Tomáš Zmeškal - A Love Letter in Cuneiform

“What, did you think that he was going to defend the hippies and LSD? He’s a priest, isn’t he? What did you expect?”

“That’s right, Toník, he’s a priest,” Alice’s father said. “That’s the way it’s supposed to be. That’s the way it should be.”

When they got back to Prague, they still had an hour before they had to leave again for the civil ceremony, since the hall where it was taking place wasn’t far away and nobody took it as seriously as the first one. Alice, Maximilian, and Květa brought out open-face sandwiches and wine and pastries, and the guests spread out around the apartment to relax.

A stocky man in a white coat and a flat brown cap drooping over his sweaty forehead rang the doorbell insistently. Next to him stood a shorter blond-haired man of medium build with a clean white apron over his light-colored pants and a white baker’s hat on his head. The groom’s witness was standing nearest the door, so he let them in. The taller man bent down to him and asked if he could have a word with Dr. Lukavský. The witness shrugged, saying that he didn’t know anyone there and had already forgotten the names of everyone he’d been introduced to, but if they waited he would go find Maximilian and ask him. Maximilian found the doctor, aka Alice’s uncle Antonín, and he came to the door. The taller man, in the flat cap, bent down and whispered in his ear. The doctor gave them a smile and gestured for them to come in. The three of them wound their way through the guests and went to see Alice’s father.

“Josef, it’s here,” said Antonín.

“What’s here?” said Alice’s father.

“The surprise, like I told you.”

“Oh, right, right. So you want the room for the cake, is that it?”

“Quiet,” Antonín chided him. “It’s a surprise.”

“Of course. Well, put it in there in my old room. It’s all cleaned up in there, and there’s even a table.”

They walked into the room. There was a dark wooden table with a folded newspaper on top, open to a half-finished crossword, plus a pair of glasses and a ballpoint pen. The man in the apron looked it over, removed the newspaper, the glasses, and the pen, took a tape measure out of his pocket, and measured the table while the other men looked on.

“Just under three feet by five feet,” the man in the apron said disapprovingly.

“Not big enough?” the doctor asked.

“I said very clearly: I need five and three-quarters feet by six and a half feet. I was very clear!” the man in the apron said in an irritated tone.

“Well, we can expand it,” said Alice’s father. He looked at the doctor. “I thought you said it was going to be a cake?”

“Well, is it a cake, or isn’t it?” the doctor asked, turning to the man in the apron.

“Of course, brother,” said the man in the apron, who had already begun trying to figure out how to expand the table. The doctor gave him another questioning look, but the man in the apron ignored it and went about opening up the table’s folded wings.

“It doesn’t get used much, you know,” Alice’s father said to the man in the apron. “That’s why it’s stiff.” He began helping to unfold the other parts of the table.

“That will fit. Yes, that will fit just fine,” the man in the apron said, measuring the table with the additional panels installed.

“Now, I would just request,” he said, looking around, “that nobody enter this room for the next thirty minutes.”

Alice’s father looked at the doctor, who looked at the man in the apron and said: “I think … that can be arranged. Don’t you, Josef?”

“Yes,” Alice’s father said. For the next few minutes, as the man in the apron settled into the room, the taller, stocky man in the white coat, together with the doctor, proceeded to bring in boxes of various sizes. Each time they knocked, he cracked open the door and they handed him one or more boxes. When they were done, they stood in front of the door to make sure nobody walked in by accident. After exactly twenty-nine minutes, the door opened and the doctor, the man with the flat brown cap, and Alice’s father were let inside. They entered the room and looked at the table. A marzipan palace towered on top of it, five feet tall.

The man in the apron was a pastry chef, that was now sufficiently clear, and what stood on the table was a combination of a Gothic cathedral, a castle, and a palace with multiple courtyards.

“Now that I didn’t expect, Mr. Svoboda,” the doctor said.

“Brother doctor,” the pastry chef said, “a wedding, as well as a wedding cake, should only be once in a lifetime. May the bride and groom and their guests enjoy it.”

After a moment’s pause he added: “I hope, eh-hehm … that is, um, I think … I would appreciate it if I could say a few words to the newlyweds.” He cleared his throat. “If it’s possible, that is.” He looked around the room at the others. The doctor looked at Alice’s father, who couldn’t tear his eyes away from the marzipan creation.

“Do you think that would be possible, Josef?” Antonín asked, but Alice’s father didn’t notice, just walking around the table, shaking his head, mumbling, “I’ve never seen anything like it” over and over and smiling to himself. Instead of answering the doctor, he turned to the pastry chef and asked, “What about the figures? Are the figures edible too?”

“Naturally!” said the pastry chef, sounding offended. “Everything you see before you is edible.”

“That is incredible,” Alice’s father mumbled. “Truly incredible. It’s a work of art.”

“Naturally,” the pastry chef said.

“Josef, do you think Mr. Svoboda here could say a few words to the bride and groom and their guests?” the doctor repeated his question.

“Oh, of course, of course,” Alice’s father said. “Just a minute. I’ll bring them in.”

The room gradually filled up. For everybody to fit, they had to stand in a circle around the table with the marzipan castle on it. Everybody went silent the moment they walked through the door. The conversation stopped dead and outside the church bells started ringing the hour, but nobody could concentrate enough to count the number of rings. Once the room was full, Alice’s father looked around at everyone and said:

“Dear Alice and Maximilian, what you see before you is a gift from your Uncle Toník, and I believe he would like to say a few words. As for myself, the gentleman here who made the cake told me that even those little tiny minipeople are edible.”

“So, dear Alice and Maximilian, honored guests,” the doctor took the floor. “This is my wedding gift to you, and I must say, it’s even bigger and more beautiful than I had expected. It wasn’t so long ago that I gave Alice her vaccination for … for …”

“Tetanus, Uncle. Tetanus,” Alice called out.

“That’s right, tetanus,” the doctor said. “You see, I still remember.” He paused to look around the room. “But I’m not going to bore you with family stories, I just wanted to say that when I gave Alice the shot, she was so scared she crawled into a cabinet full of papers and I couldn’t get her out. She made such a mess in there it took me a week afterwards to sort them all out. It wasn’t that long ago, so I have to congratulate both of you now on this happy day, which I hope you will always look back on in those moments when not everything in life is going the way you’d like it to. So, once again, I wish you all the best, and I’d also like to thank the pastry chef, Mr. Svoboda, who actually gave me the idea of giving the newlyweds a cake. It really is a work of art, and it’s much bigger than I expected, and now its creator, the pastry maestro himself, Mr. Svoboda, would like to say a few words to you about it. And don’t be surprised if he calls you brother or sister. Mr. Svoboda?”