Sweetest Thing

by Natasha West

  Well, there’d been no holding back tonight. Robyn felt like a new woman. She hoped Jodie had had a good time too. Apparently, she found their friction (no pun intended) to have its uses beyond pleasure, and it was hard to deny she had a point. Jodie set a bar for her in the kitchen that she tried to rise to.

  And she had done exactly the opposite in the bedroom, letting Robyn do as she liked without feeling like she might be judged. Robyn had once asked Alex if she might not, err, maybe try, well, just this once, you know, could she get a tongue… back there? Alex’s face had said it all, and Robyn had never asked again. Jodie? Very different story. Without a moment’s pause, she’d spun Robyn around, pushed her on all fours, and gone right to work. And when Jodie had been sitting on Robyn’s face, Robyn had managed to mumble, ‘Is this good?’ Jodie had replied irritably, ‘What? Can you shut up? I’m trying to come here.’ So Robyn knew exactly where she stood.

  Robyn drifted to sleep that night with an ease she hadn’t felt in a while, probably since Alex had moved in. Which made it clear, if it wasn’t already, just how wrong things had been with Alex. Some part of her must have known Alex wasn’t someone she could breathe with. How hilarious that the person Robyn could truly let go with was someone she’d disliked from the off. She thought that the difference might be that what Alex really was, the worst of her, had been hidden. With Jodie, it was all sat out on the surface for anyone to see. If she didn’t like you, she let it be known. If she didn’t care about something, you couldn’t miss it.

  Robyn had to admire it in a way. She could never live like that. She existed somewhere in the middle of the scale between Jodie and Alex. She wasn’t the liar Alex was, telling you she loved you with a knife behind her back. But Robyn didn’t always know how to say what was on her mind.

  Except with Jodie. Who knew?

  ***

  Sanjay was crying. Not just a lone, manly tear. He was straight out blubbing, looking at his sticky plum flapjack bars. ‘I don’t know how I did this!’

  Nearby, Adam was holding his mouth. ‘Are you ‘idding me, Sanjay?’ he said from between his fingers. ‘What the ‘uck ‘ave ooo ‘ot to cry about?’

  Sanjay looked at Adam in abject terror. ‘But… But… I was sure I stoned all of the plums.’

  ‘’ell that ‘oo my ‘oken ‘ooth!’ Adam yelled. ‘Oh, ‘uck me. I ‘eed a ‘entist. ‘ight ‘ow’

  Nearby, Madeline looked on with horror. Imogen looked a bit less affected. Robyn could have sworn she was trying not to laugh.

  ‘Cally! Get an emergency dentist appointment, quick as you can!’ the stage manager told the runner. She nodded and got her phone out. ‘On it.’

  Robyn was sympathetic to Sanjay’s pain, much less to Adam’s. He was a brute. A chipped tooth and the loss of his hard vowels wouldn’t kill him. But Sanjay looked mortified. He would feel this longer than a toothache. A public mistake like this could take up permanent residency in a sensitive soul.

  Susan began to examine what Adam had spit out on a plate, poking through it with a wooden spoon until she found the culprit. ‘Here it is. You definitely forgot to get the stone out of one of your plums.’

  Robyn didn’t think that was necessary. Everyone already knew that. But Susan couldn’t help herself but pick at people’s fuck-ups like scabs. Robyn thought it was distasteful. It was obvious Sanjay would not survive the day. There was no need to crow.

  ‘Right, everyone, we’re gonna take a break,’ the stage manager announced unnecessarily. ‘Take ten while we regroup.’

  ‘Adam, do you need an ice pack?’ Dorothy asked, grandma-ing hard as ever.

  ‘’anks, but I ‘ink I’ll be alright,’ Adam mumbled.

  Robyn went over to Sanjay and put a hand on his arm. He immediately turned into her and began to cry on her shoulder. Robyn was slightly shocked at his open tears, but she did her best to deal with them. ‘There, there,’ she said, patting his shoulder awkwardly. Over the top of his head, she saw Jodie leaning against her island, watching the chaos dispassionately.

  Robyn and Jodie hadn’t spoken today. It was almost as though they were total strangers, not two people who’d spent the night going at each other like cats brawling in an alley. But maybe they were still strangers. They hadn’t exactly cuddled and shared their hopes and dreams afterwards. Could you say that someone you’d had sex with was still quite foreign to you? In a way, yes. In another, no. No one else in this room knew that Jodie’s eyes rolled back in her head when she came, did they? Or that she had taken real delight in leaving a red handprint on Robyn’s left bum cheek that was still there. Or that she had a scratch down her back five inches long from Robyn’s fingernails.

  ‘Adam, I’ve got a cab outside to take you to a woman in Pockton,’ Cally ran in and announced.

  Adam nodded, looked at Sanjay with daggers, and walked out. Sanjay, still crying into Robyn’s shoulder, was lucky not to see it.

  ***

  Once she’d put Adam in a cab, the runner had promptly gone on a coffee run, and everyone was drinking from cardboard cups, sitting around the set, waiting.

  Robyn was perched on a stool at her island, staring into the depths of a latte. Dorothy was consoling Sanjay, who it turned out needed more than one shoulder to cry on. Rueben was on the phone to his wife, asking if she’d washed his pants. Susan was eating her own traybake (apple crumble squares) since it had already gotten a judgment. Jodie sat at her own island, checking her phone.

  Robyn wondered what shape the afternoon would take now. She was next to receive Adam’s critical eye, and if he came back this afternoon, she despaired of his verdict. Not that she thought it very likely she’d go today; she’d have to stab him in the eye to even get his attention after the crime Sanjay had committed. But she still wanted a fair judgement on her traybake. She’d worked hard on her strawberry and macadamia blondies. She wanted to know that they were good.

  As though Jodie had somehow read her mind, she suddenly appeared in front of her. ‘Can I have a bite?’ she asked.

  Robyn was thrown for a second. ‘Beg your pardon?’ Jodie asking if she could have a bite had taken on a slightly different meaning in the last twenty-four hours.

  ‘If there’s any leftover from your twelve?’ Jodie clarified. ‘I’m starving.’

  Robyn blinked and smiled at herself. ‘Oh. What’s wrong with yours?’

  Jodie looked over at her traybake and back to Robyn’s. ‘Don’t get a big head, but I fancy yours more.’

  Robyn suppressed her pleasure. ‘Yeah, I made extra.’ She cut Jodie a piece. Jodie took a bite, chewed for a few seconds with a completely unreadable expression, and then swallowed. ‘Yeah. Not bad,’ she said and carried on eating.

  ‘Do I get to try yours?’ Robyn asked.

  Jodie raised an eyebrow. ‘Try my what, exactly?’

  Robyn tossed a look over her shoulder. No one was close enough to listen. ‘Stop that. I meant your lemon and blueberry bars.’

  ‘Shame,’ she said with a discrete wink that made Robyn’s neck feel hot. She walked back to her island and cut off a piece. Robyn ate it. God damn, it was excellent. ‘Mmm, nice,’ she said casually. She wasn’t going to let Jodie know how good she was. She didn’t need to be told.

  ‘Is this the first time we’ve actually tried each other’s baking?’ Robyn asked.

  Jodie raised an eyebrow. ‘Is it?’

  They gave each other a funny look. ‘You’d never have asked to try my food before.’

  Jodie’s mouth tightened. ‘I wouldn’t make too much of that.’

  ‘No? You sure you’re not…’ Robyn stopped a sentence she should never have started.

  But Jodie wasn’t exactly one to let you off the hook. ‘Not what?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Robyn said quickly.

  ‘Not what?’ Jodie pressed.

  ‘I guess I was going to say… Are you sure you’re not trying to get to know me after you had your… wicked way last night?’

  Jodie rolled her eyes. �
��Wicked way? Jesus Christ, you really are a girl scout. No, this isn’t a date. I’m killing time.’ But then Jodie got a look in her eyes. A very shifty look indeed.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Actually, I did want to talk to you about… I wanted to run something past you.’

  Robyn’s brow furrowed. ‘Run something past me?’

  Jodie glanced furtively around. Robyn didn’t know what she was about to say, but she felt abruptly nervous. Had she just given Jodie a segue into asking her out, and was Jodie actually going to take it?

  Jodie had another look around for earwiggers, and Jodie held her breath. ‘Have you… Have you noticed how people keep fucking up? Every week, someone does something they didn’t think they’d done.’

  Robyn let the breath go, annoyed to find herself just slightly disappointed. But she did indeed know what Jodie meant. Though she wasn’t about to make this easy. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Sanjay.’ She glanced over to where he was sipping tea, his eyes finally dry. ‘Like, he’s not brain of Britain, but he’s careful. Does he strike you as someone that would forget to destone a plum?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Robyn shrugged. ‘The pressure of all this, it can get to you. I know that’s not something you could understand.’

  ‘Yeah, ice-cold bitch, I get it, Robyn,’ Jodie sighed. Robyn was about to protest, she hadn’t meant to say anything so mean. She was becoming grudgingly admiring of Jodie’s calm manner, she didn’t want Jodie to think she thought otherwise, even if she wasn’t quite ready to compliment her. But Jodie had moved on. ‘But how about when Darnell’s yeast overdose made his croissants blow up like balloons? You didn’t think that was a weirdly novice mistake?’ Jodie said quietly.

  ‘What are you getting at?’ Robyn asked.

  ‘I don’t know. I’m not pointing any fingers. Yet,’ Jodie said, looking around the set at her potential suspects.

  Robyn looked with her and then realised something. ‘Wait, why are you talking to me about this? What if it was me?’

  Jodie chuckled. ‘It’s not you. For a start, I think you were a victim. That whole thing with your uneven batch. I think someone fucked with your oven. The salt sugar swap too.’

  ‘The uneven muffins were probably first day nerves,’ Robyn said dismissively. But she wasn’t dismissing anything Jodie was saying. Not really.

  ‘And the salt?’

  Yeah, Robyn wasn’t so sure about that. But then she realised what Jodie had said a second ago. ‘For a start?’ Robyn asked.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You said, ‘For a start.’ What’s the other reason you don’t think I’m la saboteur?’ Robyn smiled.

  Jodie looked at Robyn, her dark, cool eyes mildly surprised. ‘Well, you just…’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I guess you don’t seem shitty like that,’ Jodie shrugged.

  Robyn’s mouth slipped up at one side. ‘First, my blondies are not bad, and now I’m not shitty? You have to stop with these compliments. I can’t get my breath!’

  Jodie gave Robyn a cheeky side-eye. ‘I’m a smooth talker, what can I say?’

  It was at that exact moment that Robyn realised she was flirting with Jodie. Not sniping at her, not swapping glares. Flirting. Worse, Jodie was flirting back. Not playing with her, not sneering. Talking. Like a human. Robyn didn’t know what the hell to do with that.

  Twenty

  That stupid plum stone.

  That was why Jodie had found herself at a loose end, why she’d found herself floating over to Robyn, swapping cakes and conspiracy theories. She’d never have done it otherwise. She didn’t care what the hell anyone was up to on this show, as long as they didn’t try to fuck with her, which she was pretty sure they hadn’t.

  But the plum stone thing had happened. And Jodie had done those things. She couldn’t take them back. Very irritating.

  But Jodie did sort of want Robyn to be aware of the miscreant if she wasn’t already. Robyn had had it rough lately. And not just in that shower… That stuff with Alex had to have knocked her for six. She didn’t deserve to get shat on from a great height by some loser who couldn’t just bake something decent and leave it at that.

  Still, Jodie was determined not to get too involved. She was nearly at the finish line. She wasn’t going out today. It would obviously be Sanjay to go today. So she’d done it. Week five.

  ‘Right, everyone, we’re gonna finish the afternoon’s shooting without Adam,’ Madeline said as she walked back on set.

  ‘How are you going to explain his absence?’ Robyn asked.

  ‘We got it all, the stuff with the tooth. It’s going in the show.’

  ‘Oh god,’ Sanjay wailed.

  ‘Sorry, Sanjay,’ Madeline said soothingly. ‘But we’ve got no choice. We can’t just reshoot and pretend this never happened.’

  Fresh tears appeared on Sanjay’s cheeks. Jodie shook her head. That boy needed to get his tear ducts under control. He must have been dangerously dehydrated by now.

  ‘Imogen will do the rest of the judging solo,’ Madeline explained. ‘So places everyone. Just Robyn and Jodie and then we can all go home.’

  Jodie and Robyn swapped a look. Not their usual hostile glare, it was a ‘Thank fuck’ type of look. Jodie was annoyed with herself for being buddy-like with Robyn. She needed to go back to being cunty with her, or she didn’t know what the hell might happen next.

  ***

  Jodie had gotten top baker. It was pretty cool. Except that everyone was looking at her.

  ‘Well done,’ Susan said coldly.

  ‘Glad to see a young ‘un doing well,’ Dorothy said evenly.

  ‘Why, I oughta!’ Rueben said with a fist shake. No one laughed.

  Robyn didn’t say anything. Jodie oddly wished she would.

  But then came time for the less fun news.

  ‘Sanjay,’ Madeline announced to absolutely no one’s surprise.

  Sanjay nodded. Jodie waited for the crying to start, but Sanjay was apparently finally out of tears. Jodie breathed a sigh of relief, she couldn’t take any more of his ocean of saline.

  However, Sanjay hadn’t stopped crying because he’d accepted his fate. He was simply kicking the drama up a notch. He fainted. Robyn was the quickest to react, jumping to catch his slight frame in her arms. She looked up at the rest of the shocked contestants, straining to hold Sanjay under his armpits. ‘Can someone give me a hand?’

  ‘My back,’ Dorothy said in her defence.

  ‘My shoulder,’ Susan added.

  ‘My arse!’ Rueben said. Everyone looked. ‘Bruised my coccyx last week.’

  ‘God sakes,’ Jodie said, taking half of Sanjay’s weight and dragging him to a chair.

  ‘Can we get a paramedic on set?’ Madeline asked irritably. ‘What the fuck is going on today,’ she muttered to herself.

  Jodie wasn’t waiting for a paramedic. She gave Sanjay a sharp slap around the chops, inciting a gasp from Robyn. ‘I can’t believe you did that,’ Robyn said.

  ‘If you don’t know I can hand out a slap when needed by now, you’ll never know it,’ Jodie muttered in Robyn’s direction.

  Robyn tutted and turned her attention back to Sanjay. His eyes were fluttering open. ‘Mummy?’ he said softly. Jodie considered slapping him again. ‘It’s alright. I think he’s coming to,’ Jodie announced.

  The paramedic appeared. ‘Right. I’ll check him over.’

  ‘What for? He’s fine. He just suffers from a Victorian sense of drama,’ Jodie told him.

  ‘Insurance purposes,’ the paramedic told her flatly.

  ‘Have at it,’ Jodie said, moving away from Sanjay. Robyn did the same.

  As they watched Sanjay being checked over, Robyn leaned in unexpectedly to Jodie’s ear. Jodie had no idea what she might say and she waited with interest.

  ‘Well done, by the way. You deserved top baker.’

  ‘Oh. Thanks,’ Jodie said, flustered. ‘You don’t have to say that, though.’

&nbs
p; ‘I know,’ Robyn said. And said no more.

  ***

  Jodie and Robyn stood on the train platform as the 16.32 pulled in. They turned to each other. Jodie wasn’t sure what to say. ‘I’m in B,’ was what came out.

  ‘C,’ Robyn said.

  ‘Next week, then,’ Jodie said.