“Yeah about that, we’ve come up with a plan.”
“Who is “we”?”
“Me and Oliver.” Drew points first to himself and then to Oliver, a proud smile on his lips, like he’d just solved some of the world’s greatest problems and it wasn’t going to take much more than sticky tape and dental floss.
“Ah, Drew, can I have a word with you in private?” Without giving him a chance to answer I yank him by the arm a few metres away from where we had all be standing. “What are you thinking?”
“I was thinking you needed some help and well since Ollie is “on leave”,” Drew air quotes, “He would be the best candidate to help you. Thought it would be good for you to you know, take advantage of him.” I can only shake my head in disbelief, “C’mon, Dase, you need the help and he’s already claimed he wants to help you in your time of need.” Drew is now unable to contain his chuckle, looking past him I can see Oliver has heard the whole conversation and is doing his best not to let out a chuckle of his own.
“Fine!” Stating it loud enough for both brothers to hear, “He can help but what I say goes, I’m the boss, no arguments, no smartarsey-ness and no flirting.” Both boys come to attention and offer a salute as if I was their superior. I file away that thought for later when I am borderline wanting to strangle them both with a single hand.
* * *
Drew takes a coffee in each hand and with a cheers gesture, he disappears out the front door.
“Why are you helping me?” Crossing my arms I set my eyes on Oliver who had already started to lift chairs down of their tables. Pausing, he turns to me and shrugs.
“I still need another one hundred and twenty-four cupcakes.” He states as a matter of fact as if it was as simple as that. The shop surroundings were familiar of Sweet Nothing’s but I feared it had morphed before my very eyes into the lion’s den and I had just as easily become the prey.
21
oLIVER
* * *
Drew was a mother fucking genius, I had to give him much more credit in the future. His idea and powers of persuasion with Daisy had single handed got me a foot in the door, figuratively and literally.
Finally, Daisy needed something I could give her and she had been cornered into giving me something I wanted and needed from her, her time. I only felt a little guilty for forcing her into the decision, but that will be easily forgotten on the one hundred and fiftieth cupcake.
“So, Boss, what’s first?”
Daisy answers by rolling her eyes and turns on her heel to head in the direction of the kitchen.
“Are you coming or what?”
Before she starts digging out varieties of ingredients she tosses at me an apron, her eyes are smiling at me and the reason becomes apparent when I unfold the apron, it would have to be the frilliest and floweriest apron I had ever seen and scrolled across the chest in cursive writing were the words Nothing is as Sweet as a Grandma. Internally I groan, it was a real kick to the balls but I wasn’t going to let such a thing as an emasculating fabric design detour me from the new plan. Drew and I had agonised the details, I knew I would wear the full brunt of the plan from Daisy and her contempt for me but I was willing to wear the glares and the eye rolls as my own personal badge of honour.
“I saw the cake you made for the bake sale, should I fear for my business’s reputation?” Measuring out ingredients, I pause and turn to her,
“That was definitely a mystery of humanity. Trust me, I’m good at following instructions. Aspects of my job depend on it.” A shadow crosses her face but she doesn’t say anything. My job was clearly a sore point between us, she still believed I picked it over her and I’m yet to work out how to convince her otherwise and unless I do that I have no chance of getting her to come back to the city with me. “Okay, so what’s next?”
“You know I can’t afford to pay you right?”
“I would be happy if you just paid me in cupcakes.” Cupcakes would be a bonus right now, because what I really wanted I was getting in spades. To see her and we were talking. Daisy walks me through baking cupcakes for the next hour and some of them actually come out of the oven half decent. She won’t let me decorate them, which I can’t fault her for because my single and only attempt was disastrous at best and they were Daisy’s exact words. For someone who worked with sugar on a daily basis, she had no problem leaving the coating of sugar off her critiques. “It’s kind of therapeutic isn’t it?”
“Hmm?”
“Making cupcakes, it’s like making a castle at the beach, creating something kind of beautiful out of something like sand or in this case flour.”
“Yeah, I guess you could look at it that way, huh. For me, it’s continuing the legacy. I’m the third generation to use my grandma’s recipe book. Our love of baking has been passed on and it has and always will be tied up in memories of the two or three of us in the cramped kitchen laughing and chatting and just loving each other, you know?”
The image of Daisy as a little girl in the kitchen with her Mum and Grandma fills my thoughts. “Do you think you’ll have kids to pass your legacy on?”
From the look on her face, I feel like maybe I have crossed the invisible line that was still firmly drawn between us until she breaks her silence and answers. “I used to, I used to think that I would have a baby of my own by now and with any luck, she would have met my Grandma and carry her name but now I don’t think about it so much.”
“Why? What changed?”
“The man I thought I was going to marry and grow old with moved away.” My breath catches in my throat. She looks away, focusing her attention on frosting the cooled cupcake.
“It could still happen for you.” Her gaze comes back to me and there is no mistaking the emotional roller coaster she is on, I can see it in her eyes.
“It’s a nice thought but reality is like iced water, Oliver. That man, he’ll be leaving again soon so there is nothing left for me to do than protect my already fracturing heart and wait for the day he drives back out of town.” Her voice ends in a whisper as she gently places the cake back on the cooling rack, “Excuse me, I need some air.”
Daisy rushes past me in her need to escape, my feet are cemented to the floor as her words wash over me again, I want to run after her but I can’t move. I call her name, which does nothing to slow her down. The timer on the oven is the little motivation I need to move again, pulling the first tray of baked goods from the heat before placing them down on the island bench. What did she mean? If I stayed would she give us another chance? Could I stay knowing I would be giving up the job I love for the woman I love and would that be enough? I knew I couldn’t have both, there is no way I could ask Daisy to leave all this behind, Drew had made that abundantly clear that Fosford is Daisy’s home and everything she loved was already here. If I stayed would she love me too? There is no way I could stay here and see her if she wouldn’t come back to me.
A short time later, Daisy comes back into the kitchen, her cheeks flushed from the early morning air. She doesn’t speak or even looks at me, she simply picks up another cupcake to decorate and once she’s finished with that one she moves on to the next. Together, we work in silence until the first customer arrives.