Page 28 of Daydreams & Doughnut Cake

She could be quite sneaky at times, too.

I remembered once during our first year at uni, Danny had been quite keen on a girl called Jasmine in his tutorial group. We used to tease him about her and egg him on to ask her out, but he never would because he thought she was out of his league. The one day, Clare and I were in the kitchen and the landline phone in the hallway rang. Clare went out to answer it and from the conversation drifting through, I knew it was Danny’s crush and I remembered feeling quite excited for him.

‘What was that about?’ I asked eagerly when Clare came back into the kitchen. ‘Was it Jasmine?’

‘Yeah.’ She shrugged. ‘She wanted to talk to Danny about some assignment they have to do.’

‘Right. So did you say you’d pass on the message?’

She nodded and went back to what she’d been doing.

Then one evening a few weeks later, Danny came back from lectures and asked me if I’d taken a call from Jasmine.

I looked up from watching TV, thinking it must have been the call Clare had answered.

I was about to say so, when Danny shrugged and said, ‘Jasmine said she phoned to ask me if I wanted to go to a gig with her at the student union. But when she didn’t hear back from me, she assumed I wasn’t interested.’

‘Oh, right. Well... no, I haven’t spoken to her.’But Clare definitely did!

‘She wasn’t sure who took the message but apparently she mentioned the gig?’ He shrugged. ‘I’ve asked Clare but it wasn’t her. So I guess it must have been Jackie.’ He’d grinned, not really looking too fussed about it. ‘Just my luck, eh? I get asked out by the girl of my dreams and the message doesn’t get through.’

I’d chuckled and said maybe it was time he was brave and askedherout next time. And Danny smiled and said maybe I was right.

I never told anyone about Clare not passing on the message to Danny. I didn’t want to stir things. And it was fine anyway because hedideventually ask Jasmine out and they were together for a few months, which was a bit of a record for Danny!

But I’d got the measure of Clare then. She obviously liked Danny herself and didn’t want another girl getting her hands on him so she’d lied about the whole thing.

I could never really trust her after that.

It was strange because in other ways, Clare was lovely and she could be great fun to be around. She was really kind and thoughtful at times.

I remembered particularly the weekend of Mark’s last birthday. We were in the middle of a heatwave in July and we decided to have a picnic in the park to toast his special day.

So we met up, the five of us, and I remember we were amazed when Clare arrived red-faced and perspiring because she’d somehow lugged an icebox all the way over from where she was living, which was a train journey away.

When we commented that it looked really heavy, she set it down with a sigh and said she hoped it would be worth it.

‘What have you got in there?’ grinned birthday boy Mark. ‘Is it champagne by any chance?’

Clare smiled at him. ‘What’s your favourite snack, Mark?’

‘Er . . . I think you all know.’

‘Doughnuts!’ we all chorused, laughing.

Clare nodded. ‘So I thought instead of baking a boring Victoria sandwich birthday cake, why not make Mark a cake he’ll never, ever forget?’ Her eyes sparkling with enthusiasm, Clare opened the icebox and drew it out. Wrapped in white tissue paper, it was standing on a base, which she placed carefully on the picnic blanket between us all. Then she carefully removed the wrap and revealed the ‘cake’, and we all gasped in amazement.

It was a pyramid shape made up of doughnuts, each one topped with pink or white icing. She’d used icing to fix them carefully together and then drizzled white chocolate over the whole magnificent ‘cake’, sprinkling edible stars on top as a final flourish.

Needless to say, Mark was in ecstasies at the very sight of it and much of the pyramid was demolished that afternoon, washed down with the champagne we’d brought with us.

That afternoon stands out in my memory for several reasons.

Firstly, of course, there was Clare’s magnificent birthday cake.

And then there was the fact that it was such a beautiful, perfect day and the Famous Five were all together again.

But there was another, sad reason it sticks in my memory.

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