Tender Hearts

Chapter 7-1

I walked out of the bathroom and stood behind the corner, just so I was close enough to hear their conversation clearly, but couldn’t me.

“Hey, nice to see you again,” I heard Nick say. His voice was velvety and deep, and it made me want to hear it more.

“Yes, hello,” Alisha snapped. “Are the cakes ready?”

“They sure are,” I heard Mom respond. “How are you two doing today? My name is Karen and I’m the owner of the bakery.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Karen.” Nick spoke again. “My name is Nick and this is my fiancé, Alisha. We are here for the cake testing.”

“Wonderful,” she said happily. “Why don’t you two take a seat at a table and I will bring out the cakes.” I heard her clap once and then the sound of her feet drawing closer to me.

I decided to make myself known and stepped from the safety of the corner.

“Oh, there you are!” she said, relieved. “I’ve been wondering where you were. That man up there, Nick?” She pointed to the front, “He is one good-looking guy; it totally caught me off guard. I actually blanked on what I wanted to say for a second. You were right about the fiancé though; she’s colorful. This should be fun.” She offered a positive smile.

“Yeah, well, don’t take it personally. It seems she’s always like that,” I muttered and followed Mom to the fridge.

“Will you grab a couple of the cakes and walk them out please? And then will you grab a knife and a couple plates with forks, please?” she requested and took a couple of the cakes.

“Sure thing, Mom,” I responded as Troy entered the fridge.

“Can I help with anything, Karen?” he asked with a smug smile. He was trying to get to me.

“Suck up,” I mouthed to him and he stifled a laugh.

“Could you grab a couple cakes for me, Troy? Thank you so much; you are too sweet.” My mom adored Troy.

“I just like to help,” he stated matter-of-factly, and I proceeded to pretend to vomit behind Mom"s back.

Troy snorted and grabbed two cakes, as he was told to, and stuck his tongue out at me. I rolled my eyes in response and we followed my mother to the front where the happy couple was sitting.

I saw Alisha’s face light up, a change from her usual pout. Nick’s face looked equally impressed and once he saw me, he winked at me. Wait, he winked at me.

at meTroy turned back at me, to see if I had noticed, and I felt myself blush.

We lined the cakes on the table and I immediately turned around to grab the forks and plates. When I came back, I handed them to both Nick and Alisha and sauntered behind the counter to where Troy stood, and watched my mom work her magic.

Troy bent down so that he was near my ear. “Did I really see him wink at you?”

I looked at him and nodded, and he smiled as he shook his head. He bent down to my ear one more time to say just three words: “You are trouble.”

I snorted and looked at the table, and noticed that Nick had been staring at us. He must have been watching our interaction and his facial expression almost looked like he was, well, bugged. Alisha was oblivious and didn’t notice anything; she was too busy making goo-goo eyes at the cakes.

“These are even better than I thought they would be!” she exclaimed with a classic I’m-going-to-compliment-you but-still-offend-you at the same time. “I absolutely love roses, but instead of buttercream, I would prefer to have gum-paste roses to make them look more life-like. The color palate is perfect, everything for the wedding is going to be a beautiful blush and ivory color. I think my favorite cake is this one, with the edible lace wrapped around it and the top full of flowers. I can imagine that being our cake topper. Don’t you, sweetheart?” She turned to Nick, prompting him to return to the present.

“ Uh, Yes, it’s my favorite too,” he agreed and glanced over at me again.

I tried to stay motionless and keep my expression unreadable, but it didn’t help that Troy had noticed him looking at me either, and had started hitting my thigh, under the counter.

“You know what, Nicky?”

This is where my blank expression cracked blank and I looked down with a smile, and attempted to maintain my composure. The nickname was too much.

“I love these all so much. I think each technique should be represented somewhere on the cake hand-piping, lattice work, lace, beading, rosettes, stenciling. They should all be there! But I’m confused. Why are there eight cakes here? I thought I only requested seven?”

“Oh, well, my daughter Rosie saw Nick at the grocery store and he requested a chocolate-mint cake. He said it was his favorite and wanted to see it as an option,” my mom explained smoothly. My stomach did a nervous flip when I saw Alisha look at me with confusion and annoyance, and then turned to Nick.

Nick, however, appeared calm, cool and collected, like it was no big deal. “I thought it might be a fun addition. Is that okay with you?”

“I guess it doesn’t hurt to try out every option,” she conceded, but I could tell she didn’t care to be out of the loop.

“There’s a saying around here that you can never have too much cake,” my mom said merrily, trying to cut the tension. “Shall we begin?” She looked at Alisha, awaiting her answer, obviously ensuring that Alisha was still the one in control.

“Yes,” she replied curtly.

“Perfect. We will go down the line here. Let’s try the good ole’ white cake with vanilla buttercream.” She pointed to the first cake.

They both inserted their forks into the sides of the cake and took a bite. Immediately, their eyes lit up, and whatever “disagreement” they had had before was no longer reflected on their faces.

“Wow, Karen, that is delicious,” she complimented my mother and went in for another bite.

“There is nothing boring about that cake,” Nick agreed, which caused Alisha to glance sideways at him.

“Boring? That’s what you say about this cake?” she questioned and raised an eyebrow. Surprise, surprise, she was annoyed again.

“I meant no offense. When you have all these really yummy flavors stacked up against a plain vanilla cake, you don’t really expect it to knock your socks off, but this is hands-down the best one I’ve ever had,” Nick explained and took another bite.

“Thank you, Nick, that’s very kind of you,” Mom said politely, trying to ease the discomfort in the room.

“Or something like that,” muttered Alisha.

Nick looked over at her, clearly irritated, but didn’t say anything. He looked at me for a second, but it was unclear what he was trying to say via his facial expression.

Then Alisha spoke again. “Should we move on?”

“Yes, let"s do! The next one is close to the same thing, except it’s filled with homemade raspberry jam,” my mother explained proudly.

The front door bell rang and a group of young soccer players came in and distracted me from the cake tasting. The noise level was pretty loud, with lots of talking and giggling from the girls, so I couldn’t hear anything going on with Nick, Alisha, or my mom.

Troy and I tag-teamed the entire soccer team and made sure to get everyone their preferred treat. The coach came up, clearly exhausted, but happy to pay for his girls. Then they all left, with each girl waving and saying thank you. It had taken about twenty minutes to get through all the girls, so by the time Troy and I turned our attention back to the cake tasting, the couple were almost finished.

“This one is the carrot cake, with cream-cheese frosting.” My mom pointed to the second-to-last cake. “I love having this one at Easter.” She tried making conversation, but neither one of them took the bait.

“It’s delicious but, in a way, I think you"re right. This wouldn’t be very good for a wedding cake,” Alisha determined with a slight frown and put down her fork.

“I think carrot cake can be eaten on all occasions. Especially if it"s this carrot cake.” Nick pointed with his fork and took another bite.

this“Well, it’s a no from me. Let me guess, the last one is the chocolate mint?” Alisha said sharply and picked up her fork again.

“Yes! I’ve been waiting to try this one,” Nick said excitedly.

“Yes, it is Alisha,” my mom confirmed. “It’s a chocolate cake with mint-chocolate buttercream and, as a surprise, it has crushed thin mint cookies between the layers. A little birdie told me you loved thin mint cookies and insisted I incorporate them into the cake.”

Nick’s head snapped up to look at me and gave me a huge smile. I gave him a little smile in return, but it quickly disappeared after seeing Alisha’s lips pressing tightly together. I could tell she was not happy with me and that she did not want to try this cake. But she wanted to appear to possess class, so she forked up a small sample.

On the other hand, a very excited Nick got a big forkful of chocolate minty goodness. I couldn’t decide which reaction to watch, so I tried to pay attention to both. Nick’s eyes sparkled and he appeared pleased with what he had just tasted so much so, he went for another bite as soon as he’d swallowed the first. Alisha looked resentfully at the cake; she had already made up her mind but, once she tasted it, she looked pleasantly surprised.

“Karen! This is my favorite cake, ever. It has everything a mint lover like me could want. Moist chocolate cake, fluffy mint frosting, and a little crunchy texture from the thin mint cookies. It’s like a party in my mouth and I love it! This is what I want for the wedding. Everyone is going to love this cake.” He turned to Alisha, who appeared indifferent.

She shrugged and pushed the cake away. “I’ll admit it’s a good cake. But I think I liked the white cake, raspberry filling and vanilla buttercream better. I think that is more suitable for a wedding cake.”

“There’s no way it could be more suitable, because a wedding, in a way, is a representation of us. It’s our day and we can do and have whatever we want,” Nick pointed out.

usAlisha turned her head away from Nick and looked at my poor mother, who looked like the monkey in the middle. “Karen, thank you so much for these beautiful cakes. They’re a piece of art and every one of them tasted divine. I think we have some things to consider and we will get back to you next week.”

“No problem. Let me grab a box for you to take the rest of these home. Maybe you can have your families help decide and let them get a sneak peak,” she offered.

Quickly, I grabbed some boxes from under the counter and handed them to my mother, and watched her box them up.