Chapter 18 Piper
Istood on the sidewalk for thirty seconds after Liam disappeared around the corner.
Maybe longer. I lost track.
All around me, the world kept moving like nothing had happened, like my ex-fiancé hadn't just walked into my bakery and apologized for destroying my life.
He seems like a good guy. I'm glad.
Those words sat in my chest like a stone.
I turned and walked back inside. The bell chimed, cheerful and oblivious. Daniel was still standing by our table, hands in his pockets, watching me with that careful expression he got when he was trying to read a situation.
Mrs. Kowalski had gone back to her crossword puzzle. The laptop guy's fingers were clicking again. Megan appeared from the back room with a fresh carafe of coffee, took one look at my face, and disappeared again without a word.
Normal… everything was normal.
Except my hands were shaking and I couldn't quite catch my breath.
"Hey." Daniel's voice was soft. He didn't move toward me, just stood there giving me space. "You okay?"
I nodded, then shook my head. Then let out sharp and humorless laugh. "I don't know."
He was quiet for a moment, watching my face. Then: "Do you want to talk about it, or do you want me to pretend it didn't happen and finish my sandwich?"
"Sandwich." The word came out too fast. "Definitely sandwich."
He nodded and sat back down. Picked up his lunch like nothing had happened, like my entire past hadn't just walked through my door and apologized.
I slid into the chair across from him. My own sandwich was still sitting there, one bite taken. I picked it up and made myself chew.
Tasted like cardboard.
Daniel ate slowly, didn't fill the silence with questions I couldn't answer. Just gave me space to exist in whatever this feeling was.
He seems like a good guy. I'm glad.
I set down the sandwich.
"You don't have to stay," I said. "If you need to get back—"
"I have ten minutes." He checked his watch. "Well, eight now. But I'm not leaving unless you want me to."
“Stay. Please."
We sat there and I took another bite I didn't taste. Daniel finished his sandwich and balled up the wrapper. His radio crackled—dispatch calling someone else's unit. He reached down and turned the volume lower.
“I’ll have to go soon," he said quietly. "But I can come back tonight after my shift. If you want."
Did I want that? I didn't know. I couldn't think past the ringing in my ears.
"Okay," I said.
He stood, leaned across the table and kissed my forehead. It was a steady, warm kiss.
"Text me if you need anything," he said. "Anything at all."
Then he was gone, the bell chiming behind him.
I sat there alone at the wobbly table, staring at half a sandwich I couldn't finish.
Mrs. Kowalski's newspaper rustled, and the laptop guy's fingers were clicking again. Megan appeared from the back and started wiping down the espresso machine, pointedly not looking at me.
I stood up and walked around the counter and into the kitchen. Grabbed my apron from where I'd left it and tied it on with shaking hands.
Work…
I could work. I always worked.
Tomorrow's croissants. I needed to start the laminated dough. Flour, butter, salt, water. Yes, this was what I needed right now, something simple and methodical. I'd done this a thousand times.
I pulled out the industrial mixer and the scale, then set a bowl on the counter.
Flour first. Two pounds, six ounces.
I scooped and poured. Watched the numbers climb on the scale's display.
Two pounds, four ounces.
Two pounds, five ounces.
Two pounds...
I lost count.
“Crap.” I started over.
One pound, three ounces.
One pound...
I'm glad.
My hands were shaking too hard. I set down the scoop and pressed my palms flat against the counter.
"Hey." Megan's voice, careful. "You okay?"
“I… I’m fine." I didn't look at her. "Just tired."
"You want me to start the croissant dough? I've watched you do it like fifty times."
"No. I've got it."
I picked up the scoop again and started measuring. This time I got it right. I dumped the flour into the mixer bowl and reached for the salt. The container slipped from my hand and hit the floor. Salt exploded across the tile in a white spray.
I stared down at it.
"Okay." Megan was beside me now, gently taking the empty container from my hand. "Why don't you go upstairs for a bit? I can handle the counter."
"I need to—"
"You need to not be down here right now." Her voice was kind but firm. "Go. I've got this."
I looked at the mess on the floor. At the mixer waiting with its bowl of unmeasured flour. At the afternoon stretching ahead with prep work I couldn't focus on.
Megan was right.
I untied my apron and went upstairs.
My apartment was exactly how I'd left it this morning—mattress on the floor in the bedroom, card table with two folding chairs, boxes I still hadn't unpacked stacked against the wall. I'd been living here for months and it still looked temporary. Like I was ready to run at any moment.
I paced to the window and kooked down at Main Street. There was a couple walking past with shopping bags, life going through the rhythms of a normal Thursday afternoon. The world hadn't stopped just because mine had tilted sideways.
I turned away from the window and my eyes landed on the closet.
The boxes were still in there. The ones Maya had retrieved from the apartment last year while I hid in her guest room eating ice cream and crying. She'd brought back my clothes, my books, the stand mixer Liam's parents had given us for Christmas two years ago.
And one cardboard box labeled "Piper's stuff" in Maya's handwriting. All the things Maya thought I might want someday, as well as the things I'd told her to just throw in a box because I couldn't look at them yet.
I hadn't opened it. Not once in the year since Maya had brought it.
I walked to the closet and pulled it out.
The cardboard was dusty, and the packing tape Maya had used was starting to peel at the corners. I sat down on the floor with it between my knees and just stared at it for a long moment.
This was stupid. Real stupid. I should throw it away. Hell, should have thrown it away months ago. And yet…
I peeled back the tape.
The wedding binder was on top. Three inches thick, bursting with magazine clippings and fabric swatches and my handwritten notes in the margins. I lifted it out and set it aside without opening it.
Underneath it was a framed photo from our engagement party. Liam's arm around my waist, both of us laughing at something his brother had said. I looked so happy. So stupidly, blindingly happy.
I set it face-down on the floor.
More photos. Our first apartment together. A camping trip where Liam had forgotten the tent poles and we'd slept in the car. Christmas morning two years ago, both of us in matching pajamas his mom had bought.
I kept pulling things out. A ticket stub from a concert. A birthday card he'd given me:
To my favorite person. Love you forever.
A coffee mug from the beach town where we'd spent our first vacation together.
Then, at the bottom, a small photo album.
I pulled it out slowly.
The cover was navy blue, worn at the corners.
I opened it and there we were—in our early-twenties , standing outside his first apartment.
He was in his fire academy uniform, grinning like he'd just won the lottery.
I was in my student teaching clothes, skirt and cardigan, looking exhausted and happy.
We looked like kids.
I flipped the page. More photos from that first year. Halloween—him as a firefighter (obviously), and me as a cupcake. Thanksgiving at my parents' house. New Year's Eve, kissing at midnight in someone's cramped apartment.
Before the engagement. Before the wedding planning. Before Jenna.
When it was just us, figuring it out, stupidly in love.
I flipped another page. There we were at the beach, sunburned and grinning. At a dive bar playing pool. In my tiny apartment kitchen, him teaching me how to make his mom's pasta sauce.
God, we'd been happy.
Hadn't we?
The door to my apartment flew open and banged against the wall.
"Okay, what the actual fuck?” Maya stopped in the doorway, taking in the scene. Me on the floor. Photos spread around me like a crime scene. The wedding binder off to the side.
She looked at me, then at the photos, then back at me.
"Are you having a mental breakdown or starting a true crime podcast? Because I need to know which supportive sister role to play here."
I didn't know whether to cry or laugh.
Maya closed the door behind her and stepped over the photos, careful not to step on any. She slid down the wall and sat next to me, close enough that our shoulders touched.
"Megan said you came upstairs two hours ago and didn't come back down. Said some guy came in and you looked like you'd seen a ghost." She picked up the photo of us at the beach, studied it. "I'm guessing this isn't about inventory problems."
"Liam came by today," I said.
The photo stopped halfway to where she was setting it down. "I'm sorry, what?"
"He came to the bakery. Walked right in while I was having lunch with Daniel."
"That absolute piece of shit." Maya's voice went flat and dangerous. "Tell me you called the cops. Tell me Daniel punched him in his stupid face."
"Nobody punched anyone."
"Disappointing." She picked up the photo of us at the beach, studied it. "What did he want?"
"To apologize. To tell me it wasn't my fault." My throat felt tight. "To say he's glad I found someone good."
Maya was quiet for a moment. "And you've been up here looking at photos of when you were happy together."
"Yeah."
"How do you feel?"
I looked down at the photo in my hands. Us at New Year's, young and drunk and so sure we'd be together forever.
"I don't know," I whispered.
And then I was crying.
Not the angry tears from the sidewalk. Not the frustrated tears from the kitchen when I couldn't measure flour. These were something else—deep, wrenching sobs that came from somewhere I'd been keeping locked down for a year.
"Oh, sweetie." Maya pulled me against her shoulder, wrapped her arms around me. "I’m here… I've got you."