Chapter 2 #4
I stare after her for a long moment, then look around the bakery.
It's a little messy now, lived-in rather than staged, with crumbs on the counter and cooling racks that need washing and flour everywhere because flour is apparently a permanent condition of my existence.
But there's no trace of "defective" anywhere in this space.
Just the lingering warmth of someone seeing me—really seeing me—and believing I could be more than my worst day, more than the word that follows me, more than the bond that failed.
I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. It comes out light, easier than it has any right to be after everything that just happened.
Just take it a day at a time, Hazel. One cookie, one customer, one small victory at a time.
Dusk has teeth in Oakridge Hollow, and it bites the bakery in half with the precision of something that's done this every evening since the beginning of time—one side still cozy with lingering warmth and the ghosts of the day's baking, the other gone shadowy and strange as the sun abandons us for whatever it does at night that doesn't involve keeping us warm.
Reverie's long gone, vanished hours ago in her characteristic whirlwind of energy and good intentions, but her scribbled journal page is still tucked under the napkin holder like a promise or a talisman, peeking out with its enthusiastic handwriting and questionable spelling.
The cookies are down to crumbs and lonely survivors that I'll probably eat for dinner because cooking for one person is depressing and cookies are technically food.
I gave up on the playlist about an hour ago—even "Monster Mash" starts to feel tired and vaguely mocking when you've heard it seventeen times while closing up alone—and let the quiet settle deep into the floorboards and the corners and my bones.
The timer dings with its cheerful insistence, announcing that the last batch of scones has finished cooling and can now be boxed.
I wrap them up with the methodical precision of someone who's done this exact motion thousands of times in dozens of different bakeries, muscle memory taking over where my brain has completely checked out for the day.
I sweep behind the counter, every stroke of the broom soothing in its predictability, in the simple cause and effect of dirt disappearing when you apply bristles to it. Quick, precise, no room for second-guessing or spiraling into philosophical questions about my life choices.
The money drawer opens with its usual hopeful squeak—the mechanical equivalent of "please tell me today was worth it" or possibly "I'm barely holding together but I'm trying my best." I sort the day's cash, counting the bills twice because I don't trust my tired brain, then again because apparently I still don't trust myself even after double-checking.
It's not record-breaking. Actually, it's kind of pathetically small if I'm being honest with myself, which I'm trying to be more often even though honesty is frequently depressing.
Unless you count "fewest customers who didn't immediately judge your entire existence" as a category, in which case I'm absolutely dominating the competition.
Still. It's money I earned. Money that came from something I made with my own hands, from cookies I baked at 4 AM, from a business I opened despite everyone—and I mean everyone—telling me it was too risky, too ambitious, too much for an Omega without a pack to support her.
Nobody can take that from me. Not the gossips, not my ex-Alpha, not the voice in my head that sounds suspiciously like my mother saying "I told you so."
I stash the till in the safe that's older than me and probably held together by spite, prayer, and the accumulated hopes of every small business owner who's ever used it.
Sign the daily log with a flourish that's maybe a little dramatic but feels earned.
Wipe down every surface until they gleam—warm maple wood that's seen decades of use, slightly sticky copper counter where someone definitely touched it with sugary fingers despite the "please don't touch" sign I should probably make, display glass still fogged with the ghost of where the Cinnamon Soul Cookies spent their brief, glorious existence.
Chairs get stacked on tables with the efficiency of someone who's closed way too many restaurants in her life, who knows exactly how to break down a space for the night.
Crumbs swept into my palm with care because even the smallest waste feels wrong when you're operating on razor-thin margins, then tossed out the back door for whatever brave birds want to risk diabetes for a taste of my experimental pumpkin spice blend.
I roll down the big front window just enough to let in the evening air—that particular October mixture of wood smoke and dying leaves and the promise of cold that's coming whether we're ready or not, whether we've prepared or not, whether we're financially solvent or not.
Then I check on my resident tyrant and quality control supervisor who definitely hasn't earned her salary today.
Back in the kitchen, third flour bin from the left, exactly where I left her three hours ago because apparently some of us don't have responsibilities or obligations.
There she is—Muffin, coiled in approximately half a bag of the expensive organic flour I definitely can't afford to let her nest in but also can't bring myself to disturb because she looks so deeply satisfied with her life choices.
She's dusted like a powdered donut, one amber-green eye slitted open just enough to register my presence and silently judge it. She barely flicks her tail when I approach, but deep down—very deep down, buried under layers of feline superiority and disdain—I know she's glad I'm here.
Or at least not actively wishing I was dead. Progress.
I run a finger along her backbone with the delicate touch of someone who's been warned about boundaries and respects them, careful not to disturb her too much because the consequences would be severe and involve claws.
She purrs, but it's a warning purr. The kind that says "this is acceptable for now but don't push your luck, human. "
"Queen of carbs," I murmur, more to myself than to her because she definitely doesn't care about my opinion on anything. "You make this place look lived-in, you know that? Give it character. Or possibly make it look like I have my life even less together than I actually do, which is impressive."
She flicks an ear in response—the cat equivalent of "your neuroses are boring, let me sleep"—then curls tighter into her flour nest, surrendering completely to dreams of scone conquest and world domination through strategic napping.
On instinct older than thought, driven by muscle memory and compulsion I've never successfully fought, I cross back through the darkening bakery and plant myself in front of the window.
Maple Street's gone copper and black, transformed by the dying light into something that belongs in a Tim Burton movie or possibly a Hallmark card for people with depression.
A handful of porch lights flicker on, warm and yellow against the deepening blue.
One or two cars idle past, their headlights cutting through the gathering dusk like knives through butter or some other cooking metaphor that's less violent.
But mostly it's just autumn leaves having their nightly riot, dancing and scraping across the cobblestones like they're in a hurry to escape something only they can see.
Like they know something we don't about what's coming.
My reflection stares back at me from the darkening glass—ghostly, blurred at the edges, less substantial than I'd like to be.
The orange in my hair is even more vibrant in the half-light, practically glowing like a warning beacon or possibly a cry for help depending on how you interpret hair color choices.
There's still flour on my jaw that I didn't notice before.
A tired set to my shoulders that speaks of too many early mornings and not enough rest. Dark circles under my eyes that no amount of concealer can hide and that I've stopped trying to hide because honesty, remember?
But I don't look away.
I lift my hand without thinking, driven by habit and muscle memory and compulsion I've never successfully fought even in therapy.
My thumb finds the skin just above my collar with the precision of someone who's done this thousands of times, right at that particular spot where his mark used to be.
The bond mark that was supposed to be permanent, that was supposed to mean forever, that turned out to mean "until you stop being useful" or "until you fail to meet expectations" or whatever the actual threshold was that I crossed without realizing it.
It's invisible now. Faded to nothing through time and expensive laser treatments and sheer force of will.
But I still feel it, especially when the world goes quiet and there's nothing to distract me from my own thoughts and the phantom sensation of being claimed by someone who didn't actually want me.
Some nights, when I close my eyes and the anxiety is particularly aggressive and creative, I swear I can taste the word on my tongue—defective.
It's bitter, metallic, sticks in my teeth like bad coffee or regret or all the things I should have said but didn't. It sits in the back of my throat and waits for moments exactly like this, when I'm alone and tired and wondering if everyone was right, if I really am too broken to make this work.
But there's no room for it in this space. Not anymore. Not ever again if I have anything to say about it, which I finally do because this is mine.
This is my bakery. My rules. My second chance at being something other than someone's failed bond, someone's cautionary tale, someone's example of what happens when Omegas try to operate outside the accepted structure.
I trace the old scar with my thumb, that barely-there ridge of tissue that's more memory than physical reality now.
If I could talk to the version of me that ran away in the middle of the night with nothing but a hissing cat and a suitcase held together by duct tape and desperation—if I could tell her anything, anything at all—maybe she'd believe me when I say:
It gets better. Not easy. Not simple. Not the fairy tale ending we were promised by romance novels and well-meaning relatives who didn't understand what they were asking us to endure.
But better in the ways that matter. Better in the freedom to choose.
Better in the mornings where you wake up and realize no one's going to tell you who to be today, what to wear, how to smell, who to serve.
There's pride in the pit of my stomach, warm and solid and not even a little sweet despite being surrounded by sugar all day.
I made it through day one of actual business.
I made this space exist in physical reality rather than just in my desperate planning.
I fed people—not many, but more than zero.
Reverie called me inspiring, which is possibly the nicest thing anyone's said to me in years that didn't come with conditions attached.
That has to count for something. That has to mean I'm on the right path, even if the path is covered in flour and lined with anxiety and occasionally detours through moments where strangers call you defective in your own establishment.
Outside, the leaves keep their frantic dance.
The town keeps breathing its small-town breath, settling in for the evening with porch lights and the distant sound of someone's television and the particular quiet that only comes when everyone's inside being their most authentic selves where no one can judge them.
I turn from the window, pressing my back against the cool glass of the door, letting the chill sink through my sweater and anchor me to this moment. This place. This version of myself that I'm still learning how to be, still figuring out how to inhabit.
There's nobody around to hear this. No witnesses to what I'm about to say.
But that's the point, isn't it? That's the entire point of everything I've done, everything I've built.
This promise is just for me. Nobody else gets a vote.
Nobody else gets to weigh in on whether it's realistic or achievable or appropriately modest for someone of my designation.
I say it out loud anyway, low and steady, like I'm making a vow to the universe or myself or maybe just the empty bakery that smells like sugar and possibility and the particular loneliness that comes with choosing independence:
"No Alphas. No bonds. No promises I can't keep to anyone but myself. Just pastries and freedom and figuring out who the hell Hazel Holloway is when nobody's telling her what to be."
I believe it. In this moment, surrounded by the evidence of my own capability, standing in a space I created, I actually believe it.
And tomorrow, I'll wake up at an ungodly hour that will make me question all my life choices.
I'll do this all over again. Make the cookies at 4 AM while having minor existential crises.
Open the door at 8 AM while battling anxiety.
Face whatever comes through it with flour on my cheeks and determination in my spine and maybe, if I'm lucky, a little less fear than today.
Because this is mine. And nobody—no Alpha, no gossip, no word whispered with fake concern, no voice in my head that sounds like my ex or my mother or society's expectations—can take that away from me.
Not anymore.
Never again.