A Winning Recipe for Us

*This story is a warm, nostalgic take on a couple exploring their edges together, like a birthday gift that keeps unwrapping itself. Thanks for reading. I hope it leaves you smiling the way it left me.*

My name is Delores, I'm thirty-five years old as of today, and I spent my birthday standing at a registration table in the community center, adjusting an apron I had already adjusted four times.

"You're going to wear a hole in that strap," Derrick said. He leaned in and kissed my cheek. "Happy birthday, honey."

"Thanks." I smoothed the apron again anyway. "I just want it to look right for the photos."

"It looks right. You look right." He tugged at the strap himself, straightening it, then stepped back to check me over. "There. Now stop fussing!"

Derrick is thirty-eight, a dentist like me, which is how we met. A dental conference six years ago, of all places. Four years married. He was wearing the green shirt I bought him last fall and he had that look on his face, the one he gets when he can tell I'm wound up and he's deciding whether to say something about it.

"You've been restless all week," he said.

"It's a contest, Derrick. Of course I've been restless."

"It's more than the contest." He held up his hands before I could answer. "I'm not complaining. I like it when you get like this. I just want to make sure you're having fun today. That's the whole point of your birthday."

"I'm having fun." I picked up my registration form and my number card. "Ask me again after the judging."

The hall was set up the way it always is for the Springtown Charity Bake-Off. Rows of folding tables with checkered cloths, a raised platform at the front for the judges, and a little room off the side where they keep the cooling racks. That side room had a sign on it that said CONSULTATIONS, which made it sound more official than it was. Mostly it was where contestants went to have a small crisis in private.

I found my table, number fourteen, and set out my lavender honey cake. I had been working on that recipe for two months. The honey came from a farm stand outside town. The lavender I grew myself in a planter box Derrick built me last spring. The crumb came out dense and even, the frosting was a pale purple that didn't look like a chemistry experiment, and I had piped a border of tiny rosettes around the edge at five in the morning because I couldn't sleep.

Derrick leaned over the table with his hands behind his back, like a man at a museum.

"Can I touch it?"

"No!"

"Can I smell it?"

"You may admire it from a respectful distance."

He laughed. "It looks good, Del. Really. I'd eat it right now if you'd let me."

"You have to wait like everyone else." I tucked a loose rosette back into line with one finger. "They slice it at judging. Nobody eats before judging, that's the rules."

"You read the rules twice."

"I read the rules four times."

* * *

The hall filled up through the afternoon. Locals mostly, the same crowd that turns out for everything in Springtown. Kids running between the tables until a parent caught them. The school principal holding a coffee and a slice of somebody's lemon bar. I knew half the faces and knew the other half by their casseroles.

Fred ran the whole thing. Fred owns the bakery on Main Street, the one with the line out the door on Saturdays. He is thirty-six, divorced two years back, tall, dark hair going a little silver at the temples, and he carries himself as a man who knows exactly how good his bread is. His assistant Dottie ran the registration table while he worked the room. Dottie is thirty-four, chatty, always laughing at something. She had pinned a ribbon to her shirt that said ASK ME ABOUT THE RAFFLE.

At four o'clock Fred climbed onto the judging platform and tapped the microphone twice.

"Alright, everybody. Thank you all for coming out. This year we raised more for the library fund than we ever have, so give yourselves a hand for that." He waited through the clapping. "Now. The judges have tasted one hundred and nine entries today. My dentist is going to be busy next week."

A laugh went through the crowd. Derrick looked sideways at me and grinned.

"The three finalists, in no particular order. Mrs. Patricia Boyle, for her apple slab pie." Applause. "Young Charlie Webb, twenty-two years old, for his sourdough, which I'm told took him three days and one very patient girlfriend." More applause. Dottie whistled through her fingers.

"And third." Fred looked down at his card, then out at the room. "Delores Whitmore, for her lavender honey cake."

I don't remember if I clapped for the other two. Derrick was squeezing my arm and the woman next to us was saying congratulations and I was thinking, I made the top three, on my birthday, with a cake I invented in my own kitchen.

Fred's eyes came around the room and landed on my table. On me. He held there a beat longer than he needed to, then smiled, said "Congratulations to all three finalists, judging resumes in one hour," and stepped down off the platform.

Dottie came over with a little card and a pen.

"Just need your signature confirming you're in the final round," she said. "Also, off the record, that cake is gorgeous. I tried to steal a corner piece during setup and Fred slapped my hand."

"Off the record I appreciate that."

"Happy birthday, by the way. It's on your form. Fred saw it and said we should sing but I told him nobody wants that."

"Thank you, Dottie. Really."

I signed the card and she moved on to Patricia Boyle's table. Derrick put his hands on my shoulders.

"You did it," he said. "Top three. I told you the rosettes were the right call."

"You said the rosettes were 'a lot,' which is what you said about my wedding dress."

"And I was wrong about the dress too." He kissed the top of my head. "I'm going to get us some water. Don't touch the cake."

"I never touch the cake."

* * *

The hour break was the longest hour of my life. I walked the hall twice, looked at Patricia's pie, looked at the kid's sourdough, and stood near my own table like a guard. Derrick found me partway through and we just leaned on a wall together, which is something we've always been good at.

"Thirty-five feels fine so far," he said.

"Ask me at eight."

He laughed and slid an arm around my waist. "You know what I was thinking about on the drive over? That conference in Chicago. First time I saw you, you were arguing with a guy about floss technique and you were winning."

"He was wrong."

"You were winning and you were enjoying it." He nodded toward the front of the hall. "You're enjoying this the same way. I like seeing it."

Then Fred was there, in front of our table, with a clipboard under his arm and a stack of scoring sheets. He's taller up close. He smelled like his bakery, butter and yeast, which sounds like a joke but is just true.

"Mrs. Whitmore." He held out my scoring sheet. "Congratulations again."

"Thank you. And it's Delores."

"Delores, then." He handed the sheet over and his fingers brushed mine on the exchange, brief, probably an accident, maybe not. "I wanted to say something about your cake, if you have a minute."

"Sure."

"The honey and the lavender, the balance on that is hard. Most people go heavy on the lavender and it tastes like soap." He shook his head. "Yours doesn't. Yours tastes like somebody who actually understands what she's doing."

"Thank you." I could feel myself standing a little straighter. "The lavender is fresh. I grow it. Dried lavender is where most people lose the plot."

"There it is." He pointed at me with the clipboard. "I knew it. Fresh. You can taste when the flower's been picked that week. So what's the honey, is it local?"

"Farm stand out past the grain elevators. Wildflower, mostly."

"Good honey, that stand. I buy from them for the almond cakes." He glanced down at the sheet in my hand. "Your crumb structure too. Even all the way through. Do you weigh your flour or scoop it?"

"Weigh. Always."

"Weigh." He said it like a verdict. "See, this is why I like the contest. Patricia's pie is excellent, don't get me wrong, but she's been making the same pie for thirty years and she knows it. You made something new and you got it right. That's harder."

I laughed. "You're going to make my head too big to get through the door."

"Just telling you what the sheet says." He tapped the clipboard. "One more thing. When the judging's done tonight, come find me. There's something I want to talk to you about."

"About the cake?"

"Sort of." He smiled, and it was the kind of smile that made me aware of my own mouth. "After the judging. Enjoy your evening, Delores."

He walked off toward the platform. I watched him go for about two seconds longer than I meant to, then turned around and Derrick was standing there with two cups of water and an expression I couldn't quite read.

"What did he want?" he asked.

"Technique questions." I took a cup. "He liked the honey."

"Huh." Derrick looked over at Fred, then back at me. "Well. Good. That's good, Del."

The microphone squealed and Fred's voice came over the speakers telling everyone the final round was beginning. My heart was loud in my ears and I told myself it was just the contest, just the birthday, just wanting to win something for once.

"Alright," I said. "Let's go win this thing."

The final round took another hour. They made us stand by our tables while a second set of judges came through, and this time Fred was one of them. He tried my cake again, chewed slow, wrote something on his sheet, and nodded at me like we shared a secret. Patricia watched him from two tables over with her arms crossed.

Derrick stood beside me the whole time. He didn't say much, but I could feel him looking at me, and once or twice I caught him looking at Fred looking at me.

When the judges finally filed back up to the platform, he leaned in close to my ear.

"So," he said. "That was something."

"What was something?"

"The baker. Fred. You two were talking about flour for ten minutes and I felt like I was eavesdropping on a date."

"Derrick. It was flour."

"He touched your hand."

"It was a scoring sheet transfer, not a rendezvous." I elbowed him lightly. "What is wrong with you?"

He didn't answer right away, and that was the strange part. I expected him to laugh it off. Instead he watched Fred on the platform, then looked at me, and his face held an expression I had not seen recently. Not jealousy. Something warmer than that.

"It was kind of exciting," he said, quiet. "Watching him light up over your cake. Watching you light up over him noticing."

"Excuse me?"

"Come on, Del. I'm not blind. And I'm not mad. I don't know how to explain it. It was like watching you be the version of you I met in Chicago. It was hot, honestly."

I stared at him. "You're saying you found that hot."

"In a way, yes. Which surprises me too." He rubbed his jaw. "Look, after this is over, there's usually drinks at the community center, right? The after-party thing. What if we ask him to join us? Just for a drink. He clearly likes talking to you, and honestly I'd like to talk to him too."

"This is my birthday, not a science experiment."

"I know. And you've had a great birthday. But you keep looking over there like you left the oven on." He shrugged. "One drink. If it's weird, we go home."

I thought about it for maybe three seconds. "Fine. One drink."

He grinned and kissed my temple. "Happy birthday to me too, apparently."

* * *

They announced the results at seven. Patricia Boyle took third, which she accepted with a nod like she'd already cleared shelf space. Charlie Webb took second and whooped loud enough that his girlfriend had to shush him. And then Fred leaned into the microphone, looked right at me, and said my name.

First place. The lavender honey cake. Two months of planter boxes and farm stand honey and practice loaves that came out like soap.

Derrick grabbed me and hugged me so hard I squeaked. The crowd clapped, Dottie whistled from the side of the stage, and Fred handed me a little ribbon and a wooden spoon painted gold, which was apparently the actual trophy in Springtown.

"Congratulations, Delores," he said, low, just for me. "Told you. New and right."

I held the spoon like it was an Oscar, and I'm not ashamed.

The after-party was in the hall's back room, folding tables pushed to the walls, coffee urns, a sad vegetable tray, and wine that the library volunteers had donated from somewhere. Derrick fetched us two plastic cups of red and we claimed a corner near the wall, our usual habitat.

Fred appeared maybe ten minutes later, out of his judge clipboard mode, sleeves rolled up, holding a cup of coffee.

"The winner," he said. "And her husband. Mind if I sit? Dottie's handling the teardown and she runs it like a naval operation, so I'm useless over there."

"Please," Derrick said, and kicked a chair out for him.

"Delores Whitmore. First place." Fred sat down and shook his head. "Patricia is going to sulk about that pie for a month. Fair warning, she knows where you live."

"I'll lock the doors."

"Lock the pantry. She'll find a way in through the flour."

Derrick laughed, and I watched the two of them click into an easy rhythm the way people sometimes do, and I wondered how I'd ended up in the middle of it.

"You're the dentist, right?" Fred asked him. "Dottie mentioned it. She remembers everything, it's honestly unsettling."