The shop didn’t look like anything.
Wedged between a tailor and a phone repair stall on the eastern edge of Market Square, it had no sign, no display window, no indication from the outside that it was a bakery at all. The door was painted the same brown as the building’s façade and had been for so long that the paint had cracked into a pattern that looked deliberate but wasn’t. A health notice was taped to the inside of the glass, three years expired.
He opened the door. A bell didn’t ring. The interior was narrow and warm, flour dust in the air and the smell of something complicated happening in the back. A counter. A display case, empty except for a tray of plain rolls. No menu. No prices. No customers.
“You’re early,” said the man behind the counter.
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