Meet Me at the Cupcake Café (32 page)

‘Is Louis’s dad still around?’ asked Helena, forthright as ever.

Pearl tried not to let a little smile cross her face. She was being tough. If even Issy could show her no-good lover the door, the least she could do was put up a bit more resistance to Benjamin. On the other hand, what time was it …

‘Well, he sees his boy,’ she said, conscious that she sounded a bit proud.

‘What’s he like?’ asked Issy, anxious to change the subject to someone else’s romantic travails.

‘Well,’ said Pearl reflectively, ‘my mother always used to say that handsome is as handsome does … but I was never very good at listening to my mother.’

‘I didn’t want to listen to mine,’ said Issy. ‘She said, “Don’t get tied down.” But I would really like to be tied down …’

‘Or up,’ added Helena.

‘And nobody wants to. So I am Not Tied Down.’ Issy sighed and wondered if more rosé would help. Probably not, but worth a shot under the circumstances.

‘Well, look at you now – owning your own business, which actually sold some cakes today,’ said Helena. ‘Not reliant on some lantern-jawed eejit for snogging. And men love a woman who can bake and look nice in a flowery dress, they think it’ll be like the fifties and you’ll mix them a martini. You’re at the start of a pulling bonanza. Trust me.’ She raised a glass.

‘Now you are glass-half-full,’ said Issy, but she felt mildly cheered nonetheless.

‘What did your mother tell you, Helena?’ asked Pearl.

‘Never to get involved in other people’s business,’ said Helena promptly. And the three women laughed, and chinked glasses.

Chapter Thirteen

‘Where’s my little man Chunks?’ asked Issy as Pearl turned up – a little late, but frankly she was so grateful to Pearl that she was going to overlook the small things. ‘I miss him.’

Pearl smiled tightly and rushed in to grab the Hoover and mop so she could run round before they opened up.

‘He just loves being with his grandma,’ she said, realizing as she did so what an idyllic cake-baking, duck-feeding picture that presented, rather than the cheerless, fuggy little flat. ‘Anyway, let me just get round here quickly, the morning rush will be on soon.’

They smiled at each other, but it was true that since the accident there had been a steady stream of people – the ambulancemen, the bystanders, the mother with the lovely baby girl, and Ashok, who had popped in to ask for Helena’s phone number, which made Issy’s eyebrows rise so much he’d apologized instantly. Issy had taken his and passed it on, fully expecting Helena to drop it in the hospital incinerator.

The council had replaced the long bendy buses with the original double-deckers, which looked nicer coming down the street (and moved at more of a clip) but held far fewer passengers than the bendy buses. As a result a lot of people couldn’t get on during rush hour, and found themselves popping in for a coffee to pass the time; Issy had started buying in croissants. Short of growing another pair of hands, she sadly admitted to herself, she had to buy them in; anyway, the very best croissant-making was an art all to itself, so rather than her straining for a new goal, she’d sourced the most wonderful boulanger, courtesy of François, who’d pointed her in the direction of a company who delivered an exquisite mixed box of pains au chocolat, croissants and croissants aux amandes at 7am sharp every day; there was never a single one left by nine.

Then came the morning coffee; Mira, with little Elise, had managed to find herself some new friends among other mums, and they came often and chattered loudly in Romanian on the grey sofa, which was beginning to take on the soft, well-used sheen Issy had hoped for it. Some of the yummy mummies had started to make their way down from the crèche; if they recognized Pearl, she would smile briefly then busy herself (now not difficult) fetching organic lemonades and juices. Lunchtime was a rush, then the afternoon was a little more meditative, with office girls and women organizing children’s parties coming in to buy boxes of half a dozen or even a dozen cakes; Issy was considering getting a sign up to invite personalizing and special orders. In between there were endless lattes, teas, raspberry specials; vanilla-iced blueberry cakes; slices of thick apple pie; cleaning up, wiping, signing for suppliers, invoices; post; cleaning up spills, smiling at children and waving to regulars; chatting to passers-by and opening more milk, more butter, more eggs. By four, Issy and Pearl would be ready to lie down on one of the huge sacks of flour in the storeroom, where Pearl fearlessly scratched out the inner corners with her mop to make sure they were as sparkling as the areas of the shop people actually saw.

The Cupcake Café was afloat; it had launched, it was sailing, tipping slightly from side to side, all hands working her – but it was afloat; it felt to Issy like a living, breathing entity; a thing that was as much a part of her as her left hand. It never went away; she sat poring over the books with Mrs Prescott late at night; she dreamed in buttercream and icing, thought in keys and deliveries and sugar roses. Friends called and she begged off; Helena snorted and said it was like she was in the first grip of a romance. And although she was tired – exhausted – from working all out six days a week; although she desperately wanted to go out and have a few drinks without knowing how much she would suffer for it the next day; although she would have liked to just sit and watch some TV without wondering about stock levels and expiry dates and disposable bloody catering gloves, she shook her head in complete disbelief whenever she heard people mention the word ‘holiday’. Yet she was happier, she realized, deep down, than she’d been in years; happier every day, when she earned the rent money, then the utilities, then Pearl’s salary, then, finally, finally, something of her own, from something she was turning over with her own two hands, made to cherish and make people feel good.

At 2pm, a large group of mothers entered, tentatively at first, many with huge three-wheeled buggies. The shop was so small, Issy would have liked to ask them to leave the buggies outside so they didn’t kneecap other customers, but frankly she was a little frightened of these Stoke Newington women, who were in incredible shape, despite the fact that they all had two children, and had perfectly highlighted hair and wore very tight jeans with high heels all the time. Issy sometimes thought it must be a little exhausting, having to look identical to all your friends. On the other hand, she was delighted with their business.

She smiled a warm hello, but they glanced past her and their gazes alighted on Pearl, who looked semi-pleased to see them.

‘Um, hi,’ said Pearl to one of the mums, who glanced around.

‘Now where’s your
darling
little Louis?’ she said. ‘He’s usually here somewhere! I’d think a cake shop was a perfect environment for him.’

Issy glanced up. She recognized that voice. Sure enough, with a slight stab of nervousness she saw that it belonged to Caroline, the woman who had wanted to turn the café into a wholefood centre.

‘Hello, Caroline,’ said Pearl stoically. She sweetened her voice considerably to talk to the serious-eyed blonde girl and small boy still in the buggy at the bottom of the table.

‘Hello, Hermia! Achilles, hello!’

Issy sidled up to say hello, although Caroline seemed to be ignoring her quite competently.

‘Oh, don’t listen to them,’ said Caroline. ‘They have been absolutely foul all morning.’

They didn’t look foul to Issy. Tired, maybe.

‘And you know Kate, don’t you?’

‘Well, this is just charming!’ said Kate, looking around approvingly. ‘We’re doing up the big house across the road. Something like this is just what we need. Keep the house prices going in the right direction, you know what I mean.
Haw!
’

She had a sudden, expectorating laugh that took Issy slightly by surprise, and two girls who were obviously twins, sitting holding hands on the same stool. One had a short bob and was wearing red dungarees, and one had long blonde curls and was wearing a pink skirt with a puffed-out underskirt.

‘Aren’t your girls lovely!’ exclaimed Issy, moving forward. ‘And hello, Caroline, too.’

Caroline nodded regally to her. ‘I’m amazed this place appears to be taking off,’ she sniffed. ‘Might as well see what all the fuss is about.’

‘Might as well!’ said Issy cheerfully, bending down to the little ones.

‘Hello, twins!’

Kate sniffed. ‘They may be twins, but they are individuals too. It’s actually very damaging to twins not to be treated as separate people. I have to work very hard to build their separate identities.’

Issy nodded reassuringly. ‘I understand,’ she said, even though actually she didn’t understand for a second.

‘This is Seraphina.’ Kate indicated the little girl with the long blonde curls. ‘And this one here,’ she pointed to the other one, ‘is Jane.’

Seraphina smiled prettily. Jane scowled and hid her face in Seraphina’s shoulder. Seraphina patted her hand in a maternal fashion.

‘Well, welcome,’ said Issy. ‘We don’t normally do table service, but as I’m here, what would you like?’

Even though Pearl had now made her way back across the room to stand behind the counter underneath the pretty bunting they’d draped on the wall, Issy could, she swore to Helena later,
feel
her eyes roll in their sockets.

‘Well,’ said Kate, after deliberating over the menu for some time, ‘now.’ Seraphina had prompted Jane, and the two girls, who must have been four, walked up to the cake cabinet, rose on their tiptoes and pressed their noses to the glass.

‘You two! Snot off the glass, sweethearts,’ said Pearl, firmly but kindly, and the girls withdrew immediately, giggling, but stayed mere centimetres away where they could examine the icing carefully. Hermia looked at her mother.

‘Please may I—’ she risked.

‘No,’ said Caroline. ‘Sit nicely please.
Assieds-toi!
’

Hermia looked longingly at her friends.

‘Oh, are you French?’ asked Issy.

‘No,’ said Caroline, preening. ‘Why, do I look French?’

‘I shall have a mint tea,’ said Kate finally. ‘Do you do salad?’

Issy couldn’t bring herself to meet Pearl’s eyes.

‘No. No, at the moment we don’t do salad,’ she said. ‘Cakes mostly.’

‘What about, you know, organic flapjacks?’

‘We have fruit cake,’ said Issy.

‘With spelt flour?’

‘Um, no, with real flour,’ said Issy, wishing she was out of this conversation.

‘Nuts?’

‘Some nuts.’

Kate let out a long sigh, as if it was unbelievable what kind of hardship she had to go through on a regular basis.

‘Can we have a cake, Mummy?
Pleeease!
’ begged Jane from the counter.

‘It’s can
I
have a cake, Jane. I.’

‘Can I have a cake then please?’

‘
Me too! Me too!
’ yelled Seraphina.

‘Oh darlings … ’

Kate looked on the brink of giving up. ‘You don’t … you don’t have any little boxes of raisins, do you?’

‘Um,’ said Issy, ‘no.’

Kate sighed. ‘Well, that’s a shame. What do you think, Caroline?’

Caroline’s face didn’t move – her eyebrows were very pointy – but Issy still got the sense she was disappointed. She glanced at Hermia, who was gazing at her friends, one tear dripping slowly down her face. Achilles sorted it for her.

‘
Mummy! Cake! Now! Mummy! Cake! Cake! Mummy!
’ He went red-faced while wrestling with the buggy straps. ‘
Now!
’

‘Now darling,’ Caroline said, ‘you know we don’t really like cake.’

‘
Cake! Cake!
’

‘Oh dear,’ said Kate. ‘I’m not sure we’re going to be able to come in here again.’

‘
Cake! Cake!
’

‘They do say the sugar makes them hyperactive.’

Issy didn’t want to point out that everything in her shop was all-natural, and that they hadn’t even had any yet.

‘Fine,’ said Caroline, desperate to stop her son screaming. ‘Two cakes. I don’t care which ones. Hermia, little bites please. You don’t want to blow up like—’ Caroline immediately stopped.

‘Yes!’ shouted the twins by the counter.

‘I want pink! I want pink!’ they both yelled simultaneously, in voices so similar Issy wondered how you really did tell them apart.

‘You can’t both have pink,’ said Kate absent-mindedly, picking up the
Mail
. ‘Jane, you have the brown.’

Later, Caroline came over to chat.

‘This is actually quite quaint,’ she said. ‘You know, I love to bake too … obviously, much healthier than this, and mostly we eat raw of course, but I was like, now I
must
have a central island for my little messes … In fact, you know,’ she peered down the stairwell, ‘I think my oven is probably bigger than yours! My main oven of course, I have a steam oven and a convection oven too. But no microwave. Terrible things.’

Issy smiled politely. Pearl let out a snort.

‘I am dreadfully busy with everything now … I’ve taken on a lot of charity work, my husband’s in the City, you know … but maybe one day I could bring you one of my recipes! Yes, I create recipes … Well, it’s hard when you have a creative side, isn’t it? After children?’