Angel Cake - a short story
“Just keep the shelves tidy, help customers find things, make sure they know they can borrow books as well as buying them…oh, and make your boss a coffee now and again!” said my new manager, Cath.
It wasn’t my dream career, volunteering in a community bookshop on Trafford’s quietest high street, but that Duke of Edinburgh award wasn’t going to award itself. So here I was, being shown the ropes (and the kettle) by Cath.
I was killing some time reorganising the teen fiction, when he tumbled through the door. The fierce January gale threatened to blow him away along with his hat. He looked seven stone wet through, with tracing paper skin and a faint smell of tobacco that clung to his weather-worn overcoat.
He moved frustratingly slowly, dragging a frail finger across each shelf, squinting through his thick glasses to make out the words on each spine.
“Go on then, don’t just stand there gawping at him – go and help him!” said an exasperated Cath.
“Can I help you with anything?” I said in my friendliest and most efficient voice. I had to say it again, only much louder the second time.
“Do you have a cookery section?” he almost shouted. “I’m baking a cake this week. Never made one in my life! The wife thinks it’s hilarious that I’m attempting my first ever angel cake aged eighty-seven!”
I directed him to the cookery section, and proudly thrust Delia Smith’s Book of Cakes into his hands.
“What Delia doesn’t know about making a cake isn’t worth knowing!” I joked, as he took the book from me and started to thumb through the pages with a look of abject concentration.
“Special occasion?” I enquired, hoping for the sake of the recipient that it wasn’t. I was sceptical at how this virgin attempt at a complicated, multi-layer sponge cake would actually turn out.
“Wedding anniversary” he beamed back at me. “Fifty years on Sunday and never a dull day” he grinned.
“Wow fifty years - is that gold?” I asked.
“Yes, I suppose we are quite old” he replied wistfully.
I flushed crimson and went to correct him, to assure him that I wasn’t casting aspersions about his age. But he seemed so beautifully lost amidst pages of meringues and roulades that I decided to stay quiet.
He fished in his pocket and found a crumpled note which he handed to me; his eyes hopeful that it would cover the cost. It didn’t.
“You can borrow books from here too you know?” I offered, hoping he’d consider this as an option. “Just leave us a few details, and then once you’ve made your cake, you can return Delia to us!”
He produced a pen from his breast pocket, jotting down his name and address in a feathery, shaky scrawl.
“I hope he comes back with that book” said Cath once he’d left, “I can just about make out his first name as Bill. The rest of it… not a clue!”
And come back he did! Bill tumbled through the door again the following Tuesday, book under his arm, ready to expand upon his chef skills.
“How did your wife like the cake?” I asked.
“She said the sponge was a bit dry but she loved it all the same” he said proudly.
“Well, it sounds like it wasn’t bad for your first attempt” I joked, “she’ll have you on that Bake Off show next!”
“She’s certainly got a taste for my cooking now” he said. His eyes suddenly dropped and he became a little less jovial. “I’m doing a lot of the cooking at the minute; her health isn’t so good you see. Anyway, she always says that good food is the path to good health. Let’s hope so eh?”
I helped him seek out a book on pies, which he faithfully returned the following week along with a new request for something on stews and casseroles.
The bookshop grew gradually busier over the coming weeks. I did some social media posts so people knew about us. We even began to serve coffee and tea as our little book-hive began to buzz with more footfall. But I mostly looked forward to Bill’s Tuesday afternoon visits and updates on his cookery projects. The benchmark of success (or failure) was always his wife’s brutal appraisal of the dish.
We’d gained some new regulars too - notably two surly older ladies who drank endless pots of tea and made scathing comments. Cath (secretly) dubbed them The Sisters Grim as they always pored over the local obituaries to see who’d died that week, and then embarked on an Earl Grey fuelled assassination of the deceased person’s character!
We were edging cautiously towards Spring when I’d suggested one week to Bill that he might like to give breadmaking a go.
“I think that Doc Hollywood chap off the telly’s done a book, hasn’t he?” asked Bill.
I smiled and dutifully went off to find what he needed. I’d maintained my habit of never correcting him.
The shop was busier than usual the following week, so much so that it was nearly 3pm by the time I noticed there’d been no sign of Bill. I wondered if he - or possibly his wife - had taken unwell. I hoped they were both alright.
Another Tuesday came and went, but Bill still hadn’t been back to see us.
As I flipped the door sign to CLOSED and cleared away teapots, I saw that The Sisters Grim had left their newspaper on the table. A notice caught my eye:
APPEAL – We’re trying to trace the family of Bill O’Donnell (aged 87)
He sadly died at Cresta Close in Altrincham on Wednesday 9 February. There are no suspicious circumstances surrounding his death.
His late wife Jean (a retired cook at Springwood Primary School) passed away in 2018 and was his last known relative. Anyone with information about his next of kin should contact Trafford Police.
