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The bell over the door jingled softly, the same chime Levi had installed years ago—a quiet tinkle, not too sharp, not too loud. Just like everything else in his tea shop. Measured. Calm.
He glanced up from the counter, hands dusted with flour, and there she was again.
Hanji Zoe.
Arms full of loosely tied eucalyptus stems and tiny purple blooms. Probably lavender again. Or something else with an intoxicating, lingering scent he could never quite name.
“Delivery for the man of bread,” she grinned, her eyes lighting up behind smudged glasses. “And a peace offering.”
Levi raised one brow. “I didn’t ask for a peace offering.”
“You didn’t not ask either,” she said, placing the bouquet on the counter. “Besides, it’s Thursday. Thursdays are lavender days.”
He didn’t correct her. Thursdays weren’t lavender days. Not until she started showing up.
Hanji had begun dropping off flowers two months ago. At first, it was part of a barter deal—he offered her fresh rosemary bread in exchange for whatever wildflowers she couldn’t sell by the end of the day. Then it became more... random. Or rhythmic. Like something inevitable. Like yeast blooming.
She smelled like rain again. And soil. And something sweet under it all.
Levi tried not to notice.
She leaned against the counter now, her fingers tracing invisible patterns on the wood.
“I saw your mushroom focaccia post last night,” she said, eyes gleaming. “Very on-brand for a microbiology student to say this, but… did you ferment the mushrooms first?”
Levi wiped his hands on his apron. “No. But I could. Why?”
Hanji dropped her bag and pulled out a notebook. Pages of scribbled formulas, half-drawn spores, and tiny diagrams filled every inch.
“There’s this strain of Rhizopus—kind of a mold but edible—used in Indonesian cooking. You could grow it on rice and—"
“I’m not growing mold on my bread,” Levi muttered.
Hanji laughed. “You’re already growing mold. Yeast is fungi. Don’t be a snob.”
Levi fought a smile.
They settled into a rhythm.
She came in, always with something strange or beautiful in her arms—a broken sunflower, a paper bag of damp moss, once even a mushroom she insisted was not poisonous.
He brewed her tea, Earl Grey with milk. No sugar.
She spoke in tangents—of plant roots, decomposition, and microscopic wars happening inside the soil.
He listened. Sometimes he responded. Mostly, he baked.
He thought her chaotic. Infuriating. Brilliant. Like a thunderstorm trapped in a girl.
He didn’t notice when her scent started lingering longer than she did.
One day, she came in soaking wet.
Hair slicked to her forehead, jacket dripping on the floor, and a triumphant grin on her face.
“I fell in a pond!”
Levi blinked. “Congratulations?”
“No, seriously—it was a good pond. I found this.”
She held up a cracked ceramic pot. Inside, a strange flowering weed peeked through. Levi leaned in.
It smelled like crushed thyme and lavender. Wet, sharp, alive.
“You’re dripping everywhere.”
“I know,” she said, peeling off her coat and hanging it on the rack. “But don’t worry—I’ll clean it.”
She never did.
He baked her a lavender honey scone the next week.
Didn’t tell her it was for her. Just left it on the counter with her tea.
She took a bite and blinked. “This is…”
“New,” he said.
She looked at him for a long time.
“Thank you.”
They talked about nothing and everything. Hanji could fill silences with ease. Levi never minded silences until she came along and filled them with color.
She told him about microbes in love—fungi forming mycorrhizal bonds with tree roots, impossible symbiosis that lasted lifetimes.
He told her about flour—the way different kinds felt under the fingertips, the temperature of water needed to wake it just right.
One evening, as golden light pooled into the shop, she asked, “Why tea and bread?”
He shrugged. “My mother liked tea. My father was a miller. This was... middle ground.”
She looked around at the soft wooden walls, the smell of cinnamon and thyme.
“I think it’s more than that,” she said.
He didn’t answer.
One night, after she left, he found a pressed sprig of lavender in the pages of his baking journal.
No note. Just the scent.
He tucked it between pages and didn’t touch it again.
Rain fell in sheets the following week. Power flickered. The sky cracked open.
She barged in anyway, soaked again. A new habit.
“I lost a bouquet to the wind,” she said, hair plastered to her face.
Levi handed her a towel wordlessly.
The power went out just then. Everything stilled.
“Do you have candles?” she asked.
He lit three. The room turned golden, shadowy, warm.
She sat across the counter, watching him.
“I don’t like the dark,” she said quietly.
“I don’t mind it,” Levi replied.
“Of course you don’t. You’re secretly a bat.”
He raised a brow. “I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
They both laughed.
Then silence settled.
She broke it. “You ever feel like some people carry pieces of places with them?”
He looked up.
“You always smell like cinnamon,” she said. “And I… people say I smell like... wet earth. Lavender.”
“You do,” he said, before he could stop himself.
She looked at him.
Something shifted.
After that night, they didn’t talk for three days.
She didn’t come in. He didn’t ask.
But he missed her. In ways that annoyed him. The counter looked wrong without her elbow marks. The air too clean.
He overbaked a batch of scones. Forgot to rest his dough.
When she did return, she had no flowers.
Just a question.
“Did you miss me?”
He nodded. Just once.
She smiled. “I missed you too.”
The first time they touched—really touched—was accidental.
She reached for her tea, he passed her the honey, their hands brushed. She didn’t flinch. Neither did he.
But something buzzed in the air. Like a rising.
One late evening, she helped him close.
They stood side by side, wiping down the counter.
“I got a paper published,” she said.
He looked at her. “That’s good.”
“It was about decomposers,” she said, snorting. “Fungi. Worms. Sexy stuff.”
Levi chuckled. “You’re proud?”
“More than I expected to be,” she said softly.
He hesitated. “You should be.”
Their eyes met.
She stepped closer.
He didn’t move.
She kissed him in the dark, between shelves of chamomile and barley tea.
It was gentle. Unhurried. Like a blooming.
After that, the shop changed.
The counter had a second mug every morning. Her scent mingled with the bread. The bouquets became wilder—honeysuckle, wild mint, once even a vine she refused to name.
Levi started experimenting. He baked flower-infused cakes, citrus-lavender tarts, rosemary mushroom breads.
People noticed. The shop got busier.
But his eyes always followed one figure—the one who entered with a gust of air, the smell of storms and stories.
On the day spring turned to summer, Hanji brought in a vase of lavender and said, “You know what I realized?”
Levi looked up.
“You smell like home,” she said.
He didn’t say anything.
Just walked over and kissed her, hands still dusted in flour.