Page 68 of The Cake Fairies
Chapter Thirty
ANNABELLE
“Y
ou’re likely to get yourselves thrown out, of course, but sugar really isn’t the root of all evil.” Annabelle cradled her head in her hands.
Amber Magnolia was only asking them to dole out cake at a succession of Newcastle dentists. This had to be a prank. Annabelle had even double-checked the date on the calendar, fearing that April had snuck up on her unawares.
“We’ll be a laughingstock. They’ll call The Fuzz. She can’t be serious.” Polly’s eyes had grown to Bambi proportions.
But no, it really was January the fourth. And 2020. Which meant that, at home Annabelle would have missed the ringing in of the seventies by four whole days. Even if she now knew, from her brief spouts of historical research, that the eighties could only dream of playing second fiddle to the sixties, her heart sank with loss at the great swathes of her life that had unfairly passed her by.
Prince, Queen, Madonna: she’d missed the birth of them all. Admittedly, she was less bothered on the Chesney Hawkes front: Chip’s son was no match for his father’s band.
Besides which, practically everyone – okay, practically everyone with the exception of carefree kids – would be playing sheep and avoiding calories all over again;stillnot making the connection from their last ten attempts over the last decade of New Years, that dietsdidnot work.
“Roll on this year, that’s all I can say. I for one can’t wait to get back to the common sense of my old life,” Annabelle said with a weary sigh.
But Polly’s melancholy also pervaded the room. Home was where the heart was. And hers was marooned here in the new millennium. So, no matter which way Annabelle turned, there was no escaping her guilt. However many times she tried to console herself with the fact that she was essentially a kind person (playing agony aunt to Ivy and the pickle that was her life), and however much she tried to grapple with her thoughts, everything would come flying back like a boomerang. Annabelle had screwed up her cousin’s chance of happiness.
And all because Annabelle had tried to keep Polly happy, by turning down her own chances for romance. A flawed premise which had backfired very badly.
Annabelle had been a people pleaser for too long. That wasn’t her fault. Many were the times she could have followed any one of the paths to her own letters in love. But she hadn’t. Instead she’d grown bitter and seriously twisted.
But it was too late for regrets, even if Annabelle had had the luxury of time.
Another day: another giant cupcake to deliver to an unsuspecting surgery.
They’d taken it in turns with this month’s challenge. Polly had deposited yesterday’s mammoth vanilla chai cupcake at the private dental practice on the edge of one of Newcastle’s most sought-after districts, to a rapturous round of applause. The receptionist had obviously been having a very relaxed day. She’d even been kind enough, and dismissive enough of the potential for cavities, to produce bags and napkins so that treats could be enjoyed at home – some complimentary floss and mouthwash besides. And today Annabelle was mirthlessly undoing the good work of the state system.
She stealthily crept into the fuchsia-wallpapered waiting room of her destination, thankful there was no assembly required for her white currant and rhubarb cupcake, placed it next to the pile of battered magazines that had seen better days, and made to tiptoe out of the room, with a fleeting backward glance to appreciate the Cake Fairies’ stellar efforts of the morning. Those tiny white berries gleamed like the most expensive Mallorcan pearls, it had to be said.
But, for the first time since they’d set off on this daft debacle, nobody – not a solitary soul – acknowledged her gift. There was not a peep. No, they stubbornly remained glued to their mobiles, intent on crushing poxy virtual candy in their hopelessly childish games.
A palpable red mist coiled itself around Annabelle: they’d spent hours putting this gem together. Hours. She’d individually studded those precious berries, exactly one centimetre apart for maximum dazzle effect. Besides all of that: had these people no idea how much two kilos of white currants flipping well cost these days?
“What’s wrong with you all?” she heard herself screech.
Silence.
“I said, what the flaming hell is the matter with you blithering idiots?” Her head grimaced at her mouth.What was she playing at?
Somebody coughed. A solitary male half raised a hoop-pierced eyebrow and wiped his nose with his tissue before stuffing it back in his leather jacket, shuffling in his seat, and refocusing on his screen.
“I hate this place,” thundered Annabelle. “And I hate all of you… why, you’re nothing but ignorant and ungrateful. Don’t you realise the riches you have in front of you?”
An alarm sounded. Feet scuttled immediately down the stairs, a male dentist armed with a vicious-looking needle stampeded towards Annabelle, and she let out a shriek to rival the war-like tone of the surgery’s alarm system.
“What on earth is going on here?Sherry?”
Annabelle guessed Sherry was the receptionist, not a request for an alcoholic tipple to come to terms with her tempestuous theatrics. As much as she could have done with a fortifying glass herself, she didn’t hang around to see if she was right.
