Georgia Hill - Millie Vanilla’s Cupcake Café

It was the middle Saturday in January and Millie was going stir-crazy. She needed fresh air. She closed the café early and sent Zoe home. It had been quiet anyway since the literary festival had finished. She decided to drive into Lyme Regis. She had Tessa’s birthday present to buy and a sudden need to do some pottering around the town’s quirky shops.

It was one of those wonderful gifts of a day at which her part of the coast excelled. Spring really did seem just a few days around the corner. The sky was an optimistic shade of clear blue and you could smell the changing season lilting in on the gentle breeze from the sea. Millie wondered if her thick Guernsey might be a mistake, but it had been her dad’s and wearing it filled her with happy memories of him.

She found a parking space and eased her wheezing Fiesta into it, ignoring the sounds it was making. Repairs meant more expense, and money was short. The much-needed refurb of the café might have to wait.

‘Can’t afford to do both, Trevor my lad,’ she said to the dog. ‘Maybe we’ll start doing the Lottery again?’

She took the dog to Church Beach for a run around and laughed as he scampered in circles, high on the new smells. Finally, when he’d had enough, he came back to be put on the lead.

‘And now for some real exercise, Trevor.’ She pulled a face. ‘How to spend as little as possible on a pressie without looking mean.’

Trevor’s only response was a little whine and a regretful look back at the beach as they made their way to the shops.

Two hours later and an exhausted cockapoo and an over-heated Millie sat on a bench on the Bell Cliff tucking into a pasty. ‘Well, I think we’ve done okay, Trev,’ Millie said as she blew on her pasty to cool it down. She pulled off an edge of pastry and gave it to him. ‘That “Don’t Disturb Me, I’m Baking” mug is perfect for Tessa.’ She giggled. ‘She’ll love how it plays the theme to The Great British Bake Off.’

‘Talking to yourself, Millie?’

It was Jed.

Millie jumped a foot. Trevor lunged with a bark and her carrier bag slithered to the ground.

‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. Here, let me.’ Replacing the shopping on the bench, he sat down. ‘What are you doing sitting out here? Enjoying the sunshine?’

Millie waved her pasty at the sea. ‘I’ve been shopping and got rather warm. Wrong clothes choice,’ she explained further. She squinted at the sun. ‘Besides, it’s a glorious day and you can’t complain about the view from here.’

Jed took off his Ray-Bans and grinned, showing even, white teeth. He pushed his sunglasses onto his head. ‘Can’t believe you can get days like this in this country – and in January. It’s glorious!’

‘I think spring will be early this year. Quite often is around here.’

Jed sat back, taking up most of the room on the bench. ‘And I wouldn’t dream of complaining about this view. It’s fantastic, isn’t it?’

Millie nodded and, feeling self-conscious about eating something so messy in front of him, wrapped the remainder of her pasty back into its paper bag. ‘You can see Portland today. That’s the bump of land far out to the right of the coast. And the sun’s just coming onto the red cliffs at West Bay, look. That’s where they film Broadchurch . And the highest bit of the coast is –’

‘Golden Cap. I know.’

‘Sorry, was I being boring? Too much of a tour guide?’ Millie deflated.

‘Millie, you’re never boring. It’s just that I know Lyme a bit. Ma and Pa had a holiday cottage near Dorchester for a couple of summers.’

‘Oh. I thought you said you’d never had a beach holiday.’

‘And I never have. Mum didn’t like the mess everything got into with sand. So we did days out, the museum here in Lyme, the tank place over at Bovington, that kind of thing. My brother and I liked it best when we had a day by the pool, though.’

‘You had a pool? A swimming pool?’

Jed nodded. ‘Yes, for a while it was great. Alex and I spent all day splashing about in it. Mum got bored, though, after a few years and bought something in France.’

‘Like you do.’

Jed didn’t seem to notice her mild sarcasm and answered cheerfully enough, ‘As you do. She’s sold that now. A restless spirit is my mother. She mentioned she’d quite like a pied- à-terre in Lyme, so I’ve just been pressing my nose against the estate agents’ windows.’

‘Along with everyone else, I would imagine.’

Jed laughed again. ‘Oh yes. I had quite a crowd to fight my way through.’

‘Lyme’s very sought-after. It’s the thing to do when coming here. Gaze at the houses for sale and gasp at the ridiculously high prices.’

‘Actually, I didn’t think they were all that bad; certainly not compared to London.’ He stretched his legs with evident enjoyment and nodded at the view. ‘And you can see why it’s so popular. I wouldn’t mind living here myself. Have you had much success with your shopping?’

Millie was about to launch into how difficult it was trying to be generous with a limited amount of money, but didn’t feel someone who accepted Lyme’s property prices so glibly and had a mother who bought and sold holiday cottages on a whim would empathise. ‘Oh yes,’ she nodded. ‘Think I’ve got what I wanted.’

She looked at his bright-orange puffa jacket and at the collar of his rugby shirt, snowy white against his tanned skin. Who was sun-tanned in January? She spotted the gleam of an expensive-looking wristwatch and the designer logo on his coat. He was a creature from a very different world to hers and her little café in Berecombe. She wondered, fleetingly, whether Cinderella had ever really been happy with her Prince Charming. They hardly had scrubbing floors in common. Millie had to scrub the old lino in the café quite a lot, what with muddy sand being walked in. She couldn’t exactly see Jed on his hands and knees, dipping a brush in a bucket.

Millie dismissed the mental image of Jed with soapsuds on his nose with a giggle. ‘So is that why you’re in the area? To suss out property for your mum?’

‘Partly.’ Jed replaced his sunglasses. He gave an embarrassed grin. ‘You don’t say no to my mother and live. She’s supposed to be checking up on me at some point.’ He paused and then added, ‘But I’ve one or two clients around here too, so I might have a bit of business to deal with. And how did you like the shopping, Trevor?’ He bent down and fussed the dog.

The change of subject wasn’t subtle and Millie didn’t miss it.

‘I envy you being able to have a dog. I’m always here, there and everywhere. It wouldn’t be fair on it.’ He sighed. ‘Not enough time, either.’

There was that note of yearning again. The same as when he’d complimented Berecombe. Millie didn’t understand it. How could anyone like him be envious of what little she had? ‘What do you do, Jed? For a living, I mean.’

He continued to fuss Trevor and didn’t answer for a moment. Then seemed to come to a decision. ‘I’m a management consultant. Freelance.’

‘Sounds high-pressured.’

‘It can be.’ He straightened and looked out to sea. ‘It most certainly can be. I enjoy a challenge, though.’

‘And you say you’ve got clients around here?’

‘One or two. Mostly in Exeter. I do some work for the university and for Lodgings.’

‘Blimey. They’re the biggest chain of solicitors in the south-west.’ Millie was impressed.

He named another couple of prominent companies and then returned to tickling under Trevor’s chin.

‘What does it involve? Your job?’

‘Oh, you know, I identify strengths and weaknesses, help to develop strategies, reduce costs. That sort of thing. Help companies do what they do but better, I suppose. And it’s always useful to have an outsider look over things.’