Yet as she pushed the pram past him, the baby inside waved a star-shaped rattle. Roy caught his own reflection in the wet window of a parked car: a fifty-two-year-old man in a rumpled suit, holding a forgotten briefcase, tears cutting clean tracks through the city grime.
Mum.
Then the bus pulled up, the woman boarded, and the scent of mint faded back to diesel. Roy Stuart stood a moment longer, then smiled—a real smile, the first in years—and walked on. roy stuart glimpse 10
He turned, certain the source would be a greengrocer’s bin or a spilled herbal tea. Instead, he saw her . Yet as she pushed the pram past him,