The Pastry Man's Other Account

Dev had spent ten years making other people's mornings sweet. In 2026 he was still the man sent through the service entrance with breakfast boxes while an old schoolmate, Duke, posed beside a boat and asked whether he was doing anything more ambitious than pastry yet. At thirty-nine, Dev could list a dozen chances he had watched pass. He could not buy one back.

He woke on 1 February 2016 with a younger face reflected in the dark kitchen window. Nassau was still outside. His phone had moved back ten years. The old balance was there too: BSD 8000 in local savings and USD 20000 cash sitting in the existing overseas brokerage account he had funded during earlier work abroad. He was twenty-nine, and tomorrow had suddenly become an ingredient.

The next decade came back in sharp pieces. A film winning an Oscar, a Bahamian athlete diving across a finish line, a long-awaited resort finally opening, terrible weather in the northern islands and the year when visitors stopped arriving. He also remembered a company whose shares had once been cheap enough for the pastry man to buy thousands. This time he opened a notebook before lighting the oven.

Kate reviewed films and was twenty-seven. She listened while he named Spotlight as the coming Best Picture winner, then asked whether his breakfast tasted better than his confidence sounded. They watched the 28 February ceremony together after an ordinary day. When the result arrived, Kate produced his earlier message and looked at him as though the quiet cook had changed the ending of her evening.

Their personal celebration involved coffee, a shared sweet and a kiss that made him forget the screen. Kate said predicting an award did not excuse arriving late for their next supper. Dev promised to remember something much more immediately useful. When he went home, he knew the returned decade was real enough to risk changing what he had once been frightened to begin.

During the first quarter he bought 8000 AMD shares at an average USD 2.50, using the USD 20000 already in his overseas account. His BSD 8000 local savings remained the starting fund for work he could actually do. He did not become a computer engineer overnight. He could remember a later price, while his hands still knew how to make a breakfast somebody wanted to pay for.

Tess ran small food operations and was thirty. She found him studying a bakery plan with a solemn expression and asked whether the guava filling had applied for a bank loan. He wanted portable breakfasts that could be ordered simply, made consistently and delivered to more than one large employer. Tess wanted a business that could survive the founder becoming sentimental about his own oven.

They agreed on eighty percent for Dev and twenty percent for Tess for their founding contributions and work. The first 500 breakfast boxes sold for BSD 12 each: BSD 6000 revenue less BSD 3500 paid ingredients, help, packaging and direct delivery left BSD 2500 contribution before wider costs and tax. His local savings financed the batch. The first repeat order tasted better than his cleverest unfinished plan.

May cooked for private clients and was thirty-one. She tried a box, praised one thing, criticised another and invited Dev to supper where neither of them would be paid to impress the table. She wore a soft yellow dress and made him laugh before the first course. When he reached to discuss the bread, she put her hand over his and asked a much more personal question.

Their kiss afterward was deliberate and warm. May wanted her own kitchen, her own customers and a man capable of enjoying a meal somebody else had made. Dev liked her competence and the easy way she could make him forget which of them was meant to be admired. He accepted another invitation before remembering to check whether he was supposed to sound less eager.

Jill captained charter boats and was twenty-eight. She ordered provisions for a small trip, then invited him on a personal afternoon ashore. She wore silver earrings, teased him about looking for a stove on the beach and kissed him when he finally admitted why he had accepted. Jill said the answer was considerably more charming than another explanation of the packaging.

Dev went home with salt on his shoes, warmth in his chest and two very different accounts beginning to grow. One contained shares he intended to hold. The other contained paid orders, a capable cofounder and evenings he had never known how to claim in his first life. He wanted to become rich. He was surprised by how much he also wanted to arrive on time.