My eyes popped open and I sat up on my own couch.
I looked around the mostly dark living room, in dire need to know what time it was.
When I looked at my phone, I realized I was late.
“Shit,” was my standard response in the morning.
I was terrible at waking up on time.
Worst yet, I owned my own business, which meant I wasn’t allowed to be late.
I kind of inherited the family bakery business.
Trust me, the entire gig was not as joyful as it probably sounded.
At first glance, I was the granddaughter who took over the business to keep it alive and keep the family name going. I was the granddaughter who put in a lot of hours, on a lot of days, and always smiled at each and every customer. I was the granddaughter who hung up pictures of her grandmother to show off where and when the bakery started.
That was all that fake crap kind of thing you’d see on some cheesy movie.
I wasn’t a small town woman with a small town business and a small town house.
I lived in the city and it was busy, competitive, and owning the bakery was…
“Shit,” I said again as I rubbed my forehead.
I stood up and looked at my clothes.
I always changed when I came home from the bakery, which meant nobody had seen me in the clothes I was wearing.
In other words - I was dressed for the day.
I swiped my phone off the table and my keys off the kitchen counter.
I spotted a note on the counter and read it.
Wake me, no matter what, in the morning.
We need to talk about something.
Please, don’t forget.
Jon
“Jon,” I whispered.
My apartment wasn’t big at all, so it was a hop, skip and a jump and I was in the bedroom.
That’s where Jon was sleeping.
Which meant last night I had fallen asleep on the couch and he went to bed without me. He didn’t carry me to bed like he usually did. Unless, of course, I yelled at him. Which I was known to do. Sometimes I would get into a really comfy spot on the couch and that was it. There was no moving me.
Jon looked so peaceful sleeping, I didn’t want to wake him.
Even though his note said to.
I crept to the nightstand and looked at his phone.
I wasn’t the snooping type of girlfriend, I was just checking for his alarm.
It was set for thirty minutes from then.
So he was fine.
I gently put his phone back down and turned.
When I did, I suddenly became an octopus. All eight of my new arms swung around and I knocked the lamp off the nightstand to the floor.
I jumped, and screamed.
Then Jon did the same.
He did some kind of crazy pushup thing and was then standing by the bed.
“Jon, it’s me,” I said. “I’m so sorry. I was just checking on you.”
“What the fu… what time is it?” he asked, gasping for a breath.
“It’s early. But I’m late. As always. I have to go.”
I stepped over the lamp.
Jon jumped from the bed wearing nothing but boxers and a t-shirt.
“Wait a second,” he called out. “We have to talk, Emily.”
“We can talk later,” I said. “I seriously can’t be much later. This is a bad look on me.”
“Emily,” he said.
I looked back and blew him a kiss. “Go back to sleep. I’ll get more light bulbs from the store later. Sorry for waking you.”
I shut the bedroom door and hurried to the door.
Then I remembered I left my keys on the counter.
I was a mess.
And this was just my normal.
“You’re late.”
“I know, Ember,” I said. I pointed to her cigarette. “And you’re smoking. Those will kill you.”
“So will boredom,” she said.
“Didn’t Lucy open up?” I asked.
“Of course she did,” Ember said. “The place is in full swing.”
“Then why are you bored?”
Ember tilted her head to the side.
“You don’t need to stay here,” I said. “You shouldn’t. You’re too good at what you do.”
“I can’t leave this place,” she said. “You need me.”
Ember had beautiful dark hair, a permanent tan, brown eyes, and an attitude that made her feisty as anyone I’d ever met. She was a genius when it came to being in a kitchen. I took a chance on her right out of culinary school and it paid off. Only now she was so much better than this bakery, but she didn’t want to leave me because I was the one who gave her a shot.
Plus, if she left and I was in charge of the food… yikes.
People drove an hour away to come here to buy something Ember baked.
And her cooking - which I experienced off the clock as a friend - was better than her baking.
“You really shouldn’t smoke,” I said. “I’m not going to stop saying it. It will kill you.”
“So will the sun,” Ember said.
“What? Cancer? You can put on sunscreen. You can’t put a smoke screen on your lungs.”
“Now there’s an invention,” Ember said. “Kind of like taking the pill so you don’t get pregnant, right? Imagine that. You inhale something that protects your lungs so you can smoke as much as you want. Then you can screw and smoke and not get cancer or pregnant.”
“Well, if the chef dream doesn’t work out, there’s your fall back,” I said.
Ember laughed. She dropped her cigarette into a cup of coffee.
It sizzled and died.
She dumped the coffee into the dumpster and we went inside the bakery.
Lucy was another lifesaver for the bakery.
She had been a customer when it was my grandmother’s. And when her husband passed away, my grandmother sent baked goods for free for the service.
When I took the place over, Lucy showed up and demanded to work.
I wasn’t in a position to argue.
In fact, part of me wanted to change the name of the place to Lucy’s.
Meow’s Nose wasn’t the most appetizing name for a bakery.
The way my family told it, my grandmother baked a lot and she had a cat named Meow and that cat would judge her baked goods. If the cat rubbed its nose to a cupcake, cake or whatever, that meant it was good. If the cat sniffed and walked away, that meant it wasn’t good.
So that’s where the name came from.
“Hey, Lucy,” I said, touching her back as I walked by her.
“Hey,” she said. “Uh, Robert called and wants to talk about ordering. I wrote out the checks for the bills that were piling up. We’re good to send them all out.”
“You’re the best,” I said.
“I also called Henry to help with two of the big bulbs. They keep flickering and one made a buzzing sound that was driving me crazy.”
“I hate that sound,” I said. “Hey, are you going to splash a little perfume on your wrists and neck for when he shows up?”
“Stop that talk,” Lucy said. She leaned toward me. “You’re lucky I’m not mad at you for being late.”
“I own the place, I can be as late as I want,” I teased.
“Oh, please. You’re not mean like that. Not at all. Now, if you were that rotten bitch that owns the building… well…”