The Accidental Mayor

Finn Parker could have been a weather vane for small-town moods: he spent his mornings rotating between cappuccinos and conversations, nodding at whatever the sunrise wanted to feel that day. At Perch & Pour, the coffee shop he half-rented with a stack of good intentions and a too-generous cousin, Finn wore his charm like a patched apron. He had a habit of folding short lines of verse into napkins and tucking them into the pockets of patrons who looked as if they might need them. He knew the town the way his barista hands knew the rhythm of the grinder: by feel, by habit, by small instinct. Mrs Caldwell liked a little extra cream and to talk about the geraniums. Tommy the mailman needed double espresso if his truck had to climb Harper Hill. Lillian, the retired nurse, always left a tidy note on the tip jar with a joke that began 'You should see the things I used to bandage.' Baxter, his rescue mutt, slept under the counter with one ear forever cocked toward the bell, which meant Finn's life was arranged into manageable pieces—orders, smiles, small confidences. It was a life that let him be kind without promising anything more ambitious than remembering who preferred almond milk. That smallness felt safe until the night the regulars decided to be clever in a way that involved a ballot pen. It began as a dare at closing: an idle idea, the kind of joke that circulates when people have had a week of monotony and a disposable sense of mischief. 'Write in Finn,' muttered Nora behind the counter as she stacked the last blueberry scones. 'How would he even run a town? He can't even keep a milk frother from exploding on Tuesdays.' The suggestion got laughs, then signatures on spare ballots folded into a paper cup like fish in a bowl. It was supposed to be private and ridiculous, an in-house gag to keep the coffee shop's winter from turning into predictable sameness. What none of them considered was that the town's municipal election that year had no dazzling candidates on the ballot and turnout was low enough that a cluster of determined write-ins could tip a balance. They meant to be funny. They meant to make a point about apathy. They did not mean to elect a barista.