The Second Chance Café in Carlton Square

by Lilly Bartlett

  Daniel cuddled the twins as soon as they were out of their pushchair. When they toddled towards him squealing their delight, I was hit with love for them and jealousy of Daniel in a nicely aimed one-two punch. I didn’t understand it. Babies were supposed to be closest to the person who looked after them most, right? Didn’t our twins get the memo?

  I had to fight this feeling, though. I knew it wasn’t right. Emerald and Garnet were always complaining that their children didn’t let them out of their sight. Of course they fought over which of them had it worse. I should have been happy that Daniel could share the responsibility.

  But maybe sharing was the problem.

  ‘Daniel, could you please do the washing up so I can get tea started? I didn’t have time this morning with Dad and Auntie Rose turning up early.’

  ‘Give me five minutes?’ he said. ‘I’ve just got in.’

  ‘I know you have, but so have I. Look, I’m sorry, but we have to be on the same side here. I can’t fight the twins and you.’

  We stared at each other over the children’s heads.

  ‘Does it have to be done right this second?’

  ‘Otherwise I can’t start tea.’ The sink was piled with dishes, pots and pans. I really didn’t want to be the harpy. I wanted to be lovely Emma, the woman Daniel married. The one who didn’t constantly worry about nappies and laundry, dirty dishes and mealtimes.

  No, I wanted a lot more than that. I wanted to be myself again, the woman I’d always liked – not the Moaner-in-Chief who constantly squeezed the fun out of everything. I was so tired of playing the bad cop, but if I didn’t, nothing got done. Daniel just didn’t seem to grasp that life with our children was about more than being their favourite entertainment. All the boring stuff was important too.

  ‘Fine,’ he said, pulling Grace and Oscar on to his lap and making them giggle like mad. ‘Sorry, darlings, Mummy wants me to do chores. You’ll have to play on your own.’

  Two little pairs of arms reached for him when he got up. Oscar’s lip started wobbling. Perfect. I was making everyone unhappy.

  As I cleared some of the laundry and paperwork from the dining table, Daniel took out his frustration on our dishes. Cutlery clattered into the holder. He banged the pot that I burned the porridge in on the bottom of the sink. I knew without looking that it was scratching the enamel. By the time the bowls went crashing onto the drying rack, one atop the other, crack, crack, crack, I couldn’t take it anymore. ‘Daniel! I’m sorry you’re miserable, but could you not break our dishes?’

  Off went the water. He came out drying his hands. ‘What do you want? You want me to help, so I’m helping.’

  I had a pair of his pants clutched to my chest, mid-fold. ‘Only under duress. I want you to want to help. It’s different.’

  He looked at the twins. ‘Mummy wants me to whistle while I work.’ A few seconds later, the theme tune from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs floated back from the kitchen.

  ‘And stop calling me Mummy!!’

  You can just call me Grumpy these days.

  Chapter 15

  Word about the spy in the café yesterday has spread faster than news of a new 1D concert tour. Everyone has a story about where they were when it happened, but the prize goes to Leo for the weirdest. The woman just sat on one of the chairs to watch him practise his presentation upstairs. Then she went around the room like she was measuring its size and tried opening all the windows.

  ‘Maybe she was having a hot flush,’ he says, sipping the last of his morning chai. ‘My mum used to get those. She had to put her head in the fridge.’

  But I don’t think the menopause was behind this. It was the Other Half Caff Barb. It would be too big a coincidence to have two enemies in the space of a month. And didn’t the woman say something about us not lasting very long? That smacks of Barb’s vile leaflet.

  Leo pulls a book from his satchel. ‘I went through my shelves last night and thought you might like this. If you haven’t read it yet.’

  I flip the slim, well-thumbed volume over to read the back. ‘Thank you. I’ve been thinking about the philosophers since you mentioned them. It’ll be nice to get familiar with them again.’ I make it sound like we were once best friends, when what I actually mean is that it’ll be a welcome change to read something other than picture books or the instructions on a ready meal.

  ‘It’s just a potted version of the main players,’ he says. ‘It makes me feel smart to read it.’ His smile is infectious. ‘If you ever want to talk about them, I’m all ears. Without wanting to sound too wankery about it, philosophy is best shared…’ He blows out his cheeks. ‘No, I definitely sound wankery, but I mean it. I’m sure you’ll have an interesting perspective.’

  It’s not till I go back to the counter that I realise it’s been a long time since I’ve felt interesting.

  ‘This officially makes you regulars now that I can start on your order the second you walk in,’ I say later to our vicar, Del, and Mrs Delaney as I drop off their pot of tea and slice of chocolate Guinness cake. I’ve known them both for years and I still think they make an odd pair of friends, at least on the surface. Even setting aside the thirty-year age difference, he’s as large and rough with his tattoos and shaved head as she is small and delicate in her frocks and pumps. She hates football and I’m sure he’s got little interest in dressmaking, yet they’ve always got something to say to each other.

  ‘You’ve got a plethora of regulars now,’ Del says. ‘Long may it last.’ He raises his icing-smeared fork to me. ‘Your success is down to foresight more than fortune, my girl. I hope you know that.’

  ‘And some friends in high places to pull strings,’ I remind him. It was the vicar who convinced the councillor to give me the lease on the pub in the first place. Our councillor is not the most dynamic public servant. He needs pushing and wants an easy life. So he does usually give in to persuasion if it means getting to drink his pint in peace in Uncle Colin’s pub.

  ‘I’ll miss these cakes when I go,’ Mrs Delaney says, scooping a huge bite into her mouth.

  ‘Mrs Delaney has set a date,’ the vicar explains while his friend savours her slice. ‘It’s Tenerife or bust by the end of the year.’

  Well, isn’t that perfect. Why doesn’t everyone I know just bugger off to Spain? Bueno tripo, or whatever they say. ‘Maybe you and Kelly can share moving companies.’ I manage to keep the snipe out of my voice. I can’t really be angry with eighty-something Mrs Delaney for wanting to retire in the sun.

  ‘Is Kelly moving?’ the vicar asks.

  ‘Not officially yet, but she will. Boyfriend.’ I try not to roll my eyes.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Mrs Delaney says, reaching for my hand. ‘You’ll miss her.’

  Even more than Mrs Delaney will miss those cakes.

  I know it shouldn’t make a big difference whether Kelly is here or in Spain. She was right. We talk on the phone more than we set eyes on each other. It used to be a given that we’d go out together every weekend. She could count on me stopping by the fish van every day since I worked so close, even though we’d probably only seen each other the night before. And she was such a fixture at Mum and Dad’s house that she had her own key.

  Those pre-Daniel days seem a lifetime away now. In some ways they are. Her life is as wrapped up with Calvin as mine is with Daniel and the children. Kell got really ratty about that before the wedding, as I remember. She was convinced I’d leave her for a new life.

  Only now she’s the one doing it to me.

  Doreen’s on her third pot of tea. She’s here a lot now that she knows she can get Auntie Rose to play cribbage any time she wants. Sometimes she sits with Mrs Delaney and the vicar, who don’t play cribbage but like to share a pot of tea and a slice of cake (especially if it’s chocolate). Sometimes she reads one of the daily papers that we keep on a little table by the door. Sometimes she knits. And sometimes she goes into the kitchen to make herself a sandwich. She probably shouldn’t be back there, b
ut she does clean up after herself and it saves one of us making it for her. Besides, she’s scrupulous about paying what she thinks they’re worth. Which is never the full price but she usually covers the cost.

  Lou seems like her normal self when she arrives after her meeting with the duty solicitor who’ll be representing her in court, so I hope she’s forgiven me for yesterday. It was an honest mistake that any normal person would make. I didn’t see what the spy was writing down. I only saw Lou accost her, and you can only go by what you see. At least that’s what I tell myself.

  Everyone knows now to report any suspicious behaviour, so I can’t blame Auntie Rose for snitching on Carl when she sees him.

  After all, he is under the table again.

  ‘Carl? Everything okay? Where’s Elsie?’

  When he crawls back into the booth I can see that his knees are bothering him. ‘Oh, thank you, yes, Elsie’s at home. She’s not feeling very well.’

  ‘Nothing serious, I hope?’

  ‘Nothing unexpected, thank you for asking. I was just feeling nostalgic.’ He points under the table. ‘That reminds me of the old days.’

  The café is filling up, but I take a seat beside him. ‘Do you want a cup of tea? We can have a nice chat.’ Sometimes the business is as much about listening as anything else.

  ‘That would be grand,’ he says. ‘I do miss her when she’s not with me, but there’s nought I can do at home. She kicked me out for a bit.’

  I can imagine. When Dad first had to stop driving his taxi, Mum nearly went mad with him underfoot. You get used to doing things a certain way, she’d said. There’s a routine – time in the bathroom, sitting for a cup of tea in a certain spot, making whatever you want for breakfast without having to worry about another person. Mum managed about a month before sending Dad to the Cock and Crown each morning to help my uncles set up for the day. He didn’t do much apart from dry a few pint glasses, but everyone was pleased to help save their marriage.

  Elsie is usually the one who carries the conversations, so it’s nice to talk with Carl for a change. And for once he’s in the mood to talk, at least about the past. When he gets going there’s no stopping him.

  ‘Elsie only had one sister, called Hettie,’ he tells me. They were very close. Especially with only a three-year age difference. Their parents became best friends with Carl’s in the war, when everyone went to the pub during the all-clears. It was better than sitting in the house worrying about dying. Carl would have been ten then, three years older than Elsie and around Hettie’s age. But Elsie was the one for him, as proven by the graffiti carved in my table, so the families always assumed they’d marry.

  Carl assumed it too. ‘Then there was some trouble with Hettie,’ he says, shaking his head. ‘Terrible time. Elsie was beside ’erself. At one point we didn’t know if Hettie’d make it.’

  ‘Was she ill?’ I ask. Who knows what kind of everyday diseases people died from in those days – chilblains and scurvy and such. Weren’t women always getting attacks of the vapours? Or maybe that was earlier.

  ‘Not ill,’ he says. ‘She found herself in a family way.’

  ‘That wouldn’t have gone down well with her parents, I imagine. When would this have been?’

  ‘Nineteen fifty, so no, it wasn’t a good situation. There were single mothers, of course, but they had a hard time. Sometimes even their families turned from them.’ He shakes his head. ‘Terrible time.’

  ‘What happened, if you don’t mind my asking?’ He’d better not clam up now or I’ll have to go round to Elsie’s, pass her a Kleenex, fluff her pillows and get the rest of the story.

  But I’m not prepared when he tells me that she was interfered with. That’s olden day speak for rape, isn’t it? ‘How old was she?’

  ‘Nineteen. The other party would have been pressurised to step up and do the right thing in those days but, you see, she couldn’t marry the man in those circumstances.’

  ‘Did nobody know who he was?’

  Carl smiles. ‘She never even mentioned the incident until she couldn’t hide the pregnancy. Then she wouldn’t tell anyone but Elsie. She had no reason to feel ashamed, as she wasn’t at fault, but she did. She never even told me. Those were the times.’

  With Hettie’s tummy growing and her situation becoming more desperate, Elsie had a conversation with Carl. ‘We were waiting until Elsie was eighteen to marry,’ he explains. ‘But we ended up waiting another forty-five years before we even kissed.’

  You’d expect some sadness in his voice but there isn’t any. Stiff upper lip, maybe.

  There was really only one solution for poor Hettie. She needed to find someone to marry, and fast. Elsie couldn’t let her only sister’s entire life be ruined by one terrible event, especially when she had the power to do something about it.

  ‘At first I couldn’t believe what Elsie was suggesting,’ says Carl. ‘I was dead against the idea. Well, as you’d imagine. I’d loved Elsie since we were children. Of course I loved Hettie as well. We’d grown up together. And she was beside herself. Elsie too, I guess. She told me flatly that she could never be happy if Hettie was miserable. That pretty much put paid to my marriage plans with Elsie. It surprised our parents when Hettie and I announced our engagement, but by then they’d started to suspect the reason. So, you see, it was the sensible thing to do. Everyone got to be a little bit happy. Emma, dear, don’t look so shocked. People do what they need to for the people they love.’

  Of course I’m shocked! Kelly’s as close to me as any sister could be, but I’m not sure I could have given up Daniel for her. And I know I couldn’t stand seeing them together, knowing she had the life I wanted. ‘I admire you, Carl. I couldn’t have done that. I guess I’m too selfish.’

  ‘But don’t you see? Elsie couldn’t have been happy married to me if it meant her sister being unhappy. And we’re together now, that’s what matters.’ He looks at his watch. ‘I should get back. Elsie’ll be wanting her dinner.’ He unfolds himself from the booth. ‘Thank you, Emma. It’s nice to see friendly faces in here again.’

  His eyes are a bit wet when he puts his hat on and turns to go back to his wife, who he waited forty-five years to kiss.

  I’m just getting more coffee beans to feed the Gaggia when Joseph hurries in. ‘Boss, we have a problem.’

  ‘Shh, keep your voice down! You’re the one always going on about how there are no problems, remember? Only opportunities.’ He likes to google inspirational quotes when he’s on the bus. ‘Where are the cakes?’

  ‘That’s the opportunity, boss. There are no cakes. She’s sold out.’

  ‘What, all of them?’ Cleo at the Mad Batter must make seven or eight cakes at the crack of dawn every morning. Personally, I couldn’t do it. At 5 a.m. I wouldn’t know my butter from my bicarb. ‘I’d better go see her.’ This might be serious.

  Cleo’s tiny cake shop isn’t really much more than a kitchen with a few tables crammed in. People queue up, though, for her daily offerings and she does a roaring business. Too roaring, maybe. It sounds like we’re victims of her success.

  She’s just pulling a tin from the oven when I see her. ‘Let me just get this cooling,’ she says, deftly sliding the hot tin on to a rack. ‘I’m running a little behind this morning.’

  Wiping her hands on her flour-covered apron, she tucks a lock of wavy blonde hair back up into her hairband. She looks exactly as homely as a baker should. She wears jeans and T-shirts instead of pinnies and circle skirts, but she’d be at home in any illustrated cookery book from the 1950s.

  ‘That smells delicious,’ I say. My mouth is watering.

  ‘Thanks, and I’m really sorry about not having cakes for you today. I just got a huge order.’ She looks back at the tiny kitchen. ‘I can’t really make any more than I do now. I’m stretched as it is.’

  ‘That’s okay. You’re only one woman and we still have a bit of the chocolate and the plum left over from yesterday. Can I put in an order for tomorrow?’ That
was our mistake. We’ve been turning up to buy them instead of ordering ahead.

  But she shakes her head. ‘I’m sorry, Emma. I’m going to be tied up for at least a month with this new order. I could probably let you have a few slices each day from the ones I do for the eat-in crowd, though I wouldn’t want to run out for my walk-in business. My main advertising is word-of-mouth so I can’t let that dry up. I’m really sorry.’

  I’m struggling to make sense of this. What about the little enamel cake I’ve just put on my charm bracelet? Does that mean nothing to you, Universe?! ‘So you won’t have any cakes for us for at least a month?’ Then a terrible thought occurs to me. But I’m just being paranoid, like one of those conspiracy theorists who believe the US government is hiding spaceships in Hangar 18. ‘Who made the order, if you don’t mind me asking?’

  When she tells me it’s a new customer on the main road, I don’t need to hear any more to know it’s Barb from the Other Half Caff.

  Maybe I shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss the idea of aliens in Hangar 18 either.

  ‘I’m sorry, but she’s made the order in advance,’ says Cleo. ‘Nobody ever does that. I’m sure you understand that I had to take the business. I wish I could do more, but I’m really at the limit.’

  I can’t put pressure on a fellow entrepreneur when I know exactly how it feels to be stretched flat out. ‘No, no, of course I understand. We’ll have to find another supplier. It’s just that your cakes are the best. I’m going to miss them. Especially the chocolate.’

  She smiles. Then she cuts a huge wodge of gooey dark chocolate Guinness cake, puts it into a box and hands it to me. ‘I am really sorry.’

  When I return to the café with one measly slice of Guinness cake, which I’m not sharing, by the way, I break the news to Lou and Joseph. ‘Barb’s holding our cakes hostage.’

  ‘Will her customers even eat them?’ Lou wonders. ‘They don’t look like flourless organic types.’

  ‘I’m sure they’ll love them, beetroot or not,’ I say. ‘Who wouldn’t? Even Auntie Rose has tried a few and she never eats anything that’s not from Mister Kipling. Anyway, it doesn’t matter if Barb’s customers eat them or not, because we still have no cake. We’ll need another supplier.’