‘I guess you don’t eat much sugar to look like…’ I trail off, catching the rest of my sentence before I say it.
Stop mooning over him and get outta here.
‘Thanks again,’ I say, backing up. ‘Very neighbourly.’
‘Hey.’ His voice stops me on the spot. Is he going to invite me in? Maybe I can seduce him and take him to the wedding after all…
‘You forgot your milk. Maybe drop me a cookie or two?’
‘Uh, yeah, I can do that.’ With my cheeks flaming, I step forward, taking the milk before fleeing back to the safety of my home.
Heart pounding and milk spilling over my hand, I rest back against the inside of my door.
I did it!
With a groan, my excitement turns to annoyance.
I’m going to have to learn how to make cookies.
FOUR
ROMAN
‘Out!’Granny demands, shooing me from her kitchen with wafts of a tea towel.
‘I’m just trying to serve the cake.’
‘You were trying to take the biggest slice. I saw you.’ For someone standing at five feet two, she took no nonsense. Especially where cake is concerned.
‘I’m almost a foot taller than you, I need more cake,’ I laugh, moving through to the sitting room and pulling out the nest of tables, furnishing both of our seats with one.
‘Sit yourself down and behave. You’re in my house, I’ll serve up the tea.’ Granny walked more slowly these days, the teapot less steady in her grip than it used to be.
‘I thought we were having rum?’ I ask, fetching her dainty ceramic teacups from the seventies-style sideboard, setting them on matching saucers, and taking a seat.
‘You’re not getting back on that two-wheeled death machine after drinking. Not in my house.’ Her tea towel slaps my hand as I go to pour the tea. ‘Leave it.’
Sitting back, I sigh. Granny still lives in the home where I grew up. The most familiar place I know. Home. The charm of it is from an age gone by, chintzy doilies and dark brown furniture, three ascending-sized ducks on the wall. A collection of gingerbread ornaments covers the slim shelf that loops around the top of the room. I would say gathering dust, but I doubt there is a speck on them. Even dust feared my grandmother.
‘Where’s the cake from?’ Granny asks when she finally sits beside me, masking the pain in her hip as she does. She couldn’t freeze me out of the issue forever. Every attempted conversation has so far been quashed. ‘It looks good.’
‘Not as good as yours.’ Pleasure suffuses her face at the compliments, but she coyly bats it away with a hand. ‘It’s from the little bakery down on the green. The new one with the American woman. Frankie’s, I think it’s called.’
‘American?’ Granny repeats, looking suspicious.
‘Trust me, it’s good. She makes them all fresh in the shop every day. There’s a cafe too. I’ll take you sometime.’
Unable to resist the lure of the thick, decadent chocolate ganache, she cuts a little with her fork and tries it.
Not a word.
I take a bite, and it’s like angels break into a chorusinside my mouth—God-tier cake. And I’m not even a cake guy. Only for Granny.
Two bites and three sips of tea later, Granny smacks her lips. ‘It’s not bad at all.’
‘It’s bloody lovely,’ I respond, my cake already reduced to a scraping of ganache and a gathering of crumbs.
‘You look so much like your father.’ It’s not the first time the words have slipped from her mouth. I can’t blame her. She had to take me on as a kid, effectively repeating motherhood with a copy-paste of the son who took his own life.
