Chapter 4 The Impossible Offer
Ariella walked for three miles in the rain before her legs gave out.
She ended up on a bench at Laurelhurst Park, soaking wet, shivering, staring at nothing. Families walked past with dogs and strollers. Joggers splashed through puddles. A kid threw bread to the ducks in the pond, laughing when they fought over the pieces.
Normal people doing normal things.
She pulled out the business card. The rain had made the ink run slightly, but the number was still legible. Heavy cream cardstock, expensive even when wet. She thought about ripping it into pieces. Thought about throwing it in the pond.
Instead, she put it back in her pocket.
Her phone buzzed. Sophie.
“Where ARE you??? Your mom called me freaking out
She said you left at 8am and it's 2pm”
“ARI ANSWER ME”
Ariella’s fingers were too cold to type properly. She managed “l’m ok. Lost track of time. Heading home.”
The lie felt like swallowing glass.
Sophie’s response was immediate “bullshit. Where are you actually?”
Ariella turned off her phone.
The rain was relentless now, that particular Portland rain that wasn’t quite heavy enough to be dramatic but soaked through everything anyway. Her grandmother used to call it “persistent rain,” like it was a personality trait. Like the weather had feelings.
Ariella wondered what her grandmother would say about Richard Frost’s offer.
Probably something practical and cutting, delivered while kneading dough. You can’t fix everything by sacrificing yourself, sweetheart. Sometimes the only person you save is the one doing the drowning.
But her grandmother had never faced eviction. Had never watched her daughter fall apart. Had never held the weight of an entire family on seventeen-year-old shoulders.
Or maybe she had. Maybe that’s exactly what running a bakery for forty years meant.
Ariella stood up. Her legs were stiff, her clothes plastered to her skin. She needed to go home. Needed to face her mother. Needed to figure out what the hell she was going to do.
She took the bus. Forty minutes of squeaking seats and wet strangers and condensation on the windows. She got off three blocks from the bakery and walked the rest of the way, each step feeling heavier than the last.
The bakery was closed when she arrived. On Wednesday afternoons they usually stayed open until five, but the lights were off, and the sign flipped to CLOSED. Ariella’s stomach dropped.
She unlocked the door with shaking hands.
“Mom?”
No answer.
The bakery was dark, but she could see the morning’s bread still in the display case, unsold. Six loaves. Four baguettes. Two dozen rolls. All perfect. All is worthless if no one buys them.
“Mom?” Louder this time.
A sound from upstairs. Footsteps.
Her mother appeared at the top of the stairs, and the relief on her face was so profound it made Ariella want to cry.
“Oh thank god.” Claire came down quickly, wrapping Ariella in a hug before she could protest. “You’re soaked. Where did you go? I called three times, texted Sophie said she didn’t know… I thought…”
“I’m fine.” Ariella pulled away gently. “I just needed to walk.”
“For six hours?”
“I lost track of time.”
Her mother studied her face, and Ariella watched the relief shift to concern. Claire Hayes might be hollow with grief, might be barely functioning most days, but she wasn’t stupid. She knew her daughter. She knew when Ariella was lying.
“What happened?” Claire asked quietly.
Ariella opened her mouth. Closed it. The business card in her pocket felt like it was burning through the fabric.
Tell her. Just tell her.
But how? How do you tell your mother that a dying billionaire wants to buy you like property? That he’s offering enough money to solve all their problems, but the price is your entire summer, your dignity, your self? That you’re actually considering it because you’re so tired of being the one holding everything together?
“Ari.” Her mother’s voice was gentle. “Talk to me.”
“I can’t.” The words came out broken. “I can’t, Mom. I just… I need to think.”
“About what?”
About selling myself to save you.
About whether three months of my life is worth eighteen thousand dollars and a college scholarship.
About whether I’m strong enough to do this or stupid enough or desperate enough or all three.
“Nothing,” Ariella said. “It’s nothing.”
Her mother’s face crumpled slightly. “You’ve been saying that for six months. Every time I ask how you are, what you’re feeling, what you need…it’s always nothing.” Her voice cracked. “But you’re drowning, baby. I can see you drowning. And I don’t know how to…”
“You can’t.” The words came out sharper than Ariella intended. “You can’t help me, Mom. You can barely help yourself.”
The silence that followed was deafening.
Claire’s face went pale. She took a step back, as Ariella had physically pushed her.
“I’m sorry,” Ariella said immediately. “I didn’t mean…”
“No.” Her mother’s voice was very quiet. “You’re right.”
“Mom…”
“I failed you.” Claire wrapped her arms around herself. “After Ethan died, I just… I couldn’t. And you had to carry everything. The bakery, the bills, me. You’ve been parenting me instead of the other way around.” Tears were running down her face now. “I’m so sorry, Ariella. I’m so sorry I made you grow up too fast.”
Ariella felt something crack open in her chest. All the anger she’d been holding, all the resentment, all the desperate loneliness…it came pouring out.
“I’m tired,” she whispered. “I’m so tired, Mom. And I don’t know how to fix this. I don’t know how to save the bakery or pay the bills or make you okay again. I don’t know how to do any of it.”
Her mother crossed the space between them and pulled Ariella into her arms. Really held her this time, not the hollow hug from before but something solid. Present.
“You don’t have to fix everything,” Claire said into her hair. “You don’t have to save me. You’re seventeen. You should be worrying about prom and college applications and boys, not…” Her voice broke. “Not whether we’re going to lose our home.”
They stood there in the dark bakery, holding each other, both of them crying now. Ariella couldn’t remember the last time her mother had held her like this. Before Ethan died, probably. Before everything fell apart.
“I got an offer,” Ariella heard herself say. “For money. Enough to save the bakery.”
Her mother pulled back, studying her face. “What kind of offer?”
Ariella’s throat felt too tight to speak. She pulled out the soggy business card instead. Handed it to her mother.
Claire stared at it. “Richard Frost? The Richard Frost?”