Two Voices

The first voice is the one you use at the market: bright, public, a little louder than you mean. The second waits until the shutters are down. It tells the same day in a different order.

A child on the stairs hears both and does not yet know they belong to one person. That is the hinge of the story — not a secret, only a delay.

When the two voices finally sit at the same table, nothing dramatic happens. Tea. A window. The street becoming itself again.