And around the same spring, on a Tuesday afternoon, in the quiet of the shop, something else happened.
Mae caught her reflection in the display glass. Flour on her cheek, a crease between her brows she didn’t remember earning. She looked like her father at his most tired.
That night, she said it aloud.
‘I don’t think I want to run downstairs forever,’ she told Callie over dinner.
Callie nodded slowly, like she’d been waiting.
‘You don’t have to,’ she said.
Mae swallowed. ‘Feels like I’m… Like I’m betraying him.’
‘I think he’d be furious if you stayed miserable on his account,’ Callie said simply.
Mae knew she was right. But still.
‘But how can I sell it? I mean, really?’
Callie had been working on a solution for a while. She’d only been waiting to be asked for it. Since Mae couldn’t bring herself to sell, she could simply hire someone to manage it for her. Someone who could keep it running smoothly and give her space to figure out what she actually wanted next.
At first, Mae wasn’t sure. But it didn’t take too long for her to come around when she realised that she could be lying in bed with her girlfriend on Saturday mornings instead of getting up with the sun.
She hired a manager brimming with ambition and ideas: delivery options, workshops, events catering. Ideas Mae didn’t have the energy to come up with or follow through.
For the first time in her life, she didn’t work. She pottered around the house, started doing crosswords, took long baths, ripped Netflix a new arsehole. It was nice to live by her whims.
Of course, she’d peek into Morgan’s now and then to watch brisk trade in action. But she’d let go of the grind.
And on the rare moments she felt like it, she baked. Not for the business, not for the village, not for anyone else. Just for herself.
She smiled a little more often now. She woke up without the weight of living her father’s life on her chest.
They didn’t move to London. They didn’t stay in the village either.
Instead, they did something neither of them had ever been very good at before: they chose the middle. They moved to Brighton. They bought a tiny shithole with a tiny garden, which Mae began renovating herself, as well as starting a vegetable patch. She had no idea what she was doing, but she learned as she went.
Callie came home smelling of coffee and bus fumes and talked too much about spreadsheets. Mae listened. They argued about nothing important. They learned how to live together. They talked about getting married, but made no big moves to book anything. There was no rush.
Sometimes it was hard. Sometimes it was brilliant.
One day, when Mae was supposed to be looking at loft insulation, she found herself scrolling through photos of her and Callie at eight, at some birthday party. Callie was perched beside her, shoulders brushing Mae’s as she went through work stuff.
‘You know,’ Mae said, half-smiling, ‘you were ridiculously cute as a kid.’
‘Oh really?’ Callie raised an eyebrow. ‘Then why did it take you so long to realise you wanted a piece of this?’
Mae rolled her eyes. Then she paused and cleared her throat. ‘Makes me wonder what a tiny you would look like.’
One of Callie’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Oh?’
‘Mmm. So, um… Do you… want to have a baby at some point?’ Mae asked suddenly shy.
Callie’s other eyebrow joined its twin. ‘What?’
‘I mean, sometimes I think about it,’ Mae said lightly.
But Callie didn’t take it lightly. ‘Mae, that’s… I don’t know…’
