Page 19 of Mane Rival in Store
Breezy blinked. Processed. “His hair moved.”
“Upward. At the temples. While he was looking at her.”
Breezy pulled out her tablet and typed. “I’m adding ‘investigate competitor’s hair anomaly’ to the operational notes. Under the subheading ‘unexplained phenomena.’ This is my life now.”
Sybil slid off the stool. “I’ll be back tomorrow. I want to see the competing window displays in natural light.” She stopped at the door, backlit by the SoHo afternoon. “And, Lark? A man who writes letters he doesn’t send, defends you to his own customers, and changes his window display in your honor is not a rival. He’s a man who doesn’t know how to say what he means. So he’s curating it instead.”
The door closed. The brass bell chimed.
Lark stood in the middle of her store and stared through the glass at the competing window display. The Catwoman edition glowed under gallery lighting. Behind it, barely visible through the glass and the cases and the careful arrangement, Rune Sterling sat at his counter with his back to her, perfectly still, perfectly composed.
She opened the group chat.
Lark: This is NOT a thing.
Sybil: I haven’t said a word.
Breezy: 3:00 PM—Existential crisis re: lion man. 3:15 PM—Resume normal operations. I’ve updated the calendar.
Lark: HE’S NOT A LION MAN. And stop calling him that.
Breezy: His hair disagrees.
Lark pocketed her phone. Through the wall, the Bach played on—softer now, less combative. Not a counterattack. A conversation.
She left her playlist where it was.
The two sounds met in the wall and made their strange, accidental music, and the tourists outside recorded it, and the internet watched, and Lark told herself this was a rivalry.
She told herself twice, the way she had to now.
It didn’t stick.
SEVEN
LARK
The article dropped on a Monday morning, and by Monday afternoon, Lark’s phone had become a liability.
“The SoHo Comic Wars: High Art vs. Villain Chic.” Breezy read the headline from her tablet while Lark restocked the Morally Gray display for the third time that week. “Published in CultureVault. Currently trending on their homepage. Six thousand shares and climbing.”
The piece had started as a blurb. A lifestyle blogger named Piper Knox—two hundred thousand Instagram followers, a column on CultureVault, a talent for packaging neighborhood drama into shareable content—had walked past the competing window displays last Thursday, filmed herself standing between the two storefronts narrating the “aesthetic war of the century,” and followed up with a twelve-hundred-word feature that treated the rivalry like a cultural event.
The framing was irresistible. On one side: Sterling & Mane, the “temple of comics high art,” a gallery-like space where editions were handled with cotton gloves and silence was a design choice. On the other: Villainette, the “villain lifestyle revolution,” purple neon and themed lipstick and a selfie wall that had spawned its own hashtag. The blogger quoted the viral mashup video, referenced the @SoHoComicWars fan account, and described the two stores as “the most entertaining retail rivalry since Coke and Pepsi, except with better aesthetics and worse soundproofing.” She’d requested comment from both owners.
Lark had given her ten minutes on the phone and three quotable lines.
Rune Sterling had given her a statement through his PR team.
“Read me his quote again,” Lark said, clicking lipstick tubes into place to a steady beat.
Breezy scrolled. “‘Sterling & Mane International is committed to the preservation and authentication of comics as a serious art form. We welcome diverse retail perspectives in the SoHo community and remain focused on delivering an unparalleled collector experience.’ Attributed to a Sterling & Mane spokesperson.”
Lark set down a tube. “He didn’t even give the quote himself?”
“His PR team gave it. Probably had it drafted before the call ended.” Breezy’s mouth twitched. “Corporate boilerplate. Zero personality. Reads like the back of an annual report.”
“Read mine.”
