By March 1999, Gordon knew which deliveries depended on favors. He had seen Hugh carrying a bundle into his receiving room and had watched me arrive late after combining two routes to save fuel. When he asked me to sit down, I expected a complaint. Instead he cleared a space on his desk and put a proposed service schedule in front of me.
"I can give you regular volume," he said. "You can stop chasing six little collections to make one worthwhile trip."
The quantities were larger than anything we had taken on. There was an advance for materials and reserved capacity, refundable according to terms on the second page. I read that page before answering. Gordon watched me, not impatiently, but with the confidence of a man who knew he was offering something I needed.
"Those first two weeks overlap," I said. "We can't take every garment at once and keep your people dressed."
"Then tell me what you can take."
I asked to bring the papers home. He said the offer was not going to disappear overnight, but he wanted an answer before he arranged another supplier. It was reasonable. That made it harder to resist. I took the schedule to the van and sat with it across the steering wheel, imagining thread bought before we needed it and rent paid without waiting for three small invoices.
Hugh read it at the kitchen table after supper. This time I did not stand over him telling him which paragraphs mattered. He made a mark beside the delivery windows and another beside the advance. "What happens if the work stops before you've earned this?" he asked.
"We give back the unearned portion."
"And if you've bought supplies with it?"
I showed him the material allowance and how completed work would reduce the balance. We calculated an opening order small enough not to trap us with unused stock. Then he asked about labor. I had counted Celia's hours as though her availability were a fixed piece of equipment. The next morning I put the schedule before her and asked what she could actually commit.
"Not all of Thursday," she said. "I've told you that."
She had. I changed the collection day instead of asking her to rearrange her life. Between us we divided the work into batches, leaving room for ordinary repairs and for a garment that took longer than expected. The revised plan looked less impressive than Gordon's original sheet. It also looked possible.
At the second meeting I told Gordon we needed staggered quantities, a delivery window wide enough for the route, and written acknowledgment of what each payment covered. He objected to the smaller opening batch. I showed him the turnaround calculation. "I can promise this," I said. "The larger number would be a hope."
He took his pencil and changed the first line. We argued over one collection day and settled on another. He wanted a credit if we missed an agreed window without his approval. I wanted changes in quantities confirmed before we collected. Neither of us got everything. Both of us initialed the alterations.
When he handed me the advance, I checked that the receipt called it refundable and referred to the schedule. It felt almost impolite to insist, but he signed without protest. For once I thought I had found a way to make dependence safe: every obligation attached to a date, every payment given a name.
The first supply order arrived in cartons too large for the shelf. Celia helped me unpack them and asked where we would store finished work when the larger batches began. We moved a table, raised a rail, and marked separate areas for received and completed garments. By evening the room looked like a business with a future rather than a place where two women tried not to fall behind.
I brought Hugh our copy of the signed agreement. He read the changed quantities and nodded. I wanted him to admire how thoroughly I had protected us. He said the schedule looked workable. I put the contract in a folder and slept well that night, believing that enough writing could spare us the uncertainties of trusting one another.