Personal Chef

Chapter 53

Baking cookies got me through the holidays.

My parents were around, so it's not like I was lonely. I also had Paige and my other friends, but I couldn't help but miss Shawn more than usual. We'd never had a Christmas together. Sure, I worked for him over the holidays the previous year, but that wasn't the same. I grieved for the Christmas we should have been having as a couple.

When I was feeling low, I let my imagination run wild. I pictured the two of us getting a beautiful live tree and putting it in the living room of the condo. We'd decorate it wearing pajamas while drinking hot cocoa. On Christmas morning we'd wake up and exchange gifts after making love slowly and deliberately. Later in the day, we'd see our families.

The reality wasn't nearly as wonderful. I had a two foot tall fake tree that leaned to the side no matter how hard I tried to straighten it. Shawn had gotten a tree with Kat and they'd taken several pictures of him holding her gigantic belly in front of the twinkly lights of the tree. She'd posted these on Instagram and it was obvious she wanted people to think they were together.

Maybe they were. He wasn't supposed to tell me, so it's not like I'd know.

In some ways, things were easier now that Shawn and I were friends. We texted and talked and got along nicely. There was no flirting at all, and the weird in between state we'd been in vanished. It's like we were finally broken up.

I couldn't stop loving him, though. God knows I tried, but my heart still belonged to him. That's why Christmas was tough. It's a time to be with the ones you love, and being with him wasn't a possibility.

This is why I threw myself into baking.

Every day after the bistro closed, I'd spend three to four hours making cookies. I stuck to just five varieties and focused on one each weekday. I made chocolate crinkle cookies on Mondays that tasted like brownies but were so pretty with the powdered sugar pattern on top. Tuesday was macarons. One half would be red and the other green. A rich buttercream held the two cookies together. My Wednesday cookie was something my mom always made when I was a child, but that I didn't like at the time but loved now. Shortbread. These little cookies weren't very sweet, but they were divine. I cut them in squares and topped them with a tart lemon glaze. On Thursdays I'd make gingerbread people which were simply decorated and geared towards the younger customers. Fridays were my hardest day because this was when I made sugar cookie cut-outs. The rolling, cutting, and intricate decorating meant I often stayed until it got dark.

The cookies paid off.

Within a week, people were showing up just to buy cookies because they'd heard from a friend or family member that they were amazing. Thankfully some people also bought coffee or stayed for breakfast. While the cookie venture was fun and a much-needed distraction, I was a restauranteur, not a baker. I was looking forward to less baking after Christmas.

One of the great things about cookies is that they cost pennies to make so the profit margin was high. I was making quite a bit of bank, which meant I could safely let go of my severance money.

I scoured the Internet looking for reliable charities. Because I wanted to give locally, I chose the Toronto Foundation for Student Success. They did everything from feeding children to helping them overcome the hurdles that were holding them back in school. I also chose to give to a food bank that wasn't too far from where I'd grown up. My last donation went to Habitat for Humanity of Canada. I loved the concept of building homes for people in need.

On Christmas Eve, I kept the bistro open a couple hours later than usual so that people could pick up boxes of cookies for the holiday. It was a pretty slow day, so I was down to one cook, one server, and me, who was stationed behind the coffee bar, which also displayed the cookies.