A child clambered onto Billy's lap mid-bite, reaching for his cup.
"You forgot to say cheers," the little girl whispered with a stern face.
Billy raised the cup gently. "Then let's fix that."
He stood slowly, asking softly if he could say something. The chattering hushed. Even the clatter of plates quieted.
Standing among flickering lanterns, holding nothing but a cup of sweet-spiced tea, Billy looked out at the sea of faces—the people who had taken him in when he had nothing. Who gave him a name, food, and home.
He took a breath.
Billy's fingers tightened on the cup, the steam curling into the cool night air. "To the readers," he began — not loud, but steady. True.
"And to the dreamers. To the ones who feel lost, who feel like pages torn out of a book before they were ever read. To those who carry stories inside them no one has heard—yet. You are not broken. You're just… unwritten."
A hush fell deeper.
"Fate isn't always inked ahead of us.
Sometimes… it's a blank page.
