Page 3 of Sugar

He’d already been considering closing down and finding a bigger place to live so he could start up an online bakery, which seemed to be more popular these days. But with having to adjust to this on top of everything else? He was so fucking screwed.

Why was this happening to him? How was this fair?

“It isn’t fair,” the doctor said, and Juno startled. He hadn’t realized he was talking out loud.

Juno’s gaze snapped up, and he closed his right eye, staring at the blob in his left. That was his future. Maybe worse. “How long until I know about my right eye?”

“A few weeks to a few months. Sometimes as long as a year. After a year, you can breathe easier.”

He blinked, and for a second, he swore he saw a bit of blur, but then it was gone. He was probably being hysterical.

“I don’t want to do this,” he let himself admit aloud.

“I understand. Therapy will help. Learning new adaptive technology while you can still see will help,” the doctor told him. “Denial is fine, but don’t leave it until you’re struggling to learn a bunch of new things without a safety net because it won’t be there forever.”

Juno closed both eyes. Darkness like that wouldn’t be his reality, at least. He’d still have something. His breath trembled in his chest again.

“How do I get a cane?”

“I’ll have the front desk give you some pamphlets,” the doctor said. “If your vision gets worse before you can get through them, there are websites with audio navigation.”

Juno felt cold all over. “Is that all?”

“Make an appointment to see me in four weeks.”

He nodded and didn’t move until the doctor got up and opened the door. The lights in the hallway were too bright, but he forced himself to look at them until his retina burned. He trailed his hand along the wall and let his left eye look down at his shoes. He could still see those. That was nice, even if the colors were all kind of…wrong and muddled.

He checked his phone as he stepped up to the receptionist. He had to be at work in an hour, and he’d make it if the bus wasn’t running late. He’d been too afraid to drive—afraid that he’d spontaneously go completely blind between one blink and the next.

Now that he knew that wasn’t true, maybe he’d go on a few more rides before he lost his ability to. But maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he’d just call it a day and get some cash for the car that was useless to him now. Or, at least, would be in the future.

“Does two o’clock work?”

Juno blinked up at the woman. “Sorry. I was lost in my head. When?”

“Wednesday.”

Four weeks from then. He could close up shop in that amount of time. He could find a new place to live. His lease was almost up anyway, and he could transfer the money he was paying in all rent to a bigger apartment. It wasn’t much, but it was something.

“Sure. Thanks.”

He collected his paperwork and the stack of brochures, too afraid to look down at them. Except he did, and the man on the front was about his age, and his eyes were open and they looked normal, but he was holding one of those blind people canes like Juno would have to, and…fuck.

He darted into the waiting room bathroom, and in spite of knowing everyone would be able to hear him, he sicked up everything he’d eaten that morning.

He couldn’t do this.

He couldn’t fucking do this.

Baking was always something that had calmed Juno down. He’d gotten into it when he was too late in picking electives his junior year and ended up with a culinary class. He hadn’t been great with all the savory stuff, but they’d gotten into cakes and cookies, and he realized he had a skill that surpassed some of the students who had been baking with their parents for years.

He hadn’t gotten into any of the colleges he applied to before graduation, so in the end, he’d applied for a baker apprenticeship at a shop near his first apartment and then had gone to work for anyone who was hiring in the city.

He made just enough to get by in a shitty little studio, bouncing from job to job until he’d found a little Polish shop run by an immigrant woman, Hanna, and her daughter. They loved him profoundly, and Juno felt like he was finally home.

He’d lost touch with Oliver and Miles in that time, and while he missed them like a limb, he felt settled. Then Hanna died, and Lena gave Juno a chunk of her inheritance because she loved him like he was her brother. She moved to London to be with her girlfriend, and Juno found a spot in the dying mall and opened up Sugar with the money he’d been given.

And things were great. Until they weren’t.

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