Skillet Cake

Skillet Cake

It rained hard, and the studio was a mess.  We had to finish the layout for one of the cookbooks in two days.  Rain plastered the windows and blocked all sunlight.  The artificial lights inside the building only made the brick walls seemed darker and more confined than they actually were.  

“Beatrice called.”  Amanda walked over to my desk.  I powered my computer and was just about to go over the images from the other day’s shoot.

“She called twice.”

I looked up at her extended hand.  In it she held two pieces of sticky notes.

“She wants to re-do the pear cake photo.”

I took the sticky notes.  “No.”

“I told her it was probably going to be a no.”

“It is a no.”

“She won’t take no for an answer.”

“She’s going to have to.”

“She said she’s paying money.”

“She also has a deadline.”

“She doesn’t like the picture.”

“Her book goes to the publisher in two days.”

“She wants to schedule a re-shoot for this afternoon.”

“With who?”

Amanda tilted her head.

I tilt also.

“I told her you were busy.”

“Which I am.”  I inserted the memory card into the computer.

“She then said she’ll come over with the cake.”

“You’re kidding right?”  Images began to populate my screen.

“I don’t kid when it comes to threats.”  Amanda walked off.

I called my mother earlier in the morning.  So far so good.  Surgery went well.  Dad was resting.  His body and heart were well worn.  Could a person wear out their heart by loving someone so much?  Random thought, I know, but the idea captured me.  Has anyone ever been diagnosed with heart failure or just heart fatigue from over loving another person?  I guess if excessive worrying and nagging could be called over-loving a person the condition could be plausible.  What I meant was really loving a person.  Emotionally caring for them and shower attention, affection and adoration upon them.  Would a person’s health disintegrate if they discovered that they were wrong about what they thought they loved, or if their love was not reciprocated?

“Beatrice, the image is quite good.”  I could hear her oven door shut over the phone.

“The cake looks crumbly.  I don’t want it to look crumbly when thousands of people will be buying the book.”

“It’s authentic.  I touched up the fissure for you and--”

“Oh I know and that’s good, but I’ll know it was a disaster.”

“Beatrice, honestly we don’t have time to--”

“Damn it!--I hate the photo.”

Because of her popularity as a once famous country singer and award winning songwriter, my afternoon appointment was rescheduled, and I was sent over to Beatrice’s house with my lighting crew.  And because of her substantial project account with our company, we didn’t want to lose her as a valuable client.  Even though she was behaving like a spoiled brat, we were willing to eat the cost for this shoot.

Tony, the lighting engineer, nudged me as we stepped out of the car.  “You better wipe that look off your face,” he muttered and spit his gum out into one of Beatrice hedges.

Her kitchen was a replica of Paula Dean’s.  Her counter tops were cleared except for the vases of flowers.  There in the middle was the skillet cake.  The place smelled like a bakery at Thanksgiving.  

“Ok, now I want flowers around it and some pecans, you know to give it ambiance.”  She waved her hand at the cake and flowers poised for the camera.  Tony and his crew went about wordlessly setting up the lighting trees and the white background screen.

Beatrice took a bag of unshelled pecans from her pantry.  

I bit my lip.

“Or do you think cinnamon sticks will make more sense since cinnamon is one of the ingredients in the cake.  Pecans are not in the cake.”

“Beatrice.  This isn’t the same composition as was in the original plan.”

“Oh, I know!”  Her eyes lit.  “I thought we’d make it a bit more pizazzy.” 

“How so?”

“Well, it’ll add more color and depth, of course.”

Tony bumped into me.

Skillet cakes were never an issue of turmoil with Grandma.  If the cake didn’t flip perfectly, she would just reapply the pieces.  Looks you can fix, Grandma said.  It’s the taste that you can’t.

“Daaaaammmn!”  The cake did not flip for Beatrice.  It could not be cajoled or eased out of the skillet.  It fell apart in a god-awful mess, as if expressing exactly what our whole crew felt.  

I drove home with a headache.  A whole day was wasted, and now I was a day behind schedule.  When I opened the garage door, I stared.  

His bags were packed.  His CDs and DVDs were no longer on the shelves.  He was just about to open the door when I entered.  I could tell he was wishing to make a clean get-away.  I walked over to the kitchen counter and unplugged the blender.  “Don’t forget this.  Leave the garage door opener on the table.”  Then I went into the bedroom and shut the door.

Silence.

I stepped back and stared at the door.  After a few minutes he knocked.  

“Let’s talk.”

“No need.  Your actions spoke clearly.”

“You never once called me.”

“Neither did you.”

“Apparently I don’t mean anything to you anymore.”

“Apparently you feel the same.”

“How do you want to divide the furniture?”

“Get out.”

Once he was gone I went to the kitchen.  I didn’t have a cast iron skillet, but I had a Dutch oven.  I also had a couple of Bosc pears in the fridge.  I’ve watched Beatrice attempt to make the Pear Upside Down Spice Cake so often that I knew the recipe by heart.  I turned on the stove and peeled the pears as if I needed to conquer this cake.  

I cut the butter and tossed it into the Dutch oven.  Then added brown sugar after the foaming from the butter subsided.  After a couple of minutes I arranged the pear slices onto the sugar and let it cook uninterrupted for a bit.  I beat butter, sugar and egg; then added the flour and spice mixture, alternating with the molasses.  Once the batter was smooth, I poured it over the pears, covering them in the gingerbread cake mix.  

The apartment smelled wonderful with the spices baking.  Grandma loved to peek every now and then at the oven window.  Not me.  I went and showered while waiting for the timer to go off.  The cake looked like perfection; however, I couldn’t invert it.  Rather, I found a big serving spoon and scooped up a piece of cake.  Spiced Scoop Cake with Pears.

...I needed to conquer this cake.