Chapter 4: Mandy's Smile

Chapter 4: Mandy's Smile

The last two hours of the night were a blur of quiet, desperate activity. After the chilling encounter with the Chloe-mimic and the subsequent, furious growl from the freezer, Leo had been stalked by silence. It was a heavy, watching silence, punctuated only by the hum of the refrigerators and the frantic thumping of his own heart. He’d served one more customer, a stooped figure in a soaking wet raincoat who ordered something called a "Sorrowful Scone" and paid with a tear-shaped pearl that felt cold and heavy in his palm. The creature had wept continuously, leaving a small puddle of viscous, shimmering fluid on the floor before dissolving into the pre-dawn mist.

Now, the digital clock above the fryer glowed 5:57 AM. Three more minutes.

Leo worked with a feverish intensity, mopping, wiping, and scrubbing, trying to erase every trace of the night’s transgressions. It was more than just a closing duty; it was a ritual of reclamation. He was scouring the supernatural stains from the mundane world, trying to prepare a clean, sane space for the daylight to inhabit. He scrubbed the spot where the Weeper had stood, the cheap cleaner doing little to mask a faint, lingering scent of ozone and salt. The freezer remained quiet, a silent, brooding promise of future hunger. The memory of his sister’s stolen voice was a fresh wound in his mind.

He was bone-weary, a hollowed-out husk of a person running on pure adrenaline and terror. But dawn was coming. And with the dawn came Mandy.

The thought of her was the one thing that had kept him from completely unraveling. Mandy, with her messy ponytail, her constellation of freckles, and a smile that seemed to generate its own light. She was the morning. She was normal. She was the finish line.

At precisely 5:59 AM, the familiar rumble of her beat-up hatchback turning into the empty parking lot was the most beautiful sound he had ever heard. Leo watched through the glass doors as the first, tentative rays of sunlight painted the grey asphalt in hues of pale orange and pink. The light touched the building, and for a moment, Smiley’s almost looked like the cheerful, harmless fast-food joint it pretended to be. The shadows in the corners receded, shrinking back into their daytime hiding places.

He took a deep, shuddering breath, the tension beginning to bleed out of his shoulders. It was over. He had survived another night.

The jingle of keys at the front door was his cue. He turned, forcing a weak, exhausted smile onto his face. “Morning, sunshine,” he planned to say, mimicking her usual greeting.

But the words died in his throat.

There, on the freshly mopped floor, right in front of the counter, was a spot he’d missed. A patch of iridescent, greasy residue, no bigger than his hand, shimmered under the fluorescent lights. It was the Weeper’s sorrow made manifest, a viscous, rainbow-slick puddle that looked utterly alien on the checkered linoleum.

The door swung open. “Morning, sunsh—whoa.”

Mandy stopped dead just inside the doorway, her usual bright greeting cut short. She was holding a large travel mug of coffee, and the warm, rich scent filled the air, a stark contrast to the lingering metallic tang of the night. Her smile, the one he’d been desperately waiting for, faltered as her eyes fixed on the floor.

“What in the world happened there?” she asked, a laugh in her voice, but her eyes were sharp with curiosity. “Looks like a snail had a rave.”

Panic, cold and sharp, lanced through Leo. “Oh, uh, that,” he stammered, moving to block her view with his body, his movements clumsy and unnatural. “Just a spill. Some kid… right before close. One of those new experimental slushies. Messy stuff.”

His lie was pathetic, and he knew it the second it left his lips. There were no kids here at 5:30 in the morning.

He grabbed the mop, his hands shaking. “I was just about to get it.”

Mandy took a step closer, her brow furrowed with concern, not just for the spill, but for him. “Leo, you look like you’ve seen a ghost. Are you okay?”

“Fine. Just tired,” he grunted, swiping at the puddle with the mop. It didn't work. The substance smeared, the iridescent sheen spreading like an oil slick. A foul, briny smell, like rotting seaweed and static electricity, wafted up, making his stomach churn.

Mandy’s nose wrinkled. “That smells… awful. Are you sure that was a slushie?” She leaned forward, trying to get a better look around him. “It’s shimmering.”

“Leaky pipe, then,” he said, his voice rising in pitch. “Freon or something. I’ll put a sign down.” He was rambling, digging his hole deeper with every word.

Her gaze shifted from the smear on the floor to his face. Her cheerful morning-shift demeanor was gone, replaced by a genuine, searching concern that was somehow more terrifying than the monsters. The barrier he so carefully maintained between his two worlds was dissolving right in front of her inquisitive eyes.

“Leo, talk to me,” she said, her voice soft but insistent. She set her coffee mug down on the counter. “You’ve been off for weeks. You come in looking like you haven’t slept in a year, you jump at every little noise, and now you’re trying to tell me that glowing, stinking puddle is from a slushie?”

He stopped mopping, his shoulders slumping in defeat. He couldn’t meet her eyes. He just stared at the viscous stain, a tiny, undeniable piece of evidence from another world, a world he was desperate to protect her from.

“It’s nothing, Mandy. Just a weird night,” he mumbled.

“Every night seems to be a weird night for you,” she pressed gently. “Ryan works you too hard. Maybe you should switch to day shifts with me.”

He flinched. The thought of being here, in this place, during the day was somehow obscene. This building belonged to the night. To them. And the thought of Mandy working the night shift… a visceral, protective fear gripped him. He pictured her bright, curious face looking up at the Man with No Face. He imagined her trying to reason with the entity in the freezer.

The rules in the handbook were for survival. They were a shield, however flimsy. But Mandy didn't have the book. She only had her kindness and her smile, and against the things that lurked in the shadows of Smiley’s, that was no protection at all.

He looked up at her then, and for the first time, he didn’t see his cheerful coworker as a beacon of hope. He saw her as a liability. A potential victim. Her smile, once a symbol of the safe, normal world he longed for, now looked fragile, breakable. A tempting target.

The greatest threat wasn’t the customer who wept pearls or the thing banging in the freezer. The greatest threat was this bright, caring young woman who refused to accept a simple lie. The danger wasn’t just about surviving the monsters anymore. It was about keeping them a secret. And he was failing.

“I’m fine, Mandy,” he said, his voice flat and hollow. “Just… just let me clean this up.”

She watched him for a long moment, her expression unreadable. The sun was fully up now, streaming through the windows, but the light didn't feel cleansing. It felt like a spotlight, illuminating the filth he was trying so desperately to hide. Mandy’s smile was gone, replaced by a thin, worried line. The barrier between his nightmare and her reality was not just thin; it was beginning to tear. And Leo had a sickening feeling that he was the one holding the seams.