The bell above the door chimed—not the bright ding of an ordinary café, but a slow, deep toll, like a funeral bell heard through the wind. The sound hung in the air longer than it should have, vibrating through Eli’s ribs. He froze in the doorway. One moment he’d been fleeing the gunshot roar of collapsing skyscrapers, sprinting over broken glass while fire peeled the night sky open. The next—this. A café. Not the kind with glossy menus and piped-in jazz, but a dim room lit entirely by flickering candles. Shadows danced on the high, nicotine-stained ceiling. The tables were occupied, but the people didn’t look up.
A man in a dust-stricken pilot’s uniform nursed an espresso, his goggles still fogged. A woman in 1920s flapper gear tapped cigarette ash into a delicate porcelain saucer, her sequins catching the candlelight like tiny, drowning stars. In the corner, a boy in a hospital gown stared at his untouched mug, eyes glassy as if he’d been sitting there for years. Eli’s mouth was dry.
“Ah, you’re early,”
The bartender said without looking up, polishing a glass with a grey apron that might once have been white. Eli stepped inside despite himself. The air was heavy, tinged with coffee, smoke, and something sour beneath it, like damp earth after a flood. The door swung shut behind him, and the bell gave one more lazy, deathly toll.
“Where—when—is this?”
Eli asked, his voice shaking. The bartender finally glanced up. His eyes were the unsettling pale of weathered bone.
“Between,”
He said simply, sliding a steaming cup across the bar.
“For those who almost died, but didn’t. Yet.”
Eli didn’t move closer.
“What do you mean?”
The bartender gestured toward the cup. The liquid inside was dark, but not quite coffee. It moved strangely, sliding against the tilt of the cup like it had its own weight, its own tide.
“The rules,”
The bartender said.
“Drink, and you go back to your apocalypse. Leave it, and you stay here, forever unfinished.”
Eli glanced at the warped glass windows. Outside, the street was not a street. His city hung there, frozen mid-ruin. Flames curled from shattered buildings but did not move, caught like petals in amber. Smoke rose in a perfect, unmoving column. A man mid-fall from a burning balcony hung there as though suspended by invisible wire. Eli’s chest tightened. The pilot cleared his throat.
“Don’t drink it, kid.”
His voice was gravel, rough from years of cold air and thin oxygen.
“If you stay here, nothing hurts. No fire, no hunger. Just…this.”
“This?”
Eli asked, his eyes scanning the room.
“This,”
The flapper woman said with a humorless smile.
“Endless coffee. Endless waiting. Everyone here almost died. Car accidents. Drownings. Illness. Bombs. If you’re here, you’ve got a choice most don’t get. But make it once—you don’t get to make it again.”
Eli’s gaze moved to the boy in the hospital gown. The boy was staring into his mug as though it contained a mirror only he could see. His lips moved soundlessly, whispering to something unseen.
“What happens if I drink it?”
Eli asked.
“You go back,”
The bartender said.
“To the exact moment you left. Same danger. Same odds.”
Eli shivered. The sound of the skyscraper coming down was still in his bones. He remembered the smell—burning insulation, diesel, something acrid that stuck to the back of his throat. And the cold certainty that he wouldn’t make it out. He didn’t know how he’d arrived here.
He looked down at his own hands, realizing for the first time that his palms were still blackened with soot. A scrape on his arm oozed fresh blood, slow and thick in the candlelight. The pilot spoke again, softer this time.
“It’s not so bad here. The coffee’s decent. Time’s strange—you never get tired.”
The flapper rolled her eyes.
“You also never leave. Not even for a walk. You sit here, drink, talk in circles, watch new people come through the door.”
Her gaze lingered on Eli. “And watch them make the same stupid mistakes.”
Eli swallowed.
“Why are you still here then? Why not go back?”
The pilot didn’t answer. The flapper smirked.
“Because some of us don’t want to see what happens next. Out there…”
She nodded toward the still-burning city outside.
“It’s all teeth.”
Eli sat on a stool, the wood creaking under him. The cup was still there, steam curling from it in unnatural shapes—patterns like handwriting he almost recognized.
The bartender leaned closer.
“You don’t have to decide now. Some sit for years before they touch the cup. Some stare until they fade. The door only opens for new arrivals, not for those who’ve chosen.”
The boy in the hospital gown suddenly spoke, his voice hoarse.
“If you wait too long, you forget what you came from. You forget your name.”
Eli turned toward him, but the boy was already staring at his cup again. The candles flickered. Somewhere far off, a clock began to tick. Eli’s thoughts swirled. Back in the city, he’d been running toward the last evacuation point. He’d been close—so close—but the building had started to go. His sister had been there too, somewhere behind him, calling his name. His stomach knotted.
“Has anyone ever gone back and survived?” Eli asked the bartender.
The bartender tilted his head.
“Some. Not many. I don’t keep a tally.”
“Why not?”
“Because the choice isn’t about survival,”
The bartender said.
“It’s about whether you’d rather face what’s coming or live with what’s already gone.”
The flapper stubbed her cigarette out in her saucer, the smoke curling up like a question mark.
“Drink, and maybe you see your sister again. Or maybe you both die. Stay, and you lose her for sure—but nothing else can touch you.”
Eli stared at the swirling liquid. He could almost see her face in it, flickering between candle shadows. The pilot drained his cup and set it down, the sound sharp in the stillness.
“It’s worse to wonder than to know.”
The boy whispered,
“It’s worse to know than to wonder.”
Eli’s hand trembled as he reached for the cup. The steam curled around his fingers like a living thing, and he smelled something—not coffee, not earth, but the exact scent of his sister’s shampoo, the one she’d used since they were kids. The ticking clock grew louder. The flames outside seemed to flicker in slow motion. The bartender watched him with unreadable eyes.
“Choose.”
Eli lifted the cup. The liquid inside moved again, against the tilt, like it was resisting him. He brought it closer to his lips. The pilot leaned forward, the flapper leaned back, the boy didn’t move at all. The rim touched his mouth. Somewhere, very far away, he heard her voice calling his name. And then absolute silence.
