Page 24 of Fire and Icing (The Firemen of Waterford TN #1)

Dustin

Life is full of questions, cupcakes are the answer.

~ Unknown

I’m sizing up the competition.

We’re each at our own basic kitchen station, lined up in four rows with three couples per row.

I’ve seen this setup on shows my sister watches.

She’s always been obsessed with food and cooking.

Not obsessed in a way that requires therapy—ask my dad, he’s a therapist. But she’s as focused on food preparation and feeding people as I am on my guitar and fighting fires.

So, whether I wanted to or not, I’ve seen the guy who yells at everyone, the one who spikes his hair and drives cool cars while he travels around eating in divey places where you’re sure to get the best tasting food and possibly a coronary.

I’ve watched so many culinary shows in passing.

And now it’s me. I’m the guy standing next to his partner, trying to focus on the host while she explains that today’s theme is cupcakes.

“Cupcakes?” I whisper under my breath to Emberleigh. “Aren’t those kinda easy for a contest like this?”

“Shhh,” she whispers back like a mom in church.

I nod. She’s right. If anyone needs to focus right now, it’s me.

I’ve had Emberleigh’s cupcakes. They’re not like anything I’ve ever tasted before.

Light, creamy, flavorful. There must be some hidden magic to making a cupcake.

It’s a magic everyone else I ever knew missed out on.

Emberleigh has that magic in spades. She’s got more incredible qualities and skills than she gives herself credit for.

I’ve honestly never met a woman like her.

The host continues her spiel. “You’ll be judged on cake consistency, flavor complexity and balance, and overall visual appeal and presentation. Only nine of you move forward to the next round.”

I’m tempted to look behind me and make the Robert De Niro “I’m watching you” gesture to each and every competitor in the room: fingers in a V, pointing to my eyes and then theirs.

I don’t.

Emberleigh will never know how grateful she truly is for my self-restraint.

She needs to win this. I’m not exactly an asset, but I aim to be one if I can be. And, above all, I’m not going to be the reason she gets kicked out or loses her chance at the grand prize.

The host continues her orientation. “As you’ll see, cameras are located at your stations, around the studio, and we also have roving cameramen.

Feel free to look into the cameras occasionally, but for the most part, ignore them.

Interact with me, the other host, the judges and one another.

Those interactions give the contest appeal and make viewers feel as if they’re eavesdropping on us.

“I’ll do a little countdown and then we’ll roll. I’m going to give the same intro I just gave you, but into the camera, then we’ll start the clocks over your stations and you’ll have two hours to prepare, bake and decorate your confections.”

After one more sound check and the countdown, we’re live. The host does her thing, announcing to viewers that we’re in the “Cupcake Crush round,” and then we’re free to start baking. Emberleigh shifts into a state I’ve never seen her in before. She’s as focused as I am when I’m running into a fire.

And the analogy isn’t too far off. We’re in a flurry of activity as soon as the clock starts counting down. Time is of the essence and our survival in this contest depends on every single move we make.

“Come with me,” she shouts, scurrying away to the massive pantry at the front of the room. I follow behind her at a jog.

She hands me a basket and starts loading it with ingredients.

“Grab that flour—the cake flour, not the other bag!” I grab the bag she’s pointing to and set it in my basket.

“We’re doing a honeyed campfire cupcake,” she tells me as she drops a jar of local Tennessee wildflower honey into the basket. “It’s a nod to you being a firefighter.”

“How did you think that up so quickly?” I ask, turning the corner after her and extending the basket so she can drop in more ingredients.

“I have thoughts about baking all the time, and a list of options I considered before we came. But, also …” She drops baking soda and vanilla in with the other items. “I’m a baker. I have to think on my feet.”

“We have more in common than I realized.”

She pauses, but only for a second, glancing over at me and smiling. “Yeah. I guess we do.”

Back at our station, it’s a methodical flurry of activity. Emberleigh has me measuring ingredients. The main point is getting things level and precise. That, I can do.

I’m doing whatever she tells me. But my mind is barely on cupcakes. It’s on her. She’s dedicated and obviously a master at her craft. I’ve tasted her baking before, but watching her create something from scratch? That’s a whole new kind of magic.

“Cream of tartar,” she says.

I look around for cream. “Not seeing it,” I tell her.

“It’s a powder.”

“Why don’t they call it powder of tartar?” I ask.

She pauses and looks up into my eyes. I smile down at her and she breaks into laughter.

“I really don’t know.” She shrugs.

I glance up. A man in a chef’s coat with a clipboard strolls by and stops. “Glad to see one team having fun. Let’s hope the flavors are as bright as the banter.”

He keeps walking. Emberleigh’s smile fades slightly. “Back to work.”

I nod. “Yes, chef.”

We work quietly for a few minutes, her focus sharp and my mouth zipped.

"You're amazing at this," I remark, watching her mix the ingredients I hand her together in a large bowl.

Emberleigh gives me a shy smile. "Just doing what I love."

A couple in the row ahead of us starts to squabble.

“I said two eggs!”

“I heard you say three!”

“We have to start from scratch now.”

“I never claimed to be a baker. That’s the whole reason I’m here.”

“Aaagh!”

Emberleigh glances at me. The only way I can describe what passes between us is to say we hold an entire conversation without uttering a word.

It’s the kind of thing I do with my family all the time—people I’ve known my whole life.

But her? She and I only met a little while ago.

And yet we have an understanding between us that’s unexpected.

Eyes on the prize, Dustin. You’re here to help her win, not to win her over.

“Grab that cupcake tin,” she says, pointing to a rubbery thing with twelve cutouts for cupcakes.

“It’s a tin?” I ask, grabbing it.

“It’s made of silicone, but … yeah.”

“Okay …” I hand it over to her. “So we have cream that’s powder and tins made of rubber.”

“Stop.” She lets out a light, carefree laugh. It’s beautiful. “I’m sure you have confusing labels in your job too.”

“Probably.”

Her eyes are still crinkled in the corners. I did that. I put that lingering happiness in her heart and it’s etched on her face. I watch as she carefully distributes the batter into each cup of the “tin.”

She’s humming while she works. I feel like a voyeur, watching something intimate, intruding on her private world, stealing a glimpse behind the scenes.

We may be here to compete in the public eye, but what’s happening right now feels personal.

There’s a raw vulnerability in her expression the cameras could never capture.

She’s got half the cups filled when she looks at me and says, “You do the rest.”

“Me?”

“I believe in you. Just put the same amount as I did in each cup.”

I hold the bowl and scoop the batter like I’m playing a game of hot lava. Emberleigh watches me and then she gets to work on some other part of this project while I rinse the mixing bowl.

“Now, we’ll make the filling and then the frosting,” Emberleigh explains to me.

A memory comes floating up into my awareness: Mom baking in the kitchen.

Maybe I was eight or nine. Dad was home.

It could have been a weekend or one of his days off.

He walked in and kissed her on the cheek.

She asked him to hand her something and he stayed by her side, baking with her.

She did the job, but he kept her company.

Emberleigh and I aren’t my parents.

We’re faking a connection so she can be here doing what she does best.

While the cupcakes bake, we make our filling and frosting. Emberleigh has me roll a rolling pin over a bag of graham crackers to make a crumb topping.

“Make the pieces uneven. I’m not going for perfect here.” She’s all focus.

“You want imperfection? I’ve got that down pat,” I tell her.

“Hardly,” she mutters, bending to check the cupcakes with a toothpick just like Mom always did.

The contest bell rings and we stop everything.

That can’t be the end of this round. We haven’t even filled or iced our cupcakes.

I glance up, the clock still says forty-five minutes remain.

“We’ve got a little surprise for you,” the host says.

“None of you have started decorating your cupcakes yet. We’re going to start the countdown clocks again in a moment.

And you will resume your preparation. Only, for the next forty-five minutes, the non-baking partner will be wearing a blindfold and the baker in your partnership will be directing the blindfolded partner to do all the decorating. ”

“Can they change the rules on us midway like that?” I ask Emberleigh quietly.

She nods.

At least all the contestants are in the same situation. We’re all going to be challenged to complete this round with the same ease and precision we would have had if our baking partner were able to do the decorating and we could see what we were doing.

They give us a few minutes to regroup. Once we’re back on camera, production crew members walk around and hand blindfolds to all the non-baking partners in the room.

The countdown clocks are reactivated and we’re back in go-mode, only this time I’m the one front and center, and Emberleigh’s the one guiding me through each step of the process.

I slip the blindfold on, momentarily regretting every life choice that led to this situation.

Emberleigh places a scooped-out cupcake in my left hand.