FINALLY, IT'S MONDAY AND I'm allowed back in my cafe again — a greater relief than usual. The house feels claustrophobically full. Tim's recent growth spurt and Maeve's emotional frosh-fifteen probably account for the feeling that there's less room for Vic and I. Every time we go near each other, a teenager materializes out of thin air — voila! — like a romance vampire.

This morning, I'm contentedly plucking croissants and other pastries from a Patisserie Margolie delivery box and stacking them artfully in the glass cases that line the cash area. When Maeve left for university (and took her baking skills with her), I struck up a friendly relationship with Margolie, a french patisserie owner in the neighbourhood. She agreed to supply a daily assortment of delectables at a reasonable cost in exchange for a weekly batch of our house-roasted espresso beans. There was a coup de foudre between us when I found out that she, too, had walked away from corporate life to put her heart and soul into her private passion for butter and flour. While the friendship takes a small chunk out of my profit margin, the extra Pain au Chocolate she slips into the box for me each day keeps me sweet.

I've just finished placing the last shining eclair alongside its fellows. There. Looking forward to tucking into my freebie, I hear the back door chime and heavy steps come lumbering across the kitchen tiles.

I can tell from the gait that it's Buddy: my erstwhile dog-walker (Taffy, our golden retriever, is now too old for daily walks) and mostly-silent cafe co-owner. He pops in once a month or so to 'look at the books' which used to be code for drink a free latte and spill the tea on married life, a club which he and his long-time partner James finally joined -- although recently, Buddy really has been spending time looking at the books, and leaving with an increasingly worried expression on his face.

He appears at the kitchen door, looking haggard.

"I was worried I'd catch you mid-twerk," he jokes. "You've got some moves for a middle-aged lady."

That goddamn video. I'd forgotten all about it.

"Oh, god. Sorry about that. Maeve." I say, by way of explanation.

He shrugs. "Don't be sorry. Our social got a thousand new followers over the weekend. People love it."

I blush from head to toe. "By love it, you mean love to laugh at it."

"Same, same," he says. "Come on, Alice, you're the ex-PR pro. You know any publicity is good publicity. If your busted moves get us more traffic in the cafe, it's great. Might get you to do another one."

I shake my head emphatically. "Not happening."

He shrugs and heads for a table. The old Buddy wouldn't have let me drop it so easily, but I can see that today's Buddy is too exhausted to put up a fight. He must've had a bad night.

"How's the little sweetheart?" I call over as I heat a cup of milk for his latte.

"James? A little short-tempered these days, if I'm honest," he smirks back. He knows I'm not talking about his husband. I'm talking about the adorable little bundle of colic, poopy diapers and angry squalls that he and James recently welcomed into their formerly quiet home. They are fostering a now two-year-old baby named Angel with an eye to long-term adoption. Angel is, like many two-year-olds, supremely pissed off at the world. She's never been a great sleeper, but her latest developmental spurt, combined with a hellish round of teething, has turned her into the absolute opposite of her namesake. Lovingly, Buddy refers to her as "temporary Satan" and claims they may need an exorcism to get through the next few months.

James, who, as an IT consultant, travels quite a bit and is thereby blessed with frequent breaks from parenting, doesn't find Buddy's jokes funny.

There's a tension between the couple that, I continually assure Buddy, is entirely normal in the relationship between new parents. Vic and I actively loathed each other for months after each kid was born. The sleep deprivation and the sneaking suspicion that the other one is squarely to blame for the personality of the tiny, angry human that now rules your life sets you up as enemies. It takes a lot of love to get through infanthood.

Which is what I remind Buddy of as I bring him his coffee.

"She bit me this morning," he rolls up his shirtsleeve to show me two red indents an inch above his wrist.

"Ouch. Looks like her teeth have finally come in -- that's probably good news."

"Biting, though," he says, shaking his head. "I'm worried. So aggressive. What if her biological parents were...."

I hold my hand up to stop him. "What? Cannibals? Zombies? Don't go there. You don't know anything about her background, and nurture almost always overcomes nature anyway. Even with cannibals. Besides, Maeve was sent home from preschool for biting her classmates on multiple occasions, and she turned out fine."

He nods thoughtfully.

But I can't stop myself adding, "...for a university dropout."

I share the whole story with him and, eventually, come to Maeve's existential crisis.

"So that's where we're at."

"Are you sure it's as grim as all that?" he asks. "Maybe she's just in love. Sometimes, love feels like despair. Especially when you're young."

"Mmm, that's true. But what's love got to do with Kierkegaard?"

He laughs and slaps our accounts open on the table in front of us. "Plenty, Alice. Have you ever read him? Now, let's focus on how we're going to keep this cafe from going under."