, cutting through the quiet.
Beck jolted.
It wasn’t big, just a flicker of movement— his shoulders going tense, his jaw clenching tight before he exhaled hard through his nose and smoothed a hand down his thigh like he could press the moment back into place.
But Hazel saw it, felt it. There was a sudden, wild spark in his eyes, barely leashed. A glimpse of something raw and distant and honed in a different world.
And just as quickly as it appeared, it was gone.
He blinked, gave a faint shake of his head, and shifted in his seat. “Well, I should probably get back—“
“Wait here,” she murmured, beating him to it. She pushed back from the table and stood in one quick, fluid motion. Her feet were already moving, carrying her away from him and towards the rounded counter at the center of the room.
Beck blinked, surprised, but went still. “Hazel—“
“Just wait. Please.”
She didn’t explain. Just settled in that familiar spot behind the counter, one hand pulling open the display cabinet with a softclick.
As she studied the remaining contents of the cabinet, she reached beneath the register and pulled out a to-go box, already lined with parchment. Into it she placed a sticky bun, his usual, and one ofherfavourites, the galette. She nudged them over a little and then, as if they were an afterthought, added two of the lavender shortbread cookies.
She tied the box with a bit of twine, tucked it against her palm, and returned to the table.
