Chapter 4 Baking at Midnight
Eliza stood at the kitchen counter cradling the tin full of recipes.
The metal was cool beneath her touch, and the lid squeaked as she opened it.
She grazed over each of the hand-written cards, each page smudged with butter stains.
A small thrill coursed through her, excited to lose herself in another baking project.
Her fingers lingered over each of the edges, waiting for one recipe to call to her rather than the other way around.
Over in the living room came the faint sound of Lachlan’s breathing.
He was fast asleep on the couch with one hand covering his eyes, his chest rising and falling softly.
Beneath the kitchen’s windowsill, Puffcake claimed a small mixing bowl as his bed, snoring loudly in a sugar-induced coma.
Puffs of smoke billowed from his nostrils.
Then the house stirred. A loud, sudden thump disrupted the quiet, causing Eliza to jump. A book had fallen from the baker’s rack behind her, the spine hitting the floor with a solid crack. Eliza bent to pick it up, smoothing her palm over the worn cover the color of absinthe.
She swore the gold title glimmered underneath her fingers: Isadora’s Memory Baking Cookbook.
Eliza hesitated momentarily before opening it. Her heart thrummed in her chest as she thumbed through the brittle pages with care. Each word on the page floated to life, as if revealing the truest nature of the book to her.
Some of the instructions seemed odd. It was more than just ingredients and baking times. It included things like “Stir counterclockwise thrice on a new moon” and “Sing a Christmas carol to encourage the dough to rise.”
She sucked in a breath. These weren’t just recipes. They were spells. But it wasn’t the only odd thing about this book. Written on the very front page in delicate penmanship was a rhyme:
This cookbook belongs to Isadora Black.
Always remember to start at the first,
and bake ‘til the last.
Skip not a single step, nor bake too fast.
Eliza read off the first recipe. She couldn’t explain it, but it felt warm and inviting, like it almost wanted to be picked.
In a way, it felt less like Eliza was sifting through recipes and more like she was peeking into someone’s personal diary.
In her own family, recipes were sacred, passed down like heirlooms and kept close like secrets.
Baking at Midnight: Memory Making Meringue (Only to be baked at the stroke of twelve.)
She glanced at the grandfather clock. Five minutes to spare.
She was so eager to gather the ingredients that her fingers tapped on the cookbook nervously, but a moment of hesitation seized her. Was Eliza allowed to use this cookbook?
Surely so, or else it wouldn’t have almost literally fallen into her hands.
Right? Besides, the house had a way of expressing its feelings.
If it didn’t want her using these recipes, she knew it would stop her.
It could’ve hidden the instructions in blotted ink stains and smudges, or not have revealed the recipes at all.
Quickly getting to work, she rounded up the ingredients from the shelf and mixed in a hurry. Unlike most times, she followed this recipe to the letter, every stir and measure.
She stirred with vigor and felt an odd sense of warmth blooming over her. Vanilla and lemon zest filled the air in a cloud of festive cheer, and, just as she cracked the last egg, the batter shimmered.
The grandfather clock struck twelve as soon as Eliza placed the pan inside the oven.
Now she knew why the recipe insisted it be baked at midnight. The instructions demanded it, down to the minute. The meringue wouldn’t bake a moment before or after.
While she waited, she thought to flip through more of the recipes in the book, studying each of the desserts that gave her a mysterious inclination to bake them.
In all her times she’d come to visit, she never remembered seeing this cookbook before. She wondered if it even was here the last time or if there was a reason it jumped out at her now. Or had it falling from the shelf merely been a coincidence?
But it was placed far enough away from the edge of the baker’s rack for it not to be chalked up to an accident …
She half-expected at any moment for the oven to spit out the meringues as it had the pizza earlier that evening.
But ten minutes later, she was taking the meringues from the oven and setting them down to cool on the countertop.
Once they were at room temperature, she popped one of the puffs into her mouth.
Buttery, crunchy goodness flooded her senses, and her heart swelled once more with fulfillment.
Then, the kitchen around her shifted.
Sleeping Puffcake was nowhere in sight, the glow of the crescent moon was creeping through the curtains, and the counters were spotless. A stark difference to the organized chaos they had been just moments before.
Eliza wiped at her eyes, positive she must be hallucinating. And, for all practical purposes, Eliza was hallucinating.
A young woman glided through, moving like the winter chill couldn’t touch her. She wore an apron the color of sunshine, and her smile lit up the room, equally as bright. Her cheeks were dusted with blush and flour as she fluttered about the kitchen, whisking something inside a copper bowl.
Behind her, a young man with short hair the color of butter approached, wrapping his arms around her as he showered her in a series of kisses. She giggled, playfully swatting him away. He then popped a familiar-looking dollop of meringue into his mouth.
“Isadora,” he dramatically sighed, his Irish accent thicker than molasses. “You are absolute magic.”
The woman, Isadora, turned her attention away from the counter and gazed up into the man’s hazel eyes.
She looked at him with such happiness and contentment that it made Eliza’s chest tighten.
Isadora patted his cheek playfully. “Good thing you married a witch. Magic’s as common as flour around here. ”
He brushed an onyx strand of hair away from the young woman’s porcelain face and pulled her in close. Eliza’s cheeks heated at the lovers’ embrace. She suddenly felt like she was intruding, but couldn’t look away. She, too, once had someone look at her the way this man looked at Isadora.
“There is nothing common about you, sweet girl,” the man whispered in the crux of her neck.
Isadora arched into his touch, giggling softly. “I love you, Ernest.”
“I love you, too.” He smiled back at her, brightly. “Earnestly.”
The young man bent low to kiss her just as the grandfather clock gonged twelve times. Then the lovely scene in front of her was gone.
She was standing in the same spot she’d been in before she was transported away through the vision. Only, she hadn’t seen a vision.
It had been a memory.
Isadora’s Memory Baking Cookbook. Of course. Isadora Black was the owner, and, through the recipes, she was showing memories of her life, ones that had taken place here in this very cottage.
But what Eliza still couldn’t quite make out was this: Who was this Isadora Black, and why was she showing Eliza memories of her past?