There were three broken things in the bakery.
Leo noticed them before he finished his second cup of coffee.
The first was the cooling unit in the back corner.
He was working.
But the compressor didn’t sound right.
A slight, irregular vibration.
The kind that wouldn’t cause a problem today—but would cause a major one in about two weeks.
Leo looked at it for three seconds.
Then looked away.
None of his business.
The second was the display case light.
The left side.
It flickered every forty seconds or so.
Not enough to be annoying.
Just enough to be noticeable if you were paying attention.
And Leo had always paid attention.
He would never have achieved what he did in science if he had learned to ignore his surroundings and everything happening around him.
But in the end, he simply remained silent.
He was only a guest, after all, and it wasn’t his business.
The third was the oven door hinge.
Tom had opened it four times while Leo was sitting there.
Four times.
And every time, there was a sound.
A small sound.
The kind that meant: Two more weeks and this door won’t close properly.
Leo raised his cup.
Took a sip.
Said nothing.
The morning passed the way bakery mornings always did.
Loud.
Warm.
Organized somehow, despite all the evidence to the contrary.
Customers came and went.
Tom laughed at something Leo didn’t understand.
Sabine moved between the kitchen and the counter as if the entire place were mapped out in her head.
Marinette had gone upstairs an hour ago.
Something about a design appointment.
Leo didn’t ask.
It wasn’t his business.
At some point, Tom walked past him carrying a tray.
Then stopped.
Turned around.
Looked at Leo with the expression of a man who had just remembered something important.
“You know,” Tom said in his slow, careful English, “the fridge in the back—”
“The compressor.”
Tom blinked.
“What?”
“The compressor,” Leo said.
“The vibration pattern isn’t right.
It’ll hold for now.
But not for long.”
Tom stared at him.
Then at the fridge.
Then back at Leo.
“How long have you noticed—”
“Since this morning.”
Another pause.
“And you didn’t say anything because…?”
Leo looked at his cup.
Should I tell him it’s none of my business?
Yeah, that’d be social suicide.
“Because you looked busy.”
Tom set the tray aside.
Pulled out a chair and sat across from Leo with the expression of a man who had made a decision.
“Can you fix it?”
Leo considered the question seriously.
Not because it was difficult.
Because he was deciding how much to say.
“Probably.”
“Probably?”
“I need to look at it first.”
Tom’s eyes lit up with excitement.
“And what about the display light?”
Leo raised his eyes.
“The left side,” Tom said.
“I noticed you looking at it.”
“The wiring is loose,” Leo said.
“Simple fix.”
“And the oven hinge?”
“…You knew?”
“I’ve been ignoring it for a month,” Tom said cheerfully.
“Sabine doesn’t know yet.
I’d like to keep it that way for as long as possible.”
Leo looked at him.
“That’s not a good plan.
And it might not be safe.”
“No,” Tom agreed.
“It really isn’t.”
There was a short silence.
The comfortable kind.
Tom picked up his tray again.
But he didn’t leave.
“Leo.”
“What?”
“You need somewhere to stay.”
It wasn’t a question.
Leo didn’t treat it like one.
“Temporarily.”
“Of course,” Tom said, in a tone that suggested he didn’t think of it as temporary at all.
“And we—” He gestured toward the bakery around them.
“—need someone who notices things.
The little things.
Before they become big things that come back to kick us later.”
Leo looked at the fridge.
Then at the display case.
Then at the oven.
“You’re offering me a deal.”
“I’m offering you a place,” Tom said.
“The deal is just…
context.”
Leo almost smiled.
Almost.
“What would it involve?”
“Small repairs.
Helping when things get busy.
Whatever you can manage.” Tom shrugged.
“Nothing you’ll find difficult, judging by the last ten minutes.”
Leo thought about it.
He thought about it honestly.
His list of priorities hadn’t changed since morning.
First: money.
Second: repairing the watch.
Third: learning about this world.
And fourth—the person who had brought him here.
A place to stay partially covered the first.
Stability gave him time for the second.
Living with a family gave him access to the third.
As for the fourth…
The fourth could wait.
“Okay,” Leo said.
Tom gave him a huge smile—the kind that took up most of his face.
“Excellent.
Sabine will be happy.”
“You haven’t asked her yet?”
“She’ll be happy,” Tom repeated with absolute confidence.
Leo decided not to question that logic or bother his mind with it.
He fixed the display case light that afternoon.
It took eleven minutes.
Six of those were spent looking for the right tool because Tom’s toolbox was organized in a way that defied every known system of classification.
“Why is the screwdriver next to the measuring tape and the bat?”
Tom looked genuinely confused by the question.
“And where else would it be?”
Leo had no answer.
He looked at the refrigerator compressor afterward.
Opened the cover.
Studied it for a moment.
The problem was small.
A worn contact point causing an irregular current draw.
The kind of problem that remained invisible right up until it didn’t.
He could fix it.
He needed one part he didn’t have.
He wrote it down on a small piece of paper—in English, then stopped and wrote it again using the closest French equivalent he could come up with, which wasn’t very close—and handed the paper to Tom. The source of this chapter is NovelPing.
Tom looked at the paper.
Then at Leo.
“Is this French?”
“An attempt.”
Tom laughed.
Loud enough to make a customer near the door look over.
“I’ll find it,” he said, carefully folding the paper.
“Don’t worry.”
He left the oven hinge for last.
He was tightening the second screw when he heard footsteps on the stairs.
Then Marinette’s voice somewhere behind him.
“…What is he doing?”
“Fixing the oven,” Sabine said, her tone carrying the meaning (and he fixed the light too, and he’ll fix the fridge, and he’ll be staying with us, and I’m very happy about all of this)—without actually saying any of it.
“Wow,” Marinette said in surprise.
“Did someone ask him to fix the oven?”
“He noticed it needed fixing.”
“Interesting,” Marinette muttered.
That was all she said.
Then her footsteps moved toward the kitchen.
Leo kept his attention on the screw.
He finished the hinge.
Opened the door.
Closed it.
No sound.
He stood up, returned the tool to its proper place—not next to the bat—and turned around.
Marinette was standing near the counter, pretending to look at something in her notebook.
Yeah.
Not very convincingly.
“I’m done,” Leo said.
She raised her head.
“Already?”
“It wasn’t complicated.”
She looked at the oven.
Then at him.
“You could have just told us.”
“I know.”
“Then why didn’t you?”
Leo raised his coffee cup—it was still warm somehow—and looked at her.
“I thought fixing it directly would be more useful.”
She opened her mouth.
Then closed it.
Then looked back at her notebook.
“…Right.”
That evening, Tom announced over dinner that Leo would be staying.
Sabine nodded as though she had already known.
Marinette looked down at her soup.
“For how long?” she asked.
“Until he gets his affairs sorted out,” Sabine said, with the calmness of someone who had already decided the answer was as long as he needs.
Marinette nodded.
She said nothing else.
Later, Leo sat at the small table in the room they’d given him.
The watch was in front of him.
He wasn’t looking at it.
He was looking at the ceiling.
The deal was simple.
The plan was simple.
Stay here.
Fix small things.
Learn the language.
Find the components.
Repair the watch.
And somewhere in the middle of all that—find out who had decided that his life was an interesting piece to move across a chessboard.
Simple.
He looked at the watch.
The rings were motionless.
He felt exhausted.
This is going to be annoying.
“Will it get worse than it already is?” he said sarcastically.
To himself.
To the version of himself that was still eighteen, in a logical world, with a plan that had gone very differently from what he wanted.
He leaned back in the chair.
There was a small crack in the corner of the ceiling.
He had noticed it that morning.
For once, he decided to leave something unchecked.
He closed his eyes.
End of Chapter Eleven