Page 42 of The Gingerbread Cafe
‘Ferret basically means thief,’ Gretel muttered, choosing to ignore Amber’s jesting. ‘He keeps running off with the crystals you’ve been giving me, Phoebe.’
Phoebe nodded as she rubbed the green crystal pendant around her neck. ‘We often seek out the crystals we need. Have you ever considered that his chakras might be unbalanced? I have a lady who buys crystals for her dog, Cedric. He’s got such a problem with loneliness. He wears black obsidian in a bandana around his neck …’
‘Has he tried getting actual company?’ asked Amber.
‘His owner’s often on retreats.’
If Phoebe was the huffy sort, she probably would have huffed. Gretel knew she wanted to.
Eve butted between them with a soapy cloth and began wiping the worktop where Angel Gabriel had made his mad dash. ‘So, Gretel. Apart from the fact you’re probably breaking rules about ferrets in kitchens, why haven’t you invited your hot chef to help you with your baking experiments tonight? Are they running him into the ground at that restaurant of his?’
‘Told you she was psychic,’ Amber winked.
Gretel handed out the drinks and popped a selection of Lukas’s latest chewy choc chip and gingerbread cookies on a plate, wondering absent-mindedly when he’d get over his hang-ups and just make some cute gingerbread people. ‘He is really busy. But also …’ She picked over her words.
‘Eve will tell us what you’re thinking even if you don’t.’ Amber shrugged. ‘You may as well spill the tea.’
Angel Gabriel squeak-clucked his agreement and Eve shot them both a look.
‘You’re welcome to share your thoughts with us,’ said Phoebe, moving over to squeeze Gretel’s arm. ‘We’re your friends now, like it or not. And having a new friendship group is a noveltyfor all of us. In a quiet village like Mistleton you don’t get many people wanting to talk to the funny chakra lady.’
‘Or the girl with skulls on her dress and the woman who chats to dead people,’ Amber added. ‘Believe me.’
‘Maybe I’ll make a lapis lazuli bandana for a certain person’s throat chakra,’ said Phoebe in her serene voice that always balanced out Amber’s cheek.
On the plus side, Gretel realised that anything she said was likely to be less outrageous than Amber’s outpourings. So as she began weighing out her ingredients and grating her spices into little bowls like she’d seen Lukas do, she felt moved to divulge a few truths to her unlikely group of friends, even if her thoughts weren’t yet fully formed.
Chapter 35
‘Ido love having Lukas around,’ Gretel confided. Just the thought of him filled her with a fizzy, warm glow. ‘But heisa trained head chef. My baking has been going well and I want to prove to myself I can do this. These stained-glass gingerbread biscuits are brand new to me and trickier than anything I’ve tried before. It would be incredible to have a few signature bakes I can call my own.’ The delicious scent from the cinnamon stick wafted up as she pushed it against the grater.
Phoebe nodded. ‘It will do wonders for your growing confidence, although I definitely have some crystals for that.’
If Gretel could succeed with these eye-catching biscuits, with their melted boiled-sweet centres that looked like coloured glass, she would feel even more positive about her preparations for the Mistleton February Fair. She had a whole lot to live up to.
‘Not to mention you don’t want to place all your delicate eggs into one man’s rickety basket,’ said Eve, as Gretel cracked a large free-range one and congratulated herself that she didn’t lose bits of shell. ‘You want to know you can stand on your own two feet. Putting so much trust in one person can be terrifying. And I hope none of you discover how it feels to have your fragile trust trodden on by someone you thought you loved.’ The last sentence came out as a whisper and Gretel wasn’t sure the others had heard it. Eve looked out of the window into the dark night,not seeming bothered when her hot chocolate misted up her wise-woman glasses and hid her eyes from view.
‘Cooking is just about confidence, so my … flatmate always says,’ said Amber, before Gretel could ask Eve if she wanted to talk. But maybe Eve’s thoughts had been private.
Gretel nodded. She did feel more self-assured tonight. Her hands were moving deftly like an artist’s, preparing her materials ready to create. Maybe with these small steps she was finding her feet, even if she sometimes felt unstable without the comforts of Christmas and guilty that her memories might be fading.
‘Are you even old enough to have a flatmate?’ Phoebe narrowed her eyes at Amber.
‘Yeah, obvs,’ Amber replied, thrusting another cookie onto Phoebe’s plate. ‘Now feed your cake-hole chakra.’
If it was a distraction technique, it worked. After a calming breath, Phoebe took a bite and groaned. ‘Mmm, I think I’d be anybody’s in a cherry picker if they could bake like this. So what else is eating you? Because instinct tells me there’s still something.’ She was narrowing her eyes again in that way that made Gretel wonder if she had X-ray vision.
Although she hadn’t realised it, Amber’s caution from earlier had been playing on her mind. And now Eve was warning about trust too. ‘When it comes to the café, what if Lukas is still Team Whimple? Business is business, and he might still sell it to that monster,’ Gretel heard herself admit.
Amber pulled a face. ‘Yep, that bit still sucks. But I’ve told you to think about buying him out if he’s so desperate to sell.’
Gretel placed her cubed butter and sugar into the mixing bowl and began to whisk, the electrical whizz churning up her thoughts. Did Amber have a point? Because now she was finally getting her head around baking, the process wasn’t so frightening at all. The preparations were systematic, and whenyou got to the hands-on bit it was actually quite satisfying. Maybe if she approached all scary life goals in that way … ‘One step at a time,’ she shouted to Amber above the din, before she could get carried away with herself. ‘The café doesn’t make much money yet, so buying anyone out could only ever be a distant hope. And Lukas would have to be willing to wait for me to build the funds and to put his own dreams on hold.’ She switched off the noisy gadget. ‘It wouldn’t feel right asking him to do that.’
‘Sometimes dreams change,’ said Eve, simply.
After just witnessing her ingredients turn from impossibly rigid to light and creamy with a few spins of the whisk, Gretel dared to wonder if that could be true. And as she added her once delicate egg she noticed that when she mixed it with care the transformation could be almost as smooth as silk. Soon she was sprinkling in her freshly zested clementine and fragrant spices and realising that it really did take all sorts to bring something magical together.
For once Gretel resisted her impulse to ignore the suggestions in her recipe and race on. Instead, she let the dough rest in the fridge, like she’d learned to do, whilst she and her friends moved around the kitchen, tidying, cleaning and flouring the surfaces ready to roll and cut out the shapes. Gretel was going to make winter flowers and use boiled sweets in happy shades of yellow to make the stained-glass centres. She would hand-craft daffodils and winter roses in intricate shapes and if things went well, she might even ice them in different shades. She had a steady hand and a determined heart, so surely it was worth a shot?
