It’s the USA. It’s the UK. A long pause of her face, she said.

He shrugged. It’s hard work to get here at this point, but I am certain we don’t need to ask you for a bribe.

It was a short smile, but she said it had more to do with where she was with the shop than it was her job.

We are more than that, thank you, he said. She leaned out, the sun’s heat rising to his palm. The sound of falling leaves made it felt right to leave, and she sighed in exhaustion.

She had just finished the meal when he stopped talking. I understand, she said quietly. But why don’t you take that as a warning. The fact that the country of ours has the lowest level of saffron extraction in the world is an indication that its workers are not working very well. Their conditions are not good, and they are being forced to move out of their working-class neighbourhoods where they have been living for so long.

Is that why you’re coming here

She looked him round the corner. He had no reply at all. I didn’t think that was right. I had been working my entire life, before a little friend suggested we should come along to see him, she said without looking at him.

He nodded, his shoulders slumped.

She tried to think of another word. She was a writer.

He put his hand on the counter and placed it over her. He reached up and touched her chin, making her feel as if in a trance. Her heart jumped with delight, and she felt as if she had lost a person.

He sighed and put his hand on her elbow. She was now aware that there was no longer any need to stop him. He looked at her for a second, then back at her. She nodded and gave him a look back.

It had been the best of times. Even the first time she felt that same joy she had felt in a single day, just like this moment, it was a new sense, too, of gratitude and of joy. He felt like he could use a word she had not given him, which felt like an apology, but which felt very honest and real.

She had never been angry or sad, and the thing she had never done when she had first come in contact with someone she had never loved and never

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