Page 87 of Baking and Angels

“Yes, yeah,” he said, wishing she would just get thisover with.

A song jingled through the air, stopping whatever additional thing Helena was going to say. Spinning to her briefcase and purse, she dug in the latter to pull out her mobile. “Sorry, sorry, I got to take this.”

She didn’t wait for his permission to answer, turning away to talk softly into the magicrectangle.

Rafferty huffed, letting his eyes drift up to the tiled ceiling above as Honey knelt down before him. Her action was too much like other views he had seen, ones he’d rather forget. Sweat trickled down his back, making hisskin itch.

A few seconds later, Helena pocketed her phone and snatched up her coat. “I’m so sorry, but I’ve gotta run and put out another fire. Are you going to be okay here?” she asked him, her eyes pleading with him to be okay.

“I’m fine,” he lied.

That was all she needed. Shewas gone.

“My that child is running around like her house is on fire,” Honey laughed, as she stood to write down a few more measurements. “She’s going to burn herself out at that pace.”

“What would you know about it?” Rafferty responded in a surly voice, but he didn’t mean to; this helpful woman had done nothing to warrant it except being just too damnedcheerful.

She also didn’t take offense, which was its own kind of annoying. Instead, she laughed some more. “Oh, I was young once. Thinking I could change the world if I just worked hard enough. Put enough energy in, and it would all simply get done. Then I would win because I was the hero of my own story. How could I not?”

“That isn’t how the world works,” he said, watching her in the reflections of the tri-mirrors before him. Again, he saw his face, one he didn’t really recognize and so felt disconnected from. It was a feeling he hated, but in that moment, he also felt like he couldn’t turn away. Honey moved behind him, pulling some things from a rack of clothing he hadn’t noticed before. She put the first two back before humming, satisfied with the third, then changed her mind again and switched it out witha fourth.

She stepped up beside him, brandishing her prize, a suit of kitchen scrubs, only they were black with piping of bloodred. “The only thing I know for certain is no one knows how the world works. We all just try for what we think is best in any given moment, and we’re lucky if we turn out tobe right.”

“Then what’s the point of any of it?” Rafferty sneered. “If this is supposed to be winning, why doesn’t it feellike it?”

The reflection of Honey cocked her head to one side. She studied him for another long moment, her gaze feeling like it was reading more of his soul than his expression. “If I were to venture a guess, it’s because you haven’t fully let go of who you used to be in order to make room for who you are trying to become.”

“You make that sound easy.”

Honey laughed. “Oh, I know it’s not.” Then she offered him the clothes. “But let’s start with the outside of you. Please, go try these on and come back here. They won’t fit perfectly, but I’d like to see the general layout.”

There was another mirror in the changing room, and it took every fiber of Rafferty not to punch it. Instead, he quickly took off his clothes and donned the outfit Honey handed him.

While she had said it wouldn’t fit, the feel of the black cloth as it slipped over his shoulders or pulled up over his hips, it was as if it had already been made for him. He paused as he looked at himself in the single mirror.

Heliked it.

The red piping at his shoulders and down his sides at the seam made him look powerful, like a general, even though the cut was still one of a chef with the front panel buttoning at the shoulder. If he undid the button, a triangle of red appeared as it laid back. He felt strong and confident. Proud even.

“Why doesn’t this feel like winning?” he asked himself. The reflection furrowed his eyebrows at him as the answer almost slipped from his lips, a traitorous answer that he had kept trapped inside of him, threatening to come out. He had to hold it back no matter what. Helena could never know.

“Are you dressed?” Honey called from the other side of thethin door.

Without a further glance, he opened the door forcefully and marched past Honey to go to theplatform.

“Oh my, now that looks sharp!” Honey called, before giving an appreciative whistle. “Your lady is going to love you in this. What do you think?”

“It doesn’t matter what I think. Whatever she wants,” he said, stiffening his jaw like a soldier, his hands ramrod straight at his sides. His tri-reflection in the tri-mirrors repeated the gesture, but the three of him reflected back all seemed wrong.

“What do you mean it doesn’t matter? You’re the star of the show, cinnamon crisp.”

Firmly, he shook his head. “My life is hers. I owe her everything.”

A soft, gentle hand rested on his arm. “You don’t owe her your life.”

He ripped his arm away. “You don’t understand. You can’t understand.”

Honey’s eyes reflected back at him in the mirror, and he flinched. While they didn’t change at all, they burned through him.

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