Chapter 19 #2
Summer cut the thread. Macy set the raven on the counter beside the other four, where it stood crookedly on its old cake board. The board had once fitted a much larger cake; Summer had been meaning to replace it since September.
“What were you going to put in?” she asked. The window looked startlingly bare without the birds, the street outside nearer than it ought to be.
“The birthday cake. Until we make something else.” Macy nodded toward a box on the workbench. “I thought I’d use the small stand.”
Summer lifted the lid. The cake had pale green sides and three enormous orange flowers, their petals folded back around dark centers. She had drawn five smaller flowers on the order sheet, with leaves trailing down one side; there were no leaves here at all.
“That’s tomorrow’s,” she said. She looked at Macy, who was collecting the last scraps of thread. “Didn’t you find the drawing?”
“I found it.” Macy brought the stand to the counter. “She changed her mind when she came to pay. I put it in the book.”
Summer went to look. Beside the original sketch, in Macy’s writing, was the date of the customer’s visit and a description of the new design. Summer read it twice, stopping at the word large.
“I’d have used something else for the middle.” She set the book down beside the cake. “It’s a bit dark against that orange.”
“She brought a photograph,” Macy said. “They’re that color. It’s with the order.”
“I don’t mean it has to be botanically exact.” Summer touched a crumb on the edge of the board. “Something a little lighter would show the detail.”
“It’s supposed to look like her garden.” Macy had stopped gathering the decorations. “That was what she asked for.”
Summer picked up a clean brush, then put it down. The middles were dark. They would look better with a little bronze, and saying nothing wouldn’t make her stop seeing it.
“It’s my name on the box,” she said. She heard how it sounded, but Macy was already taking her apron off.
“Right.” Macy folded it over the chair. “I’d better leave it to you, then.”
“Where are you going?” Summer asked. She looked at the clock; it was barely two.
“Home. I came in at six.” Macy reached for her coat. “I said I’d do the morning. It’s in the book too.”
Summer looked down at it. She’d seen the orders and the canceled collections, the money that hadn’t come in, but she couldn’t remember looking at the page where Macy wrote her hours.
“I only meant the flowers.” Summer kept a hand on the open book. “You don’t need to leave because I said something.”
“I need to leave because I’ve finished.” Macy pulled one sleeve of her coat free of the hook. “I can show you what else is ready before I go.”
Summer wished she hadn’t asked where Macy was going. Now she had to stand here while Macy showed her everything she’d managed to do, and thank her for it. Through the empty window, people passing could see them beside the workbench. Summer moved away from the glass.
“I’m sorry about the box,” Summer said. Her fingers tightened on the book. “That was a horrible thing to say.”
“Yes, it was.” Macy put the coat on. “I’ve been putting them in your boxes all week.”
Summer nodded. She waited for something else, but Macy only fetched her bag from beneath the counter and checked that her keys were inside.
“What did you need for tomorrow?” Summer asked. “I’ll write it down.”
They went through the unfinished work. There was less than Summer had expected: labels, a filling to make, the plain cakes Macy had left wrapped for her to decorate. Summer wrote the list on the back of an unused Halloween order form.
At the door, Macy stopped. “Friday afternoon,” she said. “I still need to leave at one. My niece’s play.”
“Yes.” Summer remembered a photograph of a small girl with cardboard leaves around her face. Macy had shown her weeks ago, before everything had happened. “You told me.”
“I can come in earlier if that helps.” Macy adjusted the strap of her bag. “But I can’t stay later. She’s checked about six times that I’m coming.”
“One is fine,” Summer said. She put it beneath the list so she would see it in the morning. “Don’t come in earlier.”
After Macy left, Summer carried the cake into the window. She turned the stand, examining the flowers from the street side, then from the counter. The orange was beautiful against the green; she could admit that and still want to change the centers.
She found the customer’s photograph clipped to the order.
The flowers grew beside a low stone wall, with a child’s abandoned scooter lying across the path.
One flower leaned so far forward that it nearly filled the picture.
Macy had made that one, right down to a torn edge on a petal Summer had thought was a mistake.
Summer put the photograph back. She fetched a clean board for the ravens and began untangling the remaining thread from their feet, working without music until the stillness became unpleasant. Then she put the radio on too loudly and left it that way.
At three her mother called to ask about therapy. Summer let the call go unanswered, then sent a message saying she would call later. She didn’t want to talk about it yet, and she didn’t want her mother telling her Macy ought to understand.
The filling took twenty minutes. Summer tasted it, added more lemon, and tasted it again, the sharpness making her mouth water for the first time all afternoon. She set it aside to cool and took the unfinished cakes from the refrigerator.
She was halfway through the first one when a woman stopped outside. Summer glanced up, expecting a hand raised to ask whether they were open, but the woman was looking at the green cake. She leaned closer, smiled, and took a photograph through the glass.
Summer wiped her hands, meaning to go out and tell her who’d made it. By the time she reached the door, the woman had moved on. She locked up again and went to find the blank display cards.
The next morning, Macy found her beside the register, making a new display card. Summer had written Macy’s name beneath the description of the cake and was trying to fit the price on a line of its own.
“You don’t have to put all that,” Macy said. She stood with her coat still on. “It’s just a birthday cake.”
“I want people to know whose work it is.” Summer moved the pen away before she added anything else. “Will you check the price? I’ve looked at it until I can’t see it.”
Macy checked. The price was right; Summer had spelled dahlia wrong. She crossed it out, said a word she wouldn’t have said with a customer present, and reached for another card.
Macy took off her coat. “The lettering’s nice,” she said as she passed. “You can probably manage it twice.”
Summer turned the spoiled card over. It was clean on the back, and large enough if she started a little farther to the left.