“This,” I said, “is a sugar flower. The bakery made two hundred of them for tonight. Two hundred, because the display cake needed to be perfect from every angle.”
Janet’s smile flickered. “Display cake?”
“Oh, did I not mention that?” I turned to the guests, who were watching like this was theater — which, I suppose, it was. “When you order a three-tier showpiece for a rooftop in June, the bakery recommends a display cake. Foam tiers, real frosting, real decorations — gorgeous in photographs, and it doesn’t melt. The actual cake — the one we’re going to eat, made from our 1976 recipe with the lemon filling — is in the kitchen downstairs. It always was.”
A sound went around the rooftop — half gasp, half laugh. Barbara pressed both hands to her chest.
Janet’s face had gone very still. “You’re lying.”
“Am I?” I smiled at her. “Michael, would you do the honors?”
My son — who had been bracing for his mother to cause a scene — stared at me, then started to grin. He disappeared down the rooftop stairs. Two minutes later he emerged carrying the real cake on a silver tray, smaller than the display but unmistakably the same design, the sugar flowers fresh and perfect.
The guests burst into applause.
The part she didn’t expect
Janet stood frozen by the ruined display cake, frosting on her shoe. The satisfaction had drained out of her face, replaced by something much less pleasant: the realization that her grand gesture had destroyed nothing but foam and frosting.