Samuel slid into the last open seat at the crowded table, balancing his cup and his easy smile. The room was loud with strangers, and he liked it that way. Loud meant no one looked too closely. He had come to this small town hoping the noise might hide him until someone, somehow, saw through it anyway. That was the quiet wish under everything he did lately: to be known, not just liked. He took a slow sip and waited to see who would sit across from him. A girl set her plate down on the carved wood across from him. Vines and tiny animals curled under her hands. She did not say hello. She looked at him and said, "You smile like someone who's tired of being the safe place." Samuel's cup stopped halfway to his mouth. She had named it before he had spoken a word. He set the cup down. His easy smile was gone, and he did not know how to put it back. He tried to laugh. Nothing came out. She did not push. She just ate, calm, like she had said something about the weather. "How did you know that?" he asked. She shrugged. "Your face does the work your mouth won't." Then she stood, picked up her plate, and walked to a wrought iron bench near the far wall. She sat there alone, watching the room as if she could read every person in it. Samuel stared at where she had been. She had left something behind on the carved wood. A small locket, warm from her hand, an engraved tree spreading across its face. He did not open it. He closed his fingers around it instead. The noise of the room rushed back in, but it no longer hid him. Someone had seen him. And now she was sitting across the room, not waiting for him at all.