How to Eat a Cupcake (11 page)

Julia's a vampire
, I'd vented to Becca the other day,
but instead of blood, she sucks the sense of humor right out of me
. And here I was, letting her feed on me again. When push came to shove, did I truly believe Julia had something to do with that graffiti? No. And did I really think she would ever check her pride long enough to apologize for starting those rumors back in high school? No. I refused to spend any more time torturing myself by waiting for something that would never happen. I looked around the shop as she swiped the smudges of mascara from below her eyes. We needed, I realized, to get back to focusing on the business.

“Well,” I said, nodding toward the redwood plank, “at least orange complements our color scheme.”

Julia blinked, then laughed shakily. “Small favors, I guess.” She sniffed, looking around the shop. “It's coming together, isn't it?”

The dark wood floors, though currently coated with dust, gave the shop a richness it hadn't had before. The large, black-steel-framed front window and door were in place, as was the steel-and-glass display counter and shelving units. In the next week the front bar would be installed (assuming the graffiti snafu didn't set things back too long), the dark red Treat logo would be transferred onto the front window and door, the chandelier would go up, and work on the kitchen would be completed. I had already hired two assistant bakers and Julia had hired two women to help manage the register, cupcake counter, and coffee bar.

“We're moving along,” I said.

Julia sighed, clearly relieved. She reached into her oversized leather bag, pulled out her phone, and checked the cupcakery's to-do list. “How are the recipes coming?”

“Fine,” I said. I mentally ran over the menu I'd been creating. “It would be even better if I had my mother's recipe book . . . there's this
tres leches
dessert with rum syrup she used to make that could be an amazing cupcake. And her passion fruit meringue. Remember that?”

“Yes!” Julia cried. “It was heaven. We
have
to find that book. Why don't you come over later in the week and we'll turn the house upside down?”

I nodded. “I guess it couldn't hurt to look again. Maybe third time's a charm.”

“And we should probably do a little taste test of the menu then, too.”

I couldn't help laughing; Julia was all but licking her lips. “Very subtle. I like how you slipped that in.”

“What?” Julia said, widening her eyes innocently. “I'll supply the cups of milk and flutes of champagne.” She looked down at the list on her phone again. “How about the vendors—produce, flour, etcetera. You've been in contact with them, right?”

“Yup. I told you, Julia, I'll handle
all
of the baking-related stuff, including food purveyors. I know who to call and where to shop. That's my wheelhouse. You don't have to worry.”

“Perfect.” Julia typed a note into her phone and dropped it into her bag. She hesitated, pressing her lips together in a manner that made her look disturbingly like her mother. “Listen, Annie,” she said, “that graffiti . . . it really is just a bizarre coincidence. You believe me, don't you?”

Her eyes still glistened faintly and as I looked at her, even knowing full well that she was the master of false sincerity, I felt my shoulders finally loosen and fall from the tense position they'd assumed from the moment I'd seen that graffiti. It was exhausting being angry with her all the time, and she really did appear, whatever her motives, to be trying to make things right. “Yes,” I told her, realizing that, despite my better judgment, it was true. I actually did believe her.

Chapter 10

Julia

“J
ulia St. Clair, if you miss one more wedding appointment I'm going to lose my mustard!” my mother's voice rasped through my car's speakers when I called her after I'd pulled away from the cupcakery. I couldn't help smiling at the mixed metaphor. It was one of my mother's favorites, passed down from her own mother and her mother's mother before that as though the words “lose my mustard” were as precious as heirloom jewelry. I suspected I'd let the saying die with my mother.

“I'll be there! I promise,” I said as I navigated the streets of the Mission, turning onto Dolores Street with its palm-lined divider and stomach-roiling hills. I was in a good mood after the way my meeting with Annie had ended, even if our cupcakery was under siege by some Mission hoodlums.

“Just how late are you going to be, Julia? At least give me that courtesy.”

I glanced at the clock on the dashboard. “Twenty minutes. Maybe less. I'm on Dolores.”

“You're still in the Mission?” my mother barked. “Are you driving the Mercedes? Lock the doors. And please get off the phone and concentrate! I don't know why you didn't just let Curtis drive you. That's exactly why we
employ
him.
He
would have made sure you were back safe and sound and on the dot.”

Lock your doors.
I had, in fact, locked the doors the moment I'd entered the car back on Twentieth Street, but even I recognized how these words sounded coming from my mother. “Stop worrying. I'll be there,” I repeated. I ended the call and pressed down on the gas pedal.

And I really did intend to go to that meeting with the wedding photographer. I was as mentally prepared as I'd ever be to pore over the photographer's portfolio, discuss the proper ratio of formal portraits to photojournalistic shots, and determine which overpriced package was overpriced enough to handle the demands of a St. Clair wedding. But as I idled at a light a few blocks from the cupcakery, a slim woman in narrow jeans and a gorgeous, funnel-sleeved tweed coat walked in front of my car with a baby strapped snug against her chest. The road wavered. I pressed my eyes shut as a black wave of despair swelled and crashed inside of me, splintering my heart into a thousand throbbing pieces. A horn blared behind me and I managed to pull over through a blur of tears before I dropped my head to the steering wheel. I wasn't sure I'd ever felt so alone in my entire life.

After what felt like an eternity, I finally caught my breath. In the visor mirror I saw that bluish circles had appeared under my eyes and the skin on my cheeks looked sallow and dry. I noticed a freckle near my temple that I'd never seen before.
And on top of everything, I'm aging
. I sighed. What would my mother say if she saw my skin in this condition? Lolly St. Clair, who had a standing monthly appointment at the dermatologist and had every freckle, every mole, and every minuscule spot removed immediately upon detection? My mother accused these skin imperfections of being scouts for the Grim Reaper.
Who wants to see little calling cards from Monsieur Death all over her body?
she'd ask, shaking her head with disdain when telling me about a friend of hers who didn't take care of the spots that appeared along her décolletage.

Clearly, I was in no state to see my mother. But if I didn't go to the meeting with the photographer, where would I go?

T
he 500 Club was a dive bar on the corner of Guerrero and Seventeenth streets that Jake Logan recommended when I told him where I was. It was dark and nearly empty, without even the remotest possibility of anyone I knew walking in. In other words, it was perfect.

“We have to keep meeting like this,” Jake said when he slid into the seat across from me. I could smell the sweet, earthy scent of the scotch in his hand as he leaned across the table to kiss my cheek. We hadn't seen each other since that day at the Balboa Café in June; the padding of a few weeks' distance between meetings contributed to an unplanned, casual vibe that I welcomed. “Which appointment are we dodging today?”

“Photographer. My mother can handle it, though. She knows what I want.”

Jake's blue-green eyes narrowed. “Do
you
?”

“Hmm?” I sipped my drink and scanned the bar. An enormous, bearded man in a leather biker jacket sat on one of the farthest stools, a fluffy white shih tzu panting happily on the seat beside him.

“Do
you
know what you want?” Jake asked. “It doesn't take a detective to figure out that you're avoiding everything related to your wedding. Don't get me wrong—I love seeing this side of you. Down-and-out Julia St. Clair is”—he grinned—“very, very sexy.”

“Easy, tiger,” I said. I'd forgotten that sometimes he could be a bit much. When I drained my drink and set the glass back down, the arm of my sweater stuck for a moment to the table.

“Seriously, is everything okay?” he asked.

“Everything's
fine
.” I sighed. I waved my hand at the bartender, but he shrugged and turned away. Apparently, there was no table service at the 500 Club. Jake took my glass up to the bar for a refill and when he returned, slid into the bench beside me. “Thanks,” I said, wrapping my fingers around the ice-cold glass.

“You're welcome,” he said. “Let's try this again. I feel like I need to act the part of a concerned bridesmaid here. Let's pretend I just plunked down two hundred bucks on some hideous yellow taffeta number that gives me pancake boobs and a mare's ass. You now owe it to me to tell the truth. Are you having second thoughts?”

“What? No,” I said. My voice sounded a little high, even to my own ears. “Anyway, you know I would never make anyone wear taffeta.”

Jake smiled. “I'm sure having your handsome first love back in the picture isn't helping whatever bit of turmoil you're finding yourself in.”

“Ha-ha,” I said dryly, but couldn't help looking at him with affection. He was like an exuberant puppy that somehow managed to appear adorable even when he was piddling on your brand-new carpet. Had we ever talked about getting married? I couldn't remember.
There's a bullet dodged
, I thought to myself. Still, he reminded me of a time when my life had seemed remarkably happy and simple. And that, I realized, was why I'd wanted to see him again.
If only life had turned out as easy as it had seemed it would be when we were students at Devon Prep.

Of course, Devon Prep hadn't been easy for everyone. Crossing through those doors freshman year, I'd immediately sensed how difficult it would be for Annie to be there. It was a small school and I knew nearly all of the kids already; we'd shared intersecting childhoods of horseback riding, skiing, ballet, and ballroom. Even though the faces were all familiar, something new fell into place inside of me as I walked through Devon's doors that first time. I slowed my step, studying the girls with their plaid uniform skirts rolled just so to reveal several inches of smooth thigh, the boys with their ties loose around their necks, their hair spiked jauntily. I felt at once utterly on edge and perfectly comfortable in those halls—it was a feeling I bit into and savored, the sweet rightness of the whole scene warming my body. That night, I convinced my mother to take me to Union Square and we spent hours searching for the perfect coat—a sky-blue Searle peacoat with silver toggles that the girls in our class fingered breathlessly the next morning, wide-eyed with envy. The next week, two girls showed up to school in ivory and camel versions—they swore, of course, that they hadn't realized it was the same coat—but it didn't matter; by then, I was wearing a black cashmere capelet with my grandmother's enormous Tahitian pearl brooch on the lapel. No other girl stood a chance.

Looking back, I suppose it would have been relatively easy to pull Annie along with me as I negotiated Devon's ranks. And maybe I would have, but it honestly never seemed, right up until the end of our senior year, like the social politics at Devon really affected Annie—she remained her freewheeling, funny, outspoken self while the rest of us did everything in our power to fit in. I'd have been the first to admit that I needed friends and their validation like a bee needed pollen, but Annie? She was so independent, and at the same time so close with her mom. It wasn't like she needed me.

Right on cue for my little mental time warp, Will Smith's “Gettin' Jiggy wit It” suddenly filled the bar. I looked at Jake and laughed.

“Oh my God,” I said. “What is this, high school?”

“I wish!” Jake said, wagging his eyebrows. It was the kind of music that the radio had played nonstop during our senior year at Devon—the year Jake and I first slept together. He was the first boy I ever slept with and he claimed that I was his first, too, but even then I knew better than to trust him in matters involving bedrooms and body parts.

Before I'd even realized I'd finished my drink, Jake had wandered off to the bar for another round. I took the moment to text my mother that something had come up at Treat and I wasn't going to make the appointment with the photographer after all. I knew she would consider receiving this information via text message adding insult to injury, but I was already feeling a bit too blotto to call her and risk having to actually speak with her on the phone.

The last thing I remembered clearly from that night was taking a shot of tequila—my
third?
—with *NSYNC's “I Want You Back” blaring in the background courtesy of the fistful of change Jake had dumped into the jukebox. It was dusk by then but the bar hadn't flicked on its lights yet and everything seemed pleasantly out of focus, like looking through the old, warped windowpane of a Victorian. After the shots, Jake lifted a finger to my lip to wipe away some trail of liquor. Then he leaned in as though to kiss me, and I pushed him away, shaking my head and laughing. The alcohol made me feel almost giddy; my heart felt bigger, more expansive and inclusive, more capable of joy. After that, the night just melted away with me.

S
ometime later, I woke up in a bed in a pitch-black room. I bolted upright, then groaned and clutched my throbbing head. Fumbling to find the lamp on the bedside table, I groaned again when I found it and light pierced the room. I was alone. And, thank God, fully dressed.

I looked around slowly. The room was tastefully furnished with dark, Asian-influenced wood furniture and a few oversized 1960s-era photographs of surfers and beaches. There were no personal photographs, and I'd never been there before, but I was sure I was in Jake Logan's bedroom.

I rose gingerly and made my way to the door. In the living room, Jake was stretched out on the couch watching
Top Gun
on a large flat-screen television. Diet Coke cans littered the black leather ottoman, and three surfboards leaned against a navy accent wall. It was the quintessential bachelor pad, if you happened to be a bachelor with a trust fund. Three walls of windows revealed the bay, black and still, Sausalito twinkling in the distance.

“Sleeping Beauty awakens!” Jake called, making room for me on the couch. “I'd nearly forgotten how gorgeous you are when you're vertical.”

I grimaced, collapsed on the couch beside him, and waved away the can of soda he held out to me. He shot me an amused smile.

“I'm afraid,” he said, “you've come down with a serious case of tequila-itis. The only known cure is eggs, coffee, and sleep.”

I groaned. “What time is it?”

Jake glanced at the glowing cable box and laughed. “Midnight. You're a cheap date. Passed out by nine.”

I hung my head in my hands, unable to look over at him. “We didn't
do
anything, did we?”

Jake, cruelly, let a beat of silence pass before he answered. “Would it be so terrible if we had?”

“Don't be an asshole,” I said, feeling tears prick my eyes.

“Ouch. Don't worry, Jules. Nothing happened.” He sat back on the couch, sounding petulant. “Anyway, it's not like you're married yet.”

I looked at him, wondering how he could be so dense and still so endearing. “No,” I said, softly. “But you are.”

Jake looked surprised. He shrugged, rubbing the base of his left ring finger, where a tan line was still in the process of fading.

“Only in the eyes of law,” he said at last, dimples flashing across his cheeks and then disappearing like stones skimming water ever so briefly before they sink.