The city had seen better days, like most cities. Over the past decade, Marisol had felt that her own troubles were reflected in the city itself. She couldn't pinpoint a single thing—just the accumulation of regular things. Parks were still maintained, but people didn't go into them as often, like they didn't trust them. Sewer grates collected items as they rolled down the gutter. A city sweeper would come by eventually, but like everything else, it always seemed like the sweeper was waiting till the last minute to come through. All the blinds were pulled on the windows, lights would be on inside, but it didn't look like anyone wanted to see out, like they didn't want to be reminded of the city they were in.

  The city was alive in places, and was falling apart in others. Some area were lit like a beating heart, others were dark and cold like a frostbitten limb, that the city was trying to forget about. Still, there were people there, and they were the blood of the city, and they flowed to every part of it.

  This evening, the city was dark. Cloud cover kept the moon and stars hidden, as if the light pollution would allow anyone to see beyond the city itself. It was as if the city wanted to trap people, preventing them from dreaming of anywhere else. Tonight, the clouds helped. The street lights were all mismatched in colors ranging from bright white, to dim yellow, or bright yellow. Some blinked confused, unable to settle on a brightness or color. The city replaced the bulbs when they were reported, and not a second earlier. Some reports were never aknowledged, no matter how many phone calls came in.

  There was a little market on a corner street. It was a smaller version of some huge chain. They either couldn’t afford the bribes for city officials or didn’t care enough about the area to put in a full store, so they settled for a corner market with a nice-sounding name, something like "local" or "hometown" in the title. This little shop probably had such a name, but the lights in the sign had gone out, and corporate had been “considering” fixing it for six months. It was clean in the inside, graffiti stains were on the windows, but had been cleaned off some months ago. The perpetrators had not returned to restore thier work, like they too didn't care enough about the neighborhood to do it more than once.

  Marisol was leaning back on am orange foldable stool she'd brought from home. The manager didn’t want her sitting down on the job, but that was inhumane and he wasn't here, so she just brought a stool that folded down to the size of a large hockey puck. All she had to do was press a little button, and it would collapse so she could kick it under the counter. Not that she cared what the manager thought, but she didn’t want to lose this job.

  This job was close to home. It paid enough for the bare minimum; food, electricity, and cell service, with the way her life had gone the past few years—if not decades—it felt like a step up. She pushed a strand of hair away from her face and looked around the store. The store still smelled of pinesol, a smell she associated with clean since she was a little girl. She'd mopped just an hour ago.

  She took in the air and shifted her shoulders. She glanced at the mirrors, then at the cameras. There were three other people in the store, so she stayed vigilant. She saw one customer press a freezer door closed, after pulling out what looked like a frozen pizza, one of the cheaper ones.

  She shifted on her stool, her fingers tracing the outline of her phone in her pocket. Then they gripped a star charm hanging off her belt. She held the charm in her hand and played off the points with a practiced familiarity. Like so many others, she often reached for her phone when bored, but she was working to break that habit. Her charm reminded her that she could always strive to be better—to bring a little shine into the world. Her phone, she realized, often kept her from truly seeing the people around her, and she didn’t want to miss what was in front of her anymore.

  She looked out the main window as rain started to fall. She smiled; it would wash the cars, sidewalks, and buildings clean. It was like the city taking a shower. It didn't mean much overall, but she enjoyed feeling clean when she showered, no matter how old her body got.

  An older man came up with his items, holding a magazine, an energy drink, some chips and some toothpaste. Marisol directed her attention to him. She pulled the wand and started scanning the items.

  "No ring? Well, I'm single myself," said the older man. He wore a baseball cap that had seen many days in the sun, its rim stained with sweat. His button-up shirt bore a few stains of its own. He held a smile, attempting to be charming, but he'd obviously been rejected enough times that the smile didn't reach his eyes.

  Marisol smiled and nodded. "Yes, but I’m not looking at the moment. Sometimes a girl has to make time for herself." The answer was canned, and she avoided eye contact. She didn’t want men getting the wrong idea—like they needed any help. She finished scanning and said, "$25.30."

  The older man nodded and thankfully took the hint. He held out his card, smiling and nodding. It seemed he didn’t feel any more needed to be said. Marisol was thankful for the brief reprieve. They were just here for the transaction, they were people that didn't need to be more. \

  She ran the card, it beeped, the little display danced with little flickers until it approved the transaction. Marisol pushed the items back to the man, he nodded, adjusted his hat, as if it would help against the rain, and he made his way out into the storm. The smell bursting into the store with a fresh smell of the stench of city the fresh rain had riled up.

  Marisol turned back to the others in the store. She spied one shoving a small bag of chips into their coat pocket. She'd known desperation, she handled the charm at her belt, her thumb counting off the points. It was a small bag of chips, hardly something the megacorp that owned the store would miss.

  She looked back out over the store. She listened to the rain tapping on the windows, a flash of lightning, and the thunder following sometime afterward. Her eyes settled on a box of brightly colored cereal. The kind that was for kids was mostly sugar, and you gave them because you needed to head off to work and couldn't make them breakfast.

  The shoplifter came over, his gait much more confident than she thought it should be, he dropped a single pack of gum and an energy drink on the counter. She finally saw his face. They made eye contact and his eye lit up with recognition, "Marisol? What a surprise!"

  It took Marisol a minute to see the young kid that she'd saved all those years ago. He'd been in a really bad place then, and her squad and her had to get involved. He didn't remember any of it, as usual, but still, it was the same person, Jameson. She hadn't seen him since college. "James?" She swallowed and smiled like this was a normal, and expected place for her to be.

  "Wow, I haven't seen you in years! How have you been doing?" Jameson was grinning, comfortable in his own skin. His clothes were worn, and old, but kept clean. He glanced around, like he was trying to see all sides of her.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  Everyone from that part of her life had either moved away or lived in better parts of the city. She tried to mirror his confidence. "I'm good, just doing the work." Her hands began to sweat, and she rubbed them on her jeans.

  "Wow, I don't see many people from college around here. I thought you'd have become an engineer or something." He leaned up against the counter, grinning, his eyes dropping to her hand where he must have noticed a lack of a wedding ring. He placed his left hand on the counter, she picked up that it was to show her that he wasn't wearing a ring either.

  She began to ring him up quickly. "Yeah, I graduated, but, well, you know." She shrugged, coughed, and said, "That's 4.50." She'd defaulted to cashier mode. She wanted to say more, she wanted to explain that the girl that she was back then was still in there. She was dressed differently, things had happened, that had lead her here. Except, she didn't want to have that conversation, it would lead to a discussion, explanations, and maybe even crying.

  "Well, I graduated too." *He gave her a charming grin, it looked a little practiced, but still maintained its charm. " A lawyer," he scoffed, "but when you want to become a public defender and take on pro bono work, well, it leads you to places like this." He waved to the store, the rain, and the decaying city around them.

  "Yeah," she just let the answer hang. The sounds of the rain outside seemingly raised in volume to match the things that had brought both of them here, to this part of the city, to this spot in their lives. She checked the monitors and attempted to look busy.

  He handed her five dollars and nodded. "I'll be sure to drop by here more regularly since I know you work here, we can catch up sometime."

  "Yeah, that might be nice." Her voice wavered more than she wanted, but she was sincere. Some feelings stirred at the idea of human connection since everything had happened. She'd missed the feelings he was stirring up in her. The good times, the friends she had, the life she'd been looking forward to. He'd taken her by surprise, but maybe she could make space for an old friend. "I'm here," she reconsidered for a half-second, not sure if she was ready to open this opportunity, "about this time every day." It didn't matter now, she'd said it, and it was out there.

  "Good." He nodded and knocked on the counter like punctuating the date. "I'll see if I can swing by in the next week." He pocketed the two quarters and turned away towards the doors. He tried to zip up his jacket, but instead, he ended up just holding, it closed and pushed out into the rain. He turned back to wave as the rain soaked him.

  * * *

  The rain had stopped, and the clouds hung overhead, reflecting back the sickly light of the city. A lightning bolt flashed across the sky, as if the clouds were purging themselves of the city's sickly feelings.

  Marisol kept her pepper spray close in her right hand, the star pendant in her left. She didn't walk scared, nor did she shy away from the shadows—this was her part of town. Still, the city had a way of stirring some people up, no matter how comfortable you got.

  She walked around a puddle that had formed around a clogged drain. The lights of the few streetlights glittered in the dirty water. She kicked a little stone into it just to see the lights dance.

  She turned a corner, enjoying the smell of the cleaned city. She liked how smooth the sidewalk concrete felt as she walked—no litter, no smaller stones under her shoes. Just smooth concrete, except where it was cracked, of course.

  She thought about her interaction with James. She had given up on social media over a decade ago, so she didn’t keep tabs on people from her past. She no longer wanted them keeping tabs on her either. Some had marriages that always looked happy, with combined accounts full of smiles from nights out. Others shared photos of their kids or vacations in exotic locations, or even snapshots with famous people. Her life didn’t compare, and such posts would often garner sympathy—or worse, pity. She’d begun to feel like it had all become some kind of competition, one she was losing. So, she went about her life, doing the best she could. It took effort to find joy, but she managed, and not comparing herself to others helped a lot.

  James had stirred up hope in her. A hope that she didn’t need to search for happiness, but that it could simply appear. That she could look forward to meeting someone with similar interests. She could imagine sharing a cup of coffee, focusing on the company instead of the heat or the aroma. She might find happiness without having to convince herself through endless positive affirmations, scented candles, regular exercise, and meditation that she was worthy of being with someone. Someone who liked her company as much as she enjoyed theirs. It also brought back the reasons she had cut herself off from others—or perhaps why they had cut her off. She couldn’t pinpoint when, or why, it had happened, but she knew that it had.

  She walked past a sound wall that had been put in when the highway was expanded. They said it was to help protect property values in the area, but everyone knew it was to protect the drivers from seeing this part of the city.

  In the beginning, the city attempted to paint over the graffiti that appeared on it within a week of it going up. Eventually, they realized they were outnumbered in this part of town. There was always something crude, sexual, or distasteful every few feet, but when something truly shined, even the most hardened taggers left it alone. For the most part, it was a smear of different types of paint—some using more resilient paint, others fading in the sun, and some bleeding in the rain.

  She came to her favorite part of her walk home. As soon as she turned that last corner, she started looking for it. The colors always made it stand out. It had become a grounding ritual.

  She didn't know when or who had put it up, but the talent behind it was undeniable. Even in the faint glow of the streetlights, it shone. The painting was of a group of girls in colorful costumes, bows, tiaras, circlets, necklaces, and bracelets. They stood together like superheroes, eyes to the sky, ready to face the greys, the blacks, and the decay of the city.

  It always reminded Marisol of when she was younger, full of hope for the future. The colors were loud and bright, untouched by time in the year she'd lived here. She stopped beneath it every night, taking it in, feeling an ember of hope flare up, just a little. It made her smile, even on the worst nights.

  She stayed there until she felt the light inside was as bright as it was going to get. She walked away a little better, a little happier. People wanted color. People wanted happiness. People had hope, even when the city was trying to strangle it from them.

  The rest of the walk home after the mural was nicer. The mirrors of the puddles glittered up the buildings and the streets a little more. She unclipped her star pendant and carried it with both hands the rest of the way home, feeling the tips against her palms, the warm metal and memories matching the hope she felt in her heart. She thought about her friends from that time, the adventures they had, and the lessons they learned. Those lessons had carried her through the toughest times in her life, and while it was all over, she didn't feel regret.

  She noticed families watching TV together in some windows. A woman sipping tea as she stared at the rain-soaked streets from her window. A child danced in their living room, silhouetted by the flickering glow of the television. She saw a man trimming his beard in a bathroom mirror, pausing occasionally to inspect his work. Just people, being people.

  It had been a long road to get here, it wasn't glorious, but it was hers.