Hand me the keys to the bakery, Grandma, before you embarrass yourself trying to

Tiffany rolled her eyes and told me to ‘make it quick, boomer.’ I dialed a number I hadn’t used in two years and said only six words: ‘Daniel, it’s Eleanor. Bring the folder.’ Twelve minutes later, the bell above the door chimed and in walked Daniel Marsh, the attorney who’d drawn up every document Marlow’s Sourdough had ever signed. He set a leather folder on the counter beside Tiffany’s tablet. ‘Ms. Marlow,’ he said, nodding to me. Then, to Tiffany: ‘There is no board. Marlow’s Sourdough LLC has one member. Eleanor Marlow. The paperwork you’ve been signing for the last six weeks transferred nothing. It was a draft she asked me to leave on the desk to see what you’d do with it.’ Tiffany’s smile cracked. Her boyfriend slowly lowered the phone. I pulled out the printouts I’d kept in my apron pocket — the ‘consulting fees’ she’d wired to herself, the supplier contracts she’d quietly inflated, the lease she’d tried to refinance under a shell company called Tiff Holdings. Forty-one thousand dollars, traced line by line. ‘I didn’t call you here to fire you, sweetheart,’ I said. ‘I called you here because the police asked me to wait until you said it on camera.’ Two officers stepped in from the back hallway, where they’d been drinking my coffee for the last hour. Tiffany’s mascara started to run before they’d finished reading her rights. The boyfriend’s livestream was still going — three thousand viewers watched her walk out in cuffs, blazer and all. I turned to the line of regulars who hadn’t moved an inch. ‘Sourdough’s still two-fifty,’ I said. ‘And the ovens are still mine.’ Mrs. Patel started clapping first. Then everyone did. I went to the back, kneaded the next batch by hand, and for the first time in a year, the dough rose exactly the way my husband taught me — slow, steady, and entirely on my terms.