Page 14 of The Wedding Cake
“Cold black coffee,” Tim finished her sentence but because of the scald he sounded like he’d just returned from the dentist after a root canal.
“Yes, that. Exactly.Just no.” Freya shook her head and Tim sensed she was trying like mad to ward off her own laughter.
“Or cold black coffee without sugar in it to take the edge off.” Tim partially recovered his standard voice.
“Now you’re a mind reader!” cried Freya, pointing at him animatedly.
Tim wasn’t sure why this particular exchange of words or actions was so funny, but it was as if the pair of them had gotten tipsy on caffeine fumes. He could tell that Freya was waiting for him to explode in a fit of giggles, her eyes twinkling expectantly, and he felt his eyes crinkle and his mouth contort in response. Damn, he could never pull off a classic Bruce Willis smirk. Once his lips twitched he was a goner. And now the two of them were both done for; hopeless cases laughing so hard they were practically crying. Tim had to reach for a serviette to dab at the corners of his eyes. What a prat!
Eventually they straightened themselves up and got back to business. Tim felt like a new man. Like somebody had given him a hardcore Swedish massage. All of the tension in his shoulders had melted away. Freya nipped into the cakery and returned with a green book full of wedding cake orders, a blunt pencil attached to its cover with Sellotape. It had definitely seen better days and looked totally out of place with the rest of her sleek business. She put it on the table and went to return to the kitchen for plates, forks, napkins and cake samples but Tim found he couldn’t let her. It was ridiculous when he was technically her client, but for some reason they felt more like friends than supplier and customer. He felt lazy sitting around while this dynamic woman waited on him hand and foot. He’d made himself a right burden turning up so early, the least he could do was earn his keep.
“Oh, all right then,” Freya relented after Tim’s third plea to help. “I could use an extra pair of hands. But we’d better be quick. I can’t risk any of my staff seeing me breaking all my own rules. We would never usually show our brides or grooms around any part of the kitchen. It’s top secret! But just for today I’ll let you have a sneak peek at the decorating room.”
Tim followed Freya into the cakery and up the stairs, once again berating himself for wishing they could get off the subject of his nuptials (and for admiring Freya’s peach of a derriere). The decorating room was incredible. He’d seen a few of thoseAmazing Wedding Cakesepisodes on TV. Piper had cooed at the beautiful works of art and he’d found it all a bit over the top. But now he was in a similar kitchen, he found he had to agree with her assessment. Impressively complex cake designs decorated the walls on pin boards, and three wedding cakes in various stages of construction lay waiting for their grand finales. The colours were an assault on the senses: a four-tier marbled rainbow cake, a cake dotted with sprigs of lavender that looked in need of a little more frosting on its surface – Tim supposed it was one of those ‘naked’ layer cakes he’d heard Piper talking about – and a square triple-tier Battenburg wedding cake with a giant pink bow on top. That one really made his mouth water. His gran often served shop-bought Battenburg when he went to her house for Saturday tea.
“We wouldn’t leave anything standing about like this for long, I assure you. The staff are on staggered lunch breaks and the first will return in about fifteen minutes.” Freya checked her watch. “The moment the cakes need chilling, they are taken next door to the giant walk-in fridge. Oh, and we’ll deliver your cake chilled all the way to the villa too. We have two refrigerated vans and we time the delivery just right so the cake has thirty minutes to reach room temperature once it’s at the venue. That way the filling has softened and it’s perfect to eat. We normally do all of this behind the scenes while the bride and groom are having their photos taken, so you won’t even know we’re there.” Freya winked.
Tim let her words go in one ear and out the other. Except the last few.He wanted to know Freya was there!And right now all he wanted to do was get back to the courtyard and eat cake with her: carrot cake, white chocolate champagne cake, lemon drizzle cake, coconut lime cake, vanilla cake. Drip cakes streaked with glossy chocolate sauce, naked layer cakes decorated with daisies and buttercups, metallic cakes, marble cakes, vegan and gluten-free cakes.All the cakes and all the conversation. Tim didn’t want this afternoon to end.
It wasn’t that he thought Freya was one to overindulge in the sweet stuff, but yet again he felt curiously compelled to compare her to Piper. Freya was blatantly an everything-in-moderation kind of woman, whilst his fiancée pecked at her food like a bird or pushed it around her plate ungratefully. Tim missed the simple pleasure of enjoying food together in a relationship. It reminded him of the no-frills dates with his teenage love interests. Shared fish and chips smothered in salt and vinegar on the seafront in Southport. Giggles and banter as the seagulls swooped. It was back to that seesaw analogy again. Although none of his week- or month-long ‘relationships’ had been the building blocks of future marriage material, he’d been on equal terms with the girls he’d dated back in his teens. The many posh meals he’d eaten out with Piper, on the other hand, always resulted in him feeling like a porker as he savoured all three of his courses and she either tapped away at her phone after eating just half of her mains, sank too many bubbles, or looked at him (and his appetite) as if he was a three-headed alien.
“Of course, the pastry kitchen is air conditioned too,” Freya continued, and Tim thought better of himself, vowing to transform back to the groom-to-be that he should be.
“That’s really cool.” Tim could have slapped his forehead at his lame pun. “I mean it’s an inspiring thing you’ve got going here. The creativity is amazing.”
“Yes and no. I mean – yes.” Freya quickly fired out the latter.
“But you saidno?” Tim knitted his brow and found himself planting his hands on his hips.
Freya sighed deeply and his heart nipped; he just wanted to pull her into his arms for a giant hug. She looked like she needed it.
“Like everything, there’s always a trade-off. At least as far as I am concerned; let’s just say I haven’t had much free time over the past few years. But you can’t have it all, as the saying goes.”
“Why not?” It was none of his business and yet he couldn’t help but probe – anything to tease out the conversation.
“Well… I… erm… I just don’t think that anyone can have their cake and eat it – for want of a better cliché.” Freya folded her arms and gazed at the ceiling. “I am comfortable, even by Marbella’s standards. But I have little time to enjoy it.”
“I can kind of see what you mean. Piper’s bank balance seems to multiply overnight.”Why did he have to bring his girlfriend into this?And what a cringey thing to say. “But there’s never any time off to just, you know…be.”
“That’s a hard relate.”
Time seemed to stand still between them and Tim’s mind went blank. He had no idea how to fill the silence. His mind was a mess, flitting from hope to betrayal to guilt to lust in a vicious circle of frivolity. After a beat, Freya blinked rapidly, snapping herself back to the moment. She set a thick round cake smothered in peaks of frosting before him. Returning with a large cake knife, she instructed Tim to cut an eighth of the cake into even-sized cubes. Then she returned with a posh cake stand. “If you can add the pieces to this, that would be great.”
But Tim hadn’t racked up a great deal of experience cutting cakes. He wasn’t sure whether he should go straight down the middle of the cake or hack off some of the sponge at the sides.Freya had said ‘pieces’, hadn’t she?And a piece was a slice. He’d best cut this like a regular cake then; the way he’d seen his mam and gran do it.
He made a tentative dent in the snow-white covering and gently eased his way into the soft beetroot-red sponge with the knife… but then a movie reel flashed through his mind and he couldn’t help but imagine Piper’s hands beneath his, just as they would be on the wedding day with the camera, a drone, a video recorder (and a glut of mobile phones) pointed at them, everyone watching expectantly. Tim’s breath hitched in his throat and he panicked, completely losing his focus. The knife plunged into the red velvet sponge cake at an angle and he tried to pull it out gently to maintain a straight line without causing any damage, but it was stuck, despite all his efforts… which was pathetic, and beyond humiliating. If he was a contestant on one of those reality TV baking programmes, he’d be sent home in the first round. He exhaled slowly and had another go with a little more force, willing the beautiful cake not to collapse on him, but of course that’s exactly what happened, and now he had a mini avalanche on his hands.
“Freya, I’m so sorry. I’ve made a total hash of cutting this sponge!”
Freya left her own caramel-hued cake and walked over to assess the damage. Tim was hyper-aware of her, now they were standing so close together. The clean, zesty and intoxicating smell of her perfume (so different from the overpowering one Piper doused herself in), her body heat, the brush of their arms as she stepped forward to inspect the disaster…
“Well… How to say this kindly, bearing in mind you are a client?” she laughed. “It might not have style anymore, but my cakes always have substance.” Tim couldn’t help but nudge Freya playfully, catching a definite blush as he peeped at her through his fringe. “Besides, nothing will go to waste. Just cube up the rubble as best you can and plonk a few bits on the cake stand.”Cube!That’s what she had asked him to do in the first place. What a muppet he was. He turned his head to see Freya’s own perfect specimens on the work surface behind him. He’d only ever had to emulate her style, chopping a wedge off the side of the cake’s circumference instead of going all in as if he were at his own wedding. A chill ran through him then and he wasn’t sure if the sensation came from the W word or the fact that Freya had disappointingly walked out of his orbit. “I work with a charity that distributes food to the homeless, families who have lost their jobs due to the pandemic, and Ukrainian refugees,” Freya added. “So all of today’s leftovers and trimmings will be recycled – so to speak.”
There was no showing off in that statement. Freya only mentioned it in passing, and doubtless wouldn’t have at all, if Tim hadn’t cut the cake so messily. But the words rooted him to the spot.Why hadn’t that occurred to him before?Piper earned huge sums of money and, as far as he knew, she didn’t give anything to charity. Not a penny. Okay, he knew he shouldn’t jump to conclusions, he was only ninety-nine percent certain this was the truth. There was always a one percent chance that she did, in fact, throw herself into philanthropy while nobody was looking. But this was Piper. Everything was for show. Everything was a profile raiser. No, Tim would lower the philanthropic endeavours stats to 0.01%. That felt more realistic.
“What’s up?” asked Freya, and Tim couldn’t help but marvel at the way they were constantly concerned for each other’s wellbeing. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“I-I… no, I’m fine. It’s just been a tiring trip, that’s all. And phew… I’m glad that the remainder of these cakes are going to a good home. That’s heartwarming. Tell me more about it.”
