Page 50

The silence in the cab was complete.Toocomplete. There wasn’t even the scratch of the radio, just the engine’s growl and the rhythmic squeak of the windshield wipers dragging across glass that didn’t need cleaning.
Was he listening? Or watching me? Was someone else?
I reached down and pretended to adjust my boot lace, the way I always did when I wanted to check my thigh holster without drawing attention. It was still there, still snug, the steel more reassuring than any word could be.
We passed an old tram stop. One lone man stood under the broken shelter, his collar high against the chill, his cigarette burning low. He didn’t move. He didn’t even seem to breathe.
I turned my head away before we passed him, just in case.
The streets grew narrower.
More shuttered buildings.
More storefronts covered in faded propaganda.
Two boys hunched together under a stairwell, trading something too quickly for me to see in a passing car.
A stray dog sniffed at a trash pile.
Every part of this city knew what it meant to disappear; and still, something about the way the streetlamps blinked just as we passed beneath them made me tense. They flickered like someone was waiting.
I met the driver’s eyes in the rearview again. He still didn’t blink, just adjusted the mirror.
I looked away.
We turned down an even narrower alley, passed behind a crumbling bakery, and came out onto a quiet lane lined with tenement housing.
We were two blocks out.
“Here,” I said.
He braked without a word and put the car in neutral.
I opened the door slowly, scanned the intersection. No lights shone through the windows. No voices spoke. Only the wind dared whisper as it scraped dead leaves across the curb.
I paid the driver in exact bills, keeping my eyes on the street.
He didn’t look at the money.
He didn’t drive off right away, either.
“Wait three minutes before you go, please,” I said.
He nodded once as I shut the door with more force than intended. I started walking.
Behind me, the taxi idled like a watchful animal, its exhaust fogging the air.
I pulled my coat tighter, adjusted my scarf. My heels clicked against the slick cobblestones, but I kept my pace measured and unhurried.
A woman in a rush got remembered. A woman who belonged didn’t need to rush.
I passed a bookstore with papered-over windows, its name half erased by age. A next-door bakery’s display was dark, its sign broken and swinging on a single chain.
Ahead, the streetlight buzzed once and died.
Darkness seeped in with the Hungarian cold.
I crossed the street and kept to the right, my shoulders brushing the edges of buildings, eyes flicking to the glints of broken glass in the gutter. A lamppost ahead had been shattered. Its wires dangled like nerves.