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Saturday mornings make The Spindle feel like a different café, every single week.

On weekdays, the shop belongs to commuters who order before they are fully awake. They come in damp from the rain, ask for the same drink they ordered the day before, then stand by the pickup counter looking at their phones while pretending not to watch the clock on the wall behind the pastry case.

Weekends stretch differently. People sit down, they ask questions about the menu. They bring books they may or may not read and dogs who collapse beneath the tables as though they have survived something significant by walking just a few blocks.

And the weather has helped.

The city has apparently decided that the middle of October deserves one day that feels borrowed from somewhere else. By seven-thirty, sunlight is pouring through the front windows, warming the old hardwood floors and catching on every glass jar arranged behind the counter. There is no rain in sight, and the temperature has climbed high enough that people keep peeling off sweaters as soon as they walk through the door.

Luis has mentioned the heat seven times since we opened thirty minutes ago.

“It’s unnatural,” he says now, standing in front of the pastry case with a tray of freshly baked almond croissants. “I do not trust it.”

“You don’t trust a lot of things.”

“It’s eighty-three degrees in October, Flora.” He huffs as he continues to arrange the pastries and later carries a stack of clean mugs toward the espresso machine. The Saturday morning rush hasn’t arrived quite yet, and there’s only a handful of people inside. A couple sits near the window sharing a cinnamon roll, and two college students have spread a bunch of textbooks and their laptops on two tables outside.

I should use the lull to restock milk, but instead, I reach into my apron pocket for my phone.

The Whisp notification has been sitting there for almost forty minutes.

New message from Primavera1959.

“Hi,” the message begins, “so I have a small issue.”

The rest of the thread goes downhill quickly from there.

According to Primavera, someone she has absolutely no romantic interest in has suddenly started behaving in a way that can only be interpreted as attraction, and because this happened within twenty-four hours of her placing the order, she would like to know whether the spell can be considered defective.

I read the sentence twice before pressing my lips together. As if I mailed her a toaster and it burst up in flames the moment she plugged it in. Defective.

“I’m not saying I don’t appreciate the efficiency,” it continues, “because obviously if this is your turnaround time, your reviews are very well deserved. But this is very much the wrong person, and I would like a full refund for the spell.”

For a few seconds, I simply stare at my screen.

The morning around me continues without any concern for the crisis unfolding inside my phone. The first of the few regular Saturday customers have started trickling in, and Luis is moving with an unhurried cadence between the front and the back room, smiling at them like usual.

I should put my phone away.

Custom requests are never handled while I’m at work, especially because I need time to consider my words, and I also need to make sure no one is standing close enough to glance over my shoulder. I have been careful about that since I started The Third Fairy, partly because I don’t feel like explaining it and partly because the shop has always felt like something that belongs entirely to me, separate from the version of myself that measures oat milk and wipes down tables and listens to Luis complain about how the manager changed the schedule that week again.

There are very few things in my life that no one else gets access to, and I like keeping this one that way.

Still, I find myself opening the reply box.

“Hello, Primavera1959. I’m sorry the situation has become confusing, but the ritual you purchased does not compel a specific person to feel attraction toward you.”

I stop there and read it back. It’s a little too clinical and most definitely not what she wants to hear.

I add: “The intention behind an attraction ritual is to create openness and movement around connection, not to override anyone’s choices.”

Better.

I glance toward the end of the counter.

Luis is crouched beside the under-counter refrigerator, rearranging cartons of milk with unnecessary aggression because the overnight delivery somehow managed to put whole milk where the oat milk belongs.

He looks up and catches me with my phone in my hand.