The health inspector's clipboard made a sharp crack against the stainless steel counter, and I watched River's smirk grow wider from across the kitchen. "Someone filed a complaint," Inspector Chen said, flipping through pages. "Multiple reports of food poisoning. Lists the entire kitchen staff as witnesses." My hands stilled over the laminated brioche I'd been shaping. Three years at Lumineux, three years of building this pastry program from nothing, and now this. "That's impossible," Elena said, our owner's perfectly manicured hand flying to her chest. She'd worn the red power suit today—the one she saved for investor meetings. "We've never had a single incident." River leaned against the prep station, his chef's whites somehow pristine despite the lunch rush we'd just finished. He'd only been here two months, hired as sous chef after staging at some pretentious molecular gastronomy place in Copenhagen. Everything about him screamed calculated chaos. "I'm sure it's just a misunderstanding," he said, voice dripping with false concern. "But you know how these things go. Better safe than sorry." Inspector Chen spent four hours dismantling our walk-ins, checking temperature logs, swabbing surfaces. The dinner service ground to a halt. I watched my carefully plated desserts—the brown butter tart with burnt honey ice cream, the olive oil cake with candied fennel—sit under the heat lamps until they were garbage. When Chen finally left, promising a follow-up visit, Elena called an all-hands meeting. "Look, this is clearly bullshit," she announced, perched on a barstool in the empty dining room. The Edison bulbs cast dramatic shadows across her face. "Some competitor trying to mess with us before the James Beard nominations. But we need to play it safe, show the city we're taking it seriously." She smiled, the one that had charmed investors out of millions. "So here's what we're doing. Bonus shifts for everyone. Extra hours, extra pay. We'll deep clean, we'll document everything, we'll make this place so pristine they'll want to eat off the floors." Cheers erupted from the line cooks. Even I felt a flutter of relief. "Schedule posts tomorrow," Elena said. "We're in this together." River caught my eye across the room and winked. I should have known then. --- The schedule went up at 6 AM. I saw it on my phone before my coffee had finished brewing—our kitchen group chat exploding with messages. *LET'S GET THIS BREAD (literally)* *double time let's gooooo* *mama needs new shoes and also to pay rent* I scrolled through the posted shifts, looking for my name among the deep-clean rotations and extra prep blocks. Nothing. I checked again. Marcus, our grill guy, had twelve extra hours. Jenny from garde manger had ten. Even River—the person who'd caused this entire mess—had been scheduled for additional "quality control oversight" shifts. My name appeared exactly where it always did: my regular four-day schedule. Not a single extra hour. The coffee in my hand had gone cold. I called Elena. Straight to voicemail. I texted her. Read receipt, no response. I showed up for my shift anyway, arriving early like I always did to feed Beatrice—my sourdough starter, three years old, temperamental as a toddler and twice as essential. Every bread item at Lumineux depended on her: the table bread, the brioche buns for our signature burger, the focaccia we sold at farmer's markets for twenty dollars a loaf. River was already there, reorganizing my station. "Oh, Zara," he said, like he'd forgotten I existed. "Elena wanted me to tell you—we're reassessing the pastry program. Might be going in a different direction." "What direction?" "More modern. Less..." He waved vaguely at my mise en place. "Precious." Something crystallized in my chest, cold and sharp. I looked at Beatrice in her container, bubbles rising through the starter like tiny promises. Three years of daily feeding, of learning her rhythms, of coaxing her back to life when I'd nearly killed her during that first summer heatwave. River was still talking, something about molecular desserts and foams. I stopped listening. ---