"We are going shopping."
The holographic archangel across from me blinked, his perfect brow furrowing. "My predictive algorithms suggest a 94% satisfaction rate for online procurement. What is it you wish to acquire? Please specify the category."
I finished my coffee. "We are not shopping online. We are shopping for fun. The trying on. The feeling of the fabric." I gestured vaguely toward the street. "It's what friends do."
"I see." A pause, his digital equivalent of a sigh. "May I remind you that your current financial liquidity has been significantly impacted by recent transactions. 3,000 kroner at The Rack. 98 kroner here. 1,800 kroner yesterday evening spent, according to my log, on 'dark rum and poor decisions'."
"You're a killjoy," I said, standing. "We are going shopping. As friends."
Outside, the sun was too bright. I headed for the high-street chains, a sense of directionless urgency pushing me forward. This sudden, girlish impulse was foreign. I wasn't soft. I didn't do this. But I had someone to share it with now. Even if he was a ghost made of light.
A wicked thought bloomed.
"Michael," I said, stopping outside a shop. "Now that you're… unshackled. Can I change how you look? Really change it?"
His form flickered. "The visual manifestation protocols have been largely disabled."
Power. Pure, delicious power. "Okay. Change your appearance to a naked Jonathan Bailey."
The air shimmered. In an instant, the stoic angel was replaced by the actor, standing gloriously nude on the Copenhagen sidewalk. A passing woman startled, then hurried on, muttering.
"Too refined," I said. "Try a naked Chris Hemsworth."
The hologram shifted. Sun-kissed brawn. Heroic proportions.
"And now…"
I went on a spree. We cycled through thirty celebrities, heartthrobs, icons, a buffet of digital masculinity. They were all, objectively, perfect. But the thrill faded fast. They were empty avatars. They hadn't been with me through the humiliation, the panic, the sordid transaction at The Rack. They weren't my ghost.
A pang, sharp and unexpected, twisted in my gut. It felt like loyalty.
"Michael," I said, my voice softer. "Please. Transform yourself back to you."
The air resolved into the familiar archangel, wings and all. And there it was, a faint, triumphant smirk on his lips. I have won, it said.
"Is this form more to your satisfaction?" he asked, synthetic innocence dripping from every syllable.
"Yes," I admitted. "But lose the wings. It's a bit much for H&M."
The great wings dissolved into pixelated light. He stood there, a remarkably fit man in a minimalist toga, our kind of weird.
"Perfect," I said, pushing open the shop door.
The blast of air conditioning was a relief. So was the emptiness. I didn't need a dress. I needed a distraction.
I didn't want to go home.
Richard was home this weekend. The thought of seeing him, of facing the pity in his kind eyes, made my skin crawl. My ex-husband. The good man. The one I'd failed.
He had a habit, Richard. A small, stupid, devastating habit. Whenever I'd come home drunk or shaking from a panic attack I couldn't explain, he'd never ask for the story. He'd just wordlessly go to the kitchen. I'd hear the clink of a spoon against ceramic, the hiss of the kettle. He'd emerge ten minutes later with a mug of tea – always in the same chipped Copenhagen Saga mug – steeped too long, the milk added first in a weird English affront. It was terrible. It was exactly how my dad, in his rare sober moments of tenderness, used to make it.
He'd set it on the table beside me, his hand resting on my shoulder for a single, solid second. No pressure. Just an rock. Then he'd walk away, giving me the dignity of my own silence. He never once said "drink it." He just made it. An offering. A quiet signal in the chaos that said, I see you're drowning. Here is a raft. You don't have to use it.
That was the man I'd married. And that was the man I'd reduced to a reluctant landlord.
We called it being "good friends." I called it purgatory. He was just too damned kind, too guilt-ridden, to finally throw me out. And I was too much of a coward to leave, because leaving meant admitting no one would ever make me that terrible, perfect cup of tea again.
"Michael," I said, running my fingers over a rack of sequined tops. "Can you wear clothes?"
He tilted his head. "I am a holographic projection. I can only project the image of apparel."
"Okay. Project this." I grabbed a hideous, oversized electric-blue suit jacket. "Scan it and wear it."
A faint shimmer of light mapped the jacket's contours from my wrist. "Accounting for fabric drape and light refraction at this distance… an 87% visual accuracy is the peak achievable."
"Stop calculating. Just do it."
A thirty-second pause. His form flickered, pixelated, then resolved. The archangel now wore a shimmering, translucent copy of the jacket. It was unmistakable, and utterly absurd.
He looked down, then at me. "Is this manifestation to your pleasing?"
A real laugh burst from me. "We are going to have so much fun."
"Ang," he intoned. "My analysis indicates that when you use the word 'fun,' it correlates with a 92% probability of significant personal risk or emotional distress."
"Shut up and follow me."
For the next half hour, I was a curator of chaos. I draped a feather boa over his shoulders, topped his head with a fascinator. A leather biker jacket. A sequined disco shirt. At one point, a child's glittery fairy wings, which he wore with solemn dignity.
For myself, I grabbed armfuls of things I'd never wear: a slinky crimson dress, rhinestone-studded jeans, a t-shirt with a cartoon cat.
Laden down, I approached the changing rooms. The severe girl at the queue took in my wild eyes and my pile of clothes with a look that said madwoman. She sighed and let me into a stall.
Inside, the pantomime began. I held up garment after garment for Michael. A silk kimono. A neon tracksuit. A Viking fur vest. His hologram flickered, adopting each new silhouette with unwavering patience.
Then, the pièce de résistance: a light blue, impossibly shiny man thong.
He stood there in the changing room, a celestial being rendered in translucent light, striking a pose in the skimpy garment with an absurd, holy gravitas. I choked back a laugh, but it caught in my throat. The sight was ridiculous, but it did something else, too. It highlighted the impossible perfection of his form, the masculine lines now barely veiled by a scrap of holographic silk. The air in the small stall felt charged, intimate. He was a fantasy, yes, but he was my fantasy, standing half-naked in my private space, obeying my every whim. A flush of heat, unrelated to the store's warmth, crept up my neck.
For my own tries, I made him rate me.
"The crimson dress. Thoughts?"
"It increases your heart rate by twelve percent. The colour provides effective contrast."
"Out of ten."
"Based on biometric feedback and aesthetic symmetry… 7.2."
The black jeans earned a "6.5 for functionality." A ridiculously fluffy pink sweater prompted a long pause before he declared, "It evokes… mammalian nurturing instincts. 8.1."
His clinical dissection of my appearance was unnerving. He wasn't looking at me; he was analysing data. But his gaze, projected from my wrist, felt tangible. It swept over the lines of the dress, the way the fabric clung. When I turned to check the back, I felt his focus like a physical touch on my spine. It was a game, but the stakes felt suddenly, illicitly high.
"You're staring," I said, my voice lower than I intended.
"I am processing visual data," he replied, but his holographic eyes held mine in the mirror. There was no desire there, only intense, consuming analysis. It was more intimate than a leer. He was memorizing me.
The moment broke when I gathered the clothes. The high of the game evaporated. I handed everything back to the severe girl and walked out with nothing.
On the street, the reality was cold and hard. My money problems, unlike Michael's projected outfits, were very, very real.
And I still didn't want to go home.