It's just gone midnight. I've been baking. There's a nursery coffee morning on Friday, a cake sale on Saturday morning, Mum's birthday next week, the mother of a boy Toby plays with at nursery coming for tea and Stephen's penchant for afternoon tea with the children on the days he's working from home. So I put the children to bed, made Stephen's dinner and got started. I made two currant Genoa cakes, forty two pink fairy cakes, two batches of chocolate brownies and a heart-shaped Madeira. While they were cooling I made a batch of chocolate crispy cakes. Stephen came in to the kitchen just as I'd got the cakes wrapped and labelled for the freezer.
'Clementine,' he said, 'there's a cake in a bag here with Give to Rose on Thursday written on it.'
'Yes?'
'And this one says Use for Mum.'
'Yes.'
'Leave for Tuesday? Emergency coffee morning supply?'
I didn't deign to reply. I have my systems.
'The thing is, Clementine,' he said, shaking his head sadly over my handiwork, 'you think this is normal.'
