Then she registered my suit, my cane, and the watch on my wrist that cost more than her tuition.
Her eyes went wide.
"Two Whoppers with cheese," I said evenly. "No mayo on one. Two orders of fries."
She stared at me for a long moment, apparently trying to reconcile my appearance with my order. I waited, offering no explanation.
"For here or to go?" she finally managed.
"To go."
She entered the order mechanically, still sneaking glances at me like I might be an elaborate hallucination. When the total appeared on the screen, I handed her a hundred-dollar bill.
She stared at it. "I need to get my manager for this."
"Of course."
A harried woman in a headset emerged from the back, verified the bill with a counterfeit pen, and counted out my change. I pushed the bills back across the counter.
"For you and your staff."
The manager's eyebrows shot up. "Sir, we can't accept tips."
"Then put it in whatever jar you keep for employee appreciation. I don't need it back."
I walked away before she could argue further. Let them wonder. Let them construct whatever narrative made sense of a man in a three-thousand-dollar suit ordering fast food on a Tuesday evening.
The familiar smell of grease and salt filled my nostrils, transporting me back thirty years to that first apartment, that first taste of freedom, that first tentative hope that I might become someone worth knowing.
"Order for..." The worker at the pickup window squinted at the receipt. "Uh, hundred-dollar-guy?"
I took the paper bag, feeling the warmth through the wrapper. Then I paused.
"Do you have crowns?"
The worker blinked. "What?"
"Paper crowns. The ones you give to children."
He exchanged a glance with the purple-haired cashier, who shrugged helplessly. He ducked beneath the counter, rummaging through supplies, and emerged with a slightly bent crown in red and gold cardboard.
"This okay?"
I took it from his hand, examining the cheap promotional item like it was a priceless artifact. The cardboard was flimsy, the colors garish, the whole thing designed to be discarded after a single use.
Shane had torn one just like it from my head when I was nine years old. He had knocked me to the ground and made me watch while he threw the pieces in the trash. He had split my lip for "wasting money on garbage."
"Perfect," I said, and tucked the crown into my coat pocket.
The drive to Maxime'sClifton estate took twenty minutes through evening traffic.
I sat in the back of the Escalade with the paper bag beside me, the crown pressing against my chest through my coat pocket. Williams navigated without comment, though I caught him checking the rearview mirror more often than strictly necessary.
I thought about what I was about to do.
This wasn't a business visit. This wasn't a strategic move. This was something else entirely, something I hadn't allowed myself in decades. Vulnerability. The deliberate choice to be seen without armor, to offer something that couldn't be purchased or delegated, to show Maxime the boy I'd buried beneath thirty years of ruthless reinvention.
What if he didn't understand? What if the gesture fell flat, rendered ridiculous by the gulf between who I was now and who I'd been then? What if he looked at the paper bag and the crumpled crown and saw only the absurdity, not the meaning beneath?
