by Daisy James
‘Look at these cakes. They’re like works of culinary art! I really think you might be on to something with your business idea, Lucie. Maybe you should start by offering them to the café on the High Street. What was your verdict on their cupcakes? “As heavy as old porridge” I think were your exact words?’
Lucie giggled. ‘Well, they did taste a little like the plastic they came wrapped in!’
‘Everything you bake is superb, always was even when we were kids. Everyone who tastes your creations says the same thing. If I might be so bold – they even beat Margot Bradshaw’s!’ Jess chuckled. ‘Just don’t tell Mum I said that.’
Their sisterly camaraderie spread a mellow warmth through Lucie’s veins and she enjoyed being in the cosy kitchen in the company of the person who cared for her the most. She missed her mum but, until she could afford the plane ticket to visit her in Spain, Jess did a fabulous job of surrogacy. It was the first time since Alex had rejected her proposal that she felt like herself again and she experienced a surge of confidence, quickly followed by a sharp dip when reality stuck its nose into her plans.
‘I can’t start up a business without any capital, Jess, even if it has been my dream since I was five years old. Do you remember when we used to drag the wallpaper table out to the front gate and sell our butterfly buns to passers-by?’
‘I do! And yours were always the first to go! Those were happy days, weren’t they?’
‘Remember the race to spend our hard-earned pennies on 99s and lollies from the ice-cream van that used to come along the street on Sunday afternoons? Every time I hear ‘Greensleeves’ I think of that little pink ice-cream van. I wonder where they have all disappeared to? I haven’t seen one for ages. Hey! I’ve just had an idea!’
‘What? Start a mobile ice-cream business?’
‘No, but what about running a mobile cupcake business?’
Lucie leapt up from her chair and grabbed the plate of iced gems she’d been making inroads into. Was that possible? She felt the slab of concrete that had lain heavily on her chest since Alex had rained on her dreams shift and lighten. She flicked her eyes from Jess to the cakes and back again, a sparkle of excitement beginning to coil around her stomach.
‘It’s less risky than leasing a shop or taking on a market stall. I bet there’s plenty of trade for cupcake pyramids for weddings and christenings. Oh, oh, and what do you think about catering for children’s birthday parties? I could spend the week baking a stack of cupcakes – different flavours and colours depending on the child’s age and the theme they choose. Pink will be popular, I bet! Then, armed with bowls and bags of buttercream icing and jars of toppings from sprinkles to glitter, chocolate buttons to Smarties, I could set up Mum’s old wallpaper table and the kids are entertained – with the added bonus of being able to eat whatever they make!’
‘That’s actually a fabulous idea,’ said Jess as she scooted to the edge of her seat, her eyes shining in animation. ‘It’s fun, it’s safe and it’s different from the usual soft play scramble or trip to the cinema. There’s definitely a market for it here, too. A couple of the other mums at Lewis and Jack’s school have been lamenting the absence of anything new and different for their daughters’ birthday bashes. I think you might just have found your first customers.’
Lucie sat motionless, allowing a kaleidoscope of ideas to rotate around her exhausted brain. Her synapses had been fired and a helix of questions and myriad possibilities had begun to form. A surge of excitement blasted into her chest. She leaned forward to grab one of the cupcakes she’d baked and decorated that morning and considered it with a critical eye.
‘It wouldn’t be just another run-of-the-mill cake-making business. I’d be a party planner of sorts, and not only children’s parties. It’s a concept that could actually work really well for adult parties or hen nights with the cocktail cupcakes tie-in, or perhaps girls’ nights in, or summer garden parties, or a school fayre even. It’s an ideal way to express creativity in any way I like. And if you truly love what you do for a living then it’s not like going to work at all, is it?’
‘It most certainly isn’t!’ agreed Jess, her face wreathed in a smile.
‘So you’re on board too, then?’
‘Me?’
‘Well, I can’t deliver all that by myself. I’ll need someone I can trust to be my occasional sous chef, and to control the juvenile masses at the parties.’
‘Oh Lucie, I’d love to help out!’
A wave of emotion rippled through Lucie’s abdomen as she saw the sparkle of joy in her sister’s eyes, along with the suspicion of tears glistening along her lower lashes. Gosh, she thought, this could really work and there would be the added bonus of working alongside her sister.
‘Ooo, ooo, and we could do cake pops too. I’ve got loads of ideas.’ Lucie’s voice fizzled with enthusiasm as the possibilities flowed. ‘They’re so cute and perfect for party bag gifts at the end of children’s parties. I can decorate them with edible food colouring – cats, dogs, pigs, ducks, fish! Oh, and I could do brides and grooms for wedding favours and cocktail-shaped ones for the hen parties – I’m thinking Pina Coladas and Tequila Sunrises. We could set up a Facebook page to advertise and get feedback, and Instagram and Twitter accounts… oh no, sorry, I forgot.’
Jess smiled.
‘I might have to rethink my social media marketing strategy!’
She swallowed down the dregs of her coffee, her spirits soaring. She thanked the director of her fate for returning to duty – better late than never – as ideas filtered down to form concrete concepts, until a thought occurred to her and she crashed back down to earth.
‘But I don’t have any transport. How am I supposed to be a mobile cupcake business without transport?’
There was a long pause. Their eyes met.
‘Matt!’ the sisters chorused.
‘Do you think he’s still doing up old bangers?’ asked Jess.
‘Only one way to find out.’ Lucie scrambled in her bag for her iPhone. ‘Can you remember the name of his garage?’
‘That’s not difficult!’ laughed Jess. ‘Try Matt’s Motors. He never was the most creative of people, Matt Kirkwood, but he’s a maestro with engines. He’s come to my rescue with the Mini a few times – like a knight in grubby overalls.’
‘I thought he only worked on classic cars now. All I need is a cheap, run-of-the-mill van.’
‘Well, his obsession isn’t just confined to classic cars. Believe me, he’ll tinker with anything with wheels. At the minute he has a Triumph Stag and a Rover V8 on bricks in his back yard, but he does all sorts of vehicles. Some people are cupcake enthusiasts, some are computer geeks, Matt Kirkwood is a mechanical genius. He seems to spend all his spare time dismantling engines, polishing them and putting them back together. He’s just sold a VW Campervan he renovated for an absolute fortune and he has orders for two more. I reckon if we tell him what we’re looking for he’ll guide us to something suitable.’
‘Oh, so you’ve stayed in touch, have you? Is there still a spark there from your high-school romance?’
Lucie loved Matt. He had courted her sister all through her last year at school until she went off to catering college and met and married Dan, Lewis and Jack’s father. She hadn’t realised they were still friends.
‘Lucie…’
‘Sorry, sorry.’ She paused. ‘But there’s one huge problem we’re overlooking with this plan, Jess.’
‘What?’
‘I don’t have any money to buy the eggs and the flour for the cakes, never mind invest in a van, even of the rust-bucket variety.’
Lucie watched her sister’s good humour deflate like a pricked balloon. She scoured her brain for an answer, but came up with nothing. Her bank account was empty and she’d never opened a savings account, nor did she own a credit card as they were too tempting. And she refused to go cap in hand to her mother. She could tell that Jess was considering this as a possibility but she chose not to say anyt
hing. The Bradshaw girls had both insisted on making their own way in the world very early on. Very few people knew they had a famous mother and that’s how they liked to keep it. That way, any successes were their own, worked for and delivered from their own talents and not from riding on the name and the wings of a former celebrity chef.
‘Well, that seems to be it then,’ mumbled Jess, getting up to clear away the detritus of their morning coffee.
Then a light bulb burst into life in Lucie’s brain. ‘I know where I can get a quick few hundred pounds.’
‘Where?’ asked Jess, her eyes clouding with suspicion.
‘In fact, it’ll be poetic justice in a way. I still have the engagement ring I was planning on giving to Alex. I certainly don’t need it anymore. I’ll return it to Tiffany’s and spend the money on a second-hand runaround. Whatever Matt can come up with.’
Jess collected Lucie into her arms, tears now spilling freely down her cheeks. ‘Great! This calls for a celebration!’ She grabbed a bottle of Prosecco rosé they had been saving for lunch on Easter Sunday from the fridge and popped the cork. ‘The only thing left to decide on now is a name for your new business venture.’
‘What do you suggest?’
‘What about Lucie’s Luscious Lickable Bakes?’ giggled Jess, scrunching up her face in pleasure as the bubbles of Prosecco slipped over her tongue and down her throat.
‘Bradshaw’s Buns?’ suggested Lucie to get her own back.
‘Cupcake Carousel?’
‘I think it should be called the Travelling Cupcake Company,’ said Lucie, smiling at her beloved sister, grateful that she was going to be an integral part of her future, relieved that her brief flirtation with melancholy had been doused so quickly.
For some reason, as she raised her glass to her lips to toast the birth of her new enterprise, a sharp-focus image of Ed floated across her vision. He looked like a nineteen-twenties matinee idol with those cute dimples bracketing his very kissable lips and his mahogany eyes crinkled as he nodded his approval of her plans. A flash of heat splashed through her chest. Ed Cartolli was just too handsome for his own good.
‘The Travelling Cupcake Company it is. Let’s drink to its success!’ announced Jess, raising her glass and displaying the suspicion of dampness at the corners of her pale-blue eyes.
Chapter Nine
Easter Sunday wore its best bonnet. At what seemed to Lucie like the crack of dawn, Lewis and Jack were out charging around the garden, scavenging for the chocolate eggs the bunny had left for them, after which they spent the rest of the morning cramming their treasure into their mouths whole. As she handed Lewis and Jack a giant chocolate bar each and received a sticky hug as thanks, she realised how fortunate she was to have such a loving family to smooth over the bumps in life’s uncharted voyage.
It was the first time in weeks that she had discarded her duvet with a spring in her step. She showered, dressed and was ready to visit Matt to talk about vehicles by nine a.m. She’d had a brief conversation with him the previous day and he’d told her he would be at his garage from ten onwards if she wanted to pop over. She had smiled when he had casually asked if her sister would be coming with her.
With the boys entertained with new colouring books and felt pens, they drove over to the other side of Richmond in her sister’s rust-blistered old Mini Cooper. Matt, predictably, was on his back under the chassis of the Rover V8 while strains of Ed Sheeran wafted out from an ancient grease-splattered radio.
‘Hey, Matt. Remember my sister, Lucie?’
‘Hi, Jess, great to see you. Yes, of course I remember little pig-tailed Lucie!’ Matt stood, wiped his oil-smeared hands on an old cloth and crushed her palm with his.
Lucie smiled at the guy towering in front of her. He still wore his hair in a mop of unruly curls similar to hers, but his were dark auburn. He sported a trendy smattering of beard and clearly did not spend all his time under the bonnet of motor vehicles. His broad shoulders screamed of hours spent in the gym, or more accurately on the rugby pitch. Lucie found herself wondering whether, if Jess wasn’t interested, then perhaps… but she quickly chastised herself. She was still in mourning for her relationship with Alex.
It had been four weeks since that fateful night at Tiffany’s and she had received only one measly text from him enquiring if she was coping with everything that had happened to her. Of course she wasn’t coping! Her life had fallen apart and his text had sounded like he was asking his elderly aunt about her lumbago. Her fingers had twitched to shoot back a reply, vacillating between an indignant response and a plea to meet her. Steph and Hollie had been adamant that she do neither. She had to admit, though, that she was surprised he’d resisted the temptation to snarl at her questionable stardom on the internet.
‘Thanks so much for doing this, Matt,’ smiled Lucie.
‘It’s no problem at all,’ he replied, casting a surreptitious glance in Jess’s direction. ‘So, what sort of vehicle do you have in mind for your Travelling Cupcake Company van?’
While she explained to Matt what she was looking for, Jess and the boys sauntered around the garage, which looked more like a graveyard for mechanical objects of every species. Even an old washing machine carcass had been pressed into service as a makeshift kitchen table, sporting a rusty kettle and carton of milk. Lucie grimaced when she saw the state of the mugs. They paused to admire the Delft Blue Triumph Stag that had been liberated from the confines of Matt’s garage ready to be taken out for an Easter spin. Clearly Matt had spent the better part of the morning polishing her paintwork, which sparkled beneath the weak spring sunshine, instead of searching for chocolate eggs.
‘How about this?’ Matt indicated an old white Ford Transit van he had clearly pulled out of the garage onto the forecourt for her to inspect. ‘It wouldn’t take me long to clean it up for you and give it an up-to-date MOT.’
Lucie’s heart slumped in disappointment. ‘Mmm, bit uninspiring, don’t you think?’
‘Were you thinking more along the lines of a customised Porsche Cayenne?’ he smirked.
Lucie laughed. ‘That would be nice, but my bank manager would have a coronary. It’s just, I was hoping for something with a bit of character, that’s all.’
‘It’s the most practical thing I have, I’m afraid.’
Lucie scrunched her nose. ‘I think I’m looking for something quirky, something to set my business aside from all the others.’
‘Well… in that case… maybe…’ pondered Matt, for some reason not able to meet Lucie’s eyes as he jangled a bunch of keys from his index finger. ‘It’s probably not exactly what you had in mind, but it certainly falls into the quirky category, if that’s what you want! I wasn’t sure what to do with it, to be honest.’
‘Sounds interesting. What is it?’
‘Perhaps you should wait until you see it. I’ll totally understand if you’re horrified. I’m not sure how I was duped into taking it, to be honest, but I had a great deal of fun renovating it. Don’t worry – the engine is sound. It didn’t have one when I liberated it from my cousin’s neighbour’s shed, so I paid peanuts for it. It was no big deal to fix in a second-hand motor from one of the scrap cars that pass my door every day. It runs smoothly, and I’ve given it an MOT until the end of the year and there’s a couple of months’ tax on it. So you’ll be ready to go. This way!’
Lucie wondered why there was a faint smirk in his green eyes, or was it a splash of mischief? She left Jess and the boys admiring the vintage MG and followed him towards the storage yard at the back of the garage. She had relaxed straightaway in Matt’s company as he chatted with animation about his love of cars and his obsession with dismantling anything with an engine. She totally understood his passion – she felt the same about her culinary autopsies; the buzz she got when she discovered a new recipe or spice was indescribable. He also told them about his hobby – banger racing. She wasn’t quite sure what it entailed – surely it had nothing to do with sausages? She made a mental note
to Google the sport when she got back home.
They had arrived in a miniature version of the local scrapyard and to her untrained eyes it looked like a mechanical jungle. Everywhere she looked there were discarded car parts stacked on top of each other, but as she studied the metal clutter, she came to realise that there was a method to the chaos.
‘Over here!’ Matt led her to a wooden garage, unlocked the sturdy padlock and drew back the double doors. ‘I know it’s a bit left of centre, but what do you think?’
Lucie stopped in her tracks, her jaw loose as she waited for what her eyes were seeing to connect to her brain.
‘No way!’ exclaimed Lucie, before going on to state the blindingly obvious. ‘It’s a… it’s an ice-cream van!’
‘Top marks for observational skills.’
She stared at the little marshmallow-pink-and-cream symbol of her childhood. She hadn’t set eyes on an ice-cream van for years, certainly not in the teeming streets of the metropolis. No wonder this example was resting in the scrapheap behind Matt’s garage-repair business.
‘What do you think?’
‘Erm…’
Where did she start? How could she even begin to form an opinion when she had nothing against which to judge it? It was totally not what she had been expecting. From the outside it resembled one of her Princess-themed cupcakes – just minus the glittery roof! A tickle of excitement ran through her veins. Could she run her Travelling Cupcake Company from it? Could she even handle such a beast?
‘Want to take a look inside?’
She hesitated, then grinned, vaulted up into the van and climbed through into the back. The inside, currently the rudimentary bones of a workstation at the rear of the front two seats, was complete with stainless-steel ice-cream dispensers. The seats were intact and the steering wheel was huge.
A sharp tang of mould and something more unpleasant enveloped her nostrils. The linoleum blistered beneath her feet and threads of grime and cobwebs dangled from the ceiling. A melancholic air pervaded the cabin. Once, in the not-too-distant past, this vehicle had been a beacon of pleasure, its arrival extracting smiles as it tootled down the avenues of the residential suburbs of London. Now it was a redundant relic of a bygone era, like so many other things. It was like a maiden aunt whose beauty had faded yet was still apparent beneath the wrinkles.
