Epilogue Piper
SIX MONTHS LATER
Liam was going to kill my stand mixer.
"Gently," I said for the third time, watching him wrestle with the dough hook like it was a piece of firefighting equipment that required brute force. "You're making brioche, not defusing a bomb."
"It's not mixing." He frowned at the bowl, which was indeed not mixing because he'd put the flour in before the wet ingredients and now had what resembled a small desert landscape instead of dough.
"That's because—" I reached over and hit the off button before he could destroy both the mixer and Maya's birthday bread. "You have to add the flour gradually. After the eggs and butter."
"You didn't say that."
"I absolutely said that."
"You said a lot of things. I got distracted." He gave me that look, the one that still made my stomach flip even six months into whatever we were calling this. Relationship, second chance, controlled chaos with feelings.
"Distracted by what?"
"You." He said it simply, like it was obvious, and I felt my cheeks heat despite the fact that we'd been doing this dance for months now. Despite the fact that I'd woken up in his apartment more often than my own lately. Despite everything.
"Flattery won't save you from my sister if you ruin her birthday bread."
"Your sister terrifies me."
"Good. She should." I dumped his failed dough into the trash and started pulling out new ingredients. "Maya takes her birthday very seriously. And after she threatened to set your truck on fire if you hurt me again, I'd think you'd be extra motivated to get this right."
"She was joking about that, right?"
I didn't answer, just handed him the eggs.
He looked at them suspiciously. "How many?"
"Four. And Liam?"
"Yeah?"
"Crack them into a separate bowl first. Not directly into the mixer."
"I knew that."
"Sure you did."
The bakery was quiet at 5:30 AM, just the two of us and the hum of the refrigerator cases and the early May light starting to creep through the front windows.
This had become our routine over the past few months: him showing up before my morning shift, helping in whatever way he could, which usually meant taste-testing and keeping me company while I actually did the work.
Today was different though. Today he'd insisted on helping make Maya's birthday bread himself. Something about proving he could do more than just eat my baking.
It was going about as well as expected.
"Okay." He cracked an egg into the bowl with intense concentration. "One."
"Good. Three more."
"This is harder than it looks."
"Most things are."
He cracked another egg. This one went in clean. So, progress. "You make it look easy."
"I've been doing this since I was twelve. You've been doing it for…” I checked my phone. “Approximately eight minutes."
"I'm a quick learner."
"You're a disaster." But I said it fondly, reaching over to wipe a smudge of flour off his cheek. He caught my hand, pressed a kiss to my palm, and I let myself have the moment. Let myself be soft with him in a way that still felt new and terrifying and right.
Six months. Six months of trying. Of therapy—both together and separate. Of hard conversations at midnight and easy ones over coffee. Of him showing up, consistently, even when it wasn't convenient. Of me letting him, even when I was scared.
It wasn't perfect, not really.
We'd had fights. Moments where old wounds opened up and we had to sit with the pain instead of running from it. Nights where I'd wake up panicking and he'd hold me until I could breathe again. Days where he'd shut down with fear, afraid I’d give up on us, and I'd have to pull him back out.
But we were doing it. Actually doing it.
"Four eggs," he announced proudly.
"Good. Now the butter. Softened, not melted."
He looked at the stick of butter on the counter. "How do I know if it's softened?"
"Press your finger into it. If it gives but doesn't collapse, it's ready."
He poked it experimentally. "Gives but doesn't collapse. Like us."
I snorted. "Did you just compare our relationship to room temperature butter?"
"I'm saying we're resilient. Pliable but structurally sound."
"That's the worst metaphor I've ever heard."
"Yeah?" He grinned, that full smile that still surprised me with its openness. "What would you call us then?"
I thought about it while he measured butter with the careful attention of someone defusing an actual bomb.
What were we? Not what we'd been before; young and careless and convinced love was enough to fix anything.
Not perfectly healed either; we both still carried scars, still had moments where trust felt like a tightrope.
"Rising dough," I said finally.
He looked up. "What?"
"We're like rising dough. You have to give it time. Keep it warm and watch it carefully. Sometimes it falls and you have to start over. But if you're patient, if you do the work…” I gestured at the mixer. “Eventually it becomes something good."
"That’s…” He swallowed hard. "That's actually perfect."
"I know. I'm good at metaphors."
"You're good at everything."
"Not true. I'm terrible at asking for help. I catastrophize. I assume the worst. I—"
He kissed me. Quick and sweet and tasting like the coffee we'd been drinking since five AM.
"You're good at everything that matters," he said when he pulled back. "And I'm going to prove I can make this bread even if it kills me. Because your sister will definitely kill me if I don't, and I'd like to live long enough to take you to dinner tonight."
"We're hosting her party tonight."
"After the party. Late dinner. That new place on Lake Street you've been talking about."
"Harvest?" I looked up at him. "That place has a three-month waiting list."
"Yeah." He added the butter to the eggs, actually measuring it properly this time. "I made reservations."
Something warm bloomed in my chest. Harvest. The farm-to-table place that had opened last fall, the one I'd been dying to try but could never justify the wait or the price or taking a whole evening off.
He'd made reservations without me asking, without prompting, just because he knew I'd want to decompress after hosting Maya's party.
"You made reservations," I repeated. "At Harvest."
"I'm capable of planning ahead sometimes." He looked almost shy. "Is that okay?"
"It's perfect.
We worked in comfortable silence for a while, him following my instructions with endearing focus, me trying not to hover too much.
The Channel 7 feature had aired in February—a full sixteen-minute segment on Rise & Shine that made my phone explode with new orders and my mother cry happy tears.
Business had tripled. I'd hired two more employees.
Started talks about maybe, possibly, expanding to a second location.
Liam had been there for all of it. Listening to me spiral about hiring decisions. Helping me interview candidates even though he knew nothing about baking. Celebrating the small victories and talking me down from the panics.
"Okay," he said, studying the mixer bowl. "Now what?"
"Now we add the flour. Gradually." I measured it out, showed him how to add it in stages while the mixer ran. "See? Slow and steady."
"Slow and steady." He watched the dough come together, looking ridiculously pleased with himself. "It's working."
"It is."
"I'm doing it."
"You are."
"Maya's going to love this."
"Let's not get ahead of ourselves. We still have to let it rise, shape it, let it rise again, and actually bake it."
"But I'm doing it." He looked at me with such open joy that my chest ached. "I'm helping."
And he was. Not just with the bread, but with everything. Showing up at the bakery when I was slammed. Bringing me dinner when I worked late. Learning the things that mattered to me even when they didn't come naturally to him.
"You are," I said softly. "You really are."
The dough hook whirred. The sun climbed higher outside. Somewhere in town, Maya was probably still sleeping, blissfully unaware that her birthday bread was being made by a man who'd learned to measure flour in the past twenty minutes.
"Thank you," Liam said suddenly.
"For what?"
"For letting me try." He turned off the mixer, pulled out the dough hook, looked at the slightly sticky mess we'd created. "For not giving up on me when you had every reason to."
"You made it hard to give up on you." I moved to check the dough consistency, found it was actually pretty good despite his chaos. "You kept showing up."
"I'm going to keep showing up." He said it like a promise, like a vow. "Every day. For as long as you'll let me."
"Even when I'm scared?"
"Especially then."
"Even when I mess up?"
"We'll mess up together." He bumped his shoulder against mine. "Resilient, remember? Like room temperature butter."
I laughed, real and surprised. "You're never letting that go, are you?"
"Never. It's my best work."
We covered the dough, set it aside to rise. I walked him through what came next—the shaping, the second rise, the egg wash, the baking. He listened with the same focus he brought to everything now, taking mental notes, asking questions.
"We should probably clean up," I said, looking at the flour-covered counter.
"Probably."
Neither of us moved.
"I love you," he said.
We'd said it before. Started saying it about a month in, careful and scared and meaning it. But it still landed like something new every time.
"I love you too."
"Even though I almost killed your mixer?"
"Even though." I reached for him, pulled him close, let myself sink into the warmth and solidity of him. "But if you mess up Maya's bread, all bets are off."
"Fair."
We stayed like that for a moment, wrapped up in each other while the bakery woke up around us.
In a few hours, I'd open the doors. Customers would flood in, more now since the feature, enough that I'd started taking Sundays off for the first time since opening.
Maya's party would happen tonight, loud and chaotic and full of love. And tomorrow we'd do it all again.
But right now, it was just us. Flour on the counter. Dough rising. Morning light turning everything gold.
"You know what?" he said softly.
"What?"
"I'm happy, Piper. I really am.”
The words were simple. And they settled into my chest like something warm and permanent.
"Me too," I said. "Really happy."
He kissed my forehead. My nose. My mouth.
The timer on my phone buzzed—time to start the morning pastries, to prep the coffee station, to shift from this quiet moment into the chaos of running a business.
But I took one more second, one more breath, one more moment of just us.
Then we got to work.
Together.