MY ACCOUNT

April 10

Hey mum,
 

So… I burnt that batch of toffees. I was waiting for the sugar to reach the right temperature when I heard someone knocking on the front door. It was nearly eight in the evening, I hadn’t been expecting anyone, and Nora was out with friends.

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I was going to just ignore whomever it was, but they kept knocking, and I realized I had left almost all the lights on and hadn’t closed the blinds, so they had probably already seen me moving around in the kitchen.

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I quickly switched the stove off, cursed the person who had ruined my toffees, and went to see who was to blame. Well, it turned out it was Nora who was to blame, but it wasn’t Nora at the door that night.

It was my next-door neighbor, Jenna. She said she’d received a beautiful tin of my lavender shortbread cookies a couple weeks ago (from Nora!) and wanted to return the tin and the kindness with a fresh-baked pound cake.

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I should probably tell you, though it should be obvious given how I was raised, that I haven’t actually ever had a friend (other than you and Nora, but I don’t think that counts), and so have never had company over before. I stood there blankly at the door for a moment, blinking stupidly, before reaching out for the cake and tin, and stuttered out a thank you… while Jenna stepped in, took off her coat and shoes, said “Let’s have this with a cup of tea!”, and whisked the cake platter out of my hands and into the kitchen.

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 As soon as she stepped foot in the kitchen, she smelled the coconut sugar that had burnt in the pot, saw my prepared tools and ingredients laid out on the counter, and realized she’d interrupted whatever it had been that I was working on.

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“I’m so sorry!” she gushed, “I’ve interrupted something!” Her cheeks flushed bright red, and I could see she was mortified for having barged in. I thought she was going to excuse herself so I could get back to it, and then she said, “What were you making? C’mon, let’s start over, I’ll help!”

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Her eyes were so bright with enthusiasm, her demeanor changed so quickly from embarrassment, I couldn’t ask her to leave. But being fully honest… I was flabbergasted. I didn’t know how to handle a situation like this, let alone talk to someone like this. I didn’t know what was going on, why she was here, or why she wanted to stay. We’d never said two words to each other before, though I suppose that’s because I had never allowed that to be a possibility. I’m always rushing to and fro, from home to work to errands to Nora’s school, I’ve never paused to speak to my neighbors. I’ve never paused to really speak to anyone socially.

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This isn’t to say that I’m a grump or rude or can’t be friendly when speaking with someone. I know how to be “on” – I did it my whole life on the food truck for customers and watched you do it when I was too young to do anything but watch – but I’d never had to see or speak to that customer for more than 5 minutes. That was just customer service, not me, and it ended at the end of the workday.

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And now, here was this woman in my kitchen, holding a Bundt cake she brought over because she had probably thought I was finally reaching out with the cookies, and wanting to help me remake whatever had been ruined when she came knocking. I couldn’t tell her I wanted to be alone. So, I asked her to just soak the pot with the burnt caramel in some hot water while I measured out the sugars again.

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She seemed excited to help, quickly offering me the next ingredient when I needed it, standing over the pot and staring down the thermometer to make sure we got the sugars tempered to the exact degree, and then putting on the kettle to boil when I was pouring the toffees into the lined trays to cool.

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She found plates and cups and set about making tea, and I again found myself frozen as I watched her move around my kitchen as if she were at home. She set the table, sat down, and turned to see me immobile and staring. Unfazed, she just smiled and patted the seat next to her, inviting me to join her at my own table, stifling a giggle as she did.

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“Sorry,” she said, as she sliced into the cake. “Jerry, my husband, is always telling me I have no regard for other people’s boundaries. But really, it’s not that I have no regard, it’s that I don’t seem to have any boundaries myself, and I tend to forget that other people do!”

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She took a bite of the cake she’d plated for us, and said, “Hmm. Now, when I say this is a fresh-baked pound cake, I think I should explain that I didn’t bake this myself, because I’m a horrible cook and can’t bake worth a damn. But, surprisingly, for something I specially ordered from a pastry shop, this pretty much tastes like something I would have baked. It’s so bland! And dry! There’s absolutely no flavor in this.”

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“Oh, you ordered this?” I asked, surprised that she would have done that just to return the favor of the shortbread… which I didn’t even give her.

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“So sorry, I thought it would be better! I’d heard it was a really good pastry shop,” she said sheepishly.

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“No,” I sputtered. “I’m just…” I didn’t know how to explain to her that I was touched by her thoughtfulness. It would have seemed so silly to her, I’m sure, to be so moved by a store-bought cake. “Maybe it just needs some icing,” I said. I spotted an orange in the fruit tray on the counter and got up to grab my zester.

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I quickly whipped up a simple salted butter and powder sugar icing, zested some orange, added some almond essence, and drizzled it over our cake slices.

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Eyes wide with wonder, Jenna took a bite. “Wow. How did you do that? This is delicious. It’s completely transformed.”

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I shrugged, not really sure what to say. It was a pretty basic icing. She didn’t seem to notice my silence, though, as we finished our slices of cake. She chattered on about her history with cooking, telling me about some of her failures in the kitchen… but I can’t say I remember much of what she talked about. I was feeling so uncomfortable having someone in my space for so long, and nervous about how to contribute to the conversation.

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Looking back, though, I don’t think she noticed or even expected anything; when we were finished with our cake and tea, she offered to help clean up, which I declined, eager to have my space back to myself. And as quickly as she came, she was out the door with a wink and a “I’ll come back tomorrow, and we can finish off that cake!”

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And come back she did.

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I’ll write more soon.

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Love,

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Beatrix

 

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P.S. Apparently Nora distributed several of those cookie tins around the neighborhood, and she won’t tell me to whom!