Chapter Thirty
Julia's phone rang at seven in the morning, which could only mean one thing.
"Darling!" Gabby's voice was aggressively cheerful. "I'm calling for an update. How's my little bakery doing?"
Julia pressed the phone to her ear and stared at the ceiling of the flat.
Her flat now, empty and too quiet. No sounds of Elliott moving around in the kitchen.
No smell of something delicious being created downstairs.
She was still sleeping on the couch. She couldn’t bring herself to take over the bed.
"It's… there have been some changes," Julia said carefully.
"Changes?" Gabby's tone sharpened. "What kind of changes? Julia, I gave you two months. You were the one who told me to keep the place open."
Julia's stomach somersaulted. She… she couldn’t do this. Just… couldn’t. "Mum, I need to tell you something."
The words were right there. I'm not a baker. I've never been a baker. Elliott did everything and now she's gone and I'm alone and I don't want this life, I want to be a nurse, I've always wanted to be a nurse, and I'm tired of pretending to be someone I'm not just to make you happy.
"Yes?" Gabby prompted. "What is it? I haven't got all day, darling. There's a production meeting in twenty minutes."
Julia opened her mouth. Closed it. Her throat felt tight. She just had to say those words. The ones that were right there in her head. That was all.
But she couldn’t. It was like someone else was controlling her tongue.
"We're, um, doing some… renovations," she heard herself say. "New directions. It's all very exciting. I'll fill you in when you visit."
Coward. She was such a coward. She’d always been one. She had no backbone and she was almost thirty. What was the chance of her suddenly developing a spine right now?
"Renovations?" Gabby sounded suspicious. "What kind of renovations?"
Because lying to her mother was easier than telling the truth. Always. "Nothing major. Just freshening things up. You know how it is." Julia's voice came out bright and fake, her professional people-pleaser tone. "Anyway, I should go. Lots to do. Bakery stuff. Very busy."
"Julia—"
"Love you, Mum! Talk soon!"
She hung up before Gabby could respond and sat there in the silence, phone clutched in her hand, heart pounding like she'd just run a marathon.
That had been her chance. Her moment to finally be completely honest. And she'd choked.
Julia pulled herself off the couch. She had a bakery to run, after all. Even though she was currently having to pay through the nose to get croissants and bread brought in. Goods that were nowhere near as good as Elliott’s. Throwing money at problems again.
And when she finally got downstairs, she stood in the kitchen doorway and let herself remember. Just for a moment.
Elliott, covered in flour, swearing at sourdough. Elliott's hands guiding hers on a piping bag, her voice low and patient. Elliott's lips on hers, right there by the industrial mixer, tasting of air and wanting.
She'd lost Elliott. That was bad enough.
But she realized she'd lost something else too.
With Elliott beside her, she'd felt brave.
Strong. Like maybe she could be the person she'd always wanted to be instead of the person everyone expected her to be.
Elliott had made her want to stand up, speak out, stop apologizing for existing.
And Julia had just proved that without Elliott, she was exactly who she'd always been. A coward who couldn't even tell her mother the truth about what she wanted.
She reached for her phone and pulled up her saved videos. Medical procedures. Emergency response. Trauma assessment. Her secret library of the life she actually desired.
She clicked on one, a nursing tutorial about wound care, and waited for the familiar comfort to wash over her. The calm, competent voice explaining each step. The satisfaction of watching someone do something that actually mattered.
But this time, the comfort didn't come.
Instead, she felt something sharp and uncomfortable lodging in her chest. She was twenty-nine years old.
She'd been watching these videos for years, dreaming about a different life while doing absolutely nothing to make it happen.
Content to let her mother dictate her future.
Content to pretend. Content to watch other people actually live.
She closed the app.
The videos didn't make her feel better. They made her feel worse. Because watching wasn't the same as doing, and dreaming wasn't the same as living, and she was so bloody tired of standing on the sidelines of her own existence.
A knock at the back door made her jump.
Tom stood on the step, looking uncertain. He was wearing a flannel shirt over a band t-shirt, his short hair still slightly messy from sleep. "I saw the light on. I know I’m not due in for another couple of hours. I just wanted to check if you were okay."
Julia managed something that was probably a smile. "I'm fine."
"Right." Tom stepped inside, hands shoved in his pockets. "Because you definitely look fine. Hanging out alone in the kitchen, looking like you might pass out. Very normal, very fine behavior."
Despite everything, Julia felt her mouth twitch. "When did you get so sarcastic?"
"I learned from the best." He hesitated, then sat down across from her. "Elliott."
Julia looked at him, really looked at him. He seemed different. More settled in his own skin. More confident. "Tom?"
"Yeah?"
"You're the bravest person I know."
Tom blinked. "What?"
"I mean it." Julia swallowed. "Just so you know. You figured out who you really are, and you just… became that person. Even when it was scary. Even when people might not understand. I don't know how you do it."
Tom was quiet for a moment. "I don't know either," he admitted.
"I just… got tired, I suppose. Of pretending.
Of trying to be what everyone else wanted.
" He shrugged. "It's not like I woke up one day and was suddenly brave.
I was terrified. I still am, sometimes. But pretending to be someone I wasn't, that was worse. That was exhausting."
Julia felt tears prick at her eyes. "I don't know how to stop pretending," she whispered. "I've been doing it my whole life."
"If there's one thing I've learned," Tom said slowly, "it's that you can't live a life just to make other people happy. Not forever. Eventually, it'll break you. Or break the people you actually love."
He stood up and squeezed her shoulder on his way out. "For what it's worth, Julia? I think you're braver than you know. You just haven't figured it out yet."
???
"You're moping."
Elliott didn't look up from the book she'd been staring at for the past hour. The same page. The same paragraph. The words had stopped making sense around minute forty. "I'm reading."
"You're moping," Shay repeated, dropping onto the sofa beside her. "You haven't turned a page in forever. You've got that look on your face like you might want to fight someone. It’d better not be me."
"It's not you," Elliott sighed.
"Good, because we’ve already established the fact that you push people away. And I don’t like being pushed. So, tell me what’s going on in that little head of yours."
Elliott finally closed the book. It wasn't like she was actually reading anyway. "I'm stuck." The words sounded… sharp. Good. Bad. She wasn’t sure. Honest, definitely.
"With… Julia?" guessed Shay.
"With the cookbook." Elliott's jaw tightened. "You’re right. It's finished. Has been for ages. But I don't know what to do with it now. I don't have an agent. I don't have connections. I don't have…" She stopped.
"You were going to ask Gabby," Shay said quietly. "Weren't you?"
Elliott's silence was answer enough.
"So let me get this straight." Shay shifted to face her properly. "You were working up to asking Julia's mum for help. And then Julia went and asked for you. And you're angry because…?"
"Because she did it behind my back! She didn't even ask me. She just decided I needed saving and…"
"And then did exactly what you were planning to do, anyway?"
Elliott opened her mouth. Closed it.
"Oh my God." Shay let out a disbelieving laugh. "Elliott. You absolute idiot."
"Don't."
"You're not angry that she asked Gabby for help. You're angry that she did it before you could. That she beat you to it." Shay shook her head. "And instead of saying 'thank you' or 'that's what I wanted anyway,' you blew up at her and walked out."
"It's more complicated than that."
"Is it, though?" Shay asked. "Because from where I'm sitting, it looks pretty simple.
Julia loves you. She wanted to help you.
She went about it the wrong way, sure, but her heart was in the right place.
And you punished her for it because you're so determined to do everything alone that you can't stand someone caring about you. "
The words stung. Elliott wanted to argue, to defend herself, to explain all the reasons Shay was wrong. But the arguments wouldn't come. Probably because Shay wasn't wrong.
"Not everyone is out to get you," Shay continued, gentler now. "Some people love you and want to help you be the best version of yourself. And if you can't see that. If you keep pushing away everyone who tries to get close, then you don't deserve someone as lovely as Julia, anyway."
Elliott stared at her. She'd been so proud of doing everything alone. So determined to prove she didn't need anyone. She’d pulled her life back together, gotten a job, a career, written a cookbook, for god’s sake.
Except… she hadn't done it alone, had she? Milly had given her the kitchen, the training, the love. Shay had been there through every crisis. And Julia… Julia had believed in her from the start, even when Elliott had been nothing but prickly and difficult.
Elliott let out a breath that felt like it had been trapped in her chest for days. "I made mistakes."
"Big ones."
"But I don't…" Elliott looked up at her friend helplessly. "I don't know what to do with that information."
Shay reached over and squeezed her hand. "Figure it out, El. Because right now, you're miserable."
Elliott sat with that long after Shay had left the room.
Just what was she supposed to do now? All she could see around herself was endings. The future was… boring. Just like Milly had said. Quiet and lonely and very, very scary.