Meet Me at the Cupcake Café (26 page)

By the time it was ready, he was marching the baby round the shop, constant movement apparently the only thing that kept him quiet.

‘Don’t worry about me,’ he said to Issy’s concerned look. ‘I’ll just take a bite every third circuit.’

‘Fine,’ said Issy. ‘How’s business?’

Des marched round the room, grimacing.

‘Not ideal,’ he said. ‘This area has been up and coming for years, but it seems to hit a point beyond which it’s just not going to go, do you know what I mean?’

To a cupcake café? Issy wondered sadly to herself, but instead she just nodded and smiled.

After about the ninth rotation (Issy was absolutely sure this wasn’t ideal for a baby but didn’t feel she had the necessary expertise to offer an opinion), the woman at the end of the sofa, who’d dipped her finger tentatively in the icing of her daughter’s cupcake, eyed Des with sudden decisiveness.

‘Excuse me,’ she said. Des stopped in his tracks. Jamie immediately started up a yell like a plane taking off.

‘Uh, yes?’ he said, gulping a mouthful of coffee. ‘Issy, that really is good,’ he said out of the side of his mouth.

‘Give me your baby,’ said the woman.

Des glanced at Issy. The woman’s face fell.

‘I’m not bad lady. Give me your baby. I help him.’

‘Um, I’m not sure …’

A hideous un-PC silence hit the air until Des realized, with a sense of inevitability, that if he didn’t hand over the baby he would look like he was accusing her of something shocking. Like the true Englishman he was, he felt that inadvertently causing offence and embarrassment would, in the end, be simply too painful. Issy smiled encouragingly as he gave the screeching baby to the woman, whose little girl immediately scampered up on tiptoes to have a look.

‘Sa ziza zecob dela dalou’a

Boralea’e borale mi komi oula

Etawuae’o ela’o coralia wu’aila

Ilei pandera zel e’ tomu pere no mo mai

Alatawuané icas imani’u’

the woman sang, immediately enraptured by Jamie, who, surprised to find himself in a stranger’s arms, had momentarily fallen silent and was gazing at her with his great blue eyes. The woman gently kissed the top of his head.

‘Maybe she’s a witch,’ hissed Des to Issy.

‘Sssh!’ Issy said, fascinated by what the woman was doing. Jamie opened his mouth to prepare himself for another yell, and calmly and confidently the woman flipped the baby over on to just one arm, until he was lying there on his tummy, his tiny arms and legs flopping towards the floor. He wriggled and squirmed there for a second, Des instinctively moving forwards – it looked like he would fall, balanced so precariously on a single limb – and then the impossible happened. Jamie blinked his huge, glass-blue eyes once, twice, then somehow his tiny rosebud mouth found his thumb and he settled. Within seconds, and with all of them watching, as clearly and humorously as in a cartoon, his eyes grew heavy, heavier … and he was fast asleep.

Des shook his head.

‘What … what … Have you just slipped him something?’

The woman fortunately didn’t understand.

‘He is very tired.’ She looked at Des. ‘You too are very tired,’ she said, kindly.

Suddenly, and very uncharacteristically, Des thought he was about to burst into tears. He hadn’t even cried when Jamie was born; not since his father had died. But somehow …

‘I am … a
little
tired,’ he said suddenly, slumping down next to her on the sofa.

‘What did you do?’ asked Issy, amazed. It had been like magic.

‘Um …’ said the woman, clearly searching for the English words. ‘Hmm. Let me see. It is like the tiger in the tree.’

They both looked at her.

‘When little babies have sore tummies … then they like to lie like the tiger in the tree. It helps their tummies.’

And sure enough, Jamie did look like a sleepy cat drooping happily over a branch. Expertly, the woman transferred him to his pram on his tummy.

‘Uh,’ said Des, anxious to show that he did, at least, know the first thing about parenting, ‘you’re not meant to put them on their stomachs.’

The woman fixed him with a strict look.

‘Babies with sore tummies sleep better on tummies. You watch him. He not die.’

It had to be said that Jamie looked as utterly blissful as only a tiny baby fast asleep can look. His pale pink pillowing lips were open and only a gentle, tiny lifting of his narrow back could be seen. The woman took the blanket and tucked him in fiercely and tight so he could barely move. Des, used to watching Jamie wrestle and squirm in his sleep like he was fighting an invisible enemy, could only stare.

‘I think I’ll have another cup of coffee,’ he said in a disbelieving tone. ‘And … er … do you think … would you mind passing,’ he gulped with amazement, ‘the newspaper?’

Issy smiled at the memory. Of course in the end it had netted her about four quid, but Des and the woman, whose name turned out to be Mira, had talked and got along rather well, and for a while at least there was a little hum of conversation in the café; the sound she’d been longing to hear. Then the ironmonger from next door had come up and studied the menu in the window for ages – agonizingly long – before heading off again. Issy had called a hello but he hadn’t answered. She was starting to hate the hideously slow beat of the clock. Two teenage girls had come in at lunchtime and carefully counted out enough for one chocolate and ginger cake between them and two glasses of water, but they’d gone by the time the door dinged at half past three. It was Helena.

‘That bad, huh?’ said Helena.

Issy was amazed to find herself slightly irritated. She was never normally irritated by Helena, they’d been friends for so long. But for her to turn up now, just as she was feeling her most unsuccessful, seemed almost cruel.

‘Hey,’ said Helena. ‘How’s it going?’

‘Would you like an unsold cupcake?’ said Issy, slightly more sharply than she’d intended.

‘Yes,’ said Helena, and took out her wallet.

‘Put your wallet away,’ said Issy. ‘I have to throw them out at the end of the day anyway, for health and safety.’

Helena raised her eyebrows. ‘Be quiet. I won’t hear of it. I shouldn’t really be eating these anyway. Although I did go up another cup size, so there’s a bonus.’

‘A cupcake size!’ said Issy. ‘Ha ha. I am, at least, still hilarious.’

‘Why don’t you close up early, we’ll go home and watch
Grosse Pointe Blank
and then phone all our old friends who don’t phone us any more and tell them we’re having a lie-in tomorrow when they have to get up at five am and heat bottles?’

‘That is tempting,’ said Issy regretfully. ‘But I can’t. We’re open till four thirty today.’

‘So what about the “I am master of my own destiny and can do what I like” thing? I thought that was the point of running your own business.’

‘And,’ said Issy, ‘I have to cash up and go through my weekly accounts.’

‘Well, that’s not going to take long, is it?’

‘Helena?’

‘Too harsh?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’ll buy the wine.’

‘Fine.’

‘Fine.’ Just then the bell dinged again.

Austin looked round the shop warily. He knew they were just starting out, but nonetheless it would have been nice to see a few people here, and Issy maybe moving her butt a bit to get things done rather than sitting up at the counter mooning with her girlfriend.

Darny was at jungle gym, and Austin was having one of those realizations he had with wearying predictability, when he got the horrible feeling he’d forgotten something important and had to struggle to remember what it was. After their parents died, Austin had been advised by the social worker handling the guardianship that he should talk to a therapist. The therapist had suggested that being disorganized was at some level a cry for help for his parents to come back and sort him out, and recommended he didn’t look for a life partner to do the same. Austin suspected this was total bollocks, but that still didn’t help when, as had happened half an hour ago, he realized that he’d lost his copy of the shop rental agreement and if he didn’t get it for the files Janet was going to have his guts for garters.

‘Uh, hi there,’ he said.

Issy jumped up guiltily. What would be nice, she figured, would be if people involved with her business would come along when there were lots of people in. She wished obscurely that Helena wasn’t there, it didn’t look very professional. Especially with Helena nudging her and raising her eyebrows like Groucho Marx.

‘Hello!’ she said. ‘Would you like a cake for Darny?’

‘Giving away cakes?’ said Austin with a twinkle in his eye. ‘I’m sure that’s not in the business plan.’

‘You can’t have read it right,’ said Issy, suddenly feeling flustered. It was that grin of his. It was distractingly un-bank-like.

‘That’s right, I didn’t,’ agreed Austin. ‘How’s it going?’

‘Well, this is our soft launch,’ said Issy. ‘You know, obviously, it’s going to take a while to build up.’

‘I have full confidence in the business plan,’ he said swiftly.

‘The one you haven’t read,’ said Issy.

Austin would have smiled more if he had actually read it, but he had totally followed his gut as he always did when lending. It usually worked in his favour. If it was a good enough method for murder detectives, he liked to think, it was good enough for him.

‘You know, I know someone who does a marketing workshop,’ he said, and wrote the details down for Issy. She pored over them carefully and asked some questions; it felt like he was genuinely taking an interest. Well, protecting his investment, obviously, she realized.

‘Thanks,’ said Issy to Austin. It was odd to hear him talk so much sense when he was wearing his stripy jumper inside out. ‘Your jumper’s inside out.’

Austin glanced at it.

‘Oh, yes, I know. Darny decided that all clothes should have their labels sticking out, that’s how you know you’re wearing the right clothes. And I couldn’t seem to convince him logically otherwise, so I decided to just, you know, play along till he figures it out. He should probably have grown out of that now, huh?’

‘And how’s he going to figure it out if you’ve got it all wrong?’ asked Issy, smiling.

‘That is a very good point,’ said Austin, and in one gesture he pulled off the sweater. Inadvertently he pulled up some of his forest-green shirt with it, exposing a trim tummy. Issy caught herself staring at it, then realized Helena was staring at her, muted mirth in her eyes. Her old habit came back: she felt her cheeks flushing a deep, horrifying red.

‘I don’t know,’ said Austin, who hadn’t stopped talking. ‘I was just trying to get him to jungle gym on time. I assume the other kids will call him horrible names and make him cry till he eventually falls into line, stamps out his individuality and conforms like a sheep.’

He pulled his jumper back on properly and looked for Issy, but she’d disappeared downstairs.

‘Uh, I’ll get those rental agreement papers you need!’ she shouted up the stairwell. Helena gave him a knowing smile.

‘Stay for coffee,’ she said.

Issy threw cold water on her face from the catering sink downstairs. This was absolutely ridiculous. She had to pull herself together; she had to work with him. She wasn’t twelve.

‘Here.’ She reappeared, only mildly flushed. ‘A cupcake for Darny. I insist. It’s … what would your marketing people call it? A sample.’

‘Giving samples to people who get a pound a week pocket money probably wouldn’t pass a cost/benefit analysis,’ said Austin, ‘but thank you.’ He took the cake and found his fingers holding on to it just a second too long, as if reluctant to give up the traces of her touch.

‘And then,’ said Helena, pouring the last of the wine, ‘then you dragged him downstairs into your store cupboard and—’

Issy bit her lip. ‘Shut up!’ she said.

‘He pulled you into his manly, calculator-wielding arms and—’

‘
Stop it!
’ said Issy. ‘I will throw cushions.’