Christmas At The Cupcake Cafe

by Jenny Colgan

  He pointed at a flashily-dressed trader bellowing into a telephone. ‘Come on! We’ve tried all this shouting bollocks before and it didn’t work then. This is a total waste of time. I bet no one in here really understands what a derivative is or why it’s such a terrible idea, except three quants in a back office taking five minutes off playing World of Warcraft. Banks have spent years pulling the wool over their own eyes. It’s not sustainable, and we know it now. Why isn’t the money flowing properly? To help real businesses, real people grow and build and make things? Because that castle-in-the-air stuff fell right down. Still, nice suit, Kelvin.’

  Austin turned round and got ready to go. That was when he saw the little man with the large bow tie who had been standing in the middle of the trading floor with an unlit cigar, watching them intensely.

  ‘You,’ he said, stabbing a stubby finger at Austin. ‘You’re having lunch with me.’

  And now here he was, sitting in front of six different types of bread that were being explained to him by a ludicrously handsome young man. Austin wondered vaguely where all those fat Americans you heard about were. Maybe Manhattan’s skinny buildings and tiny living spaces simply discouraged it.

  ‘Two olive, one rye, but not if it’s warm,’ ordered Merv, and settled himself down to look at Austin. His eyes were small and curious.

  ‘London tells us you’re a bit of a curveball. Young, on the up, incorruptible … might be ready to jump from clearing while you still can.’

  ‘Um,’ said Austin. ‘That was very nice of them.’

  ‘They also said you were the only person in the entire company whose loans had never lost money.’

  Austin smiled at this. It was a nice compliment to get. He loaned on his gut instincts for people; how hard he thought they could work, how much they wanted it. When Issy had walked into his office nearly two years ago, Austin could see beyond the nerves and anxiety and the frankly total lack of preparation to the person beneath; she had more steel in her than you would think by looking at her. Well, an unusual upbringing could do that to you, as he knew only too well.

  ‘Do you know how much my bond traders lost me last year? Those klutzes in the trading room?’

  Austin shook his head politely.

  ‘About seventeen billion dollars.’

  Austin wasn’t entirely sure whether this was, in context, a lot of money or not.

  ‘We have to get back to basics, Austin.’ Merv refilled their glasses with claret. ‘We need decent, honest brokers with no blotted copybooks. We need transparency. We need to do something before the public decide we should all be in jail, capisce?’

  Austin nodded.

  ‘Guys like you … making smaller loans, more cautious investments. Not behaving like drunk fucking beavers at the wheel of a 747, you know what I’m saying? Not acting like coked-up weasels who exist simply to spunk cash down the panties of cocktail waitresses and buy themselves fucking indoor fucking trampolines.’

  Austin was slightly lost, but he smiled gamely nonetheless.

  ‘Sustainable banking?’ he tried. This was a phrase that had gone down well at head office.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Merv. ‘Exactly. You married?’

  ‘No …’ Austin was confused by the curveball question.

  ‘Kids?’

  ‘Uh, I look after my brother.’

  ‘Why, what’s up with him?’

  ‘He’s eleven.’

  Merv nodded. ‘Oh yeah, one of my kids is eleven. From Mrs Ferani number two. Doesn’t know if he’s coming or going. Half of him wants to play Star Wars, half of him wants to race in the Indy 500 …’

  ‘Is that like Formula 1?’

  ‘… so I said to him, “Well, fine, you can have the damn car, but don’t drive it off the ranch.”’

  The waiter came over and started to explain the enormously complicated list of daily specials, in such a friendly way that Austin wondered for a few moments if they’d been at school together, but Merv waved him away.

  ‘It’s Christmas, isn’t it? Bring us something with turkey. And cranberry sauce and the rest of that bullshit. And some more claret.’

  Austin, his body clock slightly messed up, and having drunk some very good but rather rich claret at lunch, lurched out of the restaurant at 4 p.m. A black town car appeared silently out of seemingly nowhere to pick up Merv, who seemed to be suffering no ill effects at all and offered Austin a lift. He declined. The New York city air was absolutely freezing in his throat, but he wanted to clear his head a little and think things over.

  ‘Sure thing,’ Merv said. ‘But you’re one of my men now, OK?’

  They shook hands and Merv pulled him into a large bear hug. It was extremely unsettling.

  Austin found himself just by the Plaza Hotel at the south-east end of Central Park. Long rows of horses and carriages lined up opposite, with jingling bells and icy breath. The horses wore blankets, and Austin went to take a picture of them on his phone before remembering that Darny would probably think this was infringing the rights of horses or something, so decided against it. Opposite the park was FAO Schwarz, the massive toy shop. Even Darny, Austin suspected, would have liked a peek in there. He headed on to Fifth Avenue, among the crowds of excited shoppers hopping in and out of Barneys and Saks and the other great department stores that lined the sidewalk. The lights and window displays were almost overwhelming, and snow was starting to fall. Wrapped up in warmth and the excitement of new people and new places … it was enervating.

  A whole new world? Really?

  He hadn’t told Issy because he didn’t want to worry her, but there was every chance the Stoke Newington branch wouldn’t make it through the next round of cuts. And to make the dizzying leap from local to global banking … it was almost unheard of. The bank had only ever been meant as a stopgap. He’d known he was capable of more, but life was so complicated, and providing stability for a terrified and confused four-year-old had been paramount at the time.

  Now, though … maybe it was time for him to reclaim some ambition for himself?

  He thought of Issy. She’d often said how much she’d love to go to New York. She could come … she’d love it, wouldn’t she? Would she? He thought with a sinking heart of how happy she was in the Cupcake Café; how she’d worked so hard to build it into a lovely cosy place for people to come and sit for a while; how she’d got to know the locals and the regulars and how the café had taken its place in Stoke Newington like it had always been there. It gave him an ominous feeling.

  But she could do it again! Maybe get her green card, start up something wonderful. Americans had invented the cupcake, surely? Two very tall women pushed past him to get into the Chanel store, talking loudly about their dates. Austin buried the thought that Issy wouldn’t feel at all at home here. That she possibly wasn’t tough enough and sharp enough for New York. He decided to buy her a present. Something lovely to show her how magical the city would be.

  In his slightly fuddled state, he couldn’t believe it. The smell. He’d just been thinking about Issy, and suddenly, out of nowhere, he’d smelled her. He followed his nose off down a side street. And sure enough, right there on the corner was the most adorable, charming, perfect little cupcake café he’d ever seen in his life.

  Outside, the little corner building was painted pink. It was completely covered top to toe in little white fairy lights, with more lights strung inside visible through the windows. Mismatched dark-coloured sofas – greens and burgundies – were dotted around, covered in tartan rugs, and the walls and the floor were dark mahogany. The smell of coffee and baking cakes made Austin nearly tearful with homesickness. He pushed open the door, and it clanged just like Issy’s did.

  ‘Well, hello there,’ said a friendly voice from behind the counter. The back wall was entirely lined with red and green twisted candy canes. ‘What can I get you today?’

  Chapter Five

  Polar Bear Cupcakes

  These little cakes are irresistible. Cut the liqu
orice into tiny eyes and a little nose, and use white buttons for the ears. Or if, like me, you hate liquorice, use chocolate chips. Try not to feel too sad when you bite into them; let’s face it, anyone who can eat a jelly baby can eat a coconut baby polar bear.

  125g unsalted butter, at room temperature

  125g caster sugar

  2 large eggs, at room temperature

  125g sifted self-raising flour

  2 tsp vanilla extract

  2 tsp milk

  For this recipe you need two different sizes of cupcake tin, one smaller than the other.

  Preheat oven to 190°C/gas mark 5, and put paper cases in the tins.

  Beat butter and sugar together, then add eggs, flour, vanilla and milk and beat until the mix drops slowly off the spoon (add more milk if it won’t).

  Spoon into paper cases, put in oven. Check with a toothpick after 12 minutes – if it comes out clean, we’re ready.

  For the topping

  125g unsalted butter

  250g icing sugar, sifted

  1tsp coconut extract (you can also use Malibu, if you’re feeling frisky!)

  splash of milk

  desiccated coconut

  chocolate chips, large and small

  white chocolate buttons

  Beat the butter and add the icing sugar, then add the coconut extract and the milk until you have a light frosting.

  Spread the frosting all over one small and one large cupcake, then stick them together so the little cake makes the polar bear’s head. Carefully roll the bear in the desiccated coconut.

  Add chocolate chips to make the eyes and the nose, and the white chocolate buttons to make the ears – and voilà! Polar bear cupcakes!!!!

  Merry Christmas!

  ‘So we’re going full Christmas,’ said Pearl in a resigned tone of voice.

  ‘They’re polar bears,’ said Issy. ‘Polar bears are for life, Pearl, not just Christmas. Anyway,’ she added, ‘it’s the first of December today! It’s Advent! It’s all official! Ta-dah!’

  She unveiled her pièce de résistance from her shoulder bag: a huge Advent calendar. It was in the shape of a traditional snow-coloured village, and the brightly coloured windows of the houses formed the numbers of the calendar.

  ‘First child every morning gets to open a door. Except for Louis.’

  Louis looked up from where he was sitting engrossed in a book about frogs.

  ‘Do you have your own calendar?’ she asked.

  Louis nodded gravely.

  ‘Grammy did give me one. It has sweeties. I get chocolate every day! And Daddy gave me one too.’

  Issy looked at Pearl.

  ‘Don’t look at me,’ said Pearl, who had some trouble watching Louis’ weight. ‘I told them both,’ she said. ‘I took one of them away.’

  ‘For the poor children,’ said Louis gravely. ‘Poor, poor children. I kept Grammy’s because I ate that first.’

  ‘OK, good,’ said Issy. ‘Don’t open this one, if you don’t mind. You can open the big doors on Christmas Eve.’

  Louis studied it carefully. ‘Issy!’ he said urgently. ‘It has no chocolate left, Issy!’

  ‘Not all Advent calendars have chocolate, Louis.’

  ‘Yes! They do!’ said Louis. ‘I think a robber came.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad I’m not going to have too much trouble keeping you away from it,’ said Issy.

  She unfolded the calendar on top of the fireplace. It looked lovely, but wouldn’t stay up.

  ‘Hmm, I wonder what would keep that up?’ she said. ‘Oh, I know. Perhaps this long rope of holly I just happen to have in my bag.’

  Pearl snorted. ‘Yeah, all right,’ she said. ‘You’ve made your point.’

  ‘Did you know who started with the holly and the ivy?’ said Issy cheerfully.

  ‘Baby Jesus!’ hollered Louis.

  ‘Well, yes,’ said Issy. ‘But also the Romans. And mistletoe is from even further back, from the Druids, their midwinter festival.’

  Pearl sold another six polar bear cakes and didn’t say anything. Caroline turned up to let Issy get back downstairs to the baking. Her face fell when she saw the holly on the fireplace.

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘You’ve decided to go with red and green, have you?’

  ‘At Christmas?’ said Issy. ‘Well. Yes, funnily enough.’

  ‘But there’s so many more chic ways to do it!’ said Caroline. ‘I was thinking maybe an all-silver motif, or those clear plastic trees they do in the Conran shop? So stylish.’

  ‘If I wanted to be stylish, I wouldn’t wear clothes from a catalogue,’ said Issy. ‘I want it to be nice and cosy and comfortable, not scary like those posh places where they make you sit on jaggedy chairs and everyone is blonde and skinny and wears leather trousers …’

  Realising she was exactly describing Caroline, Issy fell silent. Fortunately Caroline, despite having zero body fat, managed to be very thick-skinned.

  ‘We’ll never make it into the Super Secret London Guide,’ she said. ‘They choose the most select hidden shops of the year and run a special issue. There’s a prize for the most stylishly decorated.’

  ‘We will not,’ said Issy. ‘I will try and get through it as stoically as I can.’

  Caroline pouted. ‘Don’t you want to at least make the effort? They run a special supplement in January.’

  ‘The problem is,’ said Pearl, ‘if we were in it, we’d fill the shop with other people who looked like you. And people that look like you are bad for turnover. Don’t eat enough cakes.’

  ‘Yes, but we take up less room,’ pleaded Caroline. ‘So you can fit more of us in. And let’s face it, we’ll pay almost anything for a smoothie, especially if it’s green.’

  Issy smiled. ‘Well, even so. We wouldn’t win and I don’t want to spend a lot of time doing stupid stuff.’

  ‘You might,’ said Caroline. ‘And it might bump you up the ladder a bit. It’s time you were expanding anyway. That’s how the Bastard grew his business. Well, I think. He used to talk about it, but I didn’t really listen, obviously – very boring.’

  ‘I will never understand why you two split up,’ murmured Pearl.

  ‘At least I was a married mother,’ sniffed Caroline.

  Thankfully, the bell tinged, and Helena entered, carrying Chadani. She had a gigantic buggy that had cost about as much as a small car, with personally commissioned muff, hood, foot cosy and car seat in pink and purple tiger stripes, so that from a distance it looked, as Austin had pointed out (quietly), like a small monster that had just eaten a baby, then exploded. It didn’t fit up the stairwell of their apartment, through the doorway of most shops or in the boot of their Fiat, so Helena regularly left it in the middle of the pavement, which managed to make it look even more like a monster, and meant it got in absolutely everybody’s way. This didn’t stop her from recommending it as the very best in buggies to everyone she met. Issy was rather grateful it didn’t fit inside, but she’d had to insist that Helena chain it to the little tree that grew in their courtyard, after she kept leaving it outside the door and it tripped up four people in one morning (it had an extra, malevolent wheel that jutted out the front, and was used mostly to jar people’s heels at pelican crossings).

  ‘Hello!’ said Issy cheerily, glad she wouldn’t have to break up Pearl and Caroline. ‘Hello, Chadani!’

  Chadani yelled and contorted her face.

  Issy looked at Helena.

  ‘Tell me that isn’t real fur.’ Chadani was practically buried in a huge fur coat with a matching bonnet and her pale pink Uggs.

  ‘No!’ said Helena. ‘But doesn’t she look so CUUUUTE? Ashok’s great-aunt wants to pierce her ears.’

  Issy didn’t say anything to this, but kissed Chadani on her little button nose. Once you got past all the fluff and nonsense, she was a very endearing baby.

  Chadani smiled cheerfully and pointed at the largest cake on the stand, winter raspberry with pink icing confection that Issy, in whimsical
mood, had covered in sparkly stars. They were very pretty and shiny, she conceded.

  ‘WAAAH!’ shouted Chadani.

  ‘Will I get one for you to share?’ said Issy, firing up a cappuccino for Helena.

  ‘Oh, Chadani doesn’t really like to share,’ said Helena. ‘She’s a bit young to be forced into that, don’t you think?’

  ‘It’s a very big cake,’ said Issy.

  ‘Yes,’ said Helena. ‘You really shouldn’t have made them so large. You have to think about children too.’

  Issy decided not to roll her eyes, and put another batch of bear cakes into the oven. Then she decided to take a quick break – Pearl and Caroline weren’t talking to one another, which made them both work really quickly and efficiently in a gigantic huff – and sat down next to Helena, who was looking at toys in the Argos catalogue whilst Chadani made shorter work of a gigantic cupcake than Issy would have believed a one-year-old capable of.

  ‘Hey,’ said Issy.

  ‘Do you know,’ said Helena, flicking through the catalogue, ‘Chadani has every single one of these, just about. They really need to invent some new toys.’

  ‘You love having a daughter, don’t you?’ said Issy, suddenly.

  Helena beamed. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘yes. Yes, I do. I mean, obviously we got a very special child, not everyone gets that. But yes. In general. I mean, obviously, it can be …’ She stopped herself. ‘Yes. It’s wonderful. So when are you and Austin going to get to it, then?’

  Issy bit her lip. Ever since they’d got together … well, everyone had just seemed to think that it was the end to a fairy tale, a happy ever after; there was Austin and Issy, and wasn’t it funny, she fell in love with her bank manager, ha ha, bet she’ll never be short of a few bob, ha, well, you can guess where he’s putting his deposits … oh, she’d heard all the jokes. And now it was more than a year ago, and everyone was expecting some kind of announcement, or at least for something to happen. But Austin’s work had gone on and on and she’d got caught up in the shop and moving, and, well …