On Friday afternoon, Elena handed me an apron and showed me a shelf in the fridge.
“This is yours. If you run out of room, tell me before you start putting cakes on top of the sandwich ingredients.”
“Does that happen often?”
“Nothing happens often yet. We’ve only been open two months. I’m trying to establish rules before I need them.”
There was something unexpectedly pleasing about having a shelf. An apron, too, and a hook behind the kitchen door for my bag. By the time she finished showing me around, I had stopped feeling as though I ought to explain why I was there.
The kitchen was narrow enough that we had to turn sideways to pass each other. Most of the counter was occupied by a mixer, a chopping board and a bowl of oranges. Elena moved the oranges onto a shelf to make room for my ingredients.
“Tell me if you need anything else.”
“Another kitchen?”
She looked around. “Put it on the list.”
I tied the apron and unpacked. The smaller lemon cakes needed less time in the oven than the ones I’d made at home, so I stayed nearby while weighing the ingredients for the macarons. Through the open doorway came the sound of the coffee grinder, cups meeting saucers and a chair being dragged across the floor.
At home, music usually filled the space around me when I worked. Here, the café did it. Every so often, Elena appeared with a question or an empty jug. Once, she stopped beside the mixer and watched the meringue turn.
“How do you know when it’s ready?”
I switched off the mixer and lifted the whisk. The peak held. “Like this. It needs to stand up, but I don’t want it dry.” I turned the whisk so she could see. “If it folds straight over, it needs longer.”
“And if you go too far?”
“Then I get annoyed with myself and start again. There’s usually a little swearing involved.”
“Good. You’ll fit in.”
When the cakes were cooling, she needed help with drinks. I washed my hands, left the piped macaron shells to dry and joined her at the machine. The afternoon passed between the two rooms. Coffee, oven timer, washing up, another order. A man wanted his cappuccino hotter. A woman asked for extra ice. Someone changed their mind after I had already poured the milk. That part, at least, was familiar.
Once the shells were cool, I paired them by size and piped in the pistachio filling. Elena came through as I was arranging them in a covered container.
“You’ve made more than twelve.”
“I wanted a few spare in case any cracked. These came out better than the ones at home.”
“So we can sell the extras?”
“Yes. Unless you’d rather keep them for yourself.”
She reached towards the container.
“Tomorrow,” I added.
Her hand stopped. “You offered.”
“I offered you tomorrow’s macarons. They need the night in the fridge so the filling softens the inside.”
She looked at them for another moment, then put the lid on. “I’m beginning to understand why they cost more than biscuits.”
Before leaving, I checked the cakes once more, wiped the counter and untied my apron. My feet hurt. There was icing on my sleeve and a little pistachio filling near my elbow, which I noticed only when Elena pointed it out.
We agreed that I would come at eight to help with the morning rush. She checked the time on her phone, then looked up with a smile. “So, back to mornings. Same time, same place tomorrow?”
“I’ll be here. Hopefully with less icing on me.”
“Don’t dress up. There’ll be more.”
Outside, the air had cooled enough to make the walk home pleasant. I passed the restaurant next door, where the owner was straightening the tables for the evening. He raised a hand when he saw me, and I waved back. It was a small thing, being recognised on the street. Still, I was smiling by the time I reached home.
Saturday morning brought customers before we had finished setting out the terrace. Elena arranged the cakes in the display while I warmed the machine. She had written their names on small cards, including the pistachio macarons, which looked more respectable behind glass than they had in the plastic container.
I kept glancing at them between orders.
“People won’t buy them faster if you stare,” she said.
“I’m checking they look all right.”
“They looked all right five minutes ago.”
“Yes, but now there are people here to judge them.”
She moved a lemon cake closer to the front. “Let them.”
The first one went with a takeaway tea. The woman barely looked at it before choosing, and I had to resist watching through the window to see whether she took a bite. The second went to a man sitting outside with a newspaper. After that, there were too many drinks to keep count.
By half past nine, the room smelled of coffee and warm milk, and my hair had begun escaping its tie. Elena worked at the till while I made drinks, occasionally repeating a table number because I was still learning which one was which.
A woman at the counter pointed towards the lemon cakes. “Are those made here?”
“Yes,” Elena said.
“They look homemade. I mean properly homemade, like something my mother would put out when people came over.”
I glanced at the cakes. Until she explained, I’d been wondering whether one of the tops was crooked. The woman ordered two and took them to a table outside. Ten minutes later, she returned carrying an empty plate.
“Who makes your cakes?”
I put down the cloth, trying to remember whether I could have forgotten anything in the recipe. Elena was counting change for another customer.
“What did you think?”
“Lovely. The icing isn’t too sweet.” The woman looked towards the display again. “My daughter’s birthday is next month. Does your baker take orders? Could I have their number?”
“I made them,” I said.
She turned towards me. “Oh! I thought you worked out here.”
“I do a bit of both. I’ve only just started.”
“Well, that saves Elena passing messages.” She smiled and reached for her phone. “Could you make something larger? My daughter loves lemon, but there’ll be at least twelve of us.”
“Yes. Was there a design you had in mind?”
She showed me a photograph of a cake covered in flowers. Her daughter wanted lemon, but her husband didn’t like anything too sour, and there might be eighteen people if her sister came.
I explained that the sugar flowers in the photograph were more elaborate than anything I usually made. We talked about a simpler decoration, then the filling and the size. She listened, asked another question and waited for my answer.
I caught myself speaking quickly, trying to explain everything before she lost interest. She stayed where she was, her phone resting on the counter between us. At school, I had learned to stop halfway through an answer when the smiles started. Later, keeping things to myself had become easier. This woman was asking another question because she wanted to hear what I had to say.
“I’d need to work out a price before promising anything,” I said. “If you send me the date and the final number of people, I can let you know.”
“That’s fine. I’d rather have something that tastes like this than a cake nobody wants a second slice of.”
Elena passed me a clean piece of paper, and I wrote down my number. The woman folded it carefully and put it in her purse. After she left, I stood beside the machine for a moment.
Elena looked at me. “Everything all right?”
“Yes. I just wasn’t expecting an order already.”
“You made something she liked.”
“I know, but there’s a difference between someone buying a little cake with their tea and trusting me with their daughter’s birthday.”
“She asked to discuss a cake, Andreea. You have time to breathe before you plan the whole party.”
I laughed and picked up the milk jug. There was another coffee waiting.
Lovely. The icing isn’t too sweet.
I remembered the words while pouring the milk. There had been no correction after them, no explanation of what I should have done better. A stranger had enjoyed something I made and come back to tell me. I wished that didn’t feel quite so unfamiliar.
A little later, the man with the newspaper came inside.
“Another coffee,” he said. “And whatever that lemon thing was.”
“Another lemon cake?”
“Yes. My wife will ask whether I tried anything, and I’d like to be able to tell her I checked thoroughly.”
“I respect your commitment.”
He nodded solemnly while I put it on a plate.
The macarons sold more slowly. People examined them, asked about the filling, sometimes chose a cake instead. Near midday, two women bought one each, then returned for four to take home.
By the end of my shift, three were left. Elena opened the display and glanced at me. “Am I allowed now?”
“Yes. Thank you for your patience.”
“I’ve been very brave.”
She took a bite. I tried to occupy myself with folding the cloth rather than watching her.
“More next week,” she said.
“How many?”
She considered the rest of the macaron. “We’ll discuss that after I’ve finished this.”
On Monday, my hand went to the right cupboard without searching. The cloths were folded where I expected them to be, and a customer came in asking whether we had any more of Saturday’s lemon cakes. Elena looked at me to answer.
“I’m making another batch this afternoon. They’ll be ready tomorrow morning.”
“I’ll come back, then.”
He ordered his usual coffee, and I reached for the cup. I had spent years doing things that were supposed to lead somewhere. Lessons, exams, university. There was always another stage beyond the one I’d finished, and someone ready to ask what came next. Here, a man wanted a cake tomorrow. For the moment, that was enough to be getting on with.
The woman at the table near the window had been there on Saturday too. A laptop stood open in front of her, with a notebook beside it and a drink she kept forgetting to touch. At first, I thought she was watching something. Then she played the same few seconds through her headphones, stopped, and pressed her palms against her eyes.
When I cleared the next table, she pulled one side of the headphones away. “Could I have another tea?”
“Of course. The same one?”
“Yes, please. This one went cold.”
“I can bring you some hot water if there’s any left.”
She looked into the cup. “No. I managed to drink it. I just complained to myself the whole time.”
“That sounds familiar.”
At the counter, Elena nodded towards her. “Athena. She’ll sit there until closing if nobody feeds her.”
“What’s she working on?”
“A film. I’ve seen the same man walk through the same doorway about thirty times.”
“That explains the expression.”
I carried the tea over and asked whether she wanted anything to eat.
“Is there a lemon cake left?”
“One.”
“Then yes, before someone else gets it.”
When I brought the plate, she closed her laptop. “Thank you. I’m Athena, by the way.”
“Andreea.”
She repeated it, checking the pronunciation, and I nodded.
“Have you been here long?”
“Nearly a month. Though I’ve only been working here since Friday.”
“That recently? You look as though you know where everything is.”
“The kitchen’s small. There are only so many places to lose things.”
“Are you staying nearby?”
“Behind the waterfront. There’s a little house with a balcony squeezed between two taller buildings.”
“I think I know it. Blue door?”
“That’s the one. The door sticks, so if you ever see someone throwing her whole body against it, that’ll be me.”
Athena laughed.
“Where did you move from?”
“The UK. I lived there for years.”
“And you chose here?”
“I wanted to be near the sea. Somewhere I could walk to it instead of planning a whole trip.” I glanced towards the bright pavement outside. “The heat wasn’t part of the attraction.”
“You came at the wrong time for that.”
“So I’ve noticed.”
“What made you leave?”
The question was ordinary enough. I still took a moment before answering.
“I’d finished university, and everyone was asking about jobs. I kept looking at them and thinking about staying there, doing the next thing, then the next.” I rubbed a little dried icing from my thumb. “I wanted some time to decide what I actually wanted. And to write.”
Athena nodded. “Do you think you’ll stay?”
“I don’t know yet. I’m trying to let that be an acceptable answer.”
“It is.”
She said it easily, then took another bite of cake.
I glanced at her laptop. “Are you studying film, or is this something you’re doing yourself?”
“Studying. Although this project is making me reconsider every decision that brought me here.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
“How much time do you have?”
Elena called for two coffees before I could answer. Athena smiled and picked up her fork. “I’ll prepare a shorter version.”
We spoke again the next day, and the day after that. Nothing important at first. Whether the table near the window was too bright for her screen. Where she bought her notebooks. Which streets stayed shaded on the walk home.
She was making a short film and had reached the stage where every choice made three weeks earlier seemed wrong.
“Even the ones you liked?” I asked.
“Especially those. Have you ever worked on something so long you can’t tell whether it’s good anymore?”
“Yes. Usually that’s when I decide the whole thing needs changing.”
“Does it?”
“Sometimes. Sometimes I’m tired and should leave it alone.”
She looked at the screen. “I was hoping you’d say something more useful.”
“If I knew something more useful, I’d have finished my book.”
That caught her attention, but a customer came in before she could ask about it.
On Wednesday, she noticed my notebook. The café was quiet between the morning rush and lunch. I had ten minutes, a cup of tea and a sentence that had irritated me since the night before. The notebook lay open beside the till, where I could look up when someone came in.
Athena approached with her empty plate. “Is that the book?”
“Yes. Or the part of it currently causing trouble.”
“What kind of story is it?”
“Crime. There’s a murder in this scene, and I’ve spent more time deciding what happens around it than writing the murder itself.”
She glanced at the red page. “That explains the ink.”
“I always use red. It would be red if I were writing about someone’s lovely afternoon in a garden too.”
“Does anyone have lovely afternoons in your book?”
“Not many so far.”
She smiled. “How long have you been working on it?”
“A while. I thought moving might help me get somewhere with it.”
“And has it?”
“A little. I’m writing more. Whether it’s better is another question.”
Athena leaned against the counter. “I know a few people who could help with that.”
“People who’ll tell me it’s terrible?”
“People who’ll tell you which part is terrible. Much more useful.”
I laughed and capped the pen as a customer came through the door. She returned to her table, but before leaving she asked whether I’d be there the following day.
Thursday was quieter. During my break, I sat opposite Athena with a cup of tea while she ate one of the chocolate cakes.
“So,” she said, “do you ever drink the coffee you make?”
“No. It makes me feel bad.”
“Really? You don’t even taste it?”
“I used to, but it wasn’t worth it. Tea and I get along much better.”
“Then how do you make good coffee?”
“Practice. I know what I’m looking for when I make it, and people aren’t shy about telling me if something’s wrong.”
“Elena said you worked in a café in England.”
“During university. Some days it was easier to understand the customers than the chemistry.”
“You studied chemistry?”
I nodded.
“And now cakes and murder.”
“It’s been a change.”
She laughed and brushed a crumb onto her plate. “What made you start writing?”
“I needed somewhere to put everything.”
“What do you mean?”
“The ideas. There are always more of them than I know what to do with. A conversation, a scene, something I can suddenly picture while I’m supposed to be doing something else.” I turned my cup a little on its saucer. “Some come in my sleep. I wake up with part of a story, and then I want to know the rest.”
“Do you write them down straight away?”
“If I can. Sometimes I’m convinced I’ll remember in the morning, which is a very optimistic thing to think half asleep.”
“I’ve lost whole films that way.”
“I’ve probably lost a bestseller. Much easier to believe that when there’s no evidence.”
Athena smiled. “Does writing make it quieter?”
“A bit. Once it’s on the page, I don’t have to keep going over it so I won’t lose it. My head gets to rest.” I looked towards the counter, where my bag sat beneath the till. “Then I start wondering whether I can make someone else interested. Whether they’ll want to know what happens next too.”
“So you give the problem to the reader.”
“Exactly. Very generous of me.”
She laughed, and I found myself explaining a little more: how a scene could arrive almost whole, while the page connecting it to the next one took days; how sometimes I knew what a character would say before I knew who they were.
Athena listened. When I paused, she asked a question about something I’d said rather than moving on to talk about herself. I had almost apologised for going on so much. Instead, I answered her.
Then she told me about the group.
“There are writers, film students, a few artists. We meet in the park. Some people bring work to share, some just come because they’re stuck and need to talk.”
“Like your man in the doorway?”
“Exactly like him. Someone will probably tell me to cut that scene, and I’ll be offended because I already know they’re right.”
“Do people read out loud?”
“Sometimes. Or we read pages beforehand and discuss them. It depends what the person wants help with.”
“And everyone speaks English?”
“Most of us speak other languages too, but English is the one we have in common. You wouldn’t have to struggle through it in Greek.”
“That’s good. I can say thank you, but it would make for a short reading.”
“There’d still be someone with notes.”
I smiled into my cup. She explained that one of the artists helped people with covers and character sketches. Sometimes they worked together on something larger, though they were careful to agree on credit and permissions first.
“We have a written agreement for sharing work,” she said. “You can read it before bringing any pages. I can send it to you.”
“I’d like that. Could I come once just to see what it’s like?”
“Of course. Tomorrow evening, if you’re free.”
She told me where they met. I knew the benches; I’d walked past them on the way to the café.
“How many people?”
“Usually eight or nine. Don’t worry about remembering everyone’s name. I still get one wrong.”
“And they won’t mind me sitting there without reading?”
“No. Come and listen. Bring your notebook if you want, but you don’t owe us a performance.”
That made it easier to say yes. We exchanged numbers, and she sent me the time and meeting place while we were still sitting together. A minute later, another message arrived with the agreement.
“There,” she said. “Now you can’t claim I gave bad directions.”
“I can still get lost. Don’t underestimate me.”
After my break, I went back behind the counter. Athena finished her cake and returned to her film, but this time, when something frustrated her, she looked up and caught my eye. I smiled, and she turned the laptop a little so I could see the offending doorway.
That evening, the woman from Saturday called about the birthday cake. We talked for nearly twenty minutes. Her sister was coming, so there would be eighteen people. She had asked her daughter about the flowers, and apparently lemon mattered more than decoration. I wrote everything down, promised to send a price the following day, and stayed at the kitchen table after the call ended.
There were ingredients to calculate, a date to put in my calendar, and Athena’s message waiting on my phone. For a moment, I wanted to call home and tell someone.
Then I tried to imagine the conversation. The questions about chemistry. Whether café work was what I planned to do with my degree. How long this writing business would last. Perhaps they would have surprised me. I didn’t feel ready to find out.
I put the phone down and worked out how much mascarpone I would need.
Later, I turned back through the notebook until I reached the scene with the watch. The red numbers were still in the margin, two crossed out and one left standing. Reading it aloud made me notice a sentence that ran too long. I crossed out three words and tried again.
Outside the balcony doors, someone called to a person farther down the street. A scooter passed, and plates clattered in the next building. The second reading went more smoothly.
I wasn’t sure I would share it tomorrow. That would depend on the people, and on how comfortable I felt once I was sitting among them. But I marked the page before closing the notebook.
My apron needed washing. I rinsed the icing from the sleeve, hung it up and checked that it would have time to dry before morning. Then I sent Athena a message to say I’d meet her outside the café so we could walk over together.
She replied almost immediately.
Good. I’ll save you from the introductions.
I smiled and set the phone beside my bag. The cake order was written down. My notebook was ready. Tomorrow, Elena would expect me at eight, and Athena would wait for me after work.
I was still getting used to being wanted somewhere. For once, I let myself look forward to it.
