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Re: School Bake Sale
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Dear Mums!
I think I’ve spoken to you all about the cake sale but just wanted to follow up on a few items so that we’re all on the same page. PLEASE READ CAREFULLY AND THOROUGHLY!!!!!
We do accept shop-bought cakes but home-made cakes are preferred. I know that we lead busy lives but a small amount of effort makes all the difference, don’t you think?
The cakes must be delivered to the Junior School reception by 2.30 p.m. AT THE LATEST. My helpers and I will need thirty minutes to cut and display the cakes and late delivered cakes will mean the overall presentation will be affected.
Absolutely NO NUTS! (I know you are all aware of the implications for pupils with a nut allergy but we all need a little reminding sometimes.)
Provide a label for your cake so that we know what it is (some of the ones we were given last year were undetectable, even after a taste test – ha ha!) A plain hand-written label is perfectly acceptable but if you have time to design and make a more eye-catching name card that would be super. If you need inspiration, I am making flags from coloured paper and cocktail sticks with my daughter for the cakes we are making.
Thanks in advance to everyone who is making a cake. Remember that all funds from the bake sale will go towards new cushions for the school library.
Happy baking!
Melissa x
Making a bloody cake. The cost of the ingredients was more than the profit generated by fifty pence a slice. Last time, Kate had forgotten until the night before and had had to go to the twenty-four-hour Tesco for ingredients, then sit up late while the damn thing cooked. Luke had gone to bed shaking his head. ‘Why don’t you just give them a tenner and say you bought and ate your own cake?’
This time she’d make her dad’s old favourite: pineapple cake. It involved chucking all the ingredients into a pan until they melted and then sticking it into the oven for forty-five minutes. Easy. Her dad had always enjoyed cooking as long as everything went into the same pan.
Tim had offered to visit her dad the second time she’d bumped into him in the hospital corridor, but she’d declined. It would have been too weird. Her dad still hadn’t forgiven Tim for ‘stringing you along all those years’. Plus, he was a very proud man and wouldn’t want Tim seeing him in bed in his pyjamas. It had been kind of Tim to offer, though. Maybe that’s why she’d agreed to go and get a coffee with him in the hospital canteen instead.
Chapter Four
Laura
Photographs of other people’s children made Laura anxious.
She tapped her fingernails on the counter whilst she waited for a coffee. She didn’t usually get them manicured but had thought a perfect finger to point at her PowerPoint would make her feel more confident. Who was she trying to kid? I missed my target but don’t my nails look pretty? Idiot.
The woman sitting opposite her back there had seemed perfectly nice with her short mum bob and smiling face, but the pictures of her children smiling up from the phone screen had twisted something inside Laura. The woman – Kate? – had said she was forty-one, and her oldest child looked about six. Therefore, she must have been about thirty-five when she had her first child, which meant she fell pregnant when she was thirty-four. That gave Laura three years. Which sounded a long time. But wasn’t.
There was a display card on the counter advertising the free Wi-Fi on the train. Laura entered the lengthy password on her mobile; it looked like the coffee machine might take a while to regurgitate her drink. A circular icon spun around and around as her email tried to connect, and she issued another silent prayer. Please don’t cancel the order. Please don’t cancel the order.
A WhatsApp message rolled up her screen. Her mother. Laura didn’t need to read it to know what was in the message: Look at this one – it’s got a fabulous hallway! Xxx. Her mother’s new hobby was finding her daughter a home on Rightmove. It was practically an addiction: online real estate porn. It hadn’t helped when Laura had told her that she and James couldn’t afford to buy a house in South London. Her mother had happily said that houses were ‘a lot cheaper near us’ and had started to send links to three-bedroom semi-detached houses in Kent. Three bedrooms for an obvious reason.
That woman back there – Kate – had looked serene and happy. Is that what life was like when you gave up work and became a full-time parent? Lunch dates with your friends whilst the children played happily together. Must be bliss. Laura had to stop doing these mental timelines, calculating the age that someone would have had their first child. If it was thirty-six or more, though, it was strangely comforting. She used to pick up those trashy magazines with exclamation marks in their titles just so that she could read about celebrities who had had their first pregnancy well into their forties. Then her friend Tina had said that a lot of them had to do IVF or use donor eggs. Not that there was anything wrong with that, but there were lots of needles involved in fertility treatment and Laura had once passed out in the middle of Claire’s Accessories trying to get her ears pierced. She’d been revived by a very kind seven-year-old patting her hand.
Alongside the birth age calculating thing, she’d also developed an unhealthy bitterness towards people who were getting married. Up until recently, every time an old school mate announced their engagement/marriage/second child, Laura would email Tina, her last single school friend.
Can you believe it! Rhys Hereford is getting married! Rhys Hereford! He couldn’t even put his shirt on the right way round after PE!
In those days, Tina would commiserate.
ANOTHER ONE! How come all these people can manage it and we can’t? Where do they meet these people?
But now Tina was one of them too. After a whirlwind six months in which she and her now-husband had met, moved in and married. And Laura had been forced to live at the centre of it all. A week-long hen-do in Ibiza where every other woman had been married and had recounted their own wedding day in excruciating detail; a bridesmaid dress which had made Laura look like Bo Peep’s slutty sister; a wedding reception from which James had excused himself at 9.30 p.m. citing a headache, leaving Laura dancing with Tina’s slightly dodgy Uncle Bill.
Since the wedding, other than a painful evening when all the hen-attendees had had a girl’s night at Tina’s to watch the wedding DVD (and two of the freaks had actually come wearing their own wedding dresses for a ‘laugh’), the whole thing seemed to have calmed down. But who the hell was Laura going to email now?
There were still no emails from the distributor, Machon UK. Who knew the world of selling computer printers could be so stressful? Managing the distribution channel from manufacturer to distributor to retailer to end user. She might have more luck opening a stall outside PC World and flogging the damn things to passers-by herself.
Maybe her buyer wasn’t in? Off sick? Dead? Laura shook that thought from her head; that was not nice. And anyway, if they were dead, someone else would just take over and return the two thousand units of unsold printers in their warehouse. No, better they were just off sick long enough for her to get home from the sales meeting. Robert’s wrath would be easier to deal with over the phone than in person. Maybe. At least she wouldn’t have ‘the stare’ over the phone. Heaven help her from that. It made her want to frantically confess everything she’d ever done wrong, from missed sales opportunities to nail polish stolen from Boots on a dare when she was fourteen.
A dubious-looking coffee materialised and Laura edged back towards her seat. James had pronounced his advice on dealing with her distributor last night in his usual condescending way. ‘You just need to be firm, Laura. Show them that you are in control of the situation. Don’t give them an opportunity to disagree with you.’ She’d tried to let it go over her head. Her boyfriend might be the darling of his accountancy firm, but he knew nothing about sales. The advice obviously came from a place of love, but when he used his ‘I know best’ tone she wanted to shove his advice right back up that place of love
. Quite forcefully.
How he could do his job day in, day out was a complete mystery to her. They’d left university with the same accountancy qualification, but Laura had sworn she’d rather read the entire works of Shakespeare backwards on a continual loop than scrutinise someone else’s bank statements and receipts for the rest of her life. It wasn’t the numbers – that part she liked – it was the sheer repetitiveness. James, on the other hand, had followed his life plan to apply to the Big Six accountancy firms and had slid straight into a fast-track graduate scheme. Since then, he’d climbed up and up, while Laura had fallen rather more haphazardly into the world of IT sales with Sentek, a US company with a small UK office, reporting in to the European head office in Paris. And the force that was Robert Fournier: European Sales Director. She shuddered.
And now she and James were living together. Sort of. Laura was living in James’ flat in Peckham. Tina had used to point this out in the days when she’d still been single – at least you’re living with someone – but then Laura would argue that there is a world of difference between sharing some space in a rented house where you weren’t even allowed to change the layout of the kitchen cupboards, and actually buying a place together. Her living situation was so temporary. Only one step up from her student house because they didn’t have roommates in the second bedroom or a sink full of three days’ washing up.
It had all come to a bit of a head again last night. It didn’t help that Laura had made the fatal mistake of flicking through Instagram while preparing dinner. Tina had posted pictures from her honeymoon in the Maldives along with some candid shots from the wedding reception. Nothing wrong in that. Deep down, Laura was made up for her lovely friend; Tina’s new husband, Phil, was a great bloke and Tina deserved to be happy. It was the comments on the photos that had bothered her: KTB87: One of us now! CopperTop: Welcome to the Mrs Club! SadieSmith: Babies next!
Laura had taken the meat tenderiser to the two pieces of fillet steak like a psychopath who’d had a really bad day.
James had come home in a buoyant mood, carrying a bottle of champagne from a grateful client. He’d poured them a glass each, then put the rest of the bottle in the fridge with a spoon in it to keep the bubbles; he wouldn’t have more than one on a work night. Over dinner, he’d mentioned that his colleague, Peter, was getting married.
‘That’s nice. How long has he been with his girlfriend?’ Laura had focused her attention on cutting a slice of steak and keeping her voice neutral. They’d probably been together for years. Childhood sweethearts, etc., etc.
James had shrugged. ‘I’m not sure. He definitely wasn’t with her when he started with the company, which was about… er… three years ago, I guess.’
Which meant that this Peter had been with his girlfriend – fiancée – for a quarter of the time that Laura and James had been together. She’d stuck her fork into a fat chip rather forcefully. ‘And how old is Peter again?’
James clearly had no idea what he was walking into. He’d finished a mouthful of steak and picked up his champagne glass before answering. The glasses had also been a gift from a client. There were a lot of grateful people in James’ life. ‘I think he’s about twenty-seven or twenty-eight. Definitely younger than me.’
At least four years younger than him. Laura had stabbed her steak with her fork and pressed her knife down hard until a little blood oozed out. When she could trust her voice again, she spoke. ‘And did that make you start to think about when you’d like to get married?’
James put an elbow on the table and rested his forehead on his fingertips. ‘Oh, for God’s sake, Laura. How does every conversation come back to this?’
How? A conversation about a colleague getting engaged was hardly a 180-degree turn from her question about them doing the same thing. This kind of comment from James used to be her signal to back down. To stop ‘banging on’ about it. Not any more. ‘Because you never give me an answer, James.’
It was true. His refusal to just sit down and have a grown-up conversation about their future was turning her into a pathetic, nagging whiner. And that made her even angrier. But what else could she do? Not mention it and keep on not mentioning it until they were still not mentioning it in their retirement home?
James raised his head and brought his other elbow onto the table, pressing his fingertips together as if he was about to conclude a financial summary. ‘If I was ever planning on proposing, do you not think you would be ruining it by constantly bringing the subject up? The more you go on about it, the less likely it is that I will be able to surprise you. You need to just leave it alone, Laura.’
The first five or so times Laura had heard him say this, she had been excited to think that he had a plan in mind. Nowadays, she knew it for what it was: a well-rehearsed feint. Except they weren’t playing a game of James’ beloved rugby; this was her life.
Even though Laura had technically started it, she could really have done without another argument like that the night before a sales meeting. Robert – he of the intimidating stare – was hosting this meeting at a hotel near his office in Paris, and all the regional sales managers like Laura were expected to fly in from wherever they were in Europe and prostrate themselves before him. That was probably a little unfair: he had at least promised them some sightseeing today in return for giving up their Saturday, but he could be a bit of a tyrant. They also had a dinner out tonight, before, first thing tomorrow, getting down to the nitty gritty of whose territory was performing in line with expectation and whose wasn’t. It had been a tough quarter for most of them and Robert had made no secret of the fact that sales needed to improve soon. Very soon.
As she made her way back to her seat, Laura saw herself reflected back in the train windows. Reddish-brownish hair, no make-up and a T-shirt and hoodie; she hadn’t changed much since she’d graduated ten years ago with the vague plan that she would do some travelling, find a job she loved and then settle down with James and two-point-four children. How had she ended up here? Her career had started as a temp job in the finance department when she’d finished university. Somehow, a decade later, here she was, heading up the UK sales team. Badly.
When Laura slid back into her seat, Kate was engrossed in a book. What was it? Laura had almost broken her neck a few times, craning it at an awkward angle to try and find out what someone on the train was reading. The Catcher in the Rye. Good choice. James didn’t read at all. One of the many things they didn’t have in common. Maybe that’s why he didn’t want to marry her? Or surprise her with a proposal.
Lots of people around him did seem surprised: surprised that they were a couple at all. The girls in his office were blatant about looking from Laura to James and back again in amazement on the rare occasion she visited him at work. They were probably expecting someone special – and then Laura walked in. It was true that he looked good these days, with his expensive, well-cut suits and salon-styled hair. Though his mother said to her once, ‘I don’t know why he hasn’t popped the question, Laura. What is he waiting for, a supermodel?’ How was she supposed to react to that?
Kate looked up from her book and smiled. ‘How’s the coffee?’
Laura pulled a face. ‘Pretty grim, actually. It’s my fourth one today. My boyfriend says I drink too many.’
Kate nodded. ‘I used to drink a lot of coffee, but now I can’t have any caffeine after about three o’clock or I can’t get to sleep. It’s a shame your first trip to Paris is on business. Could you not get your boyfriend to come out and meet you tomorrow after your meeting with your boss? Make a romantic weekend of it?’
Laura had had the same idea. But James wouldn’t even consider it. ‘EhEHe’s not keen on Paris. Says it’s full of cigarette ends and dog crap.’
Kate raised an eyebrow. ‘Maybe he should look upwards a little more often. There’s considerably more to see above the pavement.’
Laura laughed, but she felt disloyal. James had taken her to lots of nice places in the last year and they w
ere happy together. Twelve years was a long time to be with someone and, apart from the ‘Where is this going?’ argument they had every few months, she and James rubbed along together well. Sometimes men just needed longer to get used to the idea of settling down, didn’t they? Even Laura hadn’t started worrying about it until a year or so ago. Now it was all she could think about. Well, that and not losing her job.
Kate had returned to her book. Laura couldn’t face opening her spreadsheet again and creating another colour-coded graph, even if she did find it strangely soothing. Maybe Excel could help her sort out the buzzing in her head. A pie chart, perhaps? James and commitment (35%), worrying about job (30%), life left in ovaries (20%), finding clothes that make her look thinner (10%), seeing Paolo again (5%).
Actually, the ‘seeing Paolo again’ segment was getting bigger the closer she got to Paris. She’d been actively not thinking about their conversation at the last sales meeting, but that meant she hadn’t formulated a strategy for how to act when she saw him today. Technically, nothing had actually happened between them, so she should just act normally. They were just two colleagues, meeting up with a lot of other colleagues at a sales meeting. Everything was normal.
Except, acting normally was quite tricky when you thought too hard about it. Like when you were a teenager and you came home to your parents’ house a little drunk. The sensible (and normal) thing to do would be to call out ‘goodnight’ and go straight to bed but, no, in the spirit of ‘acting normally’ you would decide now was the time to sit down with them as they watched Inspector Morse and try to have a full-blown conversation which ‘proved’ you hadn’t been drinking.
That was the kind of ‘acting normally’ she worried she might do when she met Paolo again. Minus the slurred speech. Hopefully.
One Way Ticket to Paris: An emotional, feel-good romantic comedy Page 3