That Man Right There

Addie stared at the cake on top of the fridge like a lioness on a hunt. To the other partygoers around her, she probably looked insane. But she wasn’t. She swore. She was staring at the cake because since the party had started, it had shimmied closer and closer to the edge of the refrigerator. Christine had put a lot of time into the cake; or so it looked like. The icing was piped as intricately as a non-professional baker could. Even the layers of cake were different flavors. It must’ve taken Christine hours to finish, and now it was inching closer to the edge. She wondered how badly a destroyed cake would ruin the party. After all, it was only a smallish get together. Maybe fifteen people. Twenty max. Addie thought about running to save the cake, but there were a few scenarios that kept her from doing so.

Scenario number one. Because of a height deficiency, in going to save the cake, Addie would have to climb on Christine’s counter. With that being the case, Christine would probably be angry that Adeline’s shoes were stomping on her granite countertops, and therefore unable to appreciate the fact that the cake was safe. Ultimately that would render the entire mission pointless.

Scenario number two. Addie didn’t want to be the one fool at the party who was so unamused with everyone around her that she was forced to obsess over a baked good. There were some pretty interesting people at the party. Christine worked for a public relations company, and her boss had some notable clients. Now most of those clients wouldn’t be caught dead at this party, but Christine was bubbly and friendly. A local news anchor was there; which wasn’t much, but she had brought along the weatherman, and that was. An athlete was there too. Addie didn’t know his name, but when she’d gotten accepted to Carnegie Mellon, she’d seen his face on a billboard as she drove into Pittsburgh. It was just a passing glance as she went over seventy on the freeway, so now looking out at the crowd, Addie couldn’t pinpoint which man’s face had been adorned over fifty feet.

And scenario number three. Addie kind of just wanted to see what would happen if the cake did fall from the top of the fridge. Not that she was an asshole or anything, but this cake had movement. This cake was going places. And at the end of the day, it was a cake. Addie tried to reason with herself that watching the cake fall didn’t make her a bad person. If the cake had been a child, she definitely would’ve gone to save it, or at the very least said something. But it wasn’t a child. It was a multi-leveled, multi-flavored dessert. She’d even help clean it up.

Despite seeing it coming, it wasn’t any less heartbreaking when it finally did reach its tipping point. It was almost like slow motion. Everyone was in their own conversations and Addie was watching the whole thing unfold. It hurtled to the ground, the plastic platter it had been sitting on clattered away, and the cake smashed on the kitchen floor with impressive force and velocity. And then everyone’s conversations went quiet. And by quiet, had there been a tiny mouse in the flashy apartment, you would’ve been able to hear it squeak in delight at the feast it was about to embark on.

But the deafening of the silence was overtaken by the deafening of a high-pitched squeal, not coming from a mouse, but from Christine. Her beloved baby, the masterpiece which she exclaimed took her four hours to finish, lie dead on the floor. Icing spattered around the pile of mush that had once been a beautiful three layer cake. For the first time since she noticed the cake was doomed, Addie switched her focus to something else. Now it was on her new friend, and how she was so visibly devastated by this new development. She was throwing an absolute fit. And Addie went into overdrive trying to think of a way to de-escalate and control the situation.

The most logical thing she could think of would probably be anything but in hindsight. Addie grabbed a fork from the dining room table which had been set out for the party, walked into the kitchen, sat down on the floor, and stabbed at the cake. She took a bite and searched the room for Christine, spotting her, but only after looking at all the horrified expressions of the other partygoers. Christine’s wails turned into exasperated gasps for air as she watched Addie stab at the destroyed cake again and take another bite.

Faint whispers started to float around the room, and just when Addie thought this was as demoralizing as it could get, she gained a companion. Now someone else was sitting beside her, stabbing their own fork at the cake. Addie looked up as she shoveled another piece of the chocolate layer into her mouth. In the brief moment she had to stare at her new comrade before it got creepy, she noticed a couple things. He had dark, dark hair. Brown eyes, or were they hazel? She couldn’t exactly tell before her brain moved on to capture the next thing about him, which was his smile; a soft, disarming smile that nearly put her at complete ease. But she could still hear Christine sniffling in the background, really making too big a deal out of a cake. This was funny, wasn’t it? At least Addie thought it was.

“You saw this coming.”

Addie looked up at her companion as he spoke. He was smiling that disarming smile at her and she looked back down at the cake and gathered some of the icing from the coconut layer on her fork. “I plead the fifth and refuse to answer on the grounds that it may incriminate me,”

Her companion gave a small chuckle. He looked back at Christine momentarily before taking another small bite of cake. Addie noticed he was repeatedly going for the third and final, coffee layer. “How do you know Chrissy?”

“Met her at my orientation for school,”

“Oh, you’re in PR too?”

Addie shook her head and went after the coffee layer now. “History. Our graduate programs had a combined orientation.”

“Weird,”

“Yeah.” Thinking that might be where the conversation ended, and feeling a new round of embarrassment ensuing, Addie spoke up, “how do you know her?”

“Work. I see her around every now and then,”

Addie nodded, not really knowing what to do from there. She wasn’t socially awkward by any means, and maybe this guy was a little, but what was she going to say? They were sat on the floor together, eating smushed cake.

“Sid,” he held out his free hand, “by the way.”

She took his hand, “like the demon child from Toy Story?”

“Exactly,”

Now Addie giggled. “Adeline… Addie,”

Again, he smiled that disarming smile. It took a second, but when they finally did look back at the cake, Sid took a breath. “Just out of curiosity, we’re not going to eat this whole thing, are we?”

“Between the two of us, I think you’re the one that could spare it. You look like you’ve skipped dessert for three years.” Addie smiled and unashamedly took another bite of cake, “me on the other hand, had two doughnuts for breakfast this morning. Actually, I’ve had two doughnuts for breakfast for the past week.” She paused, really thinking about that. Then she looked around the room, “where’s the vegetable platter?”

Sid laughed harder this time. “I don’t have much of a sweet tooth,”

“And yet, here you are, eating homemade cake off the kitchen floor.”

“To be honest people were starting to think you were a little nutty, you know, with you staring at the cake all night and then running at it like a rabid dog when it fell. So I’m doing my part. One person eating cake off the floor looks nutty. Two people eating cake off the floor just looks quirky.”

Addie smiled, “got it. So you’re my knight in shining armor.”

Sid shook his head gently, “I’m the back up court jester, watching the first stringer crash and burn and deciding to throw himself into the fire.”

“Come on, stop.”

They both looked up as Christine came up behind them with a trash bag in one hand and Clorox and paper towels in the other.

“I appreciate you both, but you gotta get up so I can clean it.”

Christine shooed them away, and after setting their forks in the sink, Sid followed Addie out of the kitchen. For a moment, she thought they were going to have a real conversation somewhere else, but when Addie turned around to find him, she saw his attention had been grabbed by someone else. She wasn’t disappointed by any means, just figured that’s how it went; sometimes you have someone’s attention, sometimes you don’t. And by the looks of it, Sid wasn’t having his arm twisted by the girl he was now in conversation with. He looked like he was having a pleasant time; the same disarming smile flashing at her.

So Addie found the vegetable platter. Her new companion for the night. The show she’d put on in the kitchen had done a good job of scaring people off, so when they came for the vegetables and found her, they turned right around.

As the night wound down and there were only a couple stragglers left, Addie carried a trash bag around the apartment, gathering the discarded bottles and cups that people had been too lazy to throw out. She made things as presentable as possible, giving Christine a fighting chance of cleaning her house in the morning, and then she was ready to go.

“Chris, you beautiful soul, I’m sorry about your cake. It was delicious,” Addie smiled and wrapped her arms around Christine.

“Thank you. And thank you for helping clean up.”

Addie adjusted her purse on her shoulder, “I’ll see you Monday?”

“With a vanilla latte in the library before class,”

Addie put her hand over her heart affectionately, “my angel.” She backed away and went for the front door. As she put her hand on the knob, she heard her name and looked back.

“Adeline!” Sid was en route to her with his coat over his forearm. “You heading out?”

“Yeah. It was nice meeting you. Thanks for eating cake on the floor with me,” she yanked the front door open, thinking that’s where it was going to end.

“I’ll walk you out.”

She was about to tell him that that wasn’t necessary. She’d be fine. Her car was right down in front. The likelihood of her being kidnapped from the building entrance to her car was slim to none. But he was already shutting Christine’s door when she opened her mouth. Addie didn’t really know what to say to him, mostly because his body language screamed awkwardness. When they got to the building’s entrance, Sid took a couple quick steps to reach the door first, and pushed it open for her. She scooted out past him and clicked the button on her keys, unlocking her car. He even went as far as to follow her to the car door, at which point Addie feared if he might be the one to kidnap her.

She pulled open her door and looked back at him, “well, I’m gonna go…”

He smiled and nodded, taking a step back, “yeah, sorry. I’m happy to have met you, Adeline.” He held out his hand.

Addie looked down at it. If this didn’t scream awkward, she didn’t know what did. So instead, she ignored his hand and stepped forward on her tip toes, and wrapped her arms around him for a quick hug. “I’m from California, we’re huggers.” She noticed that he seemed unsure of what to do at first, but then settled on hugging her back lightly. When she backed away, Sid looked like he was blushing.

Addie smiled at him once more and then ducked into her car. As she drove away and looked in her rearview mirror, she caught a glimpse of Sid watching her drive off before he turned and went for his own car.

Notes

New story! As if I can keep up with my other stories, but oh well :) Had an inspiration and went with it!!