“ACheese, Please!emergency,” Jordan announced, already sounding exasperated. “The walk-in needs restocking, the wine display looks like a raccoon blew through it, and your brother has buried himself in spreadsheets and quarterly projections like he’s running a Fortune 500 company instead of a glorified snack boutique. So that leaves me. And—lucky you—you.”
I blinked. “You wantmyhelp?”
He gave me a look. “You’ve got a few hours until you meet with Mrs. Wilder. Unless you’d rather keep letting your dog psychoanalyze your existential spiral from the couch.”
Before I could argue, he added, “Also, if you’re up for it, I was hoping you might take a few pictures. Some product shots for the website, maybe a few behind-the-scenes things for socials. We’re way overdue for an update, and everything you’ve posted online has looked... I don’t know, cool. Like, actually cool.”
My mouth opened, but nothing came out.
“I mean, only if you want to,” he added quickly. “It’s not a job-job. I mean, of course, we will pay you. I thought you might want something to do that didn’t involve… whatever this is that you’re doing now. Which is what, exactly?”
I shrugged and glanced down at myself—an old t-shirt and linen pants that hadn’t seen daylight since I arrived. No stains, no leftover breakfast crust. Functional. Maybe even employable.
I took another long sip of the decaf. “Okay. I’ll help.”
Jordan smiled. “Thank you.”
I paused. “But only because I’m wearing real pants.”
His grin widened. “Hey, we take progress where we can get it.”
And for the first time in a while, a flicker of purpose stirred. Small, fragile, but real.
It was a start.
***
Cheese, Please!was bright and welcoming, filled with the warm scent of fresh bread, aged cheddar, and an herby note I couldn’t quite place. It was annoyingly charming, like a Pinterest board had come to life and decided to run a cheese and wine empire.
Muted golds and soft greens wrapped around the space like a hug, and hand-lettered chalkboard signs pointed the way toward truffle brie and house-made jam. A floor-to-ceiling cooler hummed quietly along the wall, stocked with crisp white wine and those little jars of pickled things I could never afford but always craved.
I’d seen a few of their posts floating around on social media. Jordan had a solid eye for branding, but he wasn’t wrong. The photos didn’t quite match the vibe. The space itself was effortlessly cool, but the images fell short.
Still, stepping through the door now hit me in a way I didn’t expect. It wasn’t jealousy, and it wasn’t regret. It was pride. Real, breath-catching pride.
My brother used to eat peanut butter straight from the jar and swear he was destined to be the next Anthony Bourdain. Now he was part-owner of a place that looked like it belonged in a glossy spread about hidden Southern gems. And Jordan, with his soft-sweater warmth and love of the perfect blend of tannins and age of grapes, had helped turn the vision into this beautiful, tangible reality.
A smile crept in before I could stop it. My eyes probably said more than I meant them to, but I didn’t bother hiding it. For once, it felt good to be proud, even if it wasn’t mine. Even if I was standing on the edge of it all, looking in.
I held onto that feeling for as long as I could. Long enough to forget that Doyle had left me behind in New York without a second thought. Enough to quiet the part of me that still felt a little abandoned. For a few minutes, awe was louder than bitterness. And that felt akin to progress.
Jordan handed me an apron—hunter green with a tiny wedge of gold, metallic cheese, and the wordsCheese, Please!stitched across the front. I tied it around my waist and tried not to let my hormones tackle me to the ground. It was just an apron. But it felt like more. A tiny signal that I wasn’t just floating. That maybe I had a place here.
I followed him behind the counter, rolling up my sleeves with the confidence of someone whomightknow what she was doing. And somehow, I did. I stocked the fridge, sorted crackers by expiration date, and lined up glass jars of imported olives with labels I couldn’t pronounce but instinctively respected.
Jordan didn’t hover. He let me work and trusted me to get it done.
It was simple, repetitive, a quiet rhythm that let my brain go soft around the edges. I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed using my hands and my brain, moving around without the weight of judgment pressing on my shoulders.
I’d held so many odd jobs over the last few years that none of this felt particularly intimidating. I’d been a yoga instructor, a cashier, a wedding planning assistant, a hairdresser—sort of, but that’s a long story—a mortician, and a beekeeper. Also, a waitress. A really bad one. And in between all of that, I kept trying to make photography stick. I’d book a few weddings, snap some engagement shoots, and once even did a full-day elopement marathon in Central Park with twenty-nine couples and one extremely aggressive squirrel.
No matter how chaotic things got, holding a camera gave me a sense of purpose. It was the one thing that made me feel capable, useful. But the feeling never lasted. The money was inconsistent, the pressure crept in, and eventually I’d fold. I’d take the next job that came along and convince myself it was only for now, a placeholder until I figured it all out.
The problem was that I never gave myself the grace of loving the craft of photography enough to try and make it a career. I took it too seriously and would quit before I could fail.
“You’re good at this,” Jordan said, tossing me a bar towel to wipe down the counter. “Are you sure your résumé doesn’t say ‘cheesemonger in a past life‘?”
I snorted, catching the towel one-handed. “I’m adding it now. Right between ‘beekeeper’ and ‘bridesmaid wrangler.’”
