Clover Carrington's Arc

Chapter 1 of 2

Clover Carrington had thirty carrots and no place to bake them. He stood outside his cabin at dawn, sorting the vegetables into a basket on the step. His green fur caught the light, and his sparkly tail twitched as he counted. The carrot crown on his head had slipped sideways. He straightened it and frowned. For a year he had wanted one thing: a burrow-side bakery where the whole town of Ribbitmaw would gather over warm carrot bread. But you cannot sell treats you cannot make. He carried the basket inside. His cabin was small. Heart-shaped windows let in soft light, and a koi pond sat by the door, but there was no oven and no counter. The one table held his seed jars and a half-carved spoon. When he tried to picture rows of loaves cooling here, the picture broke apart. There simply was no room. Clover set down the basket and thought hard. He needed a workspace before he needed anything else. No workspace meant no bread. No bread meant no bakery, and no bakery meant no gathering spot. The problem sat at the front of every other problem. He walked to the farmstand where he bought his ingredients. It was a cottage-style stall with flower boxes and baskets of apples and greens. He had come for more carrots. Instead he stared at the wide plank counter and the deep shelves under the awning. The stall had space he did not. The old vendor watched him stare. "You want vegetables or you want to buy my porch?" she said. Clover did not smile. "I want to rent your counter," he said. "An hour each morning. Before you open. I will bake here and sell beside your stand." She wiped her hands on her apron. "And what do I get?" "Half of everything I bake for the first month," Clover said. "Your customers smell fresh bread. They stay longer. They buy more apples." The vendor squinted at him. She tapped the counter twice, thinking. Then she pulled a small key from her apron and pressed it into his paw. "Mornings only," she said. "Leave it cleaner than you found it. And bring your own oven, because mine burns everything." Clover closed his paw around the key. His plan had worked. He had a place to bake at last. But he had promised half his bread to a stranger, agreed to sell beside her stand, and now he owned nothing but a key and thirty carrots. He had no oven. He had no idea what the vendor would think when townsfolk chose his bread over her apples. Clover looked at the empty counter and understood the truth. The hard part had only started.