Chapter 7
MEG
Meg wished she could’ve booked herself a few nights in a hotel in Bern before she headed to her parents in Winterbruck.
But money was tight, especially when she was currently unemployed.
Or maybe she should think of herself as between jobs because that sounded far better than what had actually happened.
She’d hoped to find another job as a chocolatier before she told her parents anything at all, but wanting to come here to the Swiss Alps had unexpectedly overtaken any desire to stay in London now that The Cocoa Cupboard had gone. So here she was.
From the airport, she shared a taxi with three random strangers into the centre of Bern and stored her luggage at the station ready for a later train to Winterbruck.
Doing this in lieu of a hotel stay would give her a couple of hours walking around Bern so she could get her head straight, as well as spending time in this beautiful city.
London was huge in comparison and had an entirely different personality.
While London was big and boisterous and had almost swallowed her whole when she first went to live there, Bern had a calming influence with unmistakable charm.
It also felt unhurried, despite gearing up for the festive tourist season.
She’d spend a few hours here so she could get a bit of confidence for the front she’d need to put up before she came face-to-face with her family, and they managed to see failure written all over her face. Again.
Red trams connected passengers to key areas of Bern and its surrounding districts.
The city’s narrow streets were somewhat familiar, and as she wandered she reached the Zytglogge, an iconic medieval clock tower.
The tower featured a whimsical clock and in five minutes, on the hour – as it did every hour – it would begin its performance.
She assumed the clock still worked because other people were milling nearby, some with phones poised ready to take pictures or videos.
Sure enough the ritual began – the crowing rooster, the jester, the dancing bears followed by the chime of the hour.
She went on her way as the display came to its close.
It felt good to be here, somewhere different, and walking around the city she felt her stress ease.
She’d always done the same thing wherever she was.
If she was troubled, she’d put on her trainers and go outside, walk somewhere, anywhere her feet took her, and everything would feel that little bit lighter.
She passed by the most exquisite chocolate shop.
The window display showed branded forest-green and cream packaging displaying truffles flavoured with cognac, rum and lime.
The finest praline chocolates showed off their glory, and she could almost taste the cream and the finest Swiss milk just by looking at them.
Inside the shop she was greeted by the familiar intense, sweet smell. The air held a hint of hazelnut, perhaps vanilla too.
An assistant wearing an apron in the branded colours proffered a tray of samples her way.
‘Danke.’ Meg smiled and tried a piece of the exquisite dark chocolate with sea salt.
Her German was rusty, having not lived here for a long time, but she hoped in her exchange with the assistant that she managed to convey how impressed she was.
Of course, it was more likely the woman was humouring her because it was quite obvious Meg was British, and it reminded her that as a teenager she’d never quite accepted that Switzerland was her home.
When they’d moved to Winterbruck Meg had tried to make a go of things.
Their parents had said this was it, they weren’t moving again, but at the back of her mind she’d never really known whether that was true or not.
Part of her, the part that never settled anywhere, just hadn’t been able to believe or trust it.
When Meg was fifteen, she’d got a part-time job in a chocolate shop in Winterbruck every weekday after school. Her parents hadn’t been keen – they would rather she focused on her studies – but perhaps they’d decided it was a way of keeping her out of trouble if she was working.
It was there, in the Winterbruck chocolate shop, doing the job she’d found quite by accident when she stumbled inside to choose a Mother’s Day gift, that Meg began to fall in love with chocolate.
She worked front of shop setting the chocolates on display, enthusiastically helping customers choose flavours, and she’d package up the chocolates as if each collection was the perfect gift.
Chocolate was a sensory delight – the way it smelled, tasted, the sound of the snap on a fine bar made with care.
She’d watch the chocolatier out back working with different flavours and textures.
She was on a constant discovery journey, fascinated with how the chocolate went from bean to bar.
With that small shop in Winterbruck she had somehow found the world she wanted to end up in: the world of chocolate.
Of course, the best laid plans and all that.
She’d gone to London for the excitement and because she didn’t feel that Switzerland was really her home.
She’d naively thought she’d study and, in the meantime, find another chocolate shop that would welcome her with open arms so she could support herself.
She’d envisaged getting qualifications, working her way up the ranks, living the dream.
But she’d got sidetracked and suddenly having a good time took precedence over everything else.
She’d worked odd jobs that were nothing to do with chocolate to avoid the hard graft of study, enough to cover her rent, her food and the constant partying.
It was as though she needed to let herself go before she could even think about turning her mind to getting serious about her future.
Her sister hadn’t approved, she knew that much, but it wasn’t until much later – after Meg had ruined her relationship with Chrissie – that she realised the only person who could turn her life around was her.
Eventually she’d studied food science. It wasn’t directly related to the dream of working with chocolate, but she’d always intended to do something that would provide her with a good foundation because she wanted to make good money.
She wanted to buy her own home, a place to put down roots which she’d never had as a kid.
And that meant hard work and saving. The chocolate dream was put on hold.
Her studies complete, she found her first job at twenty-two in quality assurance for a water bottle company, testing, ensuring product safety, and customer satisfaction.
It paid the bills, it gave her confidence, and at twenty-nine she moved on to working as a food technologist for a manufacturer collaborating with global brands.
It was a bigger pay cheque, more responsibility, and she set aside the chocolate dream a while longer.
Instead, she worked hard in her job. She learned the importance of key documentation, accurate audits, high standards, allergen management.
Always at the back of her mind was what it would be like to be a chocolatier someday, somewhere, what it would feel like to come up with ideas, create recipes, make heavenly chocolates that would adorn a shop’s shelves.
But earning good money had been the most important thing to her at an age where she was desperate to get on the property ladder.
She would wait until the time was right to move into the world of chocolate and she was excited, as the weeks, months and years went on and it became more of a real possibility.
At almost thirty-three years old she bought her own little flat in London, a permanent home she’d stayed in ever since, and when she was made redundant from the job as a food technologist she ended up taking contracts in the food safety and compliance area to meet her mortgage payments.
She spent a year working in the meat industry, which paid well but not only turned her off the job – plenty of inspections proved difficult due to a resistance to compliance – but also turned her vegetarian, and made her question how long she was going to wait to realise her dream that had started at a little chocolate shop in the Swiss town of Winterbruck.
She carried on working contracts, but on the side, she did a chocolate and patisserie course.
She found an unpaid once-a-week internship which she could fit in with the demands of her day job, and she practised making chocolate as often as she could.
She was popular with her neighbours in her block of flats because she frequently left little packages for them in exchange for honest feedback on what she’d made.
It had reminded her of when Chrissie would taste her chocolates when she’d experimented as a teenager.
Chrissie had spat out some of the chocolates, albeit with plenty of apologies, but her sister had devoured others before telling her how brilliant she was.
At age thirty-six Meg took herself off on a four-month course in Italy where she learned the art of chocolate-making, focused on skills, window display design and elaborate decorating techniques.
And she’d come home after those four months and made the decision that she would move heaven and earth to get into the industry.
Of course, it hadn’t been easy. Her first job was at a chocolate factory showing people round, showing them exhibits, never getting to touch chocolate, let alone make it. From there she moved to working behind the counter at a chocolate shop, but again she wasn’t doing quite what she wanted.