Chapter 13
Going to the gym was one of the points of stability in Mal’s life. He used to go just before he went to work, back when he had a normal nine-to-five job. Now, he tied it in with making his deliveries. Jake opened his gyms very early in the morning, which meant that Mal could make sure that the original Jake’s Gym was the last drop-off point for the keto lunches and then go and have his own workout between that and opening the café.
He came off the last machine out of breath and satisfyingly tired. He scooped up his water bottle for a well-earned drink.
‘Hey, Mal.’
He lowered his bottle to see Travis, who tended to come in a little later normally, standing there looking fresh, like he’d just arrived. Travis was one of those guys that he knew only to nod at. The few conversations they’d had had been short and mostly about workouts or keto food. There was something about him that made Mal uneasy. He could never figure out what.
Travis swaggered towards him. ‘Did I hear you were bidding to cater for Jamie’s wedding?’
‘I am,’ said Mal.
Travis nodded and smiled. ‘I hope you win. You’re bound to be better than the competition. I mean, low carb is all the rage these days, right? You need interesting food at a wedding. Especially this sort of wedding when one of our guys is getting married.’
Who were ‘our guys’? The gym people?
Mal thought about the package that he and Elodie had put together last night. ‘To be honest,’ he said. ‘I think something that caters for a bit of both might be better. It’s Saffron’s wedding too, right?’
The gleam in Travis’s eye dimmed a little. ‘Yeah, but you’re not going to give up that easily, are you?’
‘Give up? No. I’m still bidding, I just—’
‘I don’t mean quit, quit. I meant giving in to the carb people.’
Ah. Right. Mal didn’t really like the ‘us and them’ mentality that some people had when it came to being keto. He had been there himself, but after a few years, you got over it. Travis clearly had not. ‘It’s a wedding,’ he said, mildly. ‘People will expect cake.’ Should he elaborate on his arrangement with Elodie? The partnership still felt very fragile. Besides, it wasn’t any of Travis’s business.
Travis rolled his eyes. ‘Well anyway, I hope you win the bid. Your snacks are better than most of the stuff you can get in shops these days.’
‘Right. Well, thank you. Fingers crossed.’
Travis seemed distracted by someone behind Mal. ‘Oh, speaking of,’ he said, nodding.
Mal turned to see that Jamie had arrived. He headed towards the running machine, giving them a wary nod.
It was still early. He had just over an hour before the deadline to send in the proposal. Mal nodded back to Jamie. ‘Listen, Travis, I’ve got to run. I’ll see you around.’ He raced towards the showers. If he was quick, he could get back to the arcade and see if Elodie needed any help before she hit send on the proposal.
Elodie sat in her back room and checked through her numbers again. It was twenty to nine. She had to send this email in by nine, so there was just enough time to sense check everything one more time. As an afterthought, she added Mal’s email in the cc line, so that he would see that she’d sent it. She opened the document and went through all the things they’d listed. Had she missed anything out?
Her concentration was shattered by someone banging on the shop door. She roared, ‘We’re closed.’ The knocking continued.
Muttering to herself, she went to the front to see an out-of-breath Mal, peering in through the glass.
She let him in. ‘Did you forget something to add to the list?’ It was ten to nine now.
‘No. I just wanted to see if there was anything last minute.’
She led the way back to the computer and glanced at the clock on the screen. ‘There’s only ten minutes to go. If it’s wrong. It’s wrong. I’m sending it in.’ She looked up over the screen and caught his eye. ‘Okay?’
He took a deep breath and nodded solemnly.
She checked the email address again and hit send. ‘There.’ She let out a long breath. ‘Done.’
They stared at each other for a moment. He looked tired, with bags under his eyes. Was his hair wet? He seemed to be studying her face as well. When their eyes met, it felt like a shock.
‘I … I should go and open the shop,’ he said. ‘It’s a busy time.’
‘Right. Of course. Yes.’ She closed her laptop. ‘Let’s hope they like it. The proposal, I mean.’
He nodded, made a fingers-crossed gesture and left.
When the shop door shut, Elodie exhaled. The door opened again almost immediately. Elodie frowned. Had Mal come back in?
Marty appeared in the doorway to the back room. She had asked him to come in because she needed to get on with a cake order that morning.
He shrugged off his jacket. ‘What was Mr Buns doing here at this time in the morning?’
‘We submitted the proposal to Jamie and Saffron. He just wanted to check there wasn’t anything I needed before I hit send.’
Marty gave her a knowing smile. ‘Worked the whole night together, did you?’
‘No. Well, I worked quite late, but at home. Not together.’
‘Ah,’ said Marty. ‘Pity.’
‘Stop that.’
‘Stop what? I’m just saying. He’s nice to look at. Might have been nice spending the night with him. Massaging the numbers …’
Elodie shook her head. ‘One track mind,’ she said. ‘Besides, isn’t he gay?’
Marty put his head to one side. ‘Hmmm. I don’t know that he’s straight-straight, but he’s definitely into girls. I’ve seen the way he checked you out.’
The idea made her stomach flutter. Which was weird. ‘There’s something about him that bothers me,’ she said.
Marty’s eyes widened.
‘Not in a bad way,’ she added quickly. ‘Not creepy or anything. Just when he’s around … I feel like everything is … slightly off balance.’
‘Oh. Oh!’ Marty clasped his hands at his chest. ‘That’s romantic.’
‘Not like that.’ Now she was embarrassed. And there wasn’t even anything to be embarrassed about. ‘Oh god, why do I bother talking to you?’
Marty laughed. ‘Because I make life less boring.’ He tied his apron on and washed and dried his hands. ‘Anyway, I hope you get that gig. For all sorts of dull reasons as well.’ He blew her a kiss and skipped into the shop.
‘Do you do birthday cakes?’
Mal blinked. The woman standing in front of him looked smart and formidable. She was in a teal business suit.
‘Pardon?’ he said, even though he’d heard what she said.
She repeated the question.
‘Er … Not as such.’ He gestured to the small selection of sweet snacks that he had. ‘I can make a mini carrot cake with butter and cream cheese topping or fruit muffins. I don’t really do full-sized cakes.’ He had tried, but they were difficult to replicate with any kind of accuracy.
Her face fell. ‘Oh. It’s just that my daughter asked for a real cake this year and I hoped …’ She looked wistfully at the carrot cakes.
Now he noticed the puffiness under the eyes. ‘I wish I could help,’ he said, ‘but my attempts at making anything bigger than a muffin-sized cake have not looked that great. They sink in the middle.’
‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I’ll take a couple of muffins. She likes those. Can I freeze them?’
‘I can do you a batch of six frozen ones, if you like. I have blueberry ones in the freezer today. You just defrost them overnight and they’re good to go in the morning.’
‘Yes please. It’ll be good to have backups.’
‘Do you have a way to keep them cool?’
Her shoulders slumped a little. ‘Not really.’
‘Do you want to come back on your way home this evening? You could pick them up then.’
She gave him a tired smile. ‘That is a much better idea. Thank you. You’re very kind.’
He wasn’t. She was still buying stuff from him.
‘If you like, I can make your daughter a strawberry cheesecake. I can make them up to about three and a half to one ratio on the classical keto diet. You’d have to serve them with squirty cream on top if you wanted more fat.’ There were different types of ketogenic diet when it came to epilepsy management. The classic was the simplest – you added fat until the weight of fat met a prescribed ratio compared to the weight of carbs and protein.
‘Let me ask her and get back to you.’ She pointed at a coconut and raspberry slice. ‘I’ll take one of those, though.’
He got that for her. She thanked him again for his kindness. What sort of treatment had she received before to be this grateful for his small gesture?
He looked thoughtfully at the muffins. There had to be a way. Could he make something that was half keto, half not? That would lower the cost considerably. Most keto kids only needed one keto portion at their party, everyone else ate carby food.
An idea stirred. Before he could think it through to its conclusion, his phone rang.
‘Jamie.’
‘Mal. Congratulations, Saffron loved your idea of teaming up with Elodie. Love the menu. We have a couple of small suggestions, but otherwise, basically, it’s the best one we’ve seen. It means that the guys from the gym don’t need to crash their keto and everyone else gets all the usual food. It’s genius. Well done, you.’
‘Me and Elodie,’ he said. ‘I can only take half the credit.’
Jamie chuckled. ‘Looks like you two are going to have to work together to pull this one off.’
Mal’s heart picked up. He had been so focused on winning the bid that he’d lost sight of what winning it actually meant. ‘I’m sure we’ll be fine,’ he said. ‘We have two completely separate menus, so we don’t need to work together that often.’ His tone was reassuring, mainly because he was trying to reassure himself. ‘Thank you so much, Jamie. And Saffron, obviously.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Is there anything major you want to tweak?’
‘Not from my point of view. All the stuff you’ve suggested sounds great. I’ve tried most of them anyway, when I came into your shop or through your lunch boxes. Time is quite short. We’ll just have to trust you guys not to screw it up.’
He made a few more seconds of small talk and hung up. Mal leaned against the counter and took a couple of deep breaths. Liz, who was busy wiping down the tables, looked up. ‘News?’ she said.
He nodded. ‘We got Jamie and Saffron’s wedding.’
‘Brilliant!’ Liz came over and high-fived him. ‘That’s wonderful.’ She picked up her cloth again. ‘Are you going to be okay with the cake lady?’
Mal tried not to grimace. He was a bit worried about Elodie too, if he was being honest. Arguing with her had been annoying, but the way he had noticed her last night had been worse. She was a colleague and she was going out with Leon. Out of bounds. Developing any kind of awareness of her as a woman was just going to be distracting and a pain.
He assumed Saffron would have phoned Elodie to tell her.
‘I should probably go over there and have a quick chat with her, I guess,’ he said.
‘Hope she doesn’t bite your head off,’ said Liz, cheerfully.
‘She won’t. She’s okay, really. Just a bit intense.’ He folded up the cloth he’d just picked up, placed it carefully on the counter. ‘Keep an eye on the place for me, will you,’ he said to Liz, pointlessly, since she would anyway.
When he got to the cake shop, Elodie was beaming and Marty was doing a little jig.
‘Oh, you beautiful man! You and your clever plan did it!’ said Marty.
Mal grinned. ‘Yes. It wasn’t my plan, though. Elodie suggested it.’ He turned to Elodie. She looked so pleased. With her eyes sparkling and her cheeks flushed pink, she looked almost angelic. His mind emptied.
‘I didn’t actually think we’d get the job,’ she said. ‘Did you?’
It took a second for him to get his vocal cords to work. ‘I … never doubted it,’ he said. ‘I just came to ask …’ Oh shit. What had he come here for? Oh. Yes. ‘Er … was there anything we needed to go over before we got cracking with doing the food?’
‘Nothing urgent, I don’t think.’ A crease appeared on her forehead. The happy Elodie was gone and normal Elodie was back. ‘We’ll have to organise a small tasting session, just in case they want us to tweak anything, but apart from that, I think we’re good. I’ll liaise with Saffron to organise the tasting. We need to talk about her cake anyway.’
‘That’s great. Yes. Brilliant. I … guess we’ll be in touch soon.’ He smiled. ‘I’ll see you later then.’
‘Is your friend … coming in today?’ Marty asked the question in the most casual manner, but Mal could see the real interest behind it. He studied Marty thoughtfully for a second. Hmm. Not Jake’s usual type, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. ‘No. But he will be in tomorrow afternoon.’
‘Oh,’ said Marty, looking down at the cakes on the counter in front of him. ‘That’s nice.’
Elodie was watching Marty, her eyes twinkling. Clearly, it wasn’t just him imagining Marty’s crush on Jake. Mal grinned at her. She raised an eyebrow.
Interesting. ‘Bye, Marty.’
‘I might pop round later to buy one of your proteiny lunches,’ Marty said.
‘You do that.’
Elodie handed over a cake box and took payment. At the till, Marty was cheerfully packing up the order for the next person. Someone else was waiting. They had an actual queue. Granted, not a long one, but for her tiny shop, it was admirable. The shop was busier than usual these days. She thought it might have something to do with the Saffron effect.
The phone rang.
‘I’ll get it.’ She ducked into the back room. Marty could handle the queue just fine.
It was someone else wanting a celebration cake.
‘I saw the photos of your cakes on Instagram,’ the lady said. ‘I can’t believe you’re local. It’s our fourth wedding anniversary and I’d love to do a special cake.’
‘What sort of thing did you have in mind?’
‘What’s the material for four years? Like cotton or gold or whatever?’
‘Four years that’s … linen?’ Oh. That wasn’t as inspiring as she’d hoped. ‘Is there … something else you might have that you like? A special holiday, maybe? Or an activity you both enjoy?’ The giggle from the other end of the line made her smile. ‘Something I can make in fondant, ideally without getting arrested.’
‘I don’t … Actually, you make nice flower cakes right?’
‘I can do flowers, yes. Any particular type of flower?’
‘Could you recreate my wedding bouquet?’
‘I can’t recreate it as such, but I can certainly make a cake that’s based on it.’
They chatted through some options and Elodie made notes. ‘When is it for?’
The woman told her the date, making Elodie suck in her teeth. That was the day before Saffron’s wedding. It would be difficult. ‘I’m … not sure I can make it for then.’
‘Oh.’ The woman sounded so disappointed that Elodie felt bad. ‘That’s a shame. I really like your bakes that I saw and you’re the first person who took the time to work out what would work for me.’
Elodie closed her eyes. She was on track with baking all the things for the wedding that could be frozen. She had worked in some wiggle room for unexpected problems, but none had materialised. So long as nothing went wrong, she could make this work.
‘I’ll pay extra,’ the woman said.
That would help. Even though Elodie had budgeted carefully for her quote, her profit margin wasn’t huge. Extra money would help.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘I’ll do it.’
They made the arrangements. Elodie hung up and wrote the delivery date on her calendar. She would have to pull a late night again this week. Still, it would be okay. Things were going well right now. She just had to hope that her luck held.