The first entries went back to the original town bakery before she met Reid.
Flour.
Yeast.
Rent.
Wood.
Sales.
Every cent.
Emma turned pages carefully.
Then handwriting changed slightly.
A later entry:
Mercer Ranch smokehouse conversion. Agreement: six months no rent, afterward $3.50 per week. Reid claims this is fair. Verified against other spaces. It is. Annoying.
Emma laughed aloud.
Rose leaned closer.
Another entry:
Chair completed. Too wide in the back, but sturdy. Emma claims she sanded it. Evidence doubtful.
Rose smiled.
“Grandma lied.”
“She did sand one corner.”
“Family legend survives.”
They continued.
The ledger was not only financial.
It had gradually become diary, recipe book, business plan, complaint box, memory.
Emma ate two full slices today. Reid pretended not to count. He counted.
Later:
First hotel order completed. 46 loaves. Never agree to 46 loaves with one oven again.
Then:
Reid asked me to marry him. His speech was terrible. Accepted anyway.
Emma touched the sentence with one finger.
She had heard the proposal story a hundred times.
Seeing Lena’s handwriting made it different.
Rose turned more pages.
Business grew.
Wages.
Rent.
Repairs.
Employee notes.
At one point Lena wrote:
Rule: never hire someone because I feel sorry for them. Hire because there is useful work and pay properly. Pity is unreliable payroll.
Rose laughed.
“She should’ve written management books.”
“She would have hated management books.”
Another entry:
Bought two wider customer chairs. Nobody should have to ask.
Another:
Young woman from Miller farm wants work. Family says she is slow. She is not slow. She is careful. Hired.
Another:
Reid says bakery could become larger. I say large things require more flour. He says that is how arithmetic works. Considering divorce.
Rose laughed so loudly one of the workers knocked on the wall.
Emma laughed too.
Then they reached the final years.
Handwriting shakier.
Entries shorter.
Reid gone nine years today. Bread still rises. Rude of it.
Emma stopped.
Rose placed a hand on her shoulder.
They sat without speaking.
On the next page:
Emma thinks I don’t know she checks on me every morning. She walks loudly. Has always walked loudly.
“Excuse me,” Emma whispered.
Rose smiled.
Then the final completed page.
Written approximately two weeks before Lena died.
Bakery is not mine anymore. Maybe it never was. Reid built a room. Emma invited me to a table. I baked because I knew how. Others came. That is all a business can hope for: useful work becoming useful to more people than the person who began it.
Below that:
If Emma tries to preserve everything exactly as I left it, stop her. A bakery that never changes becomes a museum. Museums do not make good bread.