Christmas At The Cupcake Cafe (12 page)

‘Doti has been
soo
helpful,’ said Maya, looking at him in a way that almost immediately put paid to their relationship being merely professional. Doti was pretty handsome, Pearl supposed. His hair was shaved, and he had a very finely shaped skull with small ears and a long neck and …

‘What can I get you?’ she said.

‘I promised Maya I’d let her try the finest coffee and cake emporium this side of N16,’ said Doti. ‘So here we are.’

‘Oh, it’s lovely,’ said Maya. She glanced at the blackboard and her face fell a little. ‘It looks expensive, though.’ She lowered her voice and spoke directly to Pearl. ‘I
really needed this job,’ she whispered. Pearl understood.

‘Well, we’re glad you got it,’ said Doti heartily. ‘Very glad. And coffee is on me.’

Louis ran in with his best friend Big Louis, scattering rucksacks, hats, scarves and gloves all over the place before the bell had stopped ringing.

‘MUM!’ he yelled, and Pearl put down the milk she was steaming and stepped over to give him a big kiss and cuddle.

‘My special guy,’ she said. ‘My number one boy.’

Louis beamed. ‘I was SOOO good today,’ he said. ‘Here is who was not good. Evan. Gianni. Carlo. Mohammed A and Felix …’

‘OK, OK,’ said Pearl. ‘That’s enough.’

Louis looked grave. ‘They have to sit on a rug. You would not like to sit on a rug.’

‘Why not?’ said Pearl. ‘What happens?’

‘You have to sit on a rug! And EVERYBODY knows you have done some naughty behaviour.’

‘Hey, Louis,’ said Doti.

Louis’ face lit up. ‘DOTI!’ he yelled. They were great friends.

Doti crouched down. ‘Hello, young man,’ he said. Louis looked suspiciously at Maya. ‘WHO’S THAT?’ he whispered very loudly.

‘That’s my friend who is also delivering post.’

‘A lady postman?’ said Louis dubiously.

‘Of course!
There are lots of lady postmen.’

‘We’re called post
women
,’ said Maya. ‘Hello. What’s your name?’

Louis still looked at her suspiciously, and, unusually for him, didn’t immediately start chatting.

‘Doti has a friend already,’ he announced loftily. ‘He has me and also he has Mummy. Thank you very much.’ Then he turned away.

‘Louis!’ said Pearl, genuinely surprised and secretly a bit pleased. ‘Where are your manners! Say hello!’

Louis stared at the floor. ‘H’lo,’ he muttered.

‘It’s very nice to meet you,’ said Maya. ‘Oh, Doti, you weren’t wrong about these mince pies.’

Pearl gave her a look.

‘It’s December,’ said Doti. ‘We can celebrate Christmas now.’

‘Oh yes,’ said Maya. ‘Definitely. Yum.’

Louis tugged at Doti’s trouser leg. ‘Have you any letters for me?’

He asked this every day. Issy often reflected that it did slightly ameliorate the effect of getting endless and ever-higher electricity bills when they were delivered by a cheerful four-year-old wearing a hat shaped like a dinosaur.

‘Well, as a matter of fact, I do,’ said Doti. ‘You know how normally you have to do a special delivery to Auntie Issy?’

Louis nodded.

‘Well, today it isn’t for Issy. Today it’s just for you.’

Louis’
eyes went wide.

‘And you won’t BELIEVE who it’s from.’

Pearl was as surprised as Louis when Doti handed him an envelope covered in snowflakes and addressed Louis Kmbota McGregor, c/o the Cupcake Café.

Doti winked at her. ‘The post office does it every year,’ he whispered. ‘I thought he might like one.’

Louis, who could recognise his own name printed in gold, was turning the envelope over and over like it was the most precious object he’d ever seen.

‘Mummy!’ he breathed.

‘Are you going to open it?’ said Pearl.

Louis shook
his head. ‘NO.’

‘Who do you think it’s from?’ said Doti.

Louis held it away from him, still with a wondering look in his eye.

‘Is it … is it from Santa?’

Doti took the envelope. ‘See this,’ he said, pointing. ‘This is a postmark. Remember I showed you before? It tells you where the letter was posted and what date.’

Louis nodded.

‘Well, this postmark says … the North Pole.’

‘THE NORTH POLE?’

‘Yup!’

‘MUMMY! I’ve got a letter from Santa! At the NORTH POLE!’

‘That’s lovely,’ said Pearl, mouthing a thank-you to Doti. ‘Come on, darling, let’s open it.’

Louis shook his head again and put the card behind his back.

‘I can’t,’ he said. ‘Too preshis.’

‘Why is it too precious?’ asked Maya.

Louis shrugged and kicked his foot against the counter, even though Pearl was always telling him not to.

‘Monster garage,’ he whispered. ‘Santa might say I can’t have a monster garage. Even though I did not do naughty behaviour and I did not have to sit on the rug. Like Evan and Gianni and Felix and Mohammed A but not me.’

Pearl bit her lip. That damn monster garage. Ever since he’d seen the advert, he’d been on about it. It was a garage that fixed monster trucks; big trucks, with big monsters inside. But every single monster cost a lot of money, and every single truck was sold separately and they cost money too, and the basic garage itself even before you bought a single monster or truck was well over a hundred pounds, and anyway they didn’t have room to store it even if they got the damn thing, which she couldn’t afford in a million years because she was going to have to buy Louis new trainers, as he’d grown out of the old ones and they were horribly shabby, and he needed a proper winter coat, and new pyjamas and loads and loads of basic stuff that probably other kids just got when they needed it and not at a special time of year, but that was just how it was.

And it hadn’t helped that Benjamin had seen him looking longingly at the advert and said, without even thinking, of
course you’re going to have a monster garage; no son of mine is going without. They’d had a furious argument outside about it when he’d gone for a cigarette – which by the way also cost a fortune they couldn’t afford – especially when he’d said, stubbornly, that he would get the fucking garage for his son and she could see by the glint in his eye not to argue, which just made her worry and panic even more because she hated to think what lengths he might go to to get it.

And every time Louis had mentioned hopefully about the monster garage and asked leading questions about whether Santa would bring him one on his sleigh or whether it would be too heavy and perhaps he would send some real monsters to carry it, or maybe a special dinosaur, she had hummed non-committally, and prayed for his little four-year-old head to latch on to something else.

So far, it hadn’t. She hated Christmas.

‘Well,’ said Doti, ‘when I went to empty Santa’s letter box, he did say that he had heard that there was a particularly well-behaved boy in N17, so I think he’ll probably try his hardest. And now we must be heading back to the depot.’

Doti and Maya departed together, chatting head to head like a couple of teenagers.

Pearl let Louis have a mince pie. Then she ate two more herself, crossly.

Kelly-Lee had
let Austin sleep until closing time – he was sweet, it wasn’t like he was a tramp or anything, although he did appear to be wearing odd socks, but perhaps that was some of that fabled charming English eccentricity she’d heard so much about. But finally it was seven o’clock, pitch dark outside, Hussein and Flavia had already gone and it was time to shut up shop.

‘C’mon, Hugh Grant,’ she said gently. He looked nice asleep; he didn’t snore or dribble or fart, like that fat little TV producer she’d dated in the fall, who’d come round, eat all her food and then try and get in her pants – she wasn’t that dumb, plus she’d felt his little dick prodding up against her thigh when they’d been making out, and frankly she’d lost interest pretty sharply after that. It didn’t stop him talking almost constantly about how many beautiful actresses hit on him every time he stepped out of his condo, and dangling hints about her maybe working in the studio one day. She sighed. She bet this guy wouldn’t do that. Kelly-Lee put on her perkiest smile.

‘Hello, hello?’

Austin blinked. He felt awful. All he wanted to do was crawl under his duvet and sleep for a day and a half. For a second he couldn’t figure out where he was. He pulled out his phone; the little red BlackBerry light was blinking at him ferociously. He had nine new emails and six new voicemails.
The first was from the bank head in London.

‘I don’t know what you’ve done to the Yanks,’ it started. ‘Maybe they like staff with hair like an unmade bed. Anyway, they want to make you an offer. Get in touch.’

The next two were from his PA, Janet, insisting he call her as soon as possible. And there was one from Merv, saying how much they were looking forward to having him aboard …

Austin clutched the side of the sofa. This was going very fast. Much too fast. Half of him was excited by the rush of being in demand; half of him was petrified.

‘Good news?’ said Kelly-Lee, watching him stare at the BlackBerry screen in consternation and run his fingers through his lovely thick hair, all tufted up like a small boy’s. Austin blinked several times.

‘I … I’ve just been offered a job. I think.’

Kelly-Lee’s eyebrows went even higher.

‘Boy, that’s great! Congratulations! That means we’ll be seeing you again!’

‘Yes, well … wow. I suppose.’

‘That’s brilliant.’

Kelly-Lee selected the largest of the day’s leftover cupcakes – an enormous red velvet – and swiftly put it in a little box, which she tied up expertly with bright bows.

‘Here you are,’ she said. ‘Congratulations. And welcome to New York.’

‘I thought
New Yorkers were supposed to be unfriendly,’ said Austin.

‘Well, you’re about to discover that just ain’t so,’ said Kelly-Lee.

Austin shrugged on his heavy greatcoat and long scarf.

‘Well, goodbye,’ he said.

‘See you again soon,’ said Kelly-Lee, and flashed him her enormous smile.

Outside, the snow was horizontal and blowing into his face. He hurried along looking for a cab. New York in the snow was a lot more picturesque in the photos. In reality it was utterly bloody freezing, far colder than he’d ever felt in London. He found a yellow taxi and ordered it to take him to his hotel, then fumbled in his pocket for his phone again and made a resolution to buy a pair of gloves. That was odd, nothing from Darny and Iss. He checked his watch; what was the time difference again? Anyway, it didn’t matter. This was news! Big news! A big job. Oh my goodness, a big job.

Austin had never meant to be a banker. He’d never really thought of doing anything much. When his parents had died in a car crash, he had been ambling gently through a degree in marine biology, after enjoying many diving holidays with his mum and dad before the extremely late and surprising new baby had come along after a silver wedding anniversary party went a bit crazy.

In the
hideous blur that followed the accident, his little brother was bombarded on all sides by well-meaning aunties, social services, distant cousins, friends of his parents he’d never met. Austin had had to grow up extremely quickly, cut his surfer hair (for the best, he thought now when he saw old photos), leave university and find a job that would allow him to take over his parents’ unexpired mortgage on their little terraced house in Stoke Newington.

It hadn’t been easy convincing everyone that they were fine the way they were, with or without the fifteen shepherd’s pies that arrived every morning on their doorstep unsolicited. As long as Austin kept the front room and the hallway reasonably tidy, he’d found, and the upstairs windows open to circulate any boy smell, they got by all right. But it had been a struggle. A long road.

By the time he’d discovered he had an aptitude for his job, he was already caught up in getting Darny to school and running the house (badly) and getting to work on time, and before he knew it, he had become one of those working mothers at school who were always dashing in late with the wrong PE kit and never contributed to the Christmas fete. Except those mothers weren’t particularly friendly towards him because all the stay-at-home mothers would cover for Austin and bake him Christmas cakes and have Darny round to sleepovers to give him some time to himself, whilst simultaneously sneering at or pitying
the working mothers, which made the working mothers furious.