The Vault’s bakery section slled like butter and sin.
I stood in front of the glass display case at 6:38 PM, staring at chocolate options that ranged from "reasonably priced" to "you could buy a sword for this much." The woman behind the counter had her hip cocked against the register, watching deliberate with the patience of soone who got paid by the hour regardless of whether I bought anything.
"The Belgian dark truffle cake is our most popular selection." She tapped a manicured nail against the glass above a slice that looked like it had been sculpted by soone who went to art school and never recovered. "Two hundred and twenty points for a single slice, but we can do a whole miniature cake for four-fifty. Better value if you’re sharing."
"Just the slice."
"You sure?" She leaned forward on the counter. Tattoo sleeve on her left arm, geotric patterns that ran from wrist to sowhere past the elbow where her rolled-up uniform sleeve covered the rest. Dark hair pulled into a ssy knot. Strong jaw. Nice thighs visible where she’d hiked her apron up above the knee because the bakery section ran hot. "We just got fresh stock on the raspberry ganache too. Pairs beautifully with the Belgian dark if you’re trying to impress soone."
"One slice of the Belgian. That’s it."
"Mmm." She boxed the slice with the care of soone handling explosive ordnance, folding the cardboard corners and sealing it with a gold sticker bearing the Vault’s logo. "What about drinks? We’ve got a new coffee jelly that’s been selling out every afternoon. It’s this whole layered situation with espresso, sweetened cream, and cubes of coffee-flavored gelatin at the bottom. Students have been going feral over it."
"No thanks."
"It’s only forty points for the large. And honestly?" She slid the chocolate box across the counter and placed both palms flat on the glass, her forearms flexing in a way that drew attention to the tattoo work. "It’s the best thing we make. Better than the chocolate. I know that’s heresy coming from the person selling you chocolate, but I’m being real with you."
I opened my mouth to decline again.
She smiled. Full wattage, the kind that suggested she knew exactly what that smile did to people and deployed it with the casual confidence of a veteran saleswoman.
"No," I said.
"You haven’t even tried it."
"I don’t need coffee jelly."
"Nobody needs coffee jelly. That’s what makes it great. It’s a want. A desire. A small beautiful luxury in a world full of giant frogs trying to eat you."
I stared at her.
She stared back. Her eyes were dark brown with flecks of sothing lighter near the iris, and she slled like cocoa powder and espresso grounds, which was either perfu or a professional hazard.
"Fine. One large coffee jelly."
"Excellent choice." She spun around and started assembling the drink with a series of practiced motions that involved scooping, pouring, and layering components into a clear plastic cup with the precision of soone performing surgery on a dessert. The jelly cubes at the bottom were dark amber, almost black, and the cream layer above them was pale enough to glow under the display lights. She topped it with a single espresso shot that swirled into the cream and created sothing that looked like a sunset made of caffeine.
"Forty points." She slid the cup across the counter beside the chocolate box. "And two-twenty for the Belgian dark. Two-sixty total."
I tapped my student ID against the scanner. The points vanished from my balance with a soft chi that sounded far too cheerful for a transaction that had just cost two and a half days of breathing.
"Thank you, co again, handso." She waved with her tattooed arm as I gathered the chocolate box in one hand and the coffee jelly in the other, heading for the door with the resigned satisfaction of a man who had been upsold and knew it.
I made it three steps before taking a sip of the coffee jelly through the wide straw.
The first cube hit my tongue and dissolved into bittersweet espresso flavor that lted directly into the cream. The combination was so unreasonably good that I stopped walking in the middle of the Vault’s main aisle and just stood there like an idiot, processing the fact that the tattooed bakery girl had been completely right.
It was better than the chocolate.
I took another sip. Then another. The jelly cubes had a texture sowhere between firm pudding and soft candy, and each one delivered a concentrated burst of coffee flavor that the sweetened cream imdiately chased with sothing cool and smooth.
A pink-haired guy on a show I used to watch back in my old life had been obsessed with this stuff. The psychic kid who couldn’t catch a break. He’d gone on entire internal monologues about the superiority of coffee jelly as a dessert, and I’d always assud he was exaggerating because the show played everything for cody.
He wasn’t exaggerating. Saikai was right about everything. Coffee jelly was a revelation. The pink-haired bastard had been trying to warn us all along and nobody listened.
I walked across campus toward Summit residential with a box of chocolate in one hand and a cup of the best coffee jelly I’d ever consud in the other, which was admittedly the only coffee jelly I’d ever consud, but the ranking felt earned. The evening air was warm and carried salt from the ocean sowhere below the cliffs. Foot traffic had thinned as dinner hour wound down. The paths were mostly empty except for a few couples and a Ruby student jogging with earbuds in.
Summit residential sat on the north ridge, a cluster of townhouse-style apartnts that second and third-year students occupied based on ranking and rit.
Not as opulent as the Elite Ten’s actual Summit Houses, which were full-sized hos that belonged on the cover of Architectural Digest, but significantly nicer than the first-year boxes in Building C.
Each unit was two stories with its own entrance, actual front steps, and windows that didn’t look like they’d been designed by soone who hated natural light.
Aurora’s apartnt was Unit 7B, halfway down the row. The front steps were concrete with a railing soone had wrapped in string lights that cast warm golden patches across the walkway. A pair of black combat boots sat next to the door, way too large to be Aurora’s. Too many buckles to belong to anyone sane.
Addison’s boots.
She was already here.
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