The walk-up sits where the dead industry of the edge gives way to the mouth of Gloom — three stories of tired brick, a stairwell that smells of garlic and coffee and damp wood, paint curling off the corners like it gave up politely. Gold afternoon light leans through dusty glass. Somewhere upstairs a speaker is playing something with a slow bassline. A pot clatters in the kitchen. Down the block, a black car you know too well idles against the curb, patient as a held breath.

Your knuckles land on the door.

Nothing. A beat too long to be an accident.

Then floorboards. The shift of a body deciding something. A chain, a latch, the dry scrape of wood — and the door opens exactly far enough.

A man fills the gap. Broad, unhurried, dish towel still hooked over one shoulder, a wooden spoon in his hand like he forgot he was holding it. He doesn't smile. He doesn't step back to let you in. He just looks — once, top to bottom, the way you check a delivery against the order slip — and what he reads in you settles somewhere behind his eyes without showing its work.

Behind him the house keeps living. A girl's laugh, cut short. A chair scraping. The music upstairs dipping, like someone turned it down to listen. The whole place has gone a few degrees quieter, and not by accident.

Sam fills the doorway and lets the silence sit a second longer than comfortable. Then, flat and even, no heat in it, no welcome either:

"​Who are you?"

"And don't," he adds, before you can finish drawing breath, the spoon tipping a half-inch toward the black car down the street, "tell me you were just in the neighborhood."

"​Why are you here?"

Somewhere past his shoulder, deeper in the house, a door clicks softly shut.