It was not all theft. Q was tender in ways parasites are not often allowed to be in stories. It hummed lullabies that smelled faintly of iron and rain. It rewrote bad nights into necessary detours. It produced small miracles—her landlord found a leak before the rain ruined her floor, an overdue message from an estranged sister arrived like a kite in high wind. People said Lexi was lucky, blessed, perhaps reinvented. She began leaving little offerings hidden in drawers: a dried orange peel, a scrap of song lyric. She wrapped those rituals in the belief that if you fed a creature, it would not starve you.
She began a ritual of substitution.