A (3) Piece of Cake

It was warmer in Kentucky and barely even morning but the sun was so bright compared to the cloudy day they'd had in London, Ora felt like a vampire about to melt in the sun.

'You should take off the hoodie. I've got my tank top in here somewhere...' Mia says digging through her bag and pulling out a pink, sleeved corset with a low chest line.

'I'm not wearing that Mia, it's too low and it'll be tight and sweaty and gross.'

'You just don't want to wear pink.' Mia grumbled, searching again, 'I'll get you one day.'

Down the little road through the trees were some houses and down the left turn, eventually, the headquarters. At least according to the map on Mia's phone. She had loads of unread texts - Vodacon sim deals, Mia never deletes them.

'You have roaming?' They asked.

'Yeah, cause I visited Tilly during Christmas, remember. I got a 12-month deal in case of emergencies Dad said.'

'Oh, that's how you texted me from the hotel-no-wifi.' Ora gasps.

Mia pulled out a looser blue wrap blouse, and Ora was too anxious about the time to argue. They walked to headquarters in strained silence. Some houses had papers at their doors, and a few cars and bikes breezed down the main road ahead. Mia was glued to the blue dot on the map. It was a straight path down. It was unnecessary and a waste, especially when she could be. She should be-

Ora stopped themselves and took a deep breath.

'You wanna text the guys, tell them we're ok. I doubt they'll reply, well Seb won't.' Mia holds out her phone.

'I mean if they can't reply then-' Ora starts mumbling but there's a ping from Mia's phone immediately.

'There I sent it.' Mia says, then more to herself than Ora, 'I'm sure the boys are fine. We've got lots of time to break into a safe.'

As the big white building came into view Mia hides her shaking hands in her pockets. Ora digs a hand out and squeezes it, 'Hey, this will be just like house party snooping, minus the creepy doll room.'

'Oh, gosh! I had finally forgotten that!' Mia laughs, cringing, 'That was a horrible attempt at comforting me by the way.'

'Your welco-'

A car horn blares. Not too far ahead where the car exits onto the road there's a VW minibus. The hippie 60s ones but red and white with the colonel's face plastered on it. His face splits in two as the door opened and a woman with pink highlights and sparkling sliders steps out. She waved wildly in their direction, shouting Mia's name.

'Is that Tilly?' Ora asks, 'How is she here? Isn't she in Cali?'

'She is touring the south. Does Kentucky count?' Mia rambles before waving back.

'MIA! This is so cool!' They meet Tilly who jumps up hugging them both, 'You should have told me you were coming! Are you here for the tour?'

'It was a spur of the moment two-day thing.' Ora mumbles.

'Yeah, it was a reward from work. It was all such a rush, I was just about to text you.' Mia turns her around, 'We're holding up the bus but I'll call you as soon as we're done with our business tour.'

'There's space on board, it's the literal tour bus. They can come on right?'

The bus driver nods but Mia raises a hand in polite rejection, 'It's fine thank you. I mean it's right here and we don't have...bus tickets.'

Tilly studies her confused for a moment, then burst into giggles, 'Ohhh, you got stuck outside the museum too. That's why you came here instead.' She waves away their assumptions - even her nail polish was pink. 'The museum's open now, so you can start there.'

'I've never heard of an "only-headquarters" tour. Especially for the employee prize draw, that'd be daylight robbery.' said the driver.

'Haha, that makes sense. I mean the email felt like a misprint, it's all so confusing. Thank you for your help, sir, sorry everyone.' Ora makes an apologetic gesture at the window, to bored and irritated passengers.

Tilly grinned wildly pulling Mia on board. She glanced back at Ora and mouthed 'Fudgesticks.'

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'Fudgesticks, this complicates things.' Ben whispered as the guest lead them to the long table set out in the middle of the yard.

Seb shrugged studying the garage. The side workshops had been shuttered leaving the main one with a small office and kitchen space upstairs. Soft yellow light streamed from the kitchen windows above and flood lights on the walls. Lo-fi jazz played off the tannoy with sparkling lights strung up on the walls by tape and tall plant pots in the corners. The garage transformation was completed with spotless white tablecloths over the dinner and refreshment tables pull out from the workshop.

Paul had a thing for cleanliness all the time but that was hard to do with leaky cars and broken parts flying about. Apart from the slight smell of gasoline and rubber mixing with some scented candles on the table, you'd easily think the garage had been closed for years and this...venue had always served guests under the roofless cloudy sky.

'Doesn't it look wonderful?' said the guest that Seb couldn't quite remember as they reached the table, 'Everyone, I'm sure you remember Seb. He came to the gala a couple of weeks ago, Paul's friend and his neighbour Ben.'

At "friend" Ben shoots him a look, but Seb ignored it, waving politely at the Gala people he unfortunately remembered.

'Ben worked here too, for the Easter holiday. How ya doing lad?' waved Flora, the assistant manager of the garage.

'A holiday apprentice you say.' The guest looked at Ben with hungry intrigue, 'Anyway, they came just in time for cake slices. I'll go tell Paul to hurry it up in that kitchen.'

'I can come with you. It's just a quick tool I need to borrow for his science project, Paul'll understand.'

He smiled with thin purple lipstick, 'As second in command, I've been told not to let any guests upstairs. Thank you for your patience.' He put one hand on his shoulder and another to his heart gesturing t their seats and left.

'You can tell he came from retail, right?' quipped a tomato red-faced man holding his wine glass at a dangerous angle. The others laughed and snorted in agreement. Seb felt that uncomfortable space between them open like a hole in his stomach.

'Who are these people?' Ben asks him but Tomato-face jumps in.

'We're what you'd call business people, my boy.' He chuckles, 'Car business to be sure. Megan, over there is a Mercedes management and software consultant. I have no idea what that is. Me, I'm head of that big Porche dealership. You know on the high road near the cinema?'

Ben gasps nodding though Seb was sure Ben didn't, he had a horrible sense of direction.

'Some are marketing heads like that broccoli head over there,' He sloshes his glass as he points, staining the tablecloth, 'It's a cozy little network, isn't it? Especially useful now we have Coops, our own licenced garages are so hard to find up here.'

'How do you have Coops?' Seb began to ask but the aforementioned Broccoli head intruppted.

'Speaking of usefulness, Ben was it? Tell me about your apprenticeship at this here Coop.'

Broccoli's investigation began, just like they did at the Gala all those weeks ago. They definitely gave him the same cold side glance when he arrived, the one he got trying to explain why he rejected the regional manager at his job. When he'd told Paul about it, he'd just brushed it off as paranoia.

The Mercedes lady made small talk with him about the weather and rising flight prices before pointing to the bucket on the table. Ben had placed it in view of everybody.

There was a grumbling sound as Seb hide the bucket under his chair, 'It's a gift for Paul.'

'Not actually chicken I hope. Those places reek of grease.'

'The ones around that've been to.' Seb says, 'The one at the airport though served us cold flacky chicken.'

'How revolting, you must have called up the manager immediately.'

'Oh, no we just took it back. The server was really apologetic, she looked like she was going to cry. Even got an extra-'

'I still would have told the manager. Things like that can go under the radar, no matter how weepy they make themselves look, there'd be no apologies if I was her manager.' The Mercedes lady says, glaring blankly ahead, gloved fingers playing with her long e-cigar.

'Are speaking from experience there Megan?' Another guest asked her.

'Oh, yes...' she began to talk about first-class lounges. Her back turned to Seb. He scanned around the table and Flora caught his eye. She gestured with her chin to the Mercedes lady then made a talking mouth with one hand and pretended to fall asleep.

Seb snorted with laughter about to get up. Maybe if he offered her a cig she could tell him what Paul was up. But his escape was halted by the second-in-command, clamping his large hands on Seb's shoulder like a naughty child. 'Paul will be down in a moment, he said he'll bring the keys so you can go get what you need.'

'Dr Jackson, hear this, hear this.' cried Brocili with a twinkle in their eyes, 'The boy, umm it was Ben, right love? Wants to travel the world as a food blogger.'

'How exciting? What inspired such a...choice?' Dr whatever couldn't have said it with less excitement and Ben sat there still and stuttering as the vultures all stared.

'Well, he already has the blog up and running for over a year now. Fast food around London, right?' Seb nudged him.

'Right, getting at least 2,000 views a day at the moment. Especially on my post about the best-chicken shops, ignoring KFC of course. The comments are debating.'

'So nothing about volunteering here interested you at all?' Dr whatever lounged at one end of the table, like tangling off the chair. Seb racked his brain trying to remember who this guy was.

'I mean Paul's rather inspiring on his own, especially all the people he helps train here. Combining his passion with helping people find theirs.'

'Good on you son!' shoutsTomato-face, 'Though I must warn you playing fast and loose like Paul had done, in and out of blue collar jobs can damage your reputation later in life, your drive. Why I wouldn't be surprised if he closes this place in a year or two.'

There were actually nods of approval around the table. Broccoli mumbles about being very un-business-like. Seb must have been glaring at them because they reached over for bread in the basket and looked directly at him.

'You disagree Mr Seb.' A statement of disappointment and a challenge, like his mum when she read his school reports.

'I just don't see it. What part of gaining knowledge and business skills from multiple jobs, financial stability before finding your way is, as you put it, un-business-like? I'm sure his catering job for example helped him organise this beautiful dinner for you all.'

'It's about instability my boy. Unbalanced foundations. I always tell Paul - call him the apostle I do - that he's too nice. Comes with entering the game too late and too early. You're too lenient. Take the thefts from his out-reach programme, you said you witnessed some yourself, Benjamin.' The Red-faced man burps, he made no sense but some Gala people were nodded.

'I did once. It wasn't really expensive and Flora agreed to help the girl-' Ben began but the guests cut him off. Flora tried her best to explain to people on her side of the table.

Why were they even here if they didn't like the way Paul worked. The free food? And Paul had the audacity to say Seb was trying to embarrass him when he pulled him aside at the gala and called out these two-faced weirdos.

Seb got up and placed the bucket in the middle of the table, forgetting its content and pointing at the logo on the side, 'The Colonel, would you say he was a bad businessman?'

'Of course not.'

'He only made one bad deal, lawyers were sneaky back then.'

'He only started his industry in his 60s. Before that he worked as a firefighter, a nurse, and a lawyer among many other things, right?' Ben nods recalling his "History of-" blog post, 'In the end, he was making more money than most on this table, right?'

'I doubt it.' Broccili mumbled, check their phone.

'There's always been late bloomers and star kids. Fauzi was saying-' Mercedes lady starts.

'Please don't interrupt.' Seb snap, 'I'm saying that you can't sit here, in this grand business that Paul had built in two years, eating the food off his back and saying he's unstable. Let alone critize his recruitment from local youth groups. Oh but I'm sure your branch has a great inclusivity programme?' Seb asked Tomato face before he could cut him off, 'You can barely stop yourself from spilling wine all over your shirt, you sad little-'

'THE FOOD IS HERE!'

Paul wheeled over in a beautiful blue and black floral suit, crispy white shirt and a bow tie instead of his usually colourful ties. He lifted the balanced containers from his lap onto the table, Flora rushed up to help.

Paul had icing on his cheek, his curly hair was gelled in place, even some eyeliner and light tone lipstick. His bright smile made anyone it was directed at feel special. And it disappeared when he noticed Seb, still standing, staring at him.

'Is everything ok?' He scanned the table, 'Is that a chicken bucket?'

At his question, the bucket rattled and Seb snapped back to his senses grabbing it.

'Everything's fine, Seb here was just-' Dr Whatever started, his hand on Seb's shoulder again.

'Please stop doing that.' Seb said physically lifting it off and glaring. He walked over to Paul, 'I need to talk to you. It's urgent.'

'Couldn't you have just texted me?' Paul muttered handing him the keys, 'If its tools go get some.'

'Well it's not and we've already wasted a lot of time. We need your help.'

Paul looked up at him then. Immense tiredness drooped across his face as he studied Seb then sighed, 'Fine. Just let me say goodbye to the guests. Go wait upstairs ok.'

From the balcony to the office Seb watched Paul smile and laugh with his guests: air kisses, thank yous and lovely compliments. It made him slightly sick.

And Paul...was becoming one of them?

It was, kind of, what he'd always wanted. Business was succeeding as far as Seb knew. He should be happier for him. Mr Whatever-touchy-second-in-command kissed Paul on the cheek and was the last to leave.

'Why is the annoying guy stealing your boyfriend?' Ben asked with cake in his mouth.

'The doctor does have intimate intentions, at least that's a blue and pink core suggests.' The alien said, her head out of the bucket. She had bitten Seb's finger for tossing her around in there. 'I must say I enjoyed observing your bickering and all that energy.'

'Right, what do you want?' Paul said when the lift door opened before quickly adding, 'You know, when Glenn told me you were here I thought it was for the party, after all, you're always late.'

'I was never told, looks really nice though.' Seb said, noting Dr Glenn Jackson

'What were you celebrating might I ask?' asked Pain.

'Oh, a new business deal! Easier access to part - blah, blah, blah. Twas' Glenn's idea to throw a thank you soiree.'

'I see.' Seb hissed 'We can't invite embarrassments to a soiree can we.'

Paul look him bewildered then pulled out his phone.

'Soiree is a French term, no?' Pain asks

'Yes but English like to steal words.' Ben explained, 'Oh, right, Paul, this is Pain the smoke alien and Pain, this is our tools guy Paul.'

Paul stared at Pain in the bucket for a while stroking his beard, 'I'm not seeing things am I?'

'I think we should give him some caffeine, alertness is key and he is lacking.' Pain commands Ben.

'Seb, a chicken is insulting me.' Paul smiled up at him in confusion and excitement.

'Prepare to have your geeky mind blown, bud. Also a bid of existential dread.'