I’m boiling now. My face is dripping sweat and I feel dizzy, but all I can focus on is the food.
I wipe down all my surfaces to remove the mess of flour and butter and icing sugar. Then, while the custard is cooking, I take out my German gingerbread.
It looks brilliant. The cake is hot and soft, with a sticky topping where I brushed it with golden syrup before baking. I slice it and inhale the hot gingery steam but not enough to risk making myself cough – just a tiny sniff. Then I put a couple of slices on a white plate and I pour my thick yellow vanilla custard from the saucepan into a white jug and put this next to it. I dust white icing sugar over the top of the cake as a contrast even though I didn’t rehearse it this way. It looks like fresh snowfall on dark earth. That’s what I like best about cooking. You can make stuff up as you go along.
I stand back and wipe my forehead with the back of my sleeve.
And just in time.
‘STOP COOKING!’ yells the bald guy.
That’s it. The two hours are up. They went so fast I hardly had time to breathe, which is not good when you have CF, as breathing is difficult even on a good day.
I glance around. Two of the other contestants are frantically trying to finish serving their meals.
I wash my hands, wipe the edges of my three plates of food with a tea towel so that there are no messy smudges and arrange them on the work surface in front of me, ready for judging. Then I try to calm my beating heart, which is difficult when you have CF, because the usual way of taking deep steadying breaths is not really an option.
The presenter starts to make his way around all twelve of the contestants with the judges. I reckon I’m about sixth in line to be interviewed, so I have time to stand and catch my breath and steady myself against the granite work top before they get to me.
Then there’s kind of a commotion behind the camera.
I try not to look because we’re supposed to be standing calm and collected behind our workstations and not gawping towards the camera, but I can’t help it.
The lights in here are very bright. All I can see is a pair of arms waving in the air as if in the middle of an argument and then Elaine, the floor manager, comes up just behind the camera so she can’t be seen on TV and she beckons me to come off the floor.
I look left and right just in case she means one of the other contestants but she’s definitely pointing at me.
My heart sinks. I step down from the workstation and leave all my lovely gleaming pots and pans behind. My three dishes sit ready for the judges and they look really good. Why am I being called off? I don’t look THAT ill, surely? Michelle did a good job in make-up.
Then I’m hustled behind the cameras and out of the studio into a little room.
She leaps up and comes towards me with her face pale and her arms outstretched.
‘Mum!’ I say. ‘What are you doing here?’
Then another figure comes out from behind her.
It’s my father. And he reaches out to hug me too.
I’m more scared than I’ve ever been in my life.
There’s something terribly wrong with their faces.
They’re not angry for a start.
My mother holds onto me so tight that I start to suffocate and have to pull my face out of her soft cashmere top.
‘Oh Amelie,’ she says. ‘Sit down. We need to talk to you. In private.’
Chapter Fifteen
I sit down with my parents one on either side of me. They each take one of my hands.
‘Stop it,’ I say. ‘You’re scaring me! Why aren’t you angry? Harry said you were angry!’
Mum glances at Dad. She’s trying not to cry.
‘We have to tell you something,’ she says. ‘Don’t worry. It will be alright.’
She gets up and goes and stares out of the window at the busy street outside. I recognise Dad’s car parked outside on a yellow line.
‘Why’ve you come in the car?’ I say. ‘Wouldn’t the train have been easier?’
‘We wanted to get here as fast as we could,’ says Dad.
I look at Mum. She looks in one piece, despite the fact that she’s crying into a tissue.
‘Who – what?’ I say, confused. ‘Why isn’t Harry here? He should have been here ages ago. He was coming to get me. Why – oh, no. Please don’t tell me that. PLEASE DON’T TELL ME.’
I start to shake. I stare at my parents wide-eyed. Why aren’t they speaking? Shouldn’t they be reassuring me that Harry is fine, that he’s outside in the car waiting for us or at home waiting for me to come back from London?
Somehow my parents don’t need to speak. Their eyes and ashen faces are telling me everything I so don’t want to know.
‘What happened?’ I say. I feel as if I need to hold it together or I’m going to start to yell and scream and never stop.
‘He was rushing to get a train,’ says Dad. ‘He stepped out on Station Road without looking, from what we can gather. White van was going too fast, couldn’t stop in time. He’s in Redhill hospital.’
I stare at Dad, not understanding.
‘Do you mean… he’s not… you know?’ I say. I can’t bring myself to say the word in case saying it makes it happen. A vision of Harry’s curly dark brown hair and brown eyes flashes in front of my eyes. I’ve always liked the freckles across the bridge of his nose and the way that his eyes seem to get darker when he’s serious about something.
We’ve all got to die sometime, right? Any of us could die tomorrow.
The tears are coming now. Mum comes over and gives me a tissue. Then she holds a bowl underneath my mouth while I cough myself almost unconscious.
‘He’s critical,’ she says. ‘His parents are at his bedside. That’s why we’ve come to get you. We need to get there as soon as possible but I have to warn you, Amelie. We may not make it in time.’
I get up.
‘What are we waiting for?’ I say. ‘I’ve got to see Harry. I’ve got to.’
Then we leave the TV studios without ever looking back.
***
In the car Mum sits in the back while Dad drives.
She passes me an inhaler and a nebuliser and tells me to use them. Then she hooks me up to an oxygen canister and I take deep steadying breaths until at last the tightness in my chest calms down a bit and my breath comes more easily.
Then she forces me to eat a sandwich and some Creon followed by a milkshake and a bar of chocolate. I feel as if eating is the last thing I ever want to do again, but I know that there’s to be no argument. It’s such a relief to have my meds back again and to feel like I’m not about to keel over and pass out, anyway.
I lean back against the seat and close my eyes for the entire journey back. I’m not asleep, but I’m thinking about all the good things that Harry has done for me since we were little and I’m replaying them over and over while silent tears pour down my cheeks.
When we pull up at the gates of the local hospital I sit up. My heart starts to pound and I feel shaky.
‘You’ll come in with me, won’t you?’ I say to Mum. ‘Even though you’re probably really angry with me.’
Mum sighs and wipes the tears from my cheeks with her tissue.
‘Well, I was,’ she says. ‘But then I was so relieved to know where you were. You should never have done this, Amelie. You should never have travelled to London in the state that you were in. You should never have run off when you were booked in for an operation. And you should NEVER have lied to me and your father and poor Harry in the way that you did.’
She does still sound a bit angry underneath the weariness. I wish she hadn’t said that last bit, but the thing is, it’s true.
If I hadn’t gone to London and lied, Harry wouldn’t have tried to rush after me.
He’d still be at school playing rugby or leaping about on the tennis courts.
If anything happens to him… if anything happens to Harry, it’s all my fault. I’ll never forgive myself. Never.
&nbs
p; The three of us walk into the hospital foyer in silence.
***
Harry’s parents are sitting one on either side of his bed as we come in.
Mum and Dad go straight over to them and offer hugs of sympathy. Our parents have been friends for many years.
I try not to look at Harry. There’s a mass of tubes and machines all over him.
‘Hello, Mel,’ says Harry’s father. He’s always been kind to me, ever since I was a little girl and he lived next door. I like his grey hair and black glasses and the way he’s holding Harry’s hand. ‘Come and sit by the bed.’
I look at his mother. She’s staring at me but the expression on her face is difficult to read. Except that I can read it, or at least I think I can. It says:
You’ve got a nerve, turning up here. If it wasn’t for your stupid selfish trip to London, my boy would still be at home doing his homework or out playing rugby. You don’t deserve to be here at his bedside. I wish to God you hadn’t come.
I stare at my feet.
‘Come,’ says Harry’s father, holding out his hand to me. ‘It’s OK.’
I look at Mum and Dad behind me and they nod and then fade off back out into the hospital corridor. There aren’t supposed to be more than two visitors by the bed at a time, but that still leaves three of us.
‘I’ll go and get some coffee,’ says Harry’s mum. She stands up and stretches her back with a grimace. Her face is streaked with tears and make-up. ‘Let me know straight away if anything changes, Adam.’
She walks past me taking care not to brush against me. Probably just as well. I feel that feeble that I’d probably fall to the floor. Mum says that I’ve got to go to the CF centre on the way home and get checked out. She reckons I’ve got another chest infection and I think she might be right. We haven’t yet touched on the sensitive subject of the operation I was supposed to be having this morning.
Harry’s dad gestures at the empty chair next to his bed. I creep into it, feeling awkward and shaken to the core. I can’t very well not look at Harry with his dad right there, so I turn and look down at his face. Most of it is obscured by tubes in his mouth, tubes up his nose and a large bandage right round the top of his head. His eyes are shut and what I can see of his face is bruised and cut and bloody.
It’s all wrong seeing big, healthy, red-cheeked Harry in a hospital bed. Somebody might as well have picked up a load of earth and thrown it onto the soft white pillows.
‘He looks like he’s asleep,’ I say and then I curse myself straight away. I’m such an idiot. If he was asleep he’d hardly be covered in all this medical stuff, would he?
‘Well, he kind of is,’ says Harry’s father. His voice has a little shake in it and he is being careful to keep his voice measured and kind. ‘Unfortunately he’s in a coma. That’s a little more serious.’
I flush and nod. I feel like a spare part.
‘You can hold his hand if you like,’ says Adam. ‘And you can talk to him. You never know, he might be able to hear it somehow.’
I take Harry’s limp hand in my own. It’s cool and soft. Then I clear my throat and prepare to say something, but it’s really embarrassing with Harry’s father sitting right opposite.
As if he senses this, Adam gets up and gives me a smile. Then he heads outside and I see him put his arm around Harry’s mother and persuade her to stay in the corridor for a moment.
I wait until the door has closed and then I put Harry’s hand to my cheek and hold it there in silence for moment.
You know when you just kind of assume that somebody is going to be in your life forever? Well, I thought that Harry and I would be going out for the rest of our lives and that we might one day even get married. When we stopped being little friends who played football together and he asked me out, my mother gave me the CF Police lecture about how I shouldn’t get too hung up on my first ever boyfriend, because first loves never lasts and I should put my health first and all that stuff. Then when we got to a year of going out and then two, my parents decided to accept that we were pretty serious about each other and they even invited Harry on holiday with us last year. I’ve been on holiday with his family too and we’ve all had dinner together either at his house or ours.
Harry is part of the fabric of my life.
And he gets my CF. He never makes me feel bad about it or inadequate and although he fusses a bit about my medication it’s only ‘cos he loves me.
Part of me wishes I’d told Harry I was going to London in the first place, but if I had he’d only have tried to stop me.
It all seems a bit stupid now, my obsession with baking and cakes.
I put a load of sponge, eggs and butter ahead of my own boyfriend and my family and I lied to them and worried them and left them behind, just so that I could enter a stupid competition.
‘I’m sorry, Harry,’ I whisper into his cold hand. ‘I’m so, so sorry. I’m the most rubbish girlfriend in the universe and I quite understand if you want to dump me pronto when you wake up.’
That’s if he does wake up. The doctors told Mum that it’s quite likely he’ll never regain consciousness and that his parents will have to make the heartbreaking decision to turn off his life-support machine.
I’m trying not to think about that option.
This is Harry. MY Harry. My big, cheerful, red-cheeked, floppy-haired Harry.
He’s not going anywhere while I’ve got a say in the matter.
‘I’ve got to go,’ I whisper. Harry’s mother is hovering outside the door looking anguished. ‘Your mum’s coming to sit with you now. But I’ll be back tomorrow.’
I give him a kiss on the forehead and go outside to where my parents are sitting in the corridor on orange plastic chairs.
They spring up when I come out.
‘Not easy for you, love,’ says Mum. She puts her arms around me. ‘But we need to go and get you checked out now. The last thing we all need is you getting sicker again.’
I bury my head into her chest and sob dry, painful sobs mixed with retching coughs. Dad rubs my back in silence. These have been the worst two days of my life, apart from that bit where I did my recipes for the competition. That bit felt good. But it’s not real life. Real life is Mum, Dad, Harry and me.
And CF.
***
Turns out I’m actually quite ill.
I see another consultant at the CF centre because Mr Rogers is on holiday and as soon as she’s examined me and listened to my cough she tells Mum that to be safe, they’re going to admit me until this infection clears.
I try to protest but I’ve got a fever and I’m all shivery and super-tired so I don’t argue all that much. It’s kind of a relief to be tucked up in the soft white hospital bed. I’ve got antibiotics being pumped into my system and I’m quite dehydrated after London, so I’m hooked up on a fluid drip as well.
The only thing I hate about it is that I’m not allowed out of bed to go and see Harry.
On the third day I have an operation to put the gastrostomy into my stomach.
I have to be put to sleep for that so when I wake up I’m groggy and a bit sore, but the first thing I ask Mum is if there is any news of Harry and she shakes her head.
‘No change,’ she says. ‘Sorry. I know that’s not what you want to hear.’
I lie on my thick hospital pillows and let the tears trickle down my face with my eyes closed. Mum sits next to me and holds my hand until I go to sleep.
The next time I wake up Dad is sitting by the bed.
‘What day is it?’ I say, confused. The blinds in the room are drawn so I can’t tell.
‘Same day you had your op,’ says Dad. ‘Evening. They’ve said you can go home tomorrow, Mel. That’s great news, isn’t it?’
I smile because it’s what he wants me to do, but underneath I feel sad and hollow. I can’t imagine what going home and not being with Harry is going to feel like. All I can see stretching out ahead of me is grief and loneliness and the continuing burden
of my CF as it gets worse and worse.
‘I feel rubbish,’ I say to Dad. He nods.
‘Your mum will have you feeling right as rain,’ he says. ‘Oh, and she’s got some news for you. I’ll let her tell you herself.’
I prop myself up into a sitting position with a grimace. I’ve got a small scar where the gastrostomy and the button which closes it off are and it tugs and pulls when I bend.
Mum comes in smiling with a bunch of yellow daffodils. She arranges these in the vase by my bed and then perches on it, her eyes twinkling.
‘What?’ I say. ‘Is it Harry? Has he woken up?’
Mum chews her lip.
‘Oh, sorry, no,’ she says. ‘I wish I could tell you that. But it’s something you might quite like to hear anyway.’
‘Are you getting back with Dad?’ I say. That would be weird, but good.
‘Oh, sorry, no,’ says Mum again. ‘We’re getting on fine, which is a good reason not to live with one another again.’
‘Well, what then?’ I say. This is turning into a tiring question-and-answer game.
Then she tells me.
She’s heard from the TV company who make Best Teen Baker. They said that the judges were so impressed with the three dishes I left behind when I rushed off that they’ve put me through to the semi-finals.
‘They said that you had managed to pull off the perfect chocolate fondant,’ says Mum. ‘When they cut into it you could hear gasps of delight from the other judges when the chocolate oozed out of the middle!’
She’s nearly bouncing up and down on the bed. My wound feels hot and sore. I have to put out a hand and stop her with a pained look.
‘Oh,’ I say, cautious. ‘But haven’t I missed the filming for the semi-finals?’
‘Nope,’ says Mum, all smug. ‘They’ve said they’ll postpone it until you’re fit to travel. And this time I can come with you.’
The Baking Life of Amelie Day Page 11
