Summer at Little Beach Street Bakery (21 page)

‘Of course.’

‘Well last night… you know it was a little choppy?’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘I’m just… I just get so scared.’ He looked away. ‘I’m… I’m terrified, Polly. I really am. I feel I have no business being in charge of the boat or the men or anything like that.’

‘But you’re doing a great job! Everyone thinks you’re brilliant!’

‘That’s because I’ve never been tested,’ said Archie, with feeling. ‘They haven’t found me out.’

‘Hush,’ said Polly. ‘Anyway, everyone feels like that.’

Archie held up a sandwich.

‘Easy for you to say,’ he said. ‘When you can make stuff like this.’

 

 

Now that Polly was feeling more in the swing of things, she headed to the mainland – where they had a decent Internet connection – to meet Reuben, who had been drafted in to help with Operation Van.

They met in a little café in Looe, where all the men had beards and wore lumberjack shirts and the drinks were served in jam jars. Polly found this very peculiar.

Reuben turned up forty minutes late, which was all right, as it gave her time to go through all the vans that were on offer. Almost all of them were old burger vans that looked heavily engrimed with the grease of a thousand late-night drunks stumbling out of nightclubs, but Polly wasn’t afraid of a little hard work. They ranged a lot in price, from two and a half thousand upwards, but Huckle had been adamant that they use his money to get exactly what they needed.

‘If you’re going to do this,’ he said, ‘you have to do it right.’

She also had a file open to list the things she needed to do. The actual baking economics she could do in her sleep; she had worked long enough to know exactly what she needed and how much she needed to charge. In fact, with fewer staff, no rent and few fixed costs, she could get away with less than the bakery.

And as she had no regular clientele to service, she could concentrate on the stuff with the slightly bigger profit margin – sandwiches and pizza as well as the loaves – and leave the cakes and buns to Malcolm’s plastic patrol. She would, in any case, need to make a very clear case to the town hall that she was not doing the same as the existing businesses; she was going to try and license it as a snack bar.

She scrolled through the list of bedraggled-looking second-hand vans, her heart sinking slightly as she did so. Each one, she thought, represented someone’s hopes and dreams come to nothing; their brilliant catering idea turned to dust. Who did she think she was to suddenly start something up in the middle of nowhere and expect it to work? Was she mad?

She couldn’t think like this, however. She couldn’t. This was their best option at this point – her only option as far as she could tell – and Huckle was busting a gut thousands of miles away just so she could have this opportunity. She scrolled through page after page of trucks that sold pasties and dirty white converted caravans… and then she saw it.

She looked at it. Then she looked away. Then she looked at it again, her negativity forgotten.

Piaggio Porter 2010
, it said.

It was markedly more expensive than all the other trucks there. But…

It was a converted VW-style camper van, in a two-tone colour scheme of dark red and white. One side slid open to reveal rails of baking trays, just like in the bakery. Behind them was a professional wood-burning oven. On the other side was a window that opened out to sell through, with a canopy over it. It looked to be in absolutely perfect nick; the description announced that it had been kitted out to sell pasties two years before, at a cost of £30,000. Whether this was true or not Polly couldn’t say, but it looked absolutely perfect. Which was probably, she reflected, why it was twice as expensive as everything else for sale in the category.

She was still looking at it when Reuben came in. She had been worried about him; worried that he’d have lost his swagger, his chippy requirement to tell everyone how well he was doing. But she needn’t have been; as she was ordering her second, shamefully expensive elderflower and ginger beer drink, he bounced in on his ridiculous limited edition Kanye West trainers – Polly only knew this because he’d mentioned the fact so repeatedly she was surprised the insolvency people hadn’t taken them away – his wide, freckled Norman Rockwell face as cheery as ever.

‘Hey!’ said Polly, delighted to see him. ‘How are you?’

‘I am fantastic,’ said Reuben. ‘Cheerfully triumphing over minor setbacks!’

‘I see that,’ said Polly. She glanced out onto the street. ‘How did you get here?’

He grimaced slightly at that.

‘Can you believe they took my Segway? How am I meant to get around now?’

He waved his hand at a member of staff who was peering at his phone.

‘Flat white.’

‘Um,’ said Polly, as the waiter carried right on looking at his phone. ‘He doesn’t work for you.’

‘He does right now,’ said Reuben. ‘Whilst I’m sitting in his coffee shop.’

‘Yes, but he won’t see it like that,’ said Polly. ‘You have to say please.’

‘Why do I have to say please? I’m giving him money for it. And if he was actually getting it for me, I’d be giving him extra money for that too.’

Reuben said this loudly – he said everything loudly – which appeared to have the required effect, as the bearded waiter pushed himself off the counter slowly.

Reuben took his flat white with some satisfaction, but without saying thank you.

‘So you don’t mind being semi-retired?’ said Polly.

Reuben shook his head.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ he said. ‘I’m working more than ever. And I’m finally getting enough sex.’

The rest of the coffee shop pretended not to be earwigging. This wasn’t very much like a business meeting, thought Polly. And also: how could Reuben and Kerensa possibly be having
more
sex? Then she thought about how much she missed Huckle, and blushed.

‘Anyway,’ she said. She showed him the van she’d found on the Internet.

‘Oh yes,’ said Reuben. ‘I like it.’

‘So what do I do?’ said Polly. ‘I mean, how do I put this kind of thing together?’

Reuben turned her laptop towards him.

‘What is this computer? How old is this? It’s rubbish. How can you even carry it around with you? Mine is made out of NASA titanium. It weighs four ounces.’

‘I don’t know what that is,’ said Polly patiently.

‘You can spin it on one finger,’ said Reuben. ‘This is a terrible computer. I want to buy you a new one.’

‘Didn’t your computer get taken away?’ said Polly.

‘Hmm,’ grumbled Reuben.

He started a new spreadsheet. He typed unbelievably quickly.

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Business plan 101.’

‘What’s 101?’

Reuben looked at her and grinned.

‘Stop looking so nervous, kid.’

Polly glanced at the picture of the van again.

‘I have run a business,’ she said. ‘I do know a bit. It’s just… So many things seem to fail. Everything seems to fall apart.’

‘Don’t be stupid,’ said Reuben. ‘Of course they do. That’s how it works.’

He smiled at her encouragingly.

‘Do you know how many failed start-ups I ran before we hit it big?’

Polly shook her head and shrugged.

‘Nine! Nine of the fuckers. But I didn’t care, because I knew I could make it. Then I did make it. Then it all went to shit again.’

He raised his spoon and his voice.

‘But you carry on! You get it back! All you have to believe is that you are awesome.’

‘I’m kind of average,’ said Polly, tentatively.

‘You live in a freaking lighthouse! You. Are. AWESOME!’ said Reuben. ‘Not as awesome as me, since you never owned a helicopter. But apart from that…’

Polly looked at him.

‘Say it!’

‘I’m not going to say it! I’m British!’

‘SAY IT!’ Reuben turned round to the waiter, who was now leaning against the wall. ‘You say it too; get yourself out of this coffee shop and into doing whatever it is you and your beard really want to do for a job.’

The nonchalant waiter perked up suddenly.

‘I want to be a film editor, man.’

‘Awesome,’ said Reuben. ‘That’s an awesome thing to want to be. Go do it!’

‘Reuben!’ said Polly. ‘This isn’t
The Wolf of Wall Street
.’

‘Everything is,’ said Reuben, who thought that film was both the best film ever made, and completely aspirational.

‘Do you want this or not? Do you want to succeed or not? Do you want your life to get better or not?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then say it.’

Polly sighed.

‘SAY IT!’

‘I am awesome,’ she said, quietly.

‘Louder,’ said Reuben.

‘I am awesome,’ she said at a normal volume.

‘LOUDER!’

‘I. AM. AWESOME!’ screamed the bearded waiter suddenly. Then he tore off his apron, threw it on the floor and marched out the door.

Reuben and Polly watched him go in surprise.

‘Aha, free drinks,’ said Reuben. ‘Awesome.’

 

 

They stayed in the café, heads together, for two hours, and hammered out the basics and structure of a solid yet flexible business plan.

Polly had learned a lot from running the graphic design business with her ex, even if it had ultimately failed. She had also picked up plenty from watching Gillian Manse deal with the books – she had been very efficient; too efficient, in fact. The old bakery had managed to cling on by virtue of good solid money management far longer than it ought to have done. Polly wondered if an earlier retirement might have led to a happier, longer life for Mrs Manse.

But she wasn’t distracted for long: she was soon pulled back into the world of profit and loss accounts and offset capital expenditure. This was as close as she had ever seen Reuben to working. He was completely and utterly engrossed, and his fierce concentration didn’t let up for a second. For the first time she could absolutely see why this short geek had taken over the world, and why you wouldn’t ever bet against him doing exactly the same again one day.

‘Do this,’ he said. ‘Use Huckle’s money; the bank can’t help you, although you can open a small business account, which lets you bank free for six months. Make sure you get that.’

Polly nodded.

‘I’ll come and look at the van with you. But your job now is to charm City Hall into granting you that trading licence. Print out pictures of the van. Even if you don’t get it, I think the fact that it looks so pretty will help you a lot. And you’re only asking to set it up in a car park, after all. I can’t see it will be that much of a problem; they let ice cream vans come past, don’t they?’

‘Not up to town,’ said Polly, thinking of the terrible blow it would be to both Muriel’s shop and the chippy if their precious Wall’s concessions were challenged. Cornetto money from the hot days of summer kept them going right through the deep storms of winter. And she was trying to do this to someone else’s business.

‘Well, speak to them anyway. Then they’ll probably need to inspect the van.’

‘You know a lot about this,’ said Polly.

‘No,’ said Reuben. ‘I’m just assuming they might like to check from time to time to make sure you’re not selling rat juice. Were you planning on selling rat juice?’

Polly shook her head. Reuben got up, then carefully shook out his wallet and left enough money to cover his own coffee. Polly did the same with her cordials.

‘Gotta respect the small businesses, man,’ said Reuben, patting the door frame of the café as they left. ‘Gotta respect ’em all.’

He gave Polly a light kiss on the cheek.

‘Right. I’m off home. Talking about business plans always makes me feel sexy.’

Polly rolled her eyes and followed his gaze. Parked behind the café was a tiny, glittering, incredibly expensive-looking micro-scooter.

‘Seriously?’ she said.

‘Oh yeah,’ said Reuben. ‘Totally. I hid it in a hedge. Okay. What are you?’

Polly smiled at him. He’d been a proper tonic.

‘Um, awesome?’

Reuben shook his head and got on his scooter.

‘Nope.’

Polly was confused.

‘What then?’

‘FUCKING AWESOME!’ he screamed, scooting away in his ridiculous trainers, highly expensive three-quarter-length trousers and designer sunglasses. As he vanished down the vertiginous hill narrowly missing a woman struggling with a huge buggy, Polly heard a faint echo on the breeze.