#{mia1}

Pietro might not have grown up in Matchak but the market at Jankeza street was still familiar to him. He’d been here several times, as a child with his family, with his grandmother, and then just with Wanda. It had that familiar sense with it mixed with nostalgia that Pietro wasn’t willing to indulge. Still, it was somewhere he liked, the hustle and bustle of it, even in winter like this where everyone was bundled up in their stalls and the smell of spiced meat cooking drifted through the air. He’d come back to Sokovia with basically no plan and no money whatsoever, though he wasn’t too worried about that at the moment. He was too fast to be caught most of the time and could steal what he needed for now. While he didn’t like to steal big things from other Sokovians, desperate times and he swiped an apple off a stall then zipped through the crowd to another part of the marketplace before anyone could see him or blink. Surely one apple wouldn’t go too amiss and Pietro was hungry.  Biting into his apple as he wandered, he heard some haggling going on at a nearby stall. Wandering closer as he chewed, he heard what sounded like an American haggling with a shopkeeper who was clearly taking full advantage. Amused, Pietro came up beside the woman. “Your Sokovian is terrible.” He commented, casually, in accented English then nodded at the vendor. “And he’s overcharging you by a lot.” Smirking a little, he leaned against the stall facing her and took another bite of his apple. 

For the first time that night, it seemed like no one was paying attention to him as he plucked a near-full bottle of... something from behind the bar and made his way to the balcony outside. The cold wind stung his face, the snow coming down so hard it was a blanket of white. The awning bowed beneath the weight but it at least kept him dry. He hardly felt the cold if he was being honest. He only felt defeated.

Pulling one of his two last cigarettes from the box, he slid it into his mouth unlit, pausing to twist the cap off the bottle before he fished the lighter out of his pocket. He’d barely taken a hit, the plume of smoke mixing with his breath in the cold air, when he felt more than heard someone behind him. Without turning to look, he let out a sigh. “If you’re here to yell at me, I’m pretty sure there’s a line inside.” Another hit, another plume of smoke. “Wait your turn.”

It wasn’t actually so much of an accident, this time. More than anything, Mia wanted to confirm it. She stood her ground, unmoving. “Kanato,” she said, simply.