The restaurant was bathed in an amber half-light, soft enough to flatter but steady enough to betray a tremor. Outside, the rain whispered against the glass, patient and watchful. I studied the menu as a matter of theater, drafting sentences in the margins of my mind, composing an opening line before the story had even found its breath.

He arrived as though he had already authored the ending. His dark wool coat was damp, his gloves tucked away with a surgeon’s precision. He didn’t just look at the room; he swept it in clean, predatory strokes, counting the exits like beads on a rosary. When he sat, it was with a calm so rehearsed it felt like a warning.

“Daniel,” he said. The name sounded borrowed—a politeness worn for convenience.

“Mara.”

“So, you are a writer,” he observed. He carried the word like both an accusation and a trophy.

“I am.” My voice felt like a blade wrapped in velvet. The waiter placed our menus between us as though they might sprout rumors if left to their own devices.

A small, sharp curve touched his mouth—admiration laced with suspicion. “A writer.” The word lingered between us like the ghost of gunsmoke.

We had spoken before, of course—digital fragments, shared oddities, hints of an intelligence sharp enough to draw blood. He had told me he was a practical man. I had mistaken that for clarity. I should have recognized the specific coldness of a man with blood moving beneath the ice.

“I suppose we should indulge in the small talk,” he said eventually. “Tell me of your latest project.”

I offered him the polished version, the one I kept for strangers on first dates: metaphors, a digestible plot, truth softened into something palatable. He listened like a man reading the warning labels on a vial of poison—clinical, curious, and entirely unafraid.

We traded masks. We spoke of the weather and the weight of books, the standard camouflage of strangers trying to decipher the architecture of the other’s soul. He spoke of insurance work with a tone far too deliberate for spreadsheets, an alertness that felt ill-suited for a routine office.

When the waiter retreated, Daniel leaned in, and the air between us turned thin.

“A hypothetical question,” he murmured, his tone as casual as a comment on the rain. “If you wanted to kill someone… how would you do it?”

It was a strange courtesy, asking so softly about the abyss.

My laugh was small, a sharp silver bell. “You ask that as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world.”

“People research their hobbies,” he replied, his gaze unwavering. “You said you liked the details.”

I let the question settle, feeling the weight of it. “An air shot between the toes,” I answered. “It looks like a heart attack. Quiet. Unremarkable. No spectacle, no villain. The world exhales, and someone is simply… gone.”

His expression shifted. It was a kaleidoscope of recognition and startled awe. The approval in his voice pressed against my throat like a gloved hand—both a devotion and a threat.

“Oh,” he breathed.

“You sound pleased,” I murmured.

He smiled, a crooked thing that didn’t reach his eyes but struck the part of me that keeps score of perfect sentences. “I am pleased.” His fingers tapped the table once. “I wanted to hear it before I decided.”

A faint tremor ran beneath my skin. Decided what? To stay? To leave? To keep the idea of me like a secret cigarette tucked behind his ear?

“Decide what, exactly?” I asked quietly.

He held my gaze, practiced and dangerous. “Whether to be efficient,” he said, “or to see what happens if I do not finish the job.”

Silence pooled between us, heavy and liquid. The taste of the wine vanished. I could feel the old animal inside me wake, alert to the shift of air on a ledge. “You were going to—”

He released a soft, almost disbelieving laugh. “Yes. I thought I would.” No defensiveness. Almost an apology.

The waiter returned with our plates and retreated as though sensing a volatile chemical reaction. We ate. The conversation resumed, first uneven, then fluid, as we stepped past a threshold neither of us had intended to acknowledge. He spoke of the discipline of order and how language betrays a liar. I spoke of characters who refuse to die, no matter how the author tries to silence them.

When we rose, he offered his arm with formal grace. I accepted, guided by an instinct older than caution. Outside, the rain had turned to a fine mist, blurring the streetlights like varnish over an oil painting. We walked side by side, two silhouettes sharing a single breath.

“So,” I said, looking at the wet pavement. “How long would it take to die if you were to, potentially, stab someone in the guts?”

“Anywhere from two to thirty minutes,” he answered instantly.

“Interesting,” I murmured, filing the information away in the dark cabinet of my mind.

If fate exists, it sometimes sits across from you in a booth and studies your sentence structure before deciding to put the blade away. It was a beginning where there should have been an ending.

A life spared. Or perhaps, merely one postponed.

Escrito el 5 de noviembre de 2025