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When Friday rolled around, Gaia struggled to believe that it had been a whole month since Evan's accident, a whole month for which Max had worked by her side for five days a week, and she felt like time was flying by out of her control. Four weeks ago, the idea of being without Evan behind the counter and having to hire someone else had been the stuff of nightmares but Gaia glanced over at Max as she pulled a freshly baked cake out of the oven, her hands encased in thick oven mitts, and she smiled. Max had been on top form ever since she had got in thirty minutes ago, whacking on an upbeat playlist to brighten the kitchen as the two of them baked and decorated to the tune of happy pop. Max had no distinguishable music style, listening to anything and everything based on the songs in her playlists.
They still had an hour before they were due to open, the two of them setting to work before Zara was due to pop in after she had woken up and given her father a hand with getting the children ready for the day. Evan was almost back to normal, his arm mending beneath his cast enough for him to put pressure on it now, but he still found it impossible to navigate Clover's onesies when his thumb couldn't quite meet his fingers on his right hand. Zara had gone above and beyond, stepping in even more than she was needed to give her parents a hand, and Gaia didn't know what she could do to thank the girl who deserved to be recognised. Zara was always going out of her way to keep life going as normally as possible, taking on as many roles as her parents, if not more: she acted as a parent and an employee, as a carer and a friend, but above all she was a daughter.
The past few days had been a little odd. Ever since Monday evening, Gaia's mind had been tumbling over what she had seen but she hadn't said a word to anybody, not daring to put her foot in her mouth by mentioning anything to Max or Zara. But since then, she had been on high alert, her eyes catching every flicker of a smile that the two shared. Zara had stayed the night with Max on Monday, and again on Wednesday, and Gaia could feel her growing up right before her eyes, gradually spending less and less time at home as she branched out. It was something of a novelty for her to have a friend, someone who lived close by and someone she wasn't related to. Until now, Stella had been the person she texted the most, but Max seemed to have effortlessly slipped into that role.
It hadn't taken long for Max and Zara to slip from co-workers to friends, and Gaia couldn't help but wonder if that relationship had taken another step without her even noticing. She usually noticed that sort of thing: she had been no idiot to Bree's crush on her when they had lived together, picking up on the cues and clues, but for this she had been blind. If it was anything at all. She had seen a hug, she told herself, and it was only her own overactive brain that had told her it was anything more.
It didn't matter. It wasn't her place to intervene so she pushed the thoughts out of her mind, returning her attention to the real world, and to Max.
"Did you realise it's been a whole month?" she asked, mixing red food colouring into a buttercream she had whipped up.
"It has?" Max caught herself, almost tripping over her own feet when she grabbed an extra couple of piping bags. "Wow, it has as well. That's crazy." She laughed in surprise, tipping the cake onto a rack to cool before pulling over the two sponges that Gaia had baked the night before.
