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1
Emma
Iwasfullyawarethat my outfit absolutely did not matter today. No one that was going to be at the signing would give two hot cookies what I looked like. But it mattered to me. A good outfit always mattered to me.
Confidently, I strode into the bank to meet with the lessor for the beautiful downtown building I would be leasing. Naturally, I was wearing a pink blazer and matching trousers with a cream top underneath, along with my favorite rhinestone heels. I didn’t have a chance to wear outfits like this often in the past few months, so I took advantage of the special day and strutted into the building.
This was my dream, and I wouldn’t let anything ruin it. I’d worked my buns off for this. After countless evenings spent chauffeuring unfamiliar faces around town for Uber, immediately following my long and arduous shifts at a bustling downtown eatery, my persistence was finally on the brink of being rewarded - a mere fifteen minutes away.
My passion had always been baking, and I decided at the ripe age of seven that I wanted to open a bakery. It started with one of those small kid ovens where you had to buy the pouches and add water before pouring out the batter in tiny cake pans. Mom had gotten it for me for my birthday and quickly regretted it as I asked her every day to get more of those tiny pouches that only made one serving. After proving myself as a master baker on the tiny oven, my parents decided that I could start making actual recipes in the real oven. The one that I wasn’t really tall enough to use because it was build into the cabinets, and I was a short kid. Undeterred, I eagerly perched atop a sturdy stool, determined to indulge my passion for baking to my heart's content. And so, with each spare moment at my disposal, I happily immersed myself in a world of buttery dough and sweet indulgences.
As I got older, my free time decreased, but my passion for all baked items continued to increase. Of course, life got in the way and I couldn’t immediately pursue my dreams of owning the world’s most famous bakery, but I was doing it now and that’s what counted. A dream that started twenty-one years ago was finally fully proofed and ready to go into the oven.
The meeting with the lessors and the notary went just as expected. I had already talked to them about the specifics of my business and we’d negotiated terms for the lease. After a few minutes of chit-chat and signing some papers, I walked out of the bank office and back onto the street, elated, and clutching the keys to my very own bakery. I already had an adorable pink donut keychain in my purse that I would attach to it as soon as I wasn’t in the eyesight of the lessors.
There might also be some happy dancing involved as soon as I was out of sight.
Amelia Island was small, and anyone could get from one end of the downtown portion of the city to the other on foot. Though I wished I had brought other shoes, so I didn’t have to walk all the way to my bakery in these heels. But I didn’t care. All that mattered was that I was now officially going to open a bakery.
I passed many people on the street. Many of them were tourists, but there were an equal amount of locals. I smiled at everyone I made eye contact with out of the overabundance of joy I had in me.
When I finally made it tomystorefront, I paused and looked up at the building. It was part of a large strip downtown that had been standing for over fifty years, but was slowly becoming more modern. Sadly, a lot of the history of this area was being renovated to look new and shiny, but I guess that was just a sign of the times. The lessors had agreed to let me paint the facade of the store and add any kind of signage and awnings that I wanted, and I knew it wouldn’t remain a plain brick store for long.
I pushed the key into the lock and twisted it. This felt like a monumental moment as I heard the lock click just before I pulled the door open and walked inside.
It was just as bland and bare inside as it was on the outside, but I could already see the vision forming in my head. I would, of course, have this place looking lively andpinkin no time. If I weren't as enthusiastic as the chemical reaction between baking soda and vinegar, the workload I had assigned myself would likely have been overwhelming. Plus, I had some great friends who I knew would help me get everything together.
Everything that I’d done to get here had all been worth it. The serving, the meal delivery, and most importantly, the self-restraint from buying new outfits. I had put so much effort into saving for this moment.
Years of hard work had finally cooked up to this, and I was determined to overcome any obstacle that might impede the success of my business.
2
Liam
If you had asked me if opening a cookie business was a manly thing to do ten years ago, I would have said hell no and gone back to eating steak and potatoes and watching football -because cookies weren’t manly.
Except here I was, signing the lease for a building downtown so that I could start a cookie company. It was a booming business right now, and Amelia Island needed one. Surprisingly, there weren’t any bakeries on the island I grew up on after Krissman’s closed down four years ago. That left the island with a gaping hole where there should be sweets and breads.
But I couldn’t make anything other than cookies, and seeing as cookies were a hot item right now, I knew that’s what I wanted to do.
Again, Idefinitelywould never have imagined myself opening a cookie business. But afterher, there was no question as to why I loved baking cookies.
Getting the lease and the loan had been easy. My last business venture was wildly successful, and the bank trusted me to grow another business. On the mainland, I opened and operated a sporting goods store for my first four years after college, then hired some fantastic managers before moving back to the island. Something about Amelia Island was too amazing to be gone from for long. Though I had only moved thirty minutes away, it still wasn’t the same to visit the island as it was to live here. Although I occasionally visit my store to oversee operations, it is mostly self-sufficient.
Sporting goods, nowthatis a manly business. But the cookie business was calling my name and I had grown bored of my work-from-the-couch lifestyle that I’d taken up since I’d moved back. Since relocating back to the island I was raised on, I decided something needed to change.
Jackson, my best friend, made fun of me, of course, when I told him that I had a passion for baking cookies and wanted to share it with the locals and the tourists of the island. But he knew precisely why I loved cookies so much. Specifically, chocolate chip ones. He’d been my closest friend for fifteen years, and was now my right-hand man in the business. He’d even moved to the mainland with me and back to the island when I told him I was moving back. I gave him a stake in my businesses, because I knew I couldn’t do it without him.
After I signed the lease at the business office of the landlord (whose assistant kept shamelessly hitting on me), I sent Jackson a text message and told him to meet me at the future spot of my cookie store. My phone vibrated as I put it back in my pocket, but I didn’t bother pulling it back out to read the message, too focused on my business plans.
Was it possibly stupid of me to open a cookie business because an ex-girlfriend of mine had taught me how to bake cookies? Okay, maybe. But every time I smelled fresh cookies, I was reminded of our college years together and how much we loved baking in her apartment. That was how I learned the perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe—with the perfect girl. And ever since her, I’d continued baking and creating fun styles of cookies. Jackson had never complained when I asked him to taste-test them.
I walked down the busy sidewalk to my storefront, and when I was in eyesight, I couldn’t focus on my own building. Why? Because the one next to it was blindingly pink. Like bubblegum pink. The juxtaposition of its color next to the red brick facades on either side of it was sharp, and I wondered who the hell decided painting the brick pink was a good idea. I supposed that it definitely caught the eye.
Chuckling to myself, I wondered what the owner would think when I painted my storefront black. It would be a stark contrast, but it would also definitely be eye-catching.
“Hey man, you seeing this?” Jackson approached me from the front, pointing behind him at the pink building I was staring at. He was shaking his head in disbelief.
