by Bryce Oakley
If the roles had been reversed, and Cody had kicked her out immediately after a sweet cuddle session, she didn’t know that she'd be so happy to see Cody again.
She was nervous to call her late last night, asking if they could go on out to a nice dinner that night and talk. She had been staring at the email from the landlord all afternoon to prepare for it.
She had also scheduled a talk with Henry the next morning, after she ran the idea by Cody to see what she’d think of it. Unorthodox business practice, sure, but she trusted Cody.
She had evidently noticed the optimism in Emilia’s voice and was doing her best to lighten the mood. She opened the door dramatically, as if it had been years since they had seen one another. She crossed the room in a few steps before sweeping Emilia into her arms, one arm under her knees and one arm behind her back.
"Wow, home from the Great War already?" Emilia teased, wrapping her arms around Cody and kissing her deeply, letting her lips silently say all the things she needed Cody to know.
Cody made her feel light and playful and all the things that she had never let herself give into before. She definitely didn't deserve that after the terrible way she had handled the night before, but she couldn't resist Cody’s charms. She doubted any woman in the world could resist those charms.
"You're scaring the customers," Frankie called out from behind the counter.
Cody planted a few more kisses on her face, gazing down at her.
"I'm just happy to see you," Cody said, setting her back down. "You ready?"
She nodded, giving Cody a few more kisses. "Let me just grab my laptop," She said, walking towards the office. She had been holed up in there for hours earlier, just staring at the email from the landlord, trying to figure out the best path forward.
“Did you give yourself an appropriate pep talk for the absolute best ice skating ever?” Cody said.
“Ice skating? How predictable,” Emilia teased.
“Well, I thought we’d get a few classics under our belts, considering you're very new to not being a Grinch,” Cody joked. She lifted a small bag she had been holding. “Also, I know it’s early, but I found this for you and I couldn’t wait.”
Emilia raised an eyebrow. “Presents? We didn’t say we were doing presents.”
“Would we call this a present?” Cody said, her voice pitching higher as she grinned.
“Is it wrapped?” Emilia asked, pointing.
Cody stared at the small bag. “Somewhat,” she admitted.
Emilia smiled, shaking her head. She kissed Cody’s cheek, walking into the office.
Cody followed and grabbed Emilia’s jacket off of the coat hook at the door. Emilia scooped up a few files and moved to grab her laptop, but her hip caught a stack of papers that she had left on the edge of the desk. They all flew in wildly different directions to the ground.
"Great," Emilia groaned, kneeling on the ground to clean up her mess.
She laughed, bending to pick them up with together. "Real graceful, babe," she said, grabbing a pile of papers. She stood, stepping around the desk to put them in a much nicer pile than Emilia had left them in.
She watched in slow-motion as Cody stood, put the papers on the desk, and glanced towards her computer, doing a double-take at the screen.
Oh no, the email.
In an action movie, she'd be able to leap in front of Cody before she would have been able to see what was on the display. But this wasn't an action movie.
Seemed much more like a comic tragedy, at the moment.
Well, letting her see the email herself definitely was one way to tell her.
Emilia waited in silence as she slowly read the email. Emilia could tell she had read it more than once by the growing red color creeping up from the collar of her shirt.
Emilia was afraid, truly afraid, of how Cody would react.
"Emilia, what does this mean?" Cody said in an eerily distant voice, not looking away from the screen. She set the present she had been holding onto the desk.
"It's, well…" Emilia began, not knowing how to explain it in the moment, and especially not after she already knew exactly what Emilia was going to say. Her stomach dropped, and her hands felt clammy. "That's what I wanted to talk to you about tonight. We've been thinking about expanding by leasing the property where the bakery is," she said, trying to appear as calm and professional as possible.
Cody turned to her, all traces of patience or understanding faded from her expression. If looks could kill, Emilia would have been six feet under.
"I was going to tell you all about it," Emilia said, standing, her voice walking on a tight rope high above the ground. She pulled at her skirt self-consciously and straightened her posture.
"Is this why you've been so weird?" Cody asked, her brows knitting together. "Why haven't you talked about this with us?"
Emilia felt sheepish and ashamed, wanting to draw back from Cody, but she willed herself to stand firm. "I originally didn't want to talk to you before I talked with Henry, but I was going to tell you tonight," she admitted.
"Well, if you had talked to either one of us, you'd know that Henry offered me the bakery. He wants me to take it over and continue his legacy," Cody said, her jaw muscles working.
Emilia felt as though she had just been slapped across the face.
That was new information that definitely put a wrench in things. It was one thing to take over the bakery's lease from Henry, who had been retiring.
It was a whole other problem to steal it from the woman she loved and respected. Her eyebrows raised. "He what? Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I needed time to process it. I didn't think I had a deadline because you were scheming to get it out from under me," Cody said, throwing her hands in the air.
Emilia’s hackles raised as she glared at her. "I'm not scheming," she countered, squaring her hands on her hips.
"Really? Sending emails behind our backs without even talking to us about it first? After all Henry has done for you?" Cody said, her face growing redder by the moment.
"He wants to retire. That's not my fault. I'm sorry you've worked there for a month or however long, but it doesn't entitle you to anything. You know how important this shop is to me, so why are you standing in the way just because of nostalgia? I thought it was a temporary thing anyway," Emilia said, knowing that temporary dig would cut a little deeper than she would have wanted.
"What makes you think your three-year-old bookshop is more important than a bakery that has been in this building for thirty years?" Cody said, pointing to the shared wall of the bakery and the bookshop.
"It's just business!" Emilia yelled, throwing her hands in the air. "It's nothing personal. I'm sorry the bakery will close, but that's life." She knew she was being a bit harsh, but she had to make Cody see that it wasn't anything personal. She wasn't trying to close the bakery to hurt Cody. If she hadn't let her personal feelings get in the way in the first place, this decision would have been an easy and quick one.
Cody was standing in the way of her dreams.
"I tell you I love you and you tell me it's just business?" Cody yelled back.
Emilia held her ground.
She wasn't afraid of Cody hurting her. She was afraid of Cody exploding into a thousand sharp pieces, typically held together by a calm demeanor, but this was definitely not a calm moment. She could practically feel the waves of anger rolling off of the woman.
"Those are two separate things," Emilia said, feeling exasperated. "Love and business are two separate things." If she had only let Emilia explain first instead of jumping to conclusions, this all might have gone over smoother. But now, it was clear that love and business were not separate things to Cody at all.
"I don't believe that for a second," Cody growled. "You love your business. You just love it so much that there's no more room in your heart for anything else."
Her jaw dropped at that.
"Oh, that's rich coming from you. You just love things t
hat are easy and temporary. You were never planning to stay and take over the bakery, and now you're projecting your guilt onto me, because you know I'm temporary, too," Emilia said, crossing her arms over her chest.
Cody stared down at her, and she didn't shrink away. She narrowed her eyes, daring Cody to say she was wrong.
"I love my business. You love your freedom. This was never going to work, anyway," Emilia said, just to drive the dagger in a bit deeper. She was done letting her personal feelings get in the way of her shop. She had poured her heart and soul into the book shop, and if Cody didn't realize that it had to come first, she wasn't worth it. She'd be better off without her.
The office door opened and a concerned Nico stood in the doorway. "Everything okay?"
"No," they both yelled in tandem. Cody grabbed her jacket off of the chair and stomped across the room. "Good luck in your bulldozing expansion, Ebenezer," she muttered before storming out.
Nico slowly turned from the door back to her. "Are you okay? I heard the yelling, and I got worried."
"I'm sorry that was so loud and unprofessional," Emilia said, wiping at her eyes. "I'm fine." She lied, sitting down on her desk chair. She spied the present in front of her and opened it, as though she was ripping off a bandage.
Inside was a tiny, carefully wrapped Christmas ornament version of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. The book they had found together. It even opened and had tiny writing inside.
Emilia burst into sudden tears, shoving it back into the bag.
Nico crossed the room to wrap her arms around Emilia.
Emilia’s initial response was surprise, but then she relaxed, letting down her guard.
She couldn't remember the last time she had cried, really cried, especially on someone else's shoulder.
She was the strong one. She was the one who held everything and everyone together.
But a lot of things had changed in the past hour, it seemed.
Chapter 16
Cody
Cody sat in the kitchen, pouring herself another glass of whiskey. It had been a week since the big fight and break up –– it was now the day before Christmas Eve.
She still hadn't told Henry about the breakup or any further answer for taking over the business. She had just asked him if she could have another few days to think about it.
She had really let herself go in the past week. Her hair was curling around her ears haphazardly. She hadn’t even changed out of her flour-covered shirt to sit in her kitchen.
Her phone rang, and she immediately silenced the call. She noticed it was her mother, and felt a pang of guilt for silencing it. Julia had been calling for days now.
"Ugh, fine," Cody said into her whiskey glass and answered. "Hey, Julia."
"Cody Nowak, you can't clear my calls forever," Julia said.
"Yeah, sorry about that, been busy. What's up?" Cody said, rubbing her brow.
"Henry called," Julia said. Cody could vaguely hear talking in the background.
"Mom, are you at still at work? I thought you had Mondays off," Cody asked, trying to hear what the noise could be.
"You're damn right I'm at work, like they ever let pediatricians in this hospital have a life,” Julia said, raising her voice just a little on the last part. Cody could hear laughter in the background.
"Feeling a little feisty?" Cody joked, trying not to slur the last word.
"You can't get me off the subject so easily, darlin'. So, Henry wants to know if you're taking over the bakery. What's going on?" Julia asked.
Cody loved that her mother always cut right to the chase, but she noticed Julia did it in a way that made it seem like she had all the time in the world to hear Cody’s problems, even when that was very much not the case.
"I don't know. It's never been my life's dream to own a business and live for it," Cody said, sighing. "But I love that bakery, and I don't want it to shut down. There are these women in the shop next door that want to take over the space, and they'd just close the bakery entirely."
"Women in the shop next door… you mean, Emilia, your girlfriend?” Julia said, sounding innocent, yet confused.
Ugh, she was good. Cody had to give her credit for calling that one.
The word “girlfriendd” cut like a knife, making Cody’s stomach instantly clench. Cody sighed. "Thought you'd forgotten."
"An elephant never forgets," Julia said, no doubt using another quote that appealed to seven-year-olds. "I've been waiting forever for you to have a girlfriend. You're no young buck."
"You sound like I've got one foot in the grave," Cody groaned.
"I'll show you one foot in the grave, ma’am, if you don't figure out what you want to do. Emilia sounds incredible. I think Henry may just give you a run for your money if you let her go," Julia said.
Cody couldn't help but agree. The way Henry talked about the Marin women, any listener would think the sun rose and set with them. "But I don't want the bakery to disappear. I don't want to put all of those people out of work. I don't want Henry's hard work and legacy to be for nothing," Cody said quickly, feeling overwhelmed and spiraling.
"He put a lot of pressure on you, didn't he?" Julia said. "That's not right of him. But I know he only did so because he believes in you. If you don't want the bakery, it's his choice to close it, not yours."
Cody sipped at her whiskey again. "I don't really want the bakery," she conceded for the first time. "And I feel so unbearably guilty because of it."
Cody heard Julia snort out of amusement. Amusement! The nerve. "You and your guilt over things that you can't control."
"But I feel like I can control this," Cody countered.
"I'm sorry, baby, but you're wrong. Hey, I've got to go. Some kid swallowed a…" Julia paused. "Yep, I'm reading this right, a toad. Poor thing. The toad, I mean. I'm so glad you and your brothers weren't assholes. Call me soon, okay?"
Cody held the phone in her hand until it went dim.
She had to tell Henry that she didn't want to take over the bakery. She truly didn’t.
Saying it aloud made it real for the first time. But she also didn't feel entirely comfortable going back to being a paramedic just yet.
Why couldn't life go on just as it was? Cody paused, considering that this moment could be the first time in her entire life where she didn't want a big change. Well, besides getting Emilia back. She didn't want to lose Emilia, and she didn't want to lose the bakery, but she couldn't keep living her life out of guilt, and that included taking over the bakery officially.
In a perfect world, she and Emilia could continue just as they were. Before the fight.
She sipped at her whiskey, knowing that she was kidding herself. They weren't perfect. Cody had hidden things from her, and she had hidden things, too.
Big things. Scheming things.
Maybe Cody didn't honestly know who she was, after all. We had only been seeing each other for about a month — how could she say she wasn't a scheming person?
With a sigh, Cody knew she was kidding herself again. She did know Emilia. She loved Emilia. Emilia had torn down the walls she had built around herself after the accident and made her feel whole for the first time in nearly a year.
Cody dialed Henry's number. "Hey, can we meet in the morning? Maybe at the coffee shop down the street from the bakery?"
Chapter 17
Emilia
Emilia sat in the front of the shop, holding the warm mug of tea in her hands, staring out the window. It was Christmas Eve, and even at midday, it was grey and cold and dreary outside. She was grateful for the warmth of the London Fog in her hands.
The shop had just closed for holiday hours, and the forecast had warned there would be a snowstorm on its way that evening.
A white Christmas. How cliche.
Some random assortment of Christmas music played over the speakers –– some woman was begging her baby to come home for Christmas.
That was one thing Emilia hadn't done. She hadn't begged.
> But then again, in her defense, Cody hadn't exactly wanted to listen or wait to hear what her explanation was.
It had been two weeks since their big fight, and even though she had tried not to replay it over and over in her head, it still snuck up on her. She wavered between pissed and despondent.
Her stomach rumbled. She hadn't been eating her usual egg white and spinach on a multi-grain roll since she couldn't show her face in the bakery next door.
Frankie had tried to bribe her with a kouign amann the day before, but the knowledge that Cody had probably made it ruined her appetite.
She glared down at the newest email on her phone. It was from the landlord, asking her to make a decision. Apparently, Henry hadn't told the landlord he was reconsidering, either.
Nico cleared her throat from beside her at the table and Emilia lifted her head to see what she needed.
"You know, the tea will taste better if you actually drink it. If you just needed a hand warmer, I could have given you a cup of hot water and saved us the price of a cup of soy milk," she said with a small grin.
In their defense, Frankie and Nico had done their best trying to cheer her up through the week. Nico was helping out with small tasks, and Frankie was doing everything in her power to make Emilia’s life easier.
The door bell jingled as Frankie walked in with a bag from the deli down the street. She handed Emilia a sandwich without a word and then handed the bag to Nico.
Frankie sat at the table, looking around. Sure, it was Christmas, but they were still elbow deep in online orders. Even Nico had been helping with them. They had been working together before the London Fog made her think of the cup of coffee and schnapps Cody had brought her in the Christmas tree lot.
"Thank you for this," Emilia said, unwrapping what looked like a turkey reuben. She smiled to herself. Her favorite. Frankie knew her so well.