Climbing down the ladder from the attic, he couldn’t figure out who could’ve done the work. Out of curiosity, he ducked into his father’s office, which was located upstairs from the restaurant. On the desk were disorderly piles of paper, an open check register, discarded paper cups and general chaos.

Mac groaned.

“It’s quite a mess,” a voice behind him said.

Mac turned. “Luke. I didn’t hear you come in.”

Luke focused on the desk. “I can’t remember the last time I saw him in here.”

“That so?”

“He loves being out on the docks, hanging with people, coming up with new ideas to grow the business. It’s this part he tends to forget about.”

Mac heard the affection for his father in Luke’s voice. “The bills getting paid?”

“Doubt it.”

Right in that moment, Mac got it. It made perfect sense. Everyone loved Big Mac. Why not the quiet young man who’d worked for him for twenty summers? “You’ve been making repairs, haven’t you? That’s what you’re spending the money on.”

“What money?”

“The money I’ve seen you pocketing.”

“And of course you thought I was stealing from him,” Luke said, sounding bitter.

“I saw the new beams and couldn’t figure out who would’ve done that. Since he never mentioned it, I figured he didn’t know.”

“The place is a wreck, and I’d tell him, ‘Mac, we need to make some repairs around here.’ He’d say, ‘Oh, come on, Luke. We can get one more year out of it, can’t we?’ We’ve had that same conversation every May for four years.”

Mac smiled. “I can picture it.”

“Since all he wants to do is hang out with his buddies, I started working nights to prop up the roof before it collapsed and killed someone. I was relieved to hear he was finally going to let you replace it. One more good blow and we would’ve been screwed.”

“You did a really good job.”

“Thanks. Let me know what I can do to help with the rest of it.”

“I appreciate that.” After Luke went back to work, Mac stared at the mess on the desk, wondering how he’d manage to get the repairs done and reorganize the business at the same time. “Looks like I got here just in time.”

Mac worked long days that week, spending hours in the hot sun on the roof and taking home stacks of paper from the office every night to sort through. He quickly discovered the business was in arrears to just about every major supplier and talked to his father about writing some checks.

“Go right ahead,” Big Mac said. “You got the same name I do. Sign away.”

“Is there money in the account?”

“Plenty.”

“Is there a bank statement lying around somewhere so I can confirm that?”

Big Mac gestured to the office. “In there somewhere.”