Roasted warmth floated on light steam clouds past Elise's nose. Her latte's soft froth cheerfully bubbled away, and the glass' caffeinated contents enveloped her fingers with a hot, soothing promise of the first sip that lay just moments away. As if sharing her anticipation, the café's interior sank into a natural lull, the energy dissipating from each conversation until little more than whispers disturbed the air. Every moment of precious peace unfurled another knot of the tension rooted deep between Elise's shoulders.

    "Hey, stranger," Cadence said, shattering the quiet air of Elise's booth. She set her stout porcelain mug beside the latte glass, slid into the booth, and laid across the double-seat opposite Elise, her head against the window with her eyes shut. "Took me a sec to find you. I didn't think you'd take the furthest seat from the counter."

    "I needed the space," Elise answered while spinning her glass on its central axis. "You don't have to sit with me, though. If you wanted to go sit in your car or something, I'd get it."

    Cadence's eyes remained closed as she shrugged. "The car's cramped even when I'm alone, and I spend too much time with that piece of junk anyway." Balancing her boot heel on the booth's armrest, she ran her finger along the polished chain of her necklace. One of her eyes opened over the course of a long moment, its hazel light directed at Elise's face. "Besides, I need to tell you something."

    Basking in the comforting warmth locked in her latte's milky swirls, Elise replayed the girl's words to check their meaning again. "You do?" she asked, setting her glass of foamy joy beside Cadence's small bowl of engine grease. "Like what?"

    "Like you're an idiot." No emotion flickered along the lines of Cadence's profile, and her slow turn to face Elise revealed no movement on the hidden side of her face either. "Like you're freaking out over nothing."

    The next sip of airy delight turned sour on Elise's tongue. "I don't get it," she said as she choked down the bitter mouthful.

    Rising from her supine position, Cadence clasped the table's edges and fixed Elise in place with her stare. "You want to quit because Flo hates you, but Flo hates everyone," she said, punctuating her words with taps of her dark fingernails against the table. "I'm telling you, Ellie, she's a cold-hearted bitch pretty much all the time these days."

    "So what?" Elise asked, her banished tension returning to plague her back with twice as much fury. "That's not a reason to stick with this job, Cade. That sounds like a great reason to quit right now and move on."

    "Like hell you should." Cadence slapped Elise's arm over the table, leaving a hot sting on Elise's skin. "I heard you two talking before I came in. How many people do you think can actually get Flo into a conversation like that?"

    Fiddling with her beaded bracelet, Elise shrugged and leaned back into her seat. "It wasn't much of a conversation, and it wasn't anything helpful either. It was just her talking about herself."

    "And that's just more than anyone else has gotten out of her in months." Moving her hand towards Elise again, Cadence delivered another, softer tap to the girl's arm. "I'm serious, Ellie. I don't know if it was the questions you asked, or the go-getter attitude you had, or even just the perfume you put on today, but Flo took you on like she never does with me. Now, that's a reason to stick around."

    Only as Cadence's gaze lingered on her face did the sincerity in the girl's tone strike Elise. Something close to hope lit up Cadence's features, imbuing her slightest movements with more energy in this moment than she had possessed since crashing back into Elise's life. "Why do you care?" she asked as she hid her hands on her lap, clutching her arm to override the memory of the girl's brief touch. "You said you didn't want anything to do with me anymore."

    Cadence clutched her coffee mug and shook her head. "I'm pretty sure I said we should both do our own thing. If your job isn't your own thing, I don't know what is," she said, sipping her coffee through a thick veil of steam. "Look, it's simple. Flo needs help, and whatever you think right now, you can help her. Trust me."

    Taking a deep breath of the syrupy café air, Elise shifted in her seat. "Do you really think so?"

    "Believe me, if there was anyone else I could beg to split this headache, I'd be talking to them instead." Though she ended her sentence with a devilish smile, a dark shadow fell across Cadence's face in defiance of the string of fairy lights beside their booth. "But there isn't. I'm stuck with you – unless you feel like disappearing again, that is. Your call."

    "Cade..." Elise uttered, abandoning her protest before it had a chance to begin. She stared out the window into the rain's gentle gloom, trying to hide the shivers Cadence's words sent down her spine. Below the hum of the café's slow business, the tap of Cadence's heel against the floor brushed against Elise's ear. "I'll stay –"

    Cadence leapt up from her seat. "Alright! That's more like it."

    " – if you tell me what this is really all about." Looking over the brim of her glass at Cadence's waning enthusiasm, Elise sent her most reassuring smile fluttering the girl's way. "You said you wanted to split this headache. This isn't just about helping Florence for you, is it?"

    Rolling her eyes, Cadence pushed her coffee away from her. "Hell, I knew I shouldn't have tried to pull a fast one over a literal editor," she said, running her tongue over her teeth. As she weighed her next words, a thin glaze formed over her eyes. "You got me. I want you to stick around because I need another set of eyes on the grump."

    Elise set her drink down and raised an eyebrow, her fingernails clinking against the side of her glass. "Why not ask Arin?"

    "Because Arin's an even bigger asshole than Flo is, duh." As she bounced her leg under the table, nerves blanched Cadence's face beyond its usual pale complexion. "Look, whatever's screwing with Flo's head right now, it's not just 'writer's block' or 'brain fog', okay? She's losing it. I know she's losing it."

    The café door jingled open, and a breeze shot through the brief opening to send shudders along the string of fairy lights overhead. A hurried sip of frothy coffee did nothing to fend off the drought that claimed Elise's mouth, reducing her voice to splintered sounds. "What do you mean?"

    Stabbing the table with her finger, Cadence infused her tone with a decisiveness sharp enough to cut the surface between them in half. "You heard me about the meds. Flo nearly killed herself because she mixed up two totally different pills." She took a swig of her coffee and shivered at the thrilling heat. "And you saw how pissed she got all of a sudden earlier, too. Her mood swings around like a wrecking ball, and it gets worse when she forgets stuff – which, by the way, is all the damn time."

    "Cade, are you saying..." Elise began, swallowing down the hot pain that erupted as she forced her words out. "Do you think Florence might have dementia?"

    "Don't you think that?"

    A motorcycle helmet landed in the space between them, knocking Elise's glass over to shower the table in silky brown milk. "Moved on, have you?" A large, blonde man with flecks of fiery red in his short beard stood beside their booth, a dark grin on his face. "I sure hope Mel doesn't come back now. She'd be furious to see her so-called 'best friend' chatting up someone else after just a few months of silence."

    Grinding her teeth, Cadence glared up at the man and wrapped her fingers around her coffee mug. "This table's taken."

    "Maybe it's for the best," the man continued as he tugged at the collar of his dark grey motorcycle jacket. His black gloves, like the rest of his outfit, hid beneath a blanket of dusty dirt stains and threadbare patches that revealed glimpses of dry olive skin. "You and Mel never really made sense anyway."

    "Back the hell up, Matt."

    "After all, she's smart, fun, popular, and damn hot to boot." Matt laughed through his pause, and he waggled a finger in front of Cadence's face. Every swing of his digit spilled another wave of red-hot anger across Cadence's features. "Not to mention she doesn't poke her nose where it doesn't belong, unlike some people."

    Porcelain clattered as Cadence unleashed a torrent of coffee over Matt's face. He yelped in shock, and Cadence flew out of her seat to shove him against the empty table, the chairs screeching in fear. "Don't you dare talk about Melody like you care about her!" she cried over his slumped form, her arm raised as if to strike at his soaked face. "You're not worth her time. She should've dumped your creeper ass the moment I warned her about you."

    Matt rose from the toppled table and flashed his teeth through the dim café lighting, a low growl escaping from his throat. "Bullshit!" he barked as he shoved Cadence into the side of the booth and snatched her by her jacket, his knuckles white. "I'd never do a damn thing to Mel, no matter what stupid little lies you want to believe, you hear me?"

    Cadence kicked out at Matt's shins, yet the lift of his firm grip unsettled her balance too much to do more than flounder. "Get off me, you psycho prick!"

    "Did you think it'd be funny to drag my name through the dirt? To mess up my relationship?"

    Blood rushed through Elise's ears. Her body trembling with every bassy beat of her heart, she grabbed her fallen latte glass and swung it at the side of Matt's head. Little of the vessel's rounded side connected with skull, yet the shock alone startled the man enough to win a curse from under his breath. "Let go of her!" she shouted in a voice more cracked than her old glass.

    Before Matt recovered from his daze, Cadence thrust her boot heel down, crushing his foot and releasing his hold on her. Hardwood furnishings toppled over in her wake as she fled for the front door, and Elise followed along the other side of the café in full view of the two silent, stunned baristas. She raised a hand in apology, yet the rattle of Matt's rising body swept her out the door into the carpark.

    The SUV rolled in front of Elise as she left the building, the passenger-side door open and swinging with the braking force. Her free hand outstretched, Cadence called out over the revving engine. "Hop in!" 

    Elise clutched her bag around her body and jumped into the car, Cadence's grip pulling her through the doorway. The door groaned in the wind, yet Cadence ignored it as she slammed her foot down and sent the car wheezing down the road. In the rear view mirror, Matt's dishevelled form emerged into the carpark and looked around, his gaze landing on the back of Cadence's SUV. Elise only released her held breath as the man walked back inside the scarred café.

    "You good?" Cadence asked with a gentle tap on Elise's shoulder, freeing her from her adrenaline rush.

    Shutting her door, Elise threw her bag into the back of the car and collapsed into her seat. "I'm alive, I think," she said through heaving breaths. Small red marks curved around Cadence's neck, and their inflamed glow scorched Elise's eyes with every glance. "Are you alright?"

    With a fiendish smile, Cadence winked at Elise from the corner of her eye. "Please, Ellie. That wasn't my first spin on the crazy wheel."

    "Still, that came out of nowhere." Elise wiped her face, stinging her palms with hot tears that escaped her eyes without her knowledge. "What was that guy's problem? What the hell was he talking about?"

    Cadence rubbed at the marks on her neck, yet neglected to acknowledge them further. "He's a drugged-up nutjob with anger issues, that's his problem," she said, her lips curling upwards into a fiendish smile. "His name's Matt, and he was Mel's boyfriend for way too long."

    A chill pricked the back of Elise's neck at the memory of the man's enraged eyes on her, of the way he pursued them out onto the road without hesitation. "Did she break up with him?" she asked, her voice trembling under a delayed hit of fear.

    "Not when I told her to," Cadence said, letting her head fall against the back of her seat. "I was crashing at Mel's place one night while he was there, and I caught him rooting through her stuff. I'm talking sweeping her desk, turning her bags inside out, even going through her underwear drawer. Creep was always wasted back then, so he was probably looking for shit to sell."

    "Gosh, seriously? And she didn't dump him right there?"

    Grinding her teeth, Cadence tightened her grip on the steering wheel. "She said she'd talk to him about it. She was always too nice for her own good. People like Matt don't stop fucking you over just because you tell them not to."

    Elise pressed her nails into the sides of her seat. "Was?" she whispered, waiting for her friend's reaction before continuing. Though she had steered her curiosity away from the name when dealing with Florence, the chance to add colour to the faceless ghost was too much for her to resist. "Your mum keeps asking about her like you're friends."

    "Used to be." Light drained from the vehicle's cabin as they drove under an archway of lurching trees. What little sunlight pushed through the thick canopy spilled silver pools in Cadence's eyes. "Then she left. Story of my life."

    Elise perched her arm on the window and took in a lungful of the woodland air, appreciating even the muddiest, earthiest notes. Her heart still thumped over the clattering engine, yet seeing Cadence's relaxed face as she guided the car away from danger hushed Elise's nerves back to rest in an instant. "You were such a boss back there," she said, unable to scrub the giddiness from her tone.

    A mischievous laugh left Cadence's lips as the sunlight returned to brighten the car's interior. "Says the girl who literally just glassed a dude she didn't know." As she eased the vehicle around a bend onto a long stretch of straight road, Cadence loosened her grip on the steering wheel. "Turns out you're pretty badass yourself, killer."

    "Me? No way." Elise stared at her shoes and shuddered at the dot of milk stained on her left boot. "I'd have freaked out so hard if he grabbed me like that."

    "If he had come at you, I wouldn't have just stomped on his foot while he was down," Cadence said with a wink. Her hand found Elise's shoulder again, and this time her touch lingered on Elise's skin as she spoke. "Thanks for having my back there. I wouldn't have blamed you for keeping out of it."

    Snuffing out the smouldering urge to take Cadence's hand in hers, Elise shook her head. "You said it yourself. It'd have just bugged me all day if I didn't do something."

    Cadence fiddled with her necklace's chain. "You always were a sweetheart," she sighed, suddenly sitting up in her seat. "Seriously, though. My life has been a fucking mess since you left, Ellie, and it'd be better if you stuck to working with Flo."

    "Cade, I'm not going anywhere." Elise defied her hesitation and wrapped her fingers around Cadence's, sending the girl a smile to mask her nerves. "Whatever happened in the past, you're still my friend. I'm not leaving you as long as you let me stick around."

    Letting her hand sit in Elise's hold, Cadence's eyes twinkled as she turned to look at her passenger. "I'll think about it."

    They sat in silence for the rest of the journey, the hum of the engine underpinning the warm echo of Cadence's final words.