Charley Dunst knew three things for certain as he stood in the pouring rain, dressed like a discount Easter nightmare:
If souls could physically wither and die, his had already decomposed.
His boss, Mrs. Brawn, had to be a demon in human skin.
If he had to mop that floor one more time, he was going to scream!
The rain hammered down on his ridiculous bunny costume with the persistence of a debt collector. Each drop felt like a tiny, cold slap of reality.
'This is my life now,' he thought, staring at his reflection in the puppet shop window. 'Twenty-eight years old, college-educated, and I'm a human traffic cone in bunny ears.'
The costume was a special kind of hell. Pastel blue fur that had probably been cute in 1987, now faded to the color of depression. One ear flopped over his eye like a dead fish, and the tail made obscene squeaking sounds every time he moved.
Behind the glass, a collection of porcelain dolls stared out at him with their glassy, judgmental eyes.
'Yeah, keep staring,' Charley muttered internally. 'At least you guys don't have to pretend to be cheerful.'
A car splashed through a puddle, sending a wave of dirty street water across his already-soaked paws. The driver didn't even slow down.
Charley's hand tightened around the cardboard sign until his knuckles went white beneath the soggy fake fur.
This wasn't how it was supposed to go.
Three years ago, he'd been Charley Dunst, rising star. The guy with the million-dollar app idea and the investors lining up to throw money at him. He'd had a corner office view, a girlfriend who laughed at his jokes, and a future that sparkled like champagne.
Then the scandal hit.
One leaked email. One misunderstood conversation. One very public accusation of insider trading that turned his name into poison overnight.
The investors vanished like smoke. The office became a crime scene. And Clara…
Clara had looked him in the eye and said, "I can't do this anymore, Charley. I need stability."
Two weeks later, she was posting Instagram photos from Marcus Bravestone's yacht, her engagement ring catching the Mediterranean sun like a middle finger aimed directly at Charley's broken heart.
Now here he was, working for Clara's father at his puppet shop, dressed like a children's party reject, waving at traffic in the rain.
The irony was so thick he could choke on it.
A rumble of thunder rolled overhead, and Charley pressed his forehead against the cold window glass.
That's when he saw it.
A cat.
Small, black, and absolutely drenched, pressed against the other side of the window like it was trying to read his soul through the glass.
Its yellow eyes were wide and desperate, fur plastered to its skinny frame like wet paint. Rain dripped from its whiskers in a steady, pathetic rhythm.
For a long moment, they just stared at each other. Two broken creatures on opposite sides of the glass, united in their mutual misery.
'Well,' Charley thought, 'at least someone understands.'
The cat's mouth opened in what was probably a meow, though the sound was lost in the rain. Its little pink tongue darted out, and something in Charley's chest cracked open.
"Screw this," he muttered.
He yanked open the shop door, causing the cheerful welcome bell to chime with aggressive enthusiasm.
"Come on," he called to the cat, stepping aside. "It's warm in here. And trust me, your dignity can't get any lower than mine."
The cat didn't hesitate. It darted inside like it owned the place, immediately shaking itself and sending water droplets flying across the display of vintage dolls.
"CHARLEY!" Mrs. Brawn's voice exploded from the back room like a sonic boom wrapped in disappointment. "Why are you inside? You're supposed to be attracting customers, not drowning our inventory!"
Charley peeled off the bunny head, revealing his soggy brown hair plastered to his skull like overcooked spaghetti. Water dripped from his nose.
"It's raining biblical proportions out there, Mrs. B. Pretty sure I saw Noah floating by with a trunk full of Barbies."
Mrs. Brawn appeared from behind the counter like a retail demon summoned by the scent of insubordination. Her burgundy blazer was pressed to military precision, and her wig—because it was definitely a wig—sat on her head like an angry beaver.
"A little water never killed anyone!" she snapped. "I worked through Hurricane Sandra in '96! Sold fifteen Chatty Cathys before the roof started leaking!"
"And you've been electrifying ever since," Charley deadpanned, wringing water from his costume tail.
Mrs. Brawn's eyes narrowed to laser points. "You think you're—WHAT IS THAT?"
She was pointing past him with the horror of someone who'd discovered a spider in their coffee.
Charley turned just in time to watch the stray cat leap onto a display of ballerina dolls with the grace of a furry wrecking ball. One porcelain dancer went flying, hitting the floor with a crystalline crash that seemed to echo through the shop like a death knell.
"Oh, come on!" Charley lunged forward, arms windmilling as he tried to catch the cat before it could cause more damage.
The cat, apparently deciding that chaos was its new hobby, bounded from the ballerina display to a shelf of ventriloquist dummies.
One particularly creepy specimen—complete with bow tie and dead glass eyes—swayed dangerously.
"No, no, NO—!"
Charley dove for the dummy just as it toppled backward. His wet bunny paws hit the slick floor, and he went down like a sack of soggy laundry. The impact knocked the wind from his lungs and made his bunny tail emit a mortifying squeak.
The dummy crashed beside him, its painted smile now chipped into something even more disturbing than before.
"CHARLEY DUNST!" Mrs. Brawn's voice could have shattered glass. "This is exactly the kind of chaos I expect from you! That animal is a liability! Get it out before it destroys everything!"
Charley groaned and started to push himself up from the floor, his pride joining his dignity in the afterlife.
'Perfect,' he thought. 'From tech entrepreneur to floor decoration in three easy steps.'
As he braced his hand against the dummy's wooden stand to lever himself upright, his fingers brushed against something that definitely didn't belong.
A card.
Not just any card. This thing was sleek as obsidian, smooth as silk, and seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it. No numbers. No bank logo. No chip or magnetic strip.
Just five words etched in silver script that seemed to glow with their own inner light:
"Divine Black Card - No Limits"
Charley's breath caught in his throat.
He'd seen black cards before. American Express Centurion cards that required seven-figure spending to even qualify. But this… this was different. This felt different.
The card was warm to the touch, as if it had been waiting for him specifically.
"What the hell?" he whispered, turning the card over. The back was completely blank, mirror-smooth black that reflected his confused face back at him.
"CHARLEY!" Mrs. Brawn was stomping toward him like an angry rhinoceros in sensible shoes. "Stop playing with trash and clean up this mess! And get that disease-ridden animal out of my shop!"
But Charley couldn't move. Couldn't think. Couldn't breathe.
The card pulsed once in his hand, warm and alive and impossible.
And somewhere in the back of his mind, a voice whispered, 'Your luck is about to change, Charley Dunst.'
The cat, now perched atop a music box, gave a single, knowing meow.
Thunder crashed outside, and the lights flickered.
Charley's fingers closed around the card like a lifeline.
Everything was about to change.