It was a slow, golden morning in late autumn, the kind where sunlight slants through the windows just right — soft, forgiving, and warm. I was behind the counter at the fast-food place where I’d been working for the past year, finally catching a few minutes of quiet after the breakfast rush. The air smelled faintly of coffee, fryer oil, and maple syrup.

That’s when I noticed it.

At a table near the window sat a purse — not just any purse, but a Louis Vuitton, unmistakable even from across the room. The leather gleamed in the sunlight, smooth and perfect, its signature monogram catching the light like a secret. It looked wildly out of place in our little restaurant, where most of the customers were commuters grabbing coffee or parents wrangling kids before school. Continues…