Gina Calanni - How To Bake The Perfect Wedding Cake

“Okay, let me text Brianna.” I pull out my cell and there is a text message from Trent.

Do you want to meet for drinks and we can discuss your team’s numbers and maybe a way I can help?

My eyes strain from reading it. He is really ridiculous. I can’t bel— Well actually I can. Why doesn’t he just leave me alone? I’m sure whatever his plan is involves a way for him to look better and get him one step closer to his next promotion. I have no intention of responding to his text or offer so I delete it.

I type a quick message to Brianna.

Jack wants to take me somewhere tomorrow, so can we reschedule the hunt?

Oh…he does? Does he? ;)

I squint my eyes. Does she know where Jack wants to take me? I toss my phone in my purse and take a long sip of my wine. I want to drift away right now. The woodsy notes of the Cabernet glide down my throat and I take in the sights. Jack.

His soft blond hair is parted to the side and I want to reach for him and run my fingers through it. I wish we were at my house so we could be nuzzled up together in bed and not so far apart at this restaurant.

“What’s on your mind?” Jack squeezes my thigh under the table. I’ll never forget the first time he did that at Vintage Estates on Thanksgiving. All of my grandmother’s friends were around us.

“You.” I sip my wine.

“You’re always on my mind too, Lauren. I never would have thought a year ago that I’d be sitting in a restaurant in Baltimore on a Friday night across from the most gorgeous woman to ever cross my path.” His eyes flicker at me with a hunger that I want to feed. Can’t we just skip the meal and head home?

“One would think that if you were so interested you might have been a little more forthcoming with sharing your pecans.” I toss my hair over my shoulder.

“I couldn’t simply hand over the pecans. Life isn’t about taking the first opportunity. Sometimes things have to build and progress.” Jack takes a sip of his wine.

“Maybe, but we’re talking about pecans. Or are we?”

Jack shrugs. “Now that we have a date and you’re on the hunt for a dress, we need to figure out a few more things.”

“Right, like where are we going to get married?”

“I think it would probably be easier for your family if our wedding was in Texas?” Jack trails his index finger along my arm. Goose bumps pop up all the way to my neck. The slightest of touches from him have such a strong effect on my body.

“But is that what you want?”

“It’s fine by me. My Aunt Minnie is only a few hours away from Austin.”

I let out a sigh. “True and telling my mom we have a location will get her off my back a little bit. She really wants to us to have a theme…but I’d rather have something simple and classic.”

Jack nods. “I agree.” He takes my hand and kisses each one of my fingertips. “We need to decide on the cake.”

It’s almost as if warm chocolate is running over my body and I’m in a fancy bath of melting fudge. “Jack…you can’t send me over here…I don’t think the restaurant owners would appreciate it if I hopped into your lap right now.”

Jack laughs. “Maybe not. But I would.”

“I bet you would.” I retract my hand and drink my wine.

“Cake. What’s it going to be?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. Why don’t we go to one of those fancy bakeries and taste a bunch?”

“Okay. Just for tasting though as I want to bake our wedding cake.”

I jerk my head back. “You want to bake our wedding cake?” I shake my head. “I don’t know, I think we should leave that to the professionals.”

Jack’s face lights up. “Are you forgetting that I’m an award-winning pie maker?”

I roll my eyes. “No and technically I am also an award-winning pie baker.”

“Lauren, second place isn’t the same as first.” He shrugs his shoulders.

“You are so ridiculous.” I roll my eyes. Over the Fourth of July my grandmother insisted that I enter an apple pie baking contest, as she had always won pie baking contests and she thought it was time I took up the mantle. Per her request, I did. Surprisingly, Jack also entered at the last minute and won. I’m still a bit shocked by that. Not that he isn’t a great baker. We made pecan pies together over Thanksgiving and a red velvet cake over Christmas, but our own wedding cake?

“I’m ridiculously in love with you and I want us to bake our wedding cake together.” He takes a swallow of his wine.

My cheeks heat up. No matter how many times Jack tells me he loves me it never ceases to make me want to throw my body on a fainting chair and just float around taking in his words, swooning. His love. He is my everything. Sitting here with him has swiped away all the negativity of my workweek. It’s so great to be with someone who can magically make everything better just by being present.

“I don’t know…don’t you think we should just hire someone?”

“No, I want to bake it with you. I want to find the perfect wedding cake recipe and I want each whip of the batter and each layer of frosting to be with you.”

I take a deep breath. “Wow, how could a girl turn that kind of offer down?”

“You can’t. Think about how much fun we’ll have deciding on the perfect cake and the right frosting.” Jack squeezes my hand. Vibrations of love spread up my arm and I can’t believe I’m in this moment of wonderfulness. How did I get here? To this point of having this amazing guy who wants to bake our wedding cake? Together. I blink my eyes. Yup, this is real.

“Okay, let’s do it.” I nod my head. Jack leans in and kisses my lips and I don’t care for this small moment that we are in a restaurant and not alone. Our kisses trail on for a second too long before we settle back and focus on the meal. Followed afterwards by dessert back at my—our—house.

***

Jack seems to be asleep and I’m wide awake. Visions of office issues and now cake baking are crumbling over in my mind and piling up into a huge ball of fear. I’m not sure how I’m supposed to tackle any of them. I climb out of bed and tiptoe to the living room. Our wine from earlier is still out. I pick up a glass not sure if it was Jack’s or mine but it honestly doesn’t matter. We are living together, we kiss…it’s probably okay if we share a glass. I flip on the TV and find the Food Network. I want to watch mindless entertainment with no drama. Pure comfort. I settle into the couch and listen as the host delivers a great speech about the fluffiness of cake and how you want to make sure to beat it to the speed and time listed in the instructions or else it will be a flop.

The blender begins to go again and the host is trying to speak over it. I take a swig of my wine and sense I’m being watched. I glance in the doorway of my bedroom and Jack is leaning against the frame.

“Hey.”

“Hey, what are you doing out here?” Jack makes his way towards me and sits down.

“I couldn’t sleep.”

His eyebrows furrow. “Is something on your mind?”

I let out a small laugh. “Not really, I just wanted to watch—”

“Wow, Lauren, I didn’t think you would take the cake baking so seriously. You don’t have to cram and study cake baking. We’re going to do this together.” He grabs my hands and kisses my fingertips and I’m being swiped away from reality. The reality is that I wasn’t studying cake baking, but rather just being a vegetable. There is no way I can tell Jack that, not now, not in this moment. I let him kiss me back to bed and enjoy this moment of naivety.

Chapter Four

Jack has been silent during the entire ride. It’s like he has been deep in thought—about what? I have no idea. After breakfast, he asked if I was ready to see his surprise. Of course I said yes and now here we sit silently in his car. It’s only been fifteen minutes but still…that’s a lot of silence. And I can’t help but worry. Surprises are usually a good thing but Jack has had his fair share of “didn’t want to tell you till I had things worked out on my own” moments. This was an issue for us before. This hang-up of his—or ours, rather. He kept things to himself. Important things. Like that he was planning on moving here and that he was going to sell his architecture firm in order to save Vintage Estates. All of which seems so long ago. Fortunately, his Aunt Minnie delivered a huge deposit to save Vintage Estates and he did move here. Both were nice surprises. But I was so in the dark in those moments. I wasn’t privy to his thought process or his grief. All of those things were kept from me. Jack wanted to shelter me from the possible bad and didn’t trust in me or our relationship enough to survive a failure. I can’t help but worry. I fiddle with my purse strap. I don’t want to be in another situation where I’m in the dark. I bite my inner cheek. Jack’s eyes were twinkling when he asked me to cancel my wedding dress shopping. So this has to be for something good.