The moment it started to topple, Jennifer was barking instructions into her headset faster than Audrey could keep up, directingevery camera and every member of the crew to make sure the event was chronicled as completely and as cinematically as possible.
“Fantastic,” she was saying, “two and three, keep on the cake; five and nine, I want reaction shots. Faces, people, show me faces.”
And faces she got. Expressions of shock and empathy from other contestants and pure mortification from Reggie. And somewhere off-camera, Grace Forsythe was coming forward and making yes-isn’t-this-exciting-but-we-have-a-show-to-shoot noises.
Once the footage was collected and the floors were cleaned, Reggie—encouraged by Grace—made his way up to the front of the ballroom.
The judges were very nice about it, explaining that they’d only be able to judge based on what they’d been served, but that his ambition had been commendable.
“What remains,” said Marianne Wolvercote as gently as she could manage without harming her brand, “is nicely baked. And if the structural integrity of the piece had held, you might have had something first-rate.”
Wilfred Honey gave one of his trademark grandfatherly nods. “You’ve had a bad week, lad. And that can happen to anyone.”
That left Alanis, who approached the judges with the perfect mix of confidence and humility, laying down her chilli-chocolate-mirror-glaze-cake-with-forest-scene with just that little bit of extra care in the wake of the great entoppling.
“Now, thislooksbeautiful,” Marianne Wolvercote began. And it did. It was recognisably the same cake as week one, but elevated as only two months of intense competitive training could elevate. The glaze was bright and reflective, and it was decorated on top with a dense, three-dimensional forest rendered in tempered chocolate.
As the cameras panned around, Audrey could see thatamongst the trees walked a girl—or the silhouette of a girl—in a flowing dress, the path beneath her feet picked out with a dusting of chilli flakes. It looked like an edible fairy tale, or perhaps an edible self-portrait.
“The presentation is just lovely,” Wilfred Honey agreed. “It’s so good it almost feels bad to cut it.”
Marianne cut it. She levered out a slice and subjected it to the autopsy-level scrutiny she applied to every bake that wasn’t an obvious dud. “Good texture,” she said. “Even layers.”
While Marianne was analysing, Wilfred Honey took a forkful. “Aye,” he said, “you’ve done well there. No complaints.”
“Is the chilli coming through?” asked Alanis, almost shyly.
“It is,” confirmed Wilfred Honey.
Marianne Wolvercote had just finished her own sample and was looking a little more reserved. “Ordinarily, I’d suggest thatBake Expectationsisn’t a show that allows do-overs, but I think you’ve been clever here. It’s definitely more of a reimagining than a simple repetition, and on this occasion it was a good opportunity to show us what you’re capable of.” She nodded, as if agreeing with herself. “Well timed.”
With that the judges retired, and Audrey followed Jennifer out to the gazebo where both the actual decision and the for-the-cameras fake decision would be made.
Having seen this side of the curtain, it was beginning to feel a little anticlimactic. While the tension of Grace Forsythe needlessly stretching out the reveal of that week’s winner and loser was clearly artificial, artificial things did tend to work a lot of the time. Being in the room with everybody else, each of you wondering,Will it be me?in one direction or the other created something real from something that wasn’t.
By contrast the flat, matter-of-fact discussion in which Grace, Wilfred, Marianne, and Jennifer decided in less than seventy seconds that clearly Reggie was out and that on balance Alanis looked better for the win was almost the opposite. It took something real—the final decision over who would be going forward in the series—and made it feel like nothing at all.
Week Seven
Childhood
Monday
“Audreeey,” said the voice down the phone. The voice that belonged to Andrew Spencer-Johns, one of Audrey’s erstwhile colleagues from her London days. “Dreedree, the Dreester.”
“Hi Andrew,” Audrey replied, newly weary despite not having heard this particular introduction in more than two years.
“So that chick you emailed about?”
“You mean that nearly a-hundred-year-old woman?”
“That’s the one. Think I’ve got a lead.”
Audrey grabbed a notepad. “Fantastic, where?”
“Monaco.”
Of course. Emily Branningham couldn’t be somewhere nice and accessible like Dagenham or Cleethorpes. “Care to narrow that down a bit?”
