Dress Rehearsal Read online

  Dress Rehearsal

  Jennifer O’Connell

  Copyright © Jennifer O’Connell 2005

  All Right Reserved

  Life is uncertain. Eat dessert first.

  • Ernestine Ulmer

  Chapter 1

  “Lauren!”

  I glanced over my shoulder in search of the shrill voice calling my name like a dog whistle. Past the snaking line of coffee-starved patrons jonesing for their morning fix with all the jittery expectation of patients in a methadone clinic, I spotted her. Gwen Stern was standing on her tiptoes in the doorway, frantically waving her French manicure at me even as a Starbucks’ barrister was yelling for her to move out of the way and let the other customers in.

  “Lauren! I can’t believe it!” Gwen gushed, pushing her way through the line, completely oblivious to the fact that there were ten people ahead of her on the verge of tackling her Jazzercised body to the floor and beating her silly with cinnamon scones. Gwen reached out and pulled me into a bear hug, squeezing me so tight I could feel the firm resistance of silicone spheres before she twisted to her left and grabbed the elbow of a reluctant Brooks Brothers suit trailing behind her. “Charlie, this is Lauren Gallagher – of Lauren’s Luscious Licks.”

  Charlie took a quick look around to gauge the crowd’s hostility before holding out his hand. “Nice to meet you, Lauren. I’ve seen your cakes in Boston Magazine.”

  “Lauren, this is Charlie Banks, my divorce attorney. He’s with Goodman & Moore – a partner,” Gwen announced proudly, as if her status as a client of the blue chip firm was the result of a stringent selection process rather than her ability to pay blue chip rates.

  “Hi, Charlie.” I attempted a genuine smile, but considering I was still two people away from my morning Caffe Latte, I wasn’t sure I was all that convincing. “So I guess David is…” I let my voice trail off, waiting for Gwen to fill in the blank.

  “About to have his clock cleaned by Charlie and his firm,” Gwen answered for me, almost gleefully.

  “I’m sorry.” I shook my head sincerely, even as I was going through my mental database trying to recall their cake.

  “I was too, but Charlie’s making it easier.”

  Not to mention more lucrative.

  “I guess I expected things to change once we were married, but I was never a priority in David’s life – in fact I was running a distant third behind the Dow Jones and his company’s balance sheet.” Gwen sighed before abruptly grabbing my shoulder with one hand and covering her mouth with the other. “I hope you don’t think I blame you! The cake was lovely, absolutely perfect. I promise I’ll be back for the next one.”

  The girl in line ahead of me moved toward the register and I gratefully stepped up to the counter to place my order.

  “Thanks, Gwen. I’m sure you will.”

  Less than five minutes later, I was standing in front of Lauren’s Luscious Licks inhaling the sweetly bitter aroma of Belgian chocolate being pumped through the vent over the doorway. As I unlocked the door and made my way through the starkly decorated cake gallery, I could already hear Maria barking orders in the kitchen.

  I’d stopped baking the cakes when Lauren’s Luscious Licks moved from my studio kitchenette to our Newbury Street storefront, and now I spent my time promoting the business and making sure we stayed one step ahead of the competition. While I was declared “the new face of wedding cakes” by Boston Magazine, Maria was strictly old school. In fact, the bakery she used to work for in the North End still used plastic bride and groom toppers complete with a miniature net veil poking out of the bride’s head and a top-hatted groom. But Maria knew her stuff. When she responded to my ad for the position of pastry chef/kitchen manager, I got the impression that she believed she was interviewing me more than the other way around. When our conversation was over and I offered Maria the job, she told me that she’d have to think about it – as if I’d be lucky to get her. And I was. Now, while I took care of the cake boutique out front, scheduling client tastings and ensuring the business ran smoothly, Maria ruled the kitchen with the knowledge and pride of someone who’d been baking for over forty years, and all the charm and tact of Mussolini.

  “Hello all,” I pushed through the swinging door to the kitchen and greeted my staff, for which I received three holas, a bonjour, and a ‘bout time from Maria.

  I headed straight to my desk next to the walk-in refrigerator and pulled a five-by-seven filing box out of the top drawer. Sure, I had a computerized accounting system and inventory program, but when it came to keeping track of client preferences, I still relied on good old-fashioned handwritten notes and index cards.

  I found the card titled Stern, David and Gwen and reviewed my comments.

  Gwen and David Stern – August 15, 1998. She’d wanted a heart-shaped white cake iced with a high-gloss fondant and trimmed with a chain of fresh gardenias. They’d settled on stacked square tiers of citron vodka cake with lemon-scented buttercream icing. No filling, no florals, no extraneous adornments. The cake was nothing more than a confectionary cocktail symbolizing the closing of yet another business deal. No wonder Gwen required the services of Charlie Banks and his firm. I could have told her she was destined for divorce court before she even set one foot down the aisle.

  “How many anniversary cakes do we have next week?” Maria asked me as she effortlessly worked the double scalloped crimper.

  “So far we’re four for six. The Novak’s number was disconnected and there was nothing listed with information. I still have to get in touch with Judy Dennison.”

  One of Lauren’s Luscious Licks’ most popular offerings, and something that we originated years ago even though our competitors have since copied us, is our Year to Remember package. When clients order their wedding cake they can also include a small five inch replica to be delivered on the anniversary of their big day. The Dennisons were the only couple I hadn’t been able to reach regarding next week’s deliveries.

  I picked up the phone and dialed Judy Dennison’s home number for the third time since Monday. She finally answered on the fourth ring.

  “Hi Judy, this is Lauren Gallagher from Lauren’s Luscious Licks. I’m just calling to confirm delivery of your anniversary cake next week.”

  “Anniversary cake?” Judy repeated. “What anniversary cake?”

  I glanced at the index card in my hand and read from my notes. “The hazelnut genoise washed with cognac, layered with dark chocolate ganach and iced with expresso buttercream – the anniversary version of your wedding cake.”

  “Don’t bother.”

  “But it was part of your Year to Remember package,” I reminded her. “It’s already been paid for.”

  “Jim moved out last month.” Judy said flatly, and then seemed to warm up to the idea. “But I guess you can go ahead and send over the cake, as long as I paid for it. I did love the hazelnut genoise.”

  Judy confirmed her address and I put the cake on Maria’s schedule for next Tuesday. Before I placed Judy Dennison’s card back in the file box I reviewed my comments. Jim Dennison was allergic to hazelnuts. Large red welts and severe itching, I’d written along the side margin. And right below it, a note scribbled in two days later - Judy okay’d hazlenut, said Jim didn’t need to have a piece.

  And another couple bit the dust. Judy and Jim had planned a cathedral ceremony with more flowers than the Parade of Roses, and were even featured in a Town & Country spread. But it didn’t matter. I’d seen enough designer gowns glide down the aisle to know that neither the wedding, nor its price tag, had any bearing on the happiness of the couple or the longevity of the marriage. The cake, on the other hand, was beginning to tell a different story.

  “Maybe it’s really that simple.” I
placed the last of the powder pink receipts on the desk next to the adding machine. The stack of slips, elegantly engraved with the Lauren’s Luscious Lick’s logo, stood three inches high.

  “Nothing’s that simple,” Maria disagreed, not even bothering to look up at me as she wiped down the stainless steel workbench.

  “Look,” I sifted through the pile of index cards I’d removed from the filing box on my desk and held out a card for Maria to see. “It’s all right here.”

  “I’m not listening to you,” Maria practically sang, like a who child holds her fingers in her ears and hums It’s a Grand Old Flag so she can tune out the noise around her.

  “Look at this,” I said even louder and pointed to the card. I felt kind of like Glen Close in Fatal Attraction, you didn’t think I’d let you ignore me, did you Maria?

  Maria didn’t flinch, and as she reached to wipe off the electric pasta machine we used to create icing gathers, pleats, ruches and swags, I grabbed for the shiny metal tool. It wasn’t exactly a boiling bunny, but it got Maria’s attention.

  “It’s undisputable,” I repeated.

  “It’s crap,” Maria replied, and swatted me away like I was nothing more than a pesky mosquito.

  “Remember the couple who chose the Wedgewood blue fondant-iced dome with the white chocolate swags?” I read from the card in my hand.

  “August 18, 2001.”

  “Lasted less than a year.” I pulled out another card. “That woman who insisted on the coffee sponge cake with rum-laced custard, mocha mousse and rolled chocolate icing?”

  “July 24, 1999.”

  “He left her for his therapist – his sex therapist. Named Harvey. I’m telling you, I know which couples will make it and which won’t just by watching them select a cake.” I looked up at Maria, who was bending over to lift the black rubber fatigue mats off the tiled floor, her thick, compact body packed into a white chef’s coat and checkerboard trousers. “I’m a marital Magic Eight Ball.”

  “More like screwball, if you ask me.” Maria folded the mats and laid them by the back door. She liked to shake her head at me and frown a lot, furrowing her brow until her thick, bushy black eyebrows practically formed a single sleeping caterpillar across her forehead, but after working together for almost seven years, I knew she got a kick out of me - even if she enjoyed acting like I was an annoyance rather than her boss.

  “Come on, you’ve seen it, how some women won’t hear of anything but pure piped white buttercream while their fiancés only want a dark chocolate layer cake with chocolate mousse filling. Or how it becomes a debate of fresh versus pastillage flowers? I mean, I can see it as they’re flipping through the pages of the portfolio, the way a man rolls his eyes when his fiancé points out a cascade of sugar blossoms and butterflies. And don’t even get me started on the dreaded groom’s cake,” I pushed back my chair and stood up. “That’s the kiss of death, a sure sign that a man isn’t ready to trade in his single status for a wife.”

  “Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for couples with groom’s cakes?” Maria shook her bandana-cloaked head, which kept her short, cropped black hair from peeking out and letting anyone know there was a real woman inside. “Lady, just sell the cakes and keep the fortune-telling to yourself.”

  So what if Maria didn’t believe me? After years of observing couples, I’d become adept at predicting everyone’s future but my own. Like people, cakes had distinct personalities, and from my stool at the tasting table I could tell which personalities would clash and which marriages would crumble. My clients could save themselves, not to mention their families and friends, the hassle and expense of a wedding if they’d just ask me up front if I thought the marriage would work. But, then I’d also eliminate the four figure price tags that accompanied five tier wedding cakes with white chocolate draping and basketweaved buttercream, not to mention the subsequent baby showers and birthday parties where our individually-sized crimped fondant-iced cakes had become a must-have for my clientele.

  “Fine, suit yourself. Deny it all you want but it doesn’t change the fact that I’m on to something here.”

  Maria responded with a few carefully chosen words in Italian, which she knew annoyed me to no end. The only Italian words I could decipher were along the lines of Rigatoni alla Bolognese and could be found on the menu at Lucia Ristorante. And Maria knew it.

  “What was that?” I asked, expecting a translation of some obscene gesture I was supposed to perform on myself.

  “I said I’ll have a large cheese pie with pepperoni,” Maria repeated and then laughed, amused at herself.

  I sat down at my desk and turned my back on Maria. My fingers flipped quickly through the filing box until I found the index card labeled Manning, Mark and Robin. I held the card in my hand and revisited the tasting that had repercussions I still felt on a daily basis, like the aftershocks following an earthquake.

  I’d known Robin and Mark weren’t going to make it long before I received what I’d thought was an obscene phone call, and ended up being the sobbing-induced hiccups of a just-dumped Robin. Once the heavy breathing subsided, Robin was able to tell me about her newly imposed single status. And, even as I told her that it would be okay, that she’d survive just fine without Mark, the only words going through my mind were I told you so. Only I hadn’t told her. There was no way you could tell one of your best friends that she was making a mistake when her newly minted emerald cut diamond was twinkling at you. But I’d known, simply by observing the way Mark turned away from Robin instead of leaning into her as they sat at the tasting table. The way he shrugged dismissively and said I don’t care, whatever you want when Robin picked the lemon cake with lemon mousse filling, fresh raspberries and lemon-scented buttercream. Besides, he kept stealing glances at this watch, which is never a good sign in any situation, but definitely an indicator of trouble for two people about to say I Do. Yes, I’d known that very afternoon, six months after their engagement and four months before they took that fateful pledge. And I hadn’t said anything. To anybody, not even Paige. And so Robin had to find out the hard way, when she discovered Mark’s duffle bag packed and ready to go in the hall closet, like a getaway car.

  “Hey, Gypsy Rosalie, what time is Paige’s appointment tomorrow?” Maria called out from the broom closet.

  “Five o’clock.”

  “Anything special or just the usual?”

  “The usual, but she was also interested in trying the white cake with blackberry filling and white chocolate mousseline, so include that, too.”

  Maria muttered something in Italian and closed the closet door with the force of a man twice her size. I wasn’t surprised that Maria had never married. She was like a human canoli – it would take a man with extraordinary patience to discover the sweet filling that I was sure was tucked deep inside her hardened exterior.

  “I’m telling you, Maria. I’m on to something here. I’m a baked goods bridal barometer. I have the predictive power of pastry.” I was cracking myself up, but no giggles emerged from the broom closet, just a scowling Maria who carried the clean mats back into the kitchen and laid them in place at the foot of the convection oven and the three hole sink.

  “How about using those powers for something good, witchy woman – like telling me if the bus will be on time for once.”

  I ignored Maria’s request for transit telepathy and continued. “Maybe there is something we could do when I can tell it’s a mismatch – like suggest a thinking it over party instead.”

  “Don’t we get paid for baking wedding cakes, not thinking it over cakes? Besides, who’d take relationship advice from someone who hasn’t been on a date since her membership in the Bon Jovi fan club was revoked?”

  The same people willing to buy a cake from someone who hasn’t had her hands on a wire whip mixer or worn a cotton apron since Lauren’s Luscious Licks opened its doors. “But it’d be a win-win for everyone – the woman can wear her princess gown, the guy can invite all his buddies t
o a party with an open bar, and we can create a new category of cakes that eliminate the middle men – divorce attorneys.” I was going to let Maria’s dating remark slide, she retained embarrassing facts the way other women retained water, but I couldn’t resist adding, “And just because I’m not willing to settle for just any guy doesn’t mean I can’t get a date – besides, that membership was a present from Paige, and it wasn’t revoked. The club disbanded.”

  What Maria also failed to acknowledge was that I’d willingly decided to sit on the dating sidelines for a while. I mean, after spending my days with couples in the throes of love, couples on the verge of committing to a life time together, a dinner at Legal Seafood didn’t exactly measure up. And even though fifty percent of the couples who sat before me, and an even higher percentage of those ordering groom’s cakes, would end up dividing their assets in court, I couldn’t help but think if someone couldn’t hold my attention for a two hour date, there was no way he’d keep my interest for more than two decades.

  I once told Paige that dating in my thirties had begun to feel like standing in a cafeteria. I was waiting my turn, eyeing my options and trying to see past the strawberry Jell-O, chick peas and pickled beets, even as other women were growing impatient, worried that the longer it took to get to the front of the line the less there’d be to pick from – nobody wanted to settle for the Styrofoam dish of syrupy fruit salad when the person before her walked off with a chocolate layer cake with a brilliant red cherry on top.

  Maria shook her head at me before unhooking her coat from the wall and stuffing her pillowy arms into the sleeves.

  “You can wait for your magic carpet, but us regular folk still have to rely on public transportation.” She wrapped a natty wool scarf around her neck and pulled on a pair of Isotoner gloves with suede patches sewed into the palms. “See ya.”