For once, the memory did not hurt.
Melissa glanced toward me.
“Dad, why are you standing over there?”
“Just watching.”
“Come here.”
So I did.
That spring, Melissa moved from two mornings at the market to four.
She never recovered Dorothy’s cinnamon-roll recipe exactly.
Eventually she stopped trying.
She created her own.
Less sugar.
More orange zest.
I complained for three straight weeks.
Customers loved them.
She named them Second Morning Rolls.
“Terrible name,” I told her.
“We sold out by nine.”
“Customers have poor judgment.”
“You raised me.”
“That proves my point.”
Maria laughed from the register.
Ava sat on the old stool we had found at an antique store, doing her homework badly enough to prove that some family traditions really could return.
Calvin arrived after work carrying groceries for dinner.
He and Melissa greeted each other warmly.
Not like strangers.
Not exactly like husband and wife.
