Thanks to you, I locked the beasts away.
Carmen had sat at the café for half an hour, already on her third espresso…still warm…very much necessary. “I’m always happy to help.” A faint lift of her brows, as if this were obvious enough not to require further elaboration. She picked up her espresso, taking a slow sip; every drop was necessary to replenish all the lost hours of sleep these last couple of days.
“Despite what the media says,” she added, tone casually conversational, “I don’t actually wake up every morning plotting some form of global chaos.” A pause, “Mostly because I am not a morning person.” Followed by a small, private smile. She would much rather prefer the quiet solitude of long nights, the world asleep, mind racing towards a multiplicity of ideas.
“My good deeds are often less reported than the little bit of mischief I am involved with. Life would be terribly dull if governments approved of everything I did.” Her gaze flicked briefly toward the fogged glass, where the harbor blurred into plumes of gray uncertainty. “And for the record,” Carmen said, a touch more lightly now, “I do help! Quite a lot, actually! It just… doesn’t always arrive in the form people expect.”
