-Dreams Killed Love-

Monday morning. It was business as usual in the pâtisserie. Cake had a sleepless night thinking about Jade, so he could not come up with any ideas. He made his daily batch of ‘bin fodder’ at 4:30 am and watched the few customers trickle through the door during the morning. Lunchtime, he went to see his family on the farm for a few hours. He spent the afternoon chatting with his mother and grandmother, seeking their advice. It was his grandmother, Pearl, who gave him the best advice, “Go back to basics Benjamin and keep it simple. You’ve done it before,” she said.

During the drive back to Lincoln, Cake had an epiphany. He arrived at the closed pâtisserie early evening, went up to the apartment, pulled out a notepad, and started scribbling.

Cake had another sleepless night jotting down his ideas. The following morning when the Daves’ arrived, they were puzzled to find the first batch of the day’s products not made. Cake, who would normally have everything in the ovens and running around the bakery on some new experiment, leant against a stainless steel prep table with notes strewn about, grinning like a Cheshire cat.

“What’s happening boss?” asked Small Dave.

“Time for a change,” announced Cake. “Wait for the girls to arrive and I will explain.”

The pâtisserie stayed closed for the day while Cake went over his plans with the others to put his new strategy into action. Cake put a sign outside, which read:

CLOSED FOR REFURBISHMENT

RE-OPEN 15th NOVEMBER.

“Right team! That gives us a week, which should be plenty of time,” Cake said after putting out the sign.

“Do you think it will work, Cake?” asked a sceptical Sarah. “So far, I have seen nothing to suggest that you can run a successful bakery business.”

Cake smiled and asked, “Have you heard of Bakewell Bakeries of Louth?”

“Yes,” said Sarah. “Who hasn’t heard of them here? They are one of the largest bakeries in Lincolnshire.”

“I started that business with help from my family, so I can start again by keeping it simple and going back to basics,” said Cake.

“Keep it simple. I’m all for that,” said Big Dave and chuckled.

Cake planned to do away with all the fancy, expensive upper-class cakes, pastries, and high-end bread products. He remembered what Jimmy told him on their first meeting about turning a bland item into something special, and he could do that. They would make simple custard pies, fruit pies, cupcakes, éclairs and crusty ploughman’s loaves, bread rolls, baguettes and quiches. The customer, from a selection housed in a redesigned temperature-controlled display cabinet, would choose the bread type and fillings. Cake wanted the new business to resemble a quaint Victorian ‘Subway’ but offer a lot more.

His family gave him an area of their customers around Lincoln. Cake would supply the restaurants and public houses in his area under the Bakewell’s banner, with his sisters delivering and checking the customers’ satisfaction. The Bakewell’s had given up farming years ago when the bakery had become a more lucrative business. They had used their farmland to extend the bakery for their expanding customer base.

Cake realised that this was what Jade had been trying so hard to tell him, but he'd ignored her. He knew he had been a fool, but at last, he had come to his senses. Jade had not contacted him now for a while, and he had been putting off phoning her until he saw how the work progressed.

One evening, after Cake thought everything was on track, he phoned Jade to tell her the news and find out when she was coming back. Jade’s phone rang, but there was no answer. ‘She might be at the gym. She mentioned that she wanted to start kickboxing again,’ he thought.

Cake made several more unsuccessful attempts to call, but she still didn’t answer.

This played on Cake’s mind, and the following day he called her at work.

Jade answered, “What do you want Cake? I’m busy!” she snapped.

“Hi darling, I tried to call you earlier, but… ”

Jade interrupted. “I will call you later. I told you, I’m busy,” she then hung up.

Confused, Cake carried on reorganising the bakery and waited for Jade’s call, which never came.

Two days remained until the re-opening of CAKES Bakery & Pâtisserie and the refurbishment went as scheduled. They did not change the pâtisserie, only refitting the refrigerated front display cabinets and extended the sandwich section to incorporate a chilled section for sandwich fillings. Cake, along with the staff, worked out their new, simple, inexpensive but delicious ranges, with plain points of sales, signs, and menus.

Cake thought about Jade a lot. He knew that he’d upset her and did not want to push her, ‘I will let her cool off’’ he thought.

That evening, he sat in the apartment feeling pleased with himself. He took a Pineapple Bacardi Breezer from the fridge and thought, ‘Sod it. I’ll call her, apologise, and reassure her everything will be fine. I will tell her about the new business and the grand opening, hopefully, she will come, after all, it’s still half her business.’

He called Jade’s number, but again there was no answer. He tried several more times over the next hour and drank a few more Breezers.

Around 9:00 pm, he called again and this time the phone clicked to receive, but nobody spoke. He blurted, “Hi darling, it’s me, I am sorry about everyth…”

“Jade doesn’t want to speak to you,” interrupted a man sounding angry.

Cake, taken aback, stammered, “Who are you?”

“You have been calling for over three hours. Can’t you take the hint? Jade does not want to speak to you,” said the stranger.

“Let me speak to Jade,” demanded Cake.

“Do you want to speak to your ex?” the man asked Jade in the background.

Cake listened as the phone went silent and then Jade said, “Stop calling me Cake. We’re finished. You made that clear. Now, leave me alone.”

Dumbfounded and trembling, Cake heard the man mumble something to Jade.

“Who was that man?” asked Cake, wishing he hadn’t asked, as he already knew the answer.

“That’s Alvin, my boyfriend, and he is hung like a moose. Now leave us alone!” (Only joking about the moose part, but I didn’t want to upset you)

Jade switched off her phone and Cake’s world fell apart.

The next two days felt the worst of Cake’s life. Inconsolable, he lost his concentration and focus. All he could think about was Jade and the time they’d spent together. His stomach churned and his throat felt dry when he recalled the phone call and he trembled when he imagined Jade sharing herself with this other man. The staff and his family rallied around to complete his project while Cake moped around the apartment in a zombie-like trance. He blamed himself for what happened and wept when he considered his unbearable future without Jade. Everything around him evoked memories of Jade. Her familiar fragrance lingered in the apartment. Cake felt that he was living in a nightmare, unable to eat, sleep, or concentrate.

The grand re-opening went with a soggy fizzle. Cake didn’t know why and didn’t care.

The Daves’ had been preparing the new products since 5:00 am and delicious baking aromas bathed the pâtisserie. Cake’s mind was elsewhere, and as the Daves’ baked, Cake stared aimlessly through the glass partition into the dark pâtisserie. The Daves’ saw Cake looking preoccupied with his intertwining thoughts, and could only imagine what must be going through his mind, considering the bombshell he’d had dropped on him several days ago and knew he was finding it difficult to stay motivated and adapting to the recent changes.

It was 9:00 am on a chilly, dark, November morning. The pâtisserie had been open for over an hour. Cake gazed through the glass partition into the pâtisserie while the staff stood around the empty counters.

Small Dave went to buy a newspaper forty minutes earlier and Big Dave sat with Cake mumbling about how long it should have taken to walk to the newsagents.

“Fifteen minutes, max.,” Big Dave blurted out.

“What?” asked Cake, with a croak in his voice.

“Sorry boss,” said Big Dave. “I was just thinking out loud. Normally, it takes fifteen minutes to walk to the newsagents, and Dopey Dave has been gone for over forty minutes. He’ll be chatting up the newsagent’s daughter again, and I bet he comes back with a lame excuse.”

Cake wasn’t paying attention as he continued staring through the glass partition into the empty pâtisserie.

Ten minutes later the door opened and Small Dave walked in looking concerned. He strode through the pâtisserie and into the bakery.

When small Dave walked into the bakery, Cake felt as if something had slapped him. He suddenly snapped out of his daydream as something stimulated his senses.

“Oh, it’s about bloody time,” grumbled Big Dave and asked. “What’s that you’ve got?”

Small Dave had something in a plastic bag, which he held up and said, “I know where all our customers went. They’re queuing up outside a small van on the car park near the newsagents which has been there four days selling this crap.” He took out a polystyrene container, opened it, and removed a slice of chocolate cake.

With Cake’s olfactory receptors in chaotic overdrive when he caught the aroma above the smells of his baked products, it was a narcotic pheromone to his heightened senses as Small Dave handed Cake the slice of chocolate sponge.

The Daves’ looked on bewildered, as Cake appeared to be having an orgasm sniffing the bland-looking confectionary.

“Chocolate, sugar, buttermilk, egg, flour, but what was that?” said Cake with a quake in his voice as he tried to distinguish the other ingredient.

Big Dave shrugged and said, “I don’t see what the fuss is about. It’s only a chocolate sponge,”

“Yeah, and it doesn’t look that good,” said Small Dave, adding, “Mind you, it must be something special because I had to queue for ages.”

“Oh! It’s something special, it’s exquisite,” said Cake, continuing to smell the sponge. “Where did you say you’d bought it?”

“A little foreign bloke’s selling those and other bakery stuff out the back of a van on the car park,” said Small Dave, and unable to understand the fuss, shrugged, “he looked like an Indian, but he might have been Chinese, I dunno,” he mumbled.

Big Dave furrowed his brow, “What is it Cake? And what makes it so special?” he asked, looking confused.

Cake looked at the Daves,’ realising they could not detect this heavenly aroma. “I don’t know; it’s indescribable. I have never come across anything like it before,” he said as the odours swirled around his senses, “It’s like nectar to a honeybee.”

“It looks like crap, but can I have a taste?” asked Small Dave.

Cake nodded and broke off two small chunks and handed them to the pair.

Cake and the Daves’ tasted the sponge, rubbing the chocolaty confectionary around their mouths with their tongues.

“Tastes okay,” said Big Dave, not knowing what all the fuss was about as he detected the flavours that he knew. “Oh!” he exclaimed as the last ingredient kicked in, “What’s that? It’s yummy.”

“Yeah, it tastes delicious,” agreed Small Dave as the unknown ingredient exploded onto their taste buds.

Cake, feeling euphoric and intoxicated by the flavour, smiled, exhaled, and murmured, “The perfect spice.”

Cake then juddered back to reality. “Come on Dave,” he said putting on his jacket. “Show me where you bought it.”