A Risky Business #SYTYCW15 #CarinaPress

Chapter Seventeen

The Sunday after the shopping trip – a bit of unmanly baking ...

*Kate*

The rest of the week passed by quietly. Damien had been busy working a lot of shifts as he was helping to provide cover for one of the guys that was away on annual leave, so he hadn't been around much, in fact we had barely seen him. Kim and I had been amusing ourselves around the house, she was getting good at offering to do the washing up or helping with preparing vegetables for the evening meal, and we were working well together as a little team. We had wrapped Jack's watch.  It was boxed up beautifully anyway, but we wrapped it in some lovely thick paper and added a ribbon and a tag to really make it look special. We'd each bought a card and they had been written. We were all ready, except of course, that we still didn't know when he was going to be back.

So, in the meantime, we just carried on as normal. That afternoon Kim had been idly flicking through one of those magazines that come with the Sunday newspapers, while I was reconciling some purchase invoices and trying, rather in vain, to balance the books.

"Wow, look at this," she said waving a double page spread at me from across the room. "This looks yummy."

"What is it?" I said, tapping away on my calculator and wondering how on earth we managed to spend so much money.

"It's a cookies and cream party cake," she said. "It doesn't actually sound that difficult to make," she added, reading through the recipe. "Maybe we could make one of these for Uncle Jack's birthday."

A 'cookies and cream party cake?' I thought to myself. That doesn't sound very 'Jack'. But hey, why not? She's such a good kid, well apart from the running away thing of course! How many other fourteen year olds would be suggesting baking a cake for a relative's birthday? Not many I bet. You'd have trouble prising them away from their smart phones for a start, and I wouldn't think many of them even knew that wooden spoons existed. But not Kim, or at least, not Kim anymore. I couldn't remember the last time we'd had to bribe her to take her earphones out, you know the ones that seemed to have been permanently embedded when she first arrived with us ...

"Kate?" she said, impatient for my response.

"Sorry," I said, "miles away. Yes, sounds like a great idea, let's have a look at the ingredients then."

She brought the magazine over and stood beside me while I scanned through the information.

"It does look lovely," I agreed, "and you're right, it doesn't look too complicated. In fact I think we've probably got everything that we'd need already in the cupboards."

I took off the glasses that I only wore when I was doing very complicated and important paperwork, or when I was trying to fool someone into thinking I was intelligent and said,

"Why don't we do a trial run? Let's have a go at baking one today, sort of as a practice, and if all goes well, we know we'll be able to bake one when he's back."

Anything to get away from these bloody invoices!

Kim thought this was a great idea so we down-tooled and headed to the kitchen. We did indeed have everything that we needed for a 'not particularly manly, but never mind', cookies and cream party cake including, surprisingly, vanilla extract. The bottle was a bit sticky and sorry looking but, it was in date and it would do, certainly for a practice run. I found us a couple of novelty aprons to wear, mine displayed a very tasteful picture of the body of a lady in a bikini and Kim's made her look like she was wearing a little maid's outfit. We tied our hair up out of the way, rolled up our sleeves, preheated the oven and set to it.

We followed the recipe meticulously, I carefully weighed out all the ingredients and Kim mixed them in until her arm ached, hhmmm, maybe I ought to invest in a mixer if we were going to make a habit of this. The cake tins were meant to be non-stick but we greased them anyway, just to be sure, and tipped in our gorgeous smelling concoction. Feeling pretty pleased with ourselves I donned the oven gloves, opened the oven door, and carefully placed the tins next to each other on the middle shelf. I don't know if it was the blast of hot air from the oven, or if I straightened up too quickly, but once again I found myself feeling dizzy and having to clutch onto the kitchen work top for support. Kim, bless her, came to my rescue, slamming the oven door closed and shoving one of the kitchen stools underneath me, seemingly in one deft movement.

She didn't seem so frightened this time, or perhaps she was just becoming used to my antics. She calmly got me a glass of water and encouraged me to sip it slowly. As she stood and watched the colour gradually returning to my cheeks, she wiped her hands on her apron and said in a very motherly fashion,

"You really should get to the doctors Kate. This is becoming a bit of a habit."

"I'm sure it's nothing," I said meekly.

"I'm sure it's nothing," she agreed, "but I'd really rather that you got it checked out. Just in case. Please."

I looked up at her. When had she become so grown up?

"Yes, you're right, I should get myself checked, just so that we know it's nothing. I'll make an appointment."

Kim looked at me, and raised an eyebrow.

"I promise."

"Good," she said and we both turned our attention to the cakes that were beginning to rise majestically in the oven.

*

Damien came in, literally following his nose and sniffing dramatically.

"What is that glorious smell?" he asked. "Have my little women been baking?"

He knew he was pushing his luck with a comment like that, but fortunately for him we were both so pleased with our afternoon's work that we were happy to just bask in the glory of it all.

"It's a cookies and cream party cake," Kim said proudly, "and we made it all ourselves."

We had just been putting the final touches to the decorations, and she pushed the cake stand towards him, waiting for his approval.

"Wow," he said. "That looks amazing. Well done girls. Who knew you were such accomplished bakers?"

I think that last comment was directed mostly at me as I had never before knocked up so much as a plate of fairy cakes for him. Pies, flans, pasta dishes ... yes, all the time, and all from scratch you know! Cakes, however .... no. Oh well, first time for everything.

"This is a trial run for Uncle Jack's birthday cake," Kim told him. "What do you think?"

Poor Damien,  You could see his enthusiasm dampen slightly. 'Bloody Jack,' he was probably thinking, 'he's not even here and they're baking him a soddin' cake.' But to give him his due, or perhaps he was just impossibly hungry and really fancied a slice of cake, he said,

"I think it looks perfect ... but does it taste perfect, that's the big question. Are you going to cut us all a slice and I'll put the kettle on?"

Kim, looking as pleased as punch, hurried off to organise plates, Damien boiled the kettle and we all mentally prepared ourselves to fight to the death for the largest slice. Cookies and cream party cake ... it could well be about to become the next big thing, in this house, if nowhere else!