Page 29 of The Goat Next Door

Don’t disappoint us.”

— Ember’s mom and dad

The alarm clock blares at five, a shrill, piercing sound that feels like a physical assault on my nervous system.

I shove a hand out from under the covers to silence it, my palm landing on the cold, sagging plastic of my air mattress. It has leaked a solid thirty percent of its air overnight, leaving my hips pressed firmly against the hardwood floor.

I groan, rolling onto my side and peeling myself off the floorboards, my body stiff and aching before the day has even properly begun.

I stumble into the bathroom, the floor freezing against my bare feet, and flick on the light.

I look in the mirror and stifle a scream.

My curls have mutated overnight into a bird’s nest. One side is a disaster of static-charged fluff, while the other is plastered flat against my temple, glued down by a stray smear of caulk I missed during yesterday’s frantic cleaning session.

“Okay, that’s just great,” I mutter to my reflection.

I grab the curl cream from my bag and pump a massive, excessive dollop into my palm. I work it through the tangled mass, but it’s like trying to reason with a cyclone.

The cream just makes the tangles slick and defiant. I try to comb through with my fingers, but I hit a knot so stubborn it tugs at my scalp, making my eyes water.

I sigh and start wrestling the strands into a tight, defensive knot at the crown of my head. I wrap an elastic band around it again and again until my scalp pulls taut, pinning the frizz down by force.

It isn’t cute, and it certainly isn’t professional, but it’s contained.

I skip the lipstick—Marge doesn’t strike me as a woman who respects a red lip at dawn—and pull on a gray jumpsuit.

I take one last look at my reflection, trying to smooth a stray, rebellious curl that keeps poking out from the elastic. It’s useless. I let it stay.

I have ten minutes until I have to get to the bakery, and if I’m late, Marge won’t care about my hair—she’ll just make sure I never show up again.

Nine minutes later, I am sprinting down Main Street. My boots hit the pavement in a frantic, uncoordinated rhythm, my breath coming in short puffs as the town clock tower begins its slow, booming chime.

Clang. Clang. Clang.

I throw my weight against the heavy glass door of the bakery at exactly 5:58 AM. The brass bell overhead lets out a wild jangle as I stumble into the warm, yeast-scented air.

Marge is already behind the counter, holding a metal clipboard. She doesn’t look up from her inventory sheet, her deep, dark skin glowing under the harsh fluorescent lights. She tracks the digital clock on the wall until the final second ticks over.

“Two minutes early,” Marge says, finally lifting her gaze. She folds her arms, her silver-streaked bun perfectly in place. “I expected you to be ten minutes late, carrying a six-dollar iced coffee and looking for a place to plug in your phone.”

“I am a professional, Marge,” I pant, gripping the edge of the counter. “I don’t miss deadlines. I don’t miss shifts. Point me toward the flour bins and I will execute the sanitation protocol with maximum efficiency.”

Marge looks at my tight, chaotic bun, then down at my pristine leather boots.

“In the back. The industrial bins are sixty-pound rolling tubs, and the lids are jammed with baked-on flour dust. There’s a wire brush, a bucket of hot water, and a bottle of white vinegar on the prep table. Don’t use the blue soap on the aluminum; it stains. Move it. The morning rush starts in two hours and I don’t have time to hold your hand.”

The back room of the bakery is a high-heat production floor. The massive deck ovens are already roaring, radiating a wall of dry heat that immediately begins to melt the curl cream straight out of my defensive hair-knot.

I drop to my knees in front of the first rolling bin. It is a massive gray plastic cylinder filled to the brim with pastry flour, and the sliding track of the lid is completely caked in a thick, concrete-like layer of dried paste.

I start scrubbing.

Within thirty seconds, I understand why bakers have forearms like medieval blacksmiths. Tiny muscles I didn’t previously know existed start aching.

The dry flour dust rises from the tracks in a fine cloud, settling into the fabric of my jumpsuit and turning my knees and elbows a dull, powdery white. My curls begin to slip from the elastic band, falling into my eyes in damp, sticky spirals as sweat beads on my forehead.

“You’re doing that all wrong,” a voice says.