Chapter 8
The Man Buns café was busy. Elodie could see that even before she opened the door. A group of teenagers were sitting at the end table, playing a card game. The two other tables were occupied by a young couple and a pair of middle-aged gentlemen. Mal was delivering milkshakes to the table with the teens on it. He had to ask one of the older gents to move, so that he could manoeuvre past the walking frame that was next to one of the teenagers. The older man harrumphed.
Mal deposited the milkshakes and turned once again, squeezing past the man. He caught sight of Elodie and his expression dropped for a second, before he smiled back at her. ‘One second. I’ll just take care of this next order and I’ll be right with you.’
She swallowed back the remark she was going to make. Clearly, it wasn’t a good time. The storm of emotions that had driven her here simmered down a little. She took a step back towards the still-open door. Because she was looking into the shop, she saw exactly what happened next.
The boy with the walking aid had some sort of mobility issue. His arm twitched and caught the milkshake that Mal had just placed next to him. The shake tipped over and ran off the table. All three boys around the table gasped. The man sitting at the table next to them turned to look at what the sound was and sprang to his feet.
He dragged his chair away from the spreading puddle of milkshake. ‘If that’s gone on my jacket …’
Mal ran in with a stack of tea towels. ‘I’m so sorry, sir, are you okay?’ He threw a glance at the boys and gave them a nod before putting a couple of the cloths on the ground to cover the puddle.
The man checked his jacket. ‘Yes, I’m fine. This time. No thanks to these—’ He glared at the boy who had knocked his drink over. Elodie felt her own temper rise. The poor boy looked terrified. Mal straightened up, his eyes narrowing.
She spotted that one of the other boys had got his phone out and was quietly filming.
‘Let me get you a refund on your coffee, sir. Since you didn’t get to enjoy it,’ Mal said. There was something odd about the way he spoke. His words were clipped, as though he wasn’t fully moving his jaw.
‘It’s the least you could do,’ said the man. He glared at the boy again. ‘This is too small a shop for—’ He gestured towards the walking frame. ‘There are limits.’
There was a stunned silence. Elodie’s mouth dropped open. Mal seemed to grow. He pulled a wallet out of his pocket, took out a tenner and handed it to the irate customer, who looked bewildered and took it.
Mal said, ‘That should more than cover your coffee. Consider it a refund.’ Then he very deliberately pushed up his sleeves. It drew attention to his arms. Muscular arms. He moved forward. The angry man stepped back.
‘You’ll be leaving now, sir,’ Mal said, spitting out the word ‘sir’.
‘What?’
‘This young man, and any other disabled person, is more than welcome in my café. You are not. Please leave.’
Elodie moved out of the way so that the door was wide open.
‘This is disgraceful. How dare you—’
Mal took another step towards him. The man was taller than Mal, but somehow Mal looked bigger. The scary thing, Elodie decided, was his expression. His jaw was clenched and his eyes blazed. He was moving with care, as though he was controlling the urge to hit the man.
‘Don’t you threaten me.’ The customer stopped. He lifted his chin.
‘I’m not,’ said Mal, his voice icy calm. ‘I’m telling you that this is my shop and I will not have you in it. Would you prefer for me to call the police?’
With a final splutter, the man grabbed his coat. He and his companion left. Elodie closed the door behind him. When she turned back round, she saw Mal was crouching next to the teenager. The boy’s eyes were huge. Mal’s entire demeanour had changed. He said something to the boy and put a hand on his arm. The boy blinked and nodded.
Elodie quietly left the shop.
All the fight drained out of her. She shuffled into the back room and slumped on her stool.
‘What? What’s wrong?’ Marty rushed in after her.
‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘He could easily copy my cakes, but I’d have a hell of a time making anything keto. His food is proper specialist. Why am I bothering trying to compete? He’ll get the contract for the wedding. It’s nonsense pretending otherwise.’
Marty shook his head furiously. ‘No. No. No. You make the most beautiful cakes. And I’ve tasted your party food, remember. Your pastry is second to none. You can’t give up.’
‘But Marty, Jamie and Saffron need both types of food for their wedding. I can’t do both. Man Buns can. Anyone can make cakes and snacks.’
‘But poor Saffron will have sub-par sausage rolls at her wedding.’ Marty folded his arms. ‘And less pretty cakes. Poor lamb.’
Elodie shrugged. ‘There’s not a lot I can do …’ An idea stirred. ‘Unless.’ It wasn’t perfect but … ‘Unless we team up.’
‘Team up? With Man Buns?’ Marty’s eyebrows rose, making his forehead wrinkle. ‘Are you sure you can cope with that?’
Elodie hooked her heels on the cross bar of the stool and leaned her hands on the edges of her seat. ‘I really, really need to cater this wedding. If not all of it, part of it will have to do.’ She thought of Travis’s smirk falling off his face. ‘If I have to team up with Mal to do it, then I will. Whatever it takes.’ She nodded, thoughtfully. ‘It would have been a really big job for me to manage by myself anyway. I imagine he’s got a similar problem – he hasn’t been in business as a café for very long. It’s not like he has a huge bank of staff that he can call on. Maybe this would work well for both of us.’
‘Except you’d have to work quite closely with him.’
She thought about Mal defending his nephew and tried to ignore the fleeting mental image of his forearms. He wasn’t all bad. ‘I can live with that, I think,’ she said.
Mal hunkered down next to Dilan. ‘Is everything okay?’
Dilan met his gaze. Mal hoped his nephew understood what he was really asking – Was that arm twitch the start of a seizure? Do I need to call your mother to check your ketones? Mal waited. Dilan’s responses always took a fraction longer when he was upset. Or ill.
Dilan blinked. ‘I’m okay.’
‘It was an accident,’ one of the other boys said. ‘Not a … you know … an episode or anything. He, like, moved his arm and tipped the milkshake over.’
Mal checked with Dilan for confirmation. He nodded. Mal’s shoulders relaxed a fraction. ‘Okay. In that case, let me get this tidied up and get you a fresh keto shake—’
‘Just some cream please,’ said Dilan. He’d had a scare. He needed a boost. Unlike most of Mal’s other clients, Dilan couldn’t just have high protein things. His diet required more fat than protein.
Mal nodded. ‘I can do that.’
Dilan’s friend said, ‘That guy was such a dick. I can’t believe people say stuff like that out loud. Did he even hear himself?’
‘I’ve got it on video,’ the other friend said.
Mal said, ‘Don’t share it.’ Dilan said the same thing, a second later, like an echo.
The boys exchanged glances.
Dilan said again, ‘Don’t share it. It’s not worth it.’
‘I won’t,’ his friend said, as he put his phone away. ‘But if that guy starts anything about the service in Mal’s café, I will.’ He looked back at Dilan. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll check with you first.’
Dilan gave him a weak smile and Mal’s heart cracked.
Liz came up with a mop and bucket, so Mal got out of the way. ‘Sorry about that,’ he said to the other couple who were in the café.
‘Oh, don’t worry about it,’ the woman said. ‘I’m glad you threw him out. Horrible man.’
Mal nodded and hurried away to get Dilan a small portion of double cream. In the kitchen, he let out a slow breath. The flare of anger had receded, leaving him feeling shaken and weak. It felt similar to the aftermath of a panic attack. He took several slow, deep breaths. He hadn’t had a panic attack in years, not since that time when he was fourteen and left on the floor of the school toilets after having had his head flushed in the loo by bullies. That day he had thought he was going to die. That was the night he’d run away and ruined everything for Pubudu.
Two weeks after that awful day, he had joined the gym. That had been a turning point in his life.
Mal gave himself a shake. Ever since he’d seen Leon, his mind kept snapping back to things he had tried hard to put behind him. He needed to focus right now and get Dilan his drink. As he poured some cream into a cup and added a bit of water and a couple of drops of strawberry flavouring to it, he thought about how joining the gym had changed his life. He had met Jake, for a start. Back then he had been a slight, shy young guy, tired of being bullied for being gay. While Mal worked to slim down, Jake worked to bulk up. The experience had bonded them.
Now he had this café. He had hoped it would be a safe place for his nephew, or indeed anyone, to hang out. The fact that this safety was threatened made him sad. He took Dilan his drink and watched as the young man sipped it. The boys had resumed their game. The floor had been cleared. It was as though the incident had never happened. But it had, and it was another thing for Mal to worry about.