Page 253 of Delicious

“Good morning,” said a gentle, polite voice, belonging to a man in a blue shirt with a waistcoat over the top, his dark hair pulled back into a neat, plaited bun. “Can I help you?”

“Oh, yeah, my friend booked us a table but I don’t think he’s here yet.”

There was the sound of a bell and a blast of cool air as the door opened behind me, and I turned to see Riley pushing back the hood of his coat and pulling off a black beanie. “Morning,” he said as he shook out his hair and ran his fingers through it, pushing it back off his face. His smile was warm and softened the harsher lines of his broad face. Not that they needed softening. He always looked gorgeous to me. “You managed to avoid getting soaked then?”

“Just about,” I said, returning his smile as butterflies fluttered inside my chest, like they were trying to whip up a wind to match the torrential spring rain. “I remembered my umbrella at least.”

Riley nodded and looked at the man in the waistcoat. “Morning Scott, I booked a table for breakfast.”

“I wondered if it was you,” Scott said as he gathered up some menus and smiled at us. “If you want to pop your umbrella in the stand, I’ll take you to your table.” He gestured at the umbrella stand by the door, which I noticed was painted with little ducks holding umbrellas and wearing yellow wellies. It was so fucking adorable I almost wanted to take a picture.

I slotted my umbrella into it and followed Scott and Riley to a little table by the wall, sliding myself onto the wooden chair and giving myself a second to look around as Scott put menus down in front of us and pointed to a chalk board on the wall which had a couple of specials written across it in neat script. The bell rang again as the door opened and another group of people entered with more behind them, so Scott bustled off leaving the two of us alone.

“This place is gorgeous,” I said. “I’ve been past a few times but I’ve never been in. Mostly because it’s closed whenever I walk past.”

Riley chuckled softly, the sound reminding me of thunder rumbling in the distance. “I don’t think many places around here open at four in the morning.”

“Sadly not, although I suppose it saves me a lot of money. If there was a coffee shop open at that time, I’d be in there every day.”

“Are you always up early?”

“Pretty much,” I said, pulling at my lip. “My insomnia means I struggle falling and staying asleep. Sometimes I’ll only sleep for two or three hours at a time, sometimes it’s more. The best days are when I manage something like five. Six is a fucking miracle and usually only happens when I’m really ill. Usually, I’ll end up napping in the afternoon, which I know I shouldn’t do but sometimes I can’t help it. Luckily my job is pretty flexible so nobody notices if I disappear for a few hours to sleep.”

“That sounds rough,” Riley said, pursing his lips together and nodding, and I was glad there were no comments of the “have you tried…” variety. I knew people thought they were trying to be helpful, but sometimes it was like they thought I was an idiot or just wasn’t trying hard enough. As if I could suddenly fix my chronic medical issue with the power of positive thinking. “What do you do for work?”

“I translate romance novels into German, and occasionally French. My dad worked for a German company as an engineer, so we lived there for a long time and I went to German schools until I was sixteen, and my mum is French, so I grew up speaking both languages alongside English. And I always liked reading. I kind of fell into translating by accident about ten years ago, but I love it. I can’t imagine doing anything else.”

I looked at him, watching for a reaction. Waiting for the almost inevitable laughter or dismissal of the genre I loved and poured my heart into every time I opened my laptop, waiting for the disdain or comments of “isn’t that just porn for women?”. I desperately wanted Riley to be different from all the others, but common experience had taught me that even the nicest looking men could be misogynistic, derisive pricks.

“That’s awesome,” Riley said, as a smile broke out across his face. It was warm and genuine, and there was a sparkling light in his eyes that I’d rarely seen before. “I don’t read much, and my language skills are whatever the fuck I can dredge up from high school—like asking where the swimming pool is or some shit—so the fact you can take a whole book and translate it? That’s really fucking cool!”

“Thanks,” I said, unsure if the heat in my face was embarrassment or just the warmth of the room. “What about you? How did you get in to making bread? Lifelong dream?”

“Nope, total fucking accident,” he said. “I saw a video on TikTok of someone making bread and thought it looked fun, and I was bored out of my skull at this bar job I was working, so I gave it a go on my day off and that was it. Soon as I started kneading the dough, I knew I had to see where this went. I mean, that first loaf was kind of shit in all honesty but it didn’t matter, because all I could think of was that I needed to do it again. So I did. And then it kind of became an obsession.”

He chuckled fondly and shook his head. “Got to the point where I was making more bread than I knew what to do with and giving it away, because I didn’t want to eat it, I just wanted to perfect it. I think all my neighbours loved it because I’d turn up at their front door with whatever I’d made and ask if they wanted it. Then someone said I should start selling it, and it all went from there. Started with a market stall and then opened Toasty last year.”

“I love that though. You found something you’re passionate about and turned it into something amazing.”

“Not sure if it’s passion or obsession at this point,” he said. “Might be a bit of both.”

“Either way, it’s awesome.”

We smiled at each other, and when Scott reappeared a moment later, we both realised we hadn’t even looked at the menu. I ordered a pot of breakfast tea, and Riley a gingerbread latte, and Scott promised to come back in a minute.

“Anything you’d recommend?” I asked as I read, already torn between at least three different options.

“The Bramble Breakfast is really good,” Riley said. “So are the pancakes and French toast if you like sweet things. And their smashed avocado with feta and egg is lush.”

“Do you provide the sourdough they use?”

He shook his head. “No, we’re not really a big enough operation. It might be something we look at in the future, but for now it’s just the shop.”

“I guess you’d need a bigger kitchen?”

“Yeah, ours is good enough for now but I’d need to find something bigger if we wanted to do more.”

“And then how would I come and watch you through the window?” I asked with a wry smile. “I’m sure you’d miss having some weirdo appear outside in the dark with a paper sign.”

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