Like a piece of cake

There is a time in our lives that will feel very much like a piece of cake. It’s not any kind of cake — most certainly not something bland like a spongecake.

No. That is both too easily edible and boring, and this kind of cake is definitely neither of those properties.

This time is like a particularly delicious piece of cake that you have when you’re on a trip to a city of cliché good pastry, like Paris.

It’s the kind of cake that you find at a café on the corner of a street that’s not particularly visible but unbeknownst to you, it’s actually gotten reviews all over the place that it is, in fact, the best cake in all of the cliché-good-pastry city.

This cake called out to you when you first looked at it behind the glass. It was nicely decorated, it seemed to have been ordered quite a bit because there’s only three pieces left, and it’s got that black forest or chocolate mousse appeal that is visceral and immediate. “TAKE THAT CAKE!” your belly and your brain yell in unison.

Despite the 14€ price tag, you ask for the cake because fuck it, you’re in the goddamn cliché-good-pastry city — and really, when will you ever be here again?!

The overly enthusiastic but chaotic, frumpy pastry chef behind the counter (who’s so pushy that you think to yourself “this has to be the owner”) places the cake on the plate and right before you could reach for it, insists you add the whipped cream for an extra 4€. You hesitate for a second before you repeat your vacation mantra “Fuck it! It’s the bloody cliché-good-pastry city” and you had over the credit card because counting the coins is too painful.

At last, you sit at the table with your cake and the sun:cloud ratio is just perfect in the sky. The music, the smell, the frumpy chef, all of it so perfect — like some fresh-out-of-college preppy’s European fantasy. Finally, the time has come. Fork in hand, you break into the perfect exterior of the cake, breaking away a piece with the extra whipped cream, and place it carefully in your mouth.

What a flavour…

The cream, you’re convinced, could not have been made by this chef, who is staring at your to ensure you’re loving it. This cream has to be made by the hands of God himself (whom you have decided most certainly exists thanks to this cake). You chew and chew, and you wonder if it’s possible to ever get tired of this cake. How? Can it be so damn good?!

Piece two is now on the fork, and into your mouth.

You decide you want to live in this city if it means you can get this cake daily. You dream of how you will bring your partner to this café when you inevitably meet them at some cool, alternative event that inevitably exists in this cliché-good-pastry city.

Piece three, fork, mouth.

You look at down, and the reality of optical illusions strikes. It seemed like halfway-through, but in reality you have just eaten the most practical and enjoyable first few piece of any triangular food (think of the point on a pizza).

Now you’re examining this oddly shaped remainder. You’re starting to feel a little full but still satisfied. You look closer and you realize that the cake was actually stuffed with whipped cream — the same stuff that the still-glaring pastry chef pushed you to add. You’re not sure why you didn’t ask what the cake was stuffed with before you agreed, but hey, it doesn’t matter. You can never have too much of this cream!

You look outside, and a big cloud is drifting into view. What a beautiful sky in this cliché-good-pastry city… What a sky!

Piece four means that you’re going to break the trapezoidal remaining piece. You realize that you’ve never used that word to describe anything before let alone a cake, but you’ve been thinking quite a bit about how to go about this piece — after all, you spent your whole life eating cake without being strategic but this is no mere cake. It’s 18€ for fuck’s sake! You must eat it in the exact perfect way, because that is utmost importance!

Aha! Piece four, fork, mouth. Chew! Chew… Che… Ch…

The dreadful thought of how heavy this cake is now dawning on you. You definitely don’t regret any of what you’ve eaten so far, but you’re wishing that they offered a half-portion. Regardless, this no-longer-a-trapezoid with extra cream is sitting on the plate and you’re not gonna throw it. Who knows when, if ever, you’ll eat something like this again!

Piece five. Halfway.

“Can I have a coffee?” you ask the chef, who gracefully prepares it and asks “how’s the cake? I see you haven’t finished it.”

You feel like shit for a second, but quickly respond “Oh its great. The best! I’m just taking a small coffee break because it’s so heavy.”

The coffee finishes faster than you expect, and despite how good the cake tastes, they just don’t seem to be so good at the blackwater in the cliché-good-pastry city.

Pieces six, seven, and eight go by quite quickly because you stopped really considering them. The taste is good, but the sweetness and your growing fullness is starting to become a little uncomfortable, so its better not give it much mind.

You look out and the sunshine seems to have disappeared behind the cloud that, you could swear, was not that grey a few minutes ago.

You’re now at the edge of the cake. The beautiful decorations, and extra chocolate shavings — the edge of a cake, unlike the other typically triangular food, is always the most flavourful and amazing thing!

Piece, fork, mouth.

It’s yet another explosion of flavour, one even more shocking than the first bite! All of a sudden you remember every cake you’ve ever eaten where you were so excited for the frosting covered ending but instantly regretted the minute you ate it. Cakes are so deceiving! Why can’t anyone make a cake with a perfectly frosted edge?! Not too sweet, not too creamy! So easy!Even this perfect cake, though slightly too sweet and too heavy, can’t seem to get this right.

The glare of the owner (you finally had the guts to ask if that was in fact the case) is now infuriating. “Look somewhere else so I can grimace in peace while I finish the last two bites of this miserable pastry?!” you want to shout out, but you don’t.

The feelings of everything up until this point have all but soured. The cake, this cliché-good-pastry city (which you’re now certain cannot possibly have the kind of alt-event that will bring you the partner that you dreamed of), the miserable grey sky, all of it has faded away into the dark depths of your memory, completely forgotten.

You finally shovel down the last of the edge of the cake while the owner was finally turned around to shine some glasses. You look down at your plate with a hand on your belly and your eyes half-shut, and you feel a collapse coming from all the sugar and cream. You’re not quite sure what you’re thinking about, but a jingle at the door wakes you up to the sight of what can only be a confused tourist who just waltzed into the door. You notice their fixated gaze on the cake and immediately, a sense of solidarity and fraternity takes over. You see yourself in this poor soul. As they look over at you, they notice the cake’s expertly cut strawberry on your table which you forgotten had fallen off the minute you got the cake and they ask if you’ve had that cake.

“Oh yeah!”

“How is it?”

“It’s so fucking good bu — “

“HELLO! You want the cake? It is my specialty!” interrupts the owner (you are certain that those glasses could not have been cleaned that quickly).

As the prompt for the extra whipped cream comes, the tourist (now soul-sibling), looks at you while the owner glares over your sibling’s shoulder. Despite not owing the owner anything, you’re still too terrified to say your own opinion to this newly introduced family member. You smile in a way that you think signalled discomfort, but for some reason the tourist (you refuse to call them kin now because they were too stupid to do the right thing) just orders the extra cream anyway.

You walk out of the café, into the cliché-good-pastry city’s streets and now that you’ve had a moment to think you realize that your smile inside the café betrayed you. It wasn’t a signal to not take it. It was a genuine smile. You’re glad your sibling (you’ve reinstituted them into your family now) walked into the café but you just wish the owner wasn’t so pushy, even though it’s a bit hard to remember why you were so upset. You look at your watch and realize that you’ve actually only been at that cafe for 15 minutes, but you feel as though the cake has changed the way you live forever.

Your short walk back to the apartment reminds you that you actually have to be at the airport tomorrow morning at 9am, and that you actually only arrived last night at 6.

Finally back at home, your friend starts badgering you with questions and insists “You have to tell me about cliché-good-pastry city!”

“Well, I actually don’t remember the city much because I wasn’t there long but I had this cake… Holy shit!”

“But what about the cake at cliché-hipster-pastry café here?”

“No, no, no. This is something else. It’s in this tiny café that is apparently super famous amongst pastry chefs but no one else really knows it. The owner is crazy but it was charming you know?”

They insist you show them photos, so you oblige. Out comes the phone, and now two heads are ogling a six-inch piece of glass as you flick through your photos from your short stay there. Everything about the city seemed kind of fake, and the photos don’t help with that feeling. Then, you find the photo and you open it.

It doesn’t seem real. You barely remember the taste, but you just have an abstract idea of how brilliant it was.

“That looks so good! We should go to the cliché-good-pastry city together and get it! I’m sure you want to have it again!”

You decline the offer. You tell them that you’re up for visiting the city again so you can experience it with more clarity, but you tell your friend that they have to try the cake anyway!

“Oh!” you exclaim.

You just remembered something.

“If the owner is still there, say yes to the extra cream.”