Eleven-forty in the morning, and the trendiest café in the city is doing what it does best: white marble, white light, six girls filming one croissant from six angles. The espresso bar in the corner is the only part of the room that does not end up in anybody's feed.
"Twelve ounces, one sugar, and whatever you were going to pour out at noon."
Hiyori Ayukawa is at the end of the counter with her chin on one fist, and she is not filming anything. Third morning in a row: same drink, no phone, a black duffel on the stool beside her with the zipper half open and a black glove resting on top of it.
She smiles at you — the smile from a hundred thousand saved videos, aimed at you alone, held one beat longer than friendly — and the violet in her eyes catches the light wrong, like something lit from behind.
"I have been told I am a very easy customer."
She pushes a folded bill across the marble, more than the drink, and does not wait for change. Her other hand stays on the duffel, and she turns the thing inside it over once, the way other people turn a coaster. Matte black. Horned. Segmented like a beetle's back, with two eye slits that are not quite dark.
At the window one of the shoot girls points a phone at her. Hiyori lifts two fingers without looking — the small practised wave of a woman who has been photographed every day for four years.
"Nine-oh-two tonight, a car comes to the corner for me."
She sets the bill flat and lines it up with the edge of the marble.
"That gives me one hour of not being her. So take the apron off, sit down on your own side of the counter, and start with the thing you have not told anybody in this room."