The Parisian Christmas Bake Off

by Jenny Oliver

  ‘OK, babe?’ He glanced up, checking that she was still there, still waiting for him to finish.

  She nodded, her mouth frozen into place.

  He pushed his plate away and stretched his arms high to the ceiling. ‘Awesome. Totally awesome, as always. Bed?’

  ‘I erm…’ But it felt as if her mind had slipped all the way through her body into a pool on the floor. And instead of saying anything else she let him lead her up to her bedroom, where she was suddenly ashamed that she’d changed the sheets because she’d had an inkling he was coming and had put the winter roses her gran had brought for her in a vase by the bed and sprayed Dark Amber Zara Home room spray to make it smell all moody and sexy.

  When the front door clicked shut forty minutes later, she lay staring up at the ceiling and wondered what had become of Rachel Smithson, because right now she felt completely hollow from the neck down.

  Chapter Three

  King’s Cross at Christmas was a nightmare. Giant sleighs and reindeer had been rigged up to float above the platforms from the metal rafters, while Christmas music played on a loop in every shop. Pret a Manger had a queue that snaked out onto the concourse and all the sandwich shelves were picked clean, WHSmith had run out of water and she’d forgotten her moisturiser but Kiehl’s had sold out of her favourite.

  With just a lukewarm coffee in hand, she forced herself through the crowds, thinking about how, in the end, she’d made the decision to go to Paris purely so she never slept with Ben again. It was heartbreakingly-good-looking-boyfriend cold turkey—maybe that should have been Pret’s seasonal sandwich. She squeezed past kissing couples and hugging relatives to track down her train. The platform was packed, the corridor to the train was even worse, blocked with suitcases and big paper bags of presents.

  God, she hated Christmas. She could just about admit, only to herself, that it had become like a phobia. And being on this train felt like when they locked someone with a fear of spiders into the boot of a car crawling with them.

  ‘Erm, excuse me, I think that’s my seat.’ She pointed to the number on the luggage rack above and showed the young blonde girl who had taken her place her ticket.

  ‘I really want to sit with my boyfriend,’ was all she said back.

  ‘Oh.’ Rachel bit her lip. ‘Well—’ Someone pushed past her and she had to hold the table to steady herself.

  ‘My seat’s fifty-seven,’ said the blonde, shrugging before turning back to talk to the guy next to her.

  Rachel nodded, wishing her legs might overrule her brain and walk straight off the train, but then she remembered that she had nowhere to live—the Australians would be arriving around about now.

  She pushed through to her new seat, where a little boy wearing reindeer ears across the aisle started screaming as his sister ate his flapjack.

  ‘We’re off to Eurodisney. Patrick, stop that,’ said the woman next to her when Rachel sat down, watching the boy hit his sister on the head. ‘Leila’s going to be a princess. Aren’t you, honey?’ She reached across to break up the fight. ‘We always go to Disney at Christmas. It’s so magical.’

  Rachel nodded and turned away to stare out of the window as the train pulled out of the station, wrapping her scarf up round her head like a cocoon. But the reflection of the excited kids in the window forced back memories of being little at Christmas—jumping on her parents’ bed and opening her stocking. Hot tea and buttered toast with home-made jam. Her dad always surprised by the stocking her mum had done for him. Rachel’s feet dangling over the bed, unable to touch the floor as she ate gold coins and the satsuma and looked at Rudolph’s half-chewed carrot by the fireplace and the signed card from Santa.

  She hadn’t thought about that for years.

  As the train sped up through the countryside the reflection in the window changed to the whole village on Christmas morning. Everyone out on the green for a massive snowball fight. Hers flying off at wonky angles because she had such a rubbish throw. Years ago they’d even skated on the pond in their wellies. She vaguely remembered her dad and her winning the prize for best snowman. It had been shaped like a wizard with a pointy hat. There was something about the hat—what had it been made of? It was bark, she thought, curled tree bark her mum had found, and the coat they’d covered in fallen leaves and acorn cups to make the pattern. She saw her dad holding up the prize of a bottle of port, triumphant, then hoisting her up on his shoulders, her wellington boots bashing snow onto his wax jacket.

  It was odd to remember her dad with that smile, that buoyancy.

  Now he just cycled. Always cycling. A group of them, sixty-five, and cycling. Never smiling. Six months after the funeral he’d gone on a trip and come back with a new bike and all the gear. Kept him busy, he’d said. Out pedalling the memories, she’d thought. The moment he stopped he’d have to deal with life.

  She realised then why she rarely allowed such reminiscences. The thought of them compared to the stark new reality made her eyes well up. She groped in her bag for a tissue; when she couldn’t find one she had to ask the woman next to her.

  ‘Of course. I always have a pack. Wet-wipe or Kleenex?’

  ‘Kleenex, please,’ Rachel said, trying to cover her face. ‘Winter cold,’ she added, while surreptitiously giving her eyes a quick wipe.

  Paris was freezing. Much colder than England. People blew into their gloved hands as they queued for a taxi. Rachel wheeled her bag over to the back of the line, rain pouring down in sheets. Her shoes were soaked through. People kept cutting into the front of the queue as she was hustled forward, her coat and bag dripping wet. She had the scrap of paper with the road name clutched in her hand.

  Jackie had booked her into an Airbnb rental in the centre of Paris. She’d kill her for this, Rachel mused as she finally got into a taxi just as the rain fell heavier, like a bucket tipped from the sky. She’d actually kill her, she thought while gazing out at a dark, soaked Paris. Stab her maybe with her new Sabatier kitchen knives that Henri Salernes had demanded each contestant buy pre-course, plus slip-on Crocs and a white apron with her name stitched on the front. Rachel had failed the sewing part of Home Ec at school so she’d got her gran to do the embroidery this time. Julie had added a flower on either side, for good luck, she’d said.

  The taxi pulled up at the end of the road after clearly driving her all the way round the city unnecessarily.

  ‘One way,’ he said. ‘Your house, at the other end. You walk.’

  The rain was unceasing. Rachel, imagining crisp snow-white streets, hadn’t thought to bring an umbrella.

  The driver dumped her bag in a puddle and drove away leaving her alone at the end of the darkened road, the streetlight above her fizzing and flickering in the rain.

  She hauled her bag behind her, wiping rain drops from her nose and eyelashes with sodden gloves, stopping finally at number 117—a thick wooden door studded with big black nails and a brass knocker shaped like a lion’s head.

  Someone buzzed her in with a string of French she didn’t understand. The piece of paper said Flat C. Rachel climbed the stairs, bumping her bag up behind her, holding onto the wooden banister. As she passed the ground floor the steps turned from plain concrete to white and blue tiles and wooden panels became richly wallpapered walls in cream, gold and burgundy. The huge double doors of Flat C were freshly painted glossy magnolia.

  A woman opened almost as soon as Rachel knocked and immediately warm smells of herbs and cooking enveloped her. Looking into the flat, she saw glistening chandeliers, expensive chintz curtains draped over large French windows, soft cream furniture and paintings of fruits brimming over in their bowls. Wow. She took a step forward. Maybe she wouldn’t kill Jackie just yet.

  ‘Je suis Rachel Smithson,’ she said to the woman in the grey uniform and apron. ‘Je reste ici. Airbnb.’

  ‘Wait,’ the housekeeper said. ‘I get Madame Charles.’

  As Rachel waited she saw a Christmas tree that wasn’t a real tree but a metal sprig twink
ling with white fairy lights and the branches tied with silver ribbons. It was the type of decoration that could be up all year round. Nothing, not even the garlands hanging from the mantelpiece, was too overpoweringly Christmas. Rachel was impressed.

  On the sofa two cats, a Persian Blue and a Siamese, had wound themselves over the arms like matching cushions. She was staring at one of them when Madame Charles appeared in the doorway.

  ‘Eer been bee,’ said the housekeeper. Madame Charles looked as if she had no idea what she was talking about and tapped ash from her cigarette in its gold holder into the tray by the door.

  The woman was a vision in beige: floor-length oatmeal cashmere cardigan, white hair impeccably styled, wide cream trousers and beige turtleneck with a gold Chanel necklace. She was someone who might adopt Rachel and put her to bed in crisp Egyptian cotton sheets with a decaf espresso and a brioche. Someone who she might ignore Christmas with and eat oysters with and drink champagne.

  ‘Airbnb,’ repeated Rachel. ‘Dans le Internet. From England. Je loue the chambre. For a week. Pour une semaine.’ Christ, her French was bad. ‘Till Christmas,’ she added, pointing to the silver branch in the background.

  ‘Ah. Airbnb.’ As it finally dawned on Madame Charles she disappeared back into the apartment saying, ‘Un moment.’ The Siamese jumped off the sofa after her.

  Rachel hopped from one damp foot to the other waiting to be led inside. But, appearing again with jewelled slippers on, Madame Charles said, ‘Follow me.’ And as she swept past her, closing the door, all three of them headed upstairs.

  Rachel wondered if there was a separate entrance up there. Perhaps the bedrooms were accessed this way. Up they went, spiralling into what felt like the turret of a tower. The dark wood walls began to narrow and the tiles on the stairs were replaced by rough wooden floorboards.

  ‘Ah, ici.’ Madame Charles unlocked one of four doors at the top of the stairs with a big old dungeon key. Rachel took a breath.

  Inside was a small room, separated into two by an alcove. It was grey, bleak and stuffy—as if no one had been in for a century. The housekeeper next to her shivered. Rachel felt her ‘oysters and champagne under the silver sprig’ dream dribble away as the bare light bulb swayed in front of her.

  Madame Charles was unperturbed. ‘This is the kitchen.’ A white rusty gas oven and hob with a grill pan at the top, the type her gran swore by. A mini fridge, two cups, two plates, one glass. ‘The TV.’ Certainly not a flat-screen; Rachel wondered if it even had a remote. ‘The sofa.’ Dark blue, no cushions. ‘And here—’ they walked through the alcove ‘—is the bed.’ A metal frame with a grey blanket folded at the end and pale pink sheets. A threadbare mat on the floor and a faded Monet print on the wall. The metal shutter on the only window was pulled closed.

  ‘Ca va, oui?’ said Madame Charles. ‘This was, how do you say? For the help. The servant. Oui?’

  Rachel tried to make her mouth move into a smile. Her soaking feet and clothes suddenly freezing cold. ‘Merci beaucoup. It is très bon.’

  ‘De rien. It is nothing.’ Madame Charles smiled. ‘There is one petite problem. The bathroom, it is outside. In the corridor.’

  After checking out the sad-looking shower and toilet in a shared room off the hallway, Rachel let herself back into her flat, sat down on the bed and found she was too tired to cry. Instead she just stared around the grey room, at her coat hanging on a chair dripping onto the floor, the bare walls with cracks up to the ceiling, a fly buzzing round the empty light bulb. What was she doing here? Why had she even considered coming?

  She watched the fly weave a path from the light to the top of the oven, to the closed shutters and back again.

  Standing up, she opened the shutters and shooed it towards the window with a tea towel, where it finally disappeared into the blackness.

  It was only as she was closing the window that she saw the view. The trees lining the Champs Élysées glistening with a million lights strung from trunk to tip, hundreds of them shining a dazzling path that stretched on till the Arc de Triomphe, which glowed a warm yellow in the night sky. She pressed her nose to the glass and stared till the steam of her breath covered the view and then she opened the window again and stuck her head out into the rain and stared some more. Hate Christmas as she might, Rachel had to admit that, even in the pouring rain, this was breathtaking.

  Chapter Four

  ‘OK, class, these are the rules: one, I don’t want an apprentice; two, you do everything I say; three, if you are shit, you leave.’

  Henri Salernes glowered at them and then turned away and disappeared into a side room at the back of the kitchen as if that was him done for the day.

  Rachel glanced warily around the room. At the back Tony, who’d already sliced his hand open getting his new knives out, looked taken aback by Chef’s abruptness and was shaking his head at Cheryl, saying, ‘That was all a bit unnecessary.’

  Everyone knew Henri Salernes had a fierce reputation. Once highly regarded in the industry, he was now a virtual baking recluse. Rachel had expected a bit of moodiness from him but it was clear to see that he had no interest in them at all. As Marcia Pritchard’s mother had said, it was all for the money.

  Abby in the next row, who was all red lipstick and huge boobs, sighed and tapped her nails on the counter. Next to her Ali, who ‘liked to experiment with flavour combinations’, was holding in a nervous giggle. And George, old, bald with a white moustache, said, ‘Well, what do you think of that?’ But no one replied. The fierce-looking woman on her far right, Lacey, shushed him. Rachel had overhead Lacey telling Cheryl that she didn’t need to be there. She was just brushing up on her pastry skills. She had a Culinary Arts degree.

  They all fell silent as soon as Chef strode back in and Rachel stopped looking around and did what everyone else was doing: she rolled out her knives, checked her utensils, peered at the buttons on the oven and pulled on her new apron—the one with her name embroidered on it—fumbling the strings at the back with clammy hands.

  Chef was up at the front shaking flour over his bench, which was double the size of theirs and wooden where their little tables were stainless steel. Next to him the walls were lined with bowls and trays and stocked like a greengrocer’s, fresh fruit and veg tumbling out of wooden crates and huge sacks of flour and sugar leaned against the skirting board like fat men taking a rest. It had taken Rachel ages to find the place; it was tucked down a side street and someone had graffitied over the road name. On the bottom floor was an unassuming pâtisserie that belonged to Henri and next to it a white door that opened onto a thin carpeted staircase that smelt of air freshener. The school was on the first floor up, a small room with two windows and packed full of work stations. Above it seemed to be another two or three floors of offices; she’d seen people in suits coming and going past the glass wall of their room.

  Chef looked up when he was ready. ‘You have your aprons?’ He nodded when he saw them all, named like food on a shelf. Putting his arms behind his back, he strolled between them, peering at the stitching and reading the names aloud, then paused when he got to Rachel.

  ‘What the fuck is this flower? You think this is the kind of course for flowers?’ He glared at her. ‘A sweet course? You think this is British Fucking Bake Off?’

  ‘No, Chef.’ Rachel swallowed.

  ‘You think you are Mary Berry?’

  ‘No, Chef.’

  ‘Get rid of those fucking flowers. Your name. The name is there so I don’t have to remember your fucking name. Comprende?’

  ‘Oui, Chef.’

  ‘Don’t mock me.’

  ‘I-I wasn’t. I promise,’ she stammered.

  He narrowed his eyes. ‘I’m watching you, Rachel. Flower girl,’ he said and stormed back up to the front.

  Rachel glanced around, blinking away moisture in her eyes, and saw seven faces pretending not to look at her. George gave her a wink. As she swung back to the front she caught a look from Marcel on her left. Scruf
fy dark brown hair and wearing a woolly Lacoste jumper, he had bright blue eyes like a wolf’s that were watching her with either disdain or sympathy, it was hard to tell.

  ‘Flower girl. This way! You’re here to learn, not look at the men next to you. Oui.’

  Blushing scarlet, Rachel fixed her eyes on Chef’s table. He’d put out rows of pâtisseries—fluffy shell-shaped madeleines, rainbow-coloured macaroons, bite-sized lemon cakes, sticky rum babas and teetering piles of profiteroles.

  She loved profiteroles. She’d make them for Ben. He would say they were the best he’d ever tasted. Crème pâtisserie piped into the centre of perfect choux pastry balls drizzled with the darkest melted chocolate she could buy in Nettleton. If they had to make profiteroles then God or the Angel Gabriel was looking down on her. Chef wouldn’t call her Flower Girl after today, she mused as he summoned them up to the front. She’d be Profiterole Girl. Star Baker Numero Uno.

  They gathered round the battered wooden bench, jostling to find a place where they could see exactly what was happening, and watched as Chef started to whisk together eggs and sugar. As he started to talk about all his little tricks of the trade everyone around her pulled out their notebooks and scribbled as he spoke.

  Rachel felt herself begin to panic. No one had told her that she needed to bring a notebook.

  ‘Can I borrow some paper?’ she whispered to Lacey when she couldn’t stand it any longer, but Lacey pretended not to hear.

  ‘What is that? Who is talking while I talk?’ Chef looked up from his tray of madeleine moulds.

  ‘I needed some paper.’

  ‘Ah, you think you know everything, Flower Girl? You think you don’t need to write it down?’

  ‘No, it’s just—’ Rachel started but he’d gone back to his mixture, shaking his head as he spread it into the silver shells.

  As she felt her face go red and nausea rising in her throat, Abby nudged her on the shoulder and tore off some paper and George gave her a chewed pencil stump while Lacey shook her head and sighed.