30. Start Again

Charity's bedroom looked empty.

Maisie wanted to be sad about the almost barren closet and the naked desk but the smile on Charity's face as she talked about Stanford was enough to make Maisie smile too. The two best friends sat on the edge of the bed and Maisie dropped her head to rest on Charity's shoulder.

"I'll miss you," Maisie said.

"I will too," Charity smiled. "But you can visit whenever you want. I'll sneak you into my dorm. And I'll be coming down every spare second I get."

Maisie smiled sadly. "You're the only best friend I've got."

"I heard that," Ocean said as he walked in, three bowls of ice cream in his hands.

He promptly sat between the two friends and scooped a healthy amount of ice-cream onto his spoon before inhaling it.

"Drama queen," Maisie muttered and took a bowl from his arms.

"I just remembered I'm lactose intolerant," Ocean mused then shrugged. "Oh well, we'll deal with that later."

"Fantastic," Maisie snapped and Charity laughed.

"I'm gonna miss this," she said.

"Honey, we're gonna be video calling you every five minutes so you won't be missing anything. Whether we're eating, shitting or fuc-"

"No," Maisie held her hand up.

"-king, we will be there, through your camera," Ocean smiled and Charity blinked.

"I mean as lovely as that sounds, I don't think-"

"Great," Ocean grinned. "It's settled then. Daily video calls it is!"

Maisie and Charity just looked over Ocean's head, laughing softly as he began to ramble about bees dying and that Cheerios knows what's up. Even though they didn't speak much after that, the two best friends gripped each other's hands around the back of Ocean and didn't let go until they had to.

***

"Are you sure he's going to like this?" Maisie asked Logan as they put plates down on the dining table, lining them with cutlery.

"Usually he doesn't have a party," Logan explained. "He'll get a cake, a ton of presents and a hug from dad before he goes to work and by the time it's the afternoon, the event is pretty much forgotten. He's not bothered by it and I've tried to give him parties before but it just doesn't work."

"Shouldn't we have invited some of his friends?" Maisie asked, concerned.

Logan sighed. "He has problems making friends."

"He does? His personality doesn't say that," Maisie said.

Logan shrugged. "He's not the best at keeping the friends he gets. I don't know. He's awkward with them."

Maisie looked sadly over at the ton of balloons surrounding the room that Nick and Andy had bought and spent the whole morning blowing up. She could never imagine a kid like him to not have hundreds of friends as his beck and call. Then again, as far as Maisie was aware, his brother only had the three friends he lived with.

"Nick, how's the food doing?" Logan called out.

Nick poked his neck around the wall and smiled. "Double bacon cheeseburgers, curly fries, strawberry ice-cream and the biggest strawberry short cake you've ever seen!"

"I swear he's the only kid that actually wants fruit in his junk food," Logan muttered.

"Says Mr. I-only-eat-lemon-cake-when-I'm-high," Maisie pointed out and Logan rolled his eyes, wrapping his arms around her from behind and kissing her temple.

"Whatever," he grumbled just as the front door opened and Keith, Charity and Ocean came stumbling in.

"He's nearly here!" Ocean cried.

The small apartment was almost transformed as balloons littered the floor, streamers hung from the ceiling, presents sat in the corner and the lights were dimmed. Nick aggressively layered strawberries on top of the cake and Keith took over trying to make sure the burgers didn't burn.

The door handle jiggled and everyone froze, Logan kicking a balloon out of the way as the door opened and Juno's sleepy face came into view, hand tightly in Andy's.

"Happy birthday!" everyone cheered.

Juno blinked owlishly for a moment before a smile spread across his face and he grinned, running over to Logan who caught him and sat his brother on his hip.

"Happy birthday, No-No," Logan said softly, kissing his brother noisily on the cheek.

"This for me?" Juno asked.

"Yep, everything," Andy smiled from the doorway.

Juno suddenly looked up to the entry of the kitchen. "I smell burgers."

Maisie laughed and walked over, holding Juno's head between her hands and kissing all over his face as he giggled.

"Happy birthday, buddy," she smiled. "You're so old now."

"I found a grey hair this morning," Juno said.

"No you didn't, you compulsive liar," Logan rolled his eyes and swung Juno over his shoulder, running through the room with him.

Andy closed the front door behind in and spotted Ocean in the living room, organizing Juno's presents so they sat on the coffee table. Andy walked over and stood in front of the table, hovering over the boy in red pants, a baby blue shirt and a black bow tie. Ocean looked up when a shadow fell over the table and looked away quickly, standing up straight when his eyes met Andy's.

"Hi," Ocean said softly.

"Hi," Andy answered with a smile. "Can we talk?"

"Um, sure," Ocean said and sat down beside Andy on the couch, putting a little distance between them.

Andy looked at the distance and frowned, shifting over so his leg touched Ocean's. The latter couldn't stop the goddamn heat of his cheeks that flared out of nowhere and he looked down at his hands, wishing his hair wasn't up in a bun so he could hide his face.

"Look I know things were weird between us earlier," Andy said. "I shouldn't have kissed you that time without...you know."

"Telling me you had a boyfriend?" Ocean asked.

Andy nodded. "Right. I'm sorry. Kissing you just sort of happened. It was impulsive."

"Get to the point, Andy," Ocean mumbled.

Andy grabbed Ocean's chin gently and lifted his head, forcing the flamboyant man to look at him but Ocean just kept averting his eyes.

"Look at me, Ocean," Andy said.

Ocean's eyes flickered to his.

"I like you," Andy said. "A lot. This might seemed rushed as it's only been a few weeks since Tom got arrested. But...it feels right."

Ocean looked away. "I don't like you," he almost whispered.

Andy narrowed his eyes and tightened his grip on Ocean's chin.

"Bullshit," Andy ground out and surged forward, pressing his lips to the other man's.

He pinned Ocean to the couch and the other slowly put his hands in Andy's hair as they kissed. It wasn't until they heard Nick call out that food was ready, that Ocean pulled away from Andy and pushed him away. His bow tie was crooked and his bun was slipping loose.

"What?" Andy asked, reaching forward again.

"No," Ocean said and Andy stopped moving. "I can't do this."

"Ocean," Andy said as the man stood up and straightened out his clothes.

"What if Tom wasn't a bad guy?" Ocean asked. "What if he didn't get arrested? What if he was still here? Would I be constantly waiting on the side for a day that wasn't going to come?"

"No you wouldn't have," Andy said.

"Really?" Ocean asked and it was Andy's turn to look away. "That's what I thought."

"I like you," Andy said again.

"I know," Ocean said. "I like you too. But I can't."

"What are we supposed to do now?"

"I'm going to keep going to school, get a degree and you can do whatever indecisive bad boys always do," Ocean said, turning away and walking back into the dining room as Nick and Keith came out of the kitchen with plates of burgers and fries.

Juno's face lit up and he immediately grabbed a handful of curly fries, stuffing them in his mouth.

"You remembered my favourite food!" Juno grinned through the food and Logan ruffled his hair.

"I also remembered this," Logan said as he looked towards the entryway of the kitchen.

Juno turned his head and watched Nick carefully carry in a huge strawberry short cake with six candles sticking out of it.

"Strawberries," Juno whispered in awe and Logan chuckled, kissing the top of his head as everyone began to sing Happy Birthday.

When they finished, Juno was about to blow out the candles when Charity stepped forward.

"Don't forget to make a wish!" she piped up.

Juno frowned for a moment before smiling and took seven turns to blow the six candles. Maisie took the candles out of the cake and they sat it in the middle of the table as everyone found a seat to eat Nick's cooking. Juno had ketchup all over his mouth a few moments later and Maisie wiped it off him gently.

The front door opened as they were halfway through their food and Delilah, Juno's nanny, came through the door, a sheepish look on her face.

"Sorry, I'm late," she said, present in hand. "I had to pick up a few people."

She stepped aside and two little boys who looked Juno's age walked in.

"These are my cousins," Delilah explained. "I had to look after them today and thought maybe they might want to play with Juno."

Juno looked over at the boys shyly and Logan grabbed two chairs, sitting them around Juno. Delilah sat down in the spare chair next to Nick and winked at him. Nick smiled at her.

"I'm Noah," the brunet, who had a Spider-Man shirt on, told Juno and he then pointed to the other boy who had dark skin and thick-rimmed glasses. "And that's Dennis."

"I'm Juno," the blond said quietly.

Noah looked down as a plate of food was put in front of him. "I love curly fries!"

Juno looked up in interest. "Really?"

"I love bacon cheeseburgers!" Dennis said.

"Really?" Juno asked again, then smiled. "Cool."

Delilah looked pleased with herself as she took a bite of her food, nodding. "Damn, this is good. Where did you get them from?"

"I made them," Nick said.

Delilah raised an eyebrow at him. "You're a man of many sides, Nick."

Nick smirked. "I try."

The food went down slowly as everyone talked. The cake was cut and strawberries littered the table and frosting was stuck to the plates. Wrapping paper was thrown everywhere and the television played loudly in the background. Chaos ensued around them but Maisie and Logan stayed at the dining table, sitting opposite each other, surrounded by family and their legs touching.

***

The weather had picked up again and a lovely, unforgiving heatwave was causing everyone to walk around with sunburns and sweat stains. The bakery was the safe-haven of the street. In front of the large windows were Juno and his new friends, Dennis and Noah. The three of them sat on stools behind a homemade lemonade stand with an umbrella over their heads that Logan had brought over to shade them. People walked past them, each one stopping to buy lemonade from the kids and then going directly into the air-conditioned bakery that for once, had a line nearly out the door.

Tables and chairs were taken up by customers sat with cold drinks and coffees and plates full of pastry. Nick had found that an ice-cream machine would be a good investment and it turned out that Keith had a knack for making the weirdest and most wonderful ice-cream flavours.

The walls were white and a light, hardwood flooring covered the ground. The display cases were bigger and everywhere, displaying the cakes that Maisie and the boys were whipping up out back. Little blackboards were pinned to the walls were Maisie had written all the prices and Charity had decorated the borders.

The cash register was never shut and the card machine was almost broken from use. Nick had decided to stay at the bakery as an employee after Maisie had said she could now afford to pay him. Charity was leaving soon but she still stepped in at the register in between packing and visiting Stanford for information sessions. Keith gave up his job at BurritoBazinga despite the Mexican Hercules' pleas to stay and ended up working at the bakery in between night classes at the local college for business. Andy was also working at the bakery much to the chagrin of Ocean who became immediately awkward when he came in to visit Maisie after class. Logan came and went as he pleased. One second he would be picking up dirty plates from empty tables and the next he would be taking a nap in the break room. Maisie humoured him.

Today was an average day and so Maisie was a little more relaxed and in less of a stressed mood. She kept glancing over at the three boys at the lemonade stand through the window as she ran the register. Everyone else was in the kitchen and Logan was at a table in the corner, eating ice cream and sketching in his book. Maisie had learned that Logan was a sketcher. He didn't do much with it but he sure as hell knew a lot about artwork if their trip to the art gallery was anything to go by. The guy wouldn't shut up, he knew more than the tour guide. Maisie smiled softly.

The door opened with a little ring and Maisie looked up as a customer walked over to the counter.

"Hey," Maisie said.

"Hey, the order's for Emma," she said and Maisie blinked.

This wasn't Starbucks.

"Okay," Maisie just nodded. "What can I get you?"

Emma stood for a moment, looking at anything but the display cases and Maisie frowned.

"I'll take a McCookie," Emma said, "and a McCoffee with no McMilk."

Maisie's lips parted. "I'm sorry?"

"I'll take a McCookie-"

"Yeah, no, I heard that," Maisie said. "Why do you keep adding Mc to everything?"

"It's not my fault the marketing is that way," Emma said.

Maisie frowned. "This isn't McDonalds."

"Oh, actually, can I get a McFlurry too, with the spoon with a straw but it's not actually a straw, it's just a hollow spoon."

"This is not McDonalds! McDonalds is three blocks over," Maisie said.

"But the sign outside..." Emma trailed off.

"Yes I know!" Maisie snapped. "We're still under renovation and don't have a sign up yet. And yes, the construction company's logo just happens to be eerily similar to Golden Arches but this is obviously not McDonalds!"

"I'll be reporting this."

"Oh my god, just get out!" Maisie yelled, swatting her hands out in front of her.

Emma huffed and stormed out of the bakery, the door doing it's stupid little jingle as she went.

"When's that sign going up?" Logan asked. "That's the third person who thought this was McDonalds."

"In the next hour," Maisie said. "Just waiting for the construction guys to get here."

Maisie walked over as the last customer left the bakery and the high of the day faded out as the time of day ticked on. She sat down next to her boyfriend in the corner booth and rested her head on his shoulder. Logan wrapped his arm around her and kissed her head.

Maisie looked down at his sketchbook and smiled. "You were drawing me."

"I usually do," he said.

"Creeper," she mumbled.

"You love it."

Maisie smiled and nodded against his body sleepily. "Yeah I do."

She reached up and took Logan's ice-cream, picking the little plastic scoop out and trying it.

"What flavour is this?" Maisie asked.

"No idea," Logan shrugged. "Keith didn't put a sign up."

"That's worrying," she said, taking some more. "But fuck if it's good."

Logan smiled and rubbed her back. A few moments later the construction van pulled up and one of the guys waved to Maisie who sat upright.

"Last hurdle to go," she smiled. "And then grandma's bakery is finally done."

Logan smiled back, kissing her on the cheek. "I'm proud of you."

Maisie hummed and stood up, heading over to the doors of the bakery to help the construction guys get the sign right. Juno and his friends were still there although they were more drinking the lemonade than selling it.

"You're supposed to be selling it, not drinking it," Maisie said.

"But it's so good," Juno groaned, knocking back another cup and Maisie laughed.

It took a bit of time and lots of tilting left and right but finally, the sign of Maisie's new bakery was up. She put her hands on her hips, the hot Arizonan weather beating down on her neck and the feeling of satisfaction running through her. Her grandma would have loved it. But more importantly, Maisie loved it. And for once, she could be proud to call this bakery her own.

"I have a surprise," Maisie told the boys, Charity and Ocean who were sat at a table in the corner, eating cake she was sure they hadn't paid for.

"What is it?" Keith asked.

Maisie tilted her head towards the door. "Its outside, I had it done while you guys were in the kitchen. Come on."

Maisie led everyone outside and together they lined up along the sidewalk. Juno rushed over and clung onto his brother's leg, tilting his head up to see it. Nick grinned and looked at Maisie.

"I love it," he said.

Maisie smiled back and stared up at a big sign above the front doors that read 'Maisie's Bakery' in thick, bold letters.

Whatever happened from there, she could handle. Bit by bit, Maisie's future was looking a little more clear and bit by bit, surrounded by these people, she knew she could finally start to enjoy the journey.

There will be a short epilogue coming up after this as well as some info and stuff so please keep this in your library! This isn't the total end!

I just want to say the biggest thank you from the bottom of my heart. This book has been a joy to write and you guys have been so wonderful to write for. Your energy and your humour (sometimes you've been funnier than the book). I've loved energy moment. You made the characters come to life and you loved them the way I could only hope you would. Thank you for this year of laughter with this book. I hope this gave you some joy when you were sad or made you smile on a rainy day. That was only ever the purpose of this novella, to make you smile. And if I ever did that, then I succeeded. Thank you. You've been amazing and this book will always be in my heart.

Stay tuned for more <3

- Ellie x