Today's activity was baking cookies. Sunlight streamed through the tall windows, glinting off the polished copper pots and pristine marble countertops. The air was thick with the warm, sweet smell of sugar, butter, and cinnamon.
"Okay, ladies. Be careful now. The trays are still hot," Lady Isla announced, her voice cheerful as she placed her own tray of perfectly golden-brown cookies on a cooling rack at the central table. "We'll leave these to cool for a moment. In the meantime, I will be coming around to see all of your wonderful works."
She started to move from table to table, a graceful and encouraging presence, complementing one lady on the uniform shape of her cookies and correcting another on her baking time. Delia had just pulled her own tray from the oven. She looked at the other ladies' cookies—all perfectly round, uniformly baked, and elegantly arranged. Then she looked at her own. They were… different.
