Page 42 of False Comeback

I was a lot like my uncle—always needing background noise and some kind of external stimulation. Neither of us could sit still for long, and we both hated total silence.

When I stepped into the kitchen, I stopped dead and stared in stunned silence at the towering… thing my uncle was standing beside, grinning excitedly.

“What the hell is that?”

“It’s called a croquembouche,” he told me proudly. “Some fancy French word. Don’t know what the fuck it means.”

Slowly, I looked around at the state of the small kitchen. Broken eggs were everywhere. A bag of flour had tipped onto its side, spilling its contents over the counter. A stick of butter was half-melted in its open wrapper and dripping down a cabinet. There was an acrid smell in the air, like burnt sugar, and several pans coated in an orangey-black crust were piled up in the sink. The top one was still lightly smoking.

“Did you make it?” I asked in disbelief.

“Yep.” Rob snagged his open beer can from the counter and sipped. “Took me all fucking day too. Started at six this morning. Been making cream puffs for goddamn hours.”

“Why?” I asked, slowly walking forward to inspect the… what had he called it? Cock something.

It didn’t look like any cock I’d ever seen.

And I’d seen a lot of cocks.

“I’m getting into baking,” Rob told me, picking up a dripping eggshell and throwing it into the sink.

I snorted. “Have you forgotten the cake you made for my fourteenth birthday? The inside of it was liquid. When I cut into it, the batter poured all over my lap.”

“That’s why I’m learning,” he insisted, nudging me with his beer can and nodding at the big cone-shaped cock thing. “Good, eh?”

“It’s…” I tilted my head and eyed it, hesitantly asking, “So is this a… beginner recipe?”

“Nah.” Rob tipped his can toward an open recipe book on the counter, its pages covered in dried egg yolk. “Didn’t want to start small. Thought I’d go for a showstopper to begin with.”

I peered down at the page.

“Croquembouche,” I read out, probably mangling the word, then huffed. “Rob, it says this is an advanced recipe. With advanced techniques. There’s not starting small and then there’s… this.” I looked up at the croquembouche towering beside us. “Is it supposed to be… tilting like that?”

“It’s just rustic.” As he said it, one of the oddly shaped cream puffs making up the cone slowly peeled away from the others and splatted onto the counter, thick yellow cream shooting out of it from the impact.

“What’s the stuff inside?” I asked in mild alarm.

Rob cackled, nudging my arm. “Pastry cream, you uncouth swine. Like a fancy version of the stuff you get in a tub at the store.”

“I like the stuff in a tub.”

“Yeah, well, I wanted to try making it.” He gestured at another saucepan on the stove, so I walked over and peered down, trying not to make a face at the oily, congealed lump inside.

“Is it supposed to look like that?” I asked doubtfully.

“My first attempt split.” Rob paused. “No, wait, I think that one was my fourth attempt. But I got there in the end.”

“Well, it’s very… impressive.” I turned back to look at the croquembouche. Another cream puff was slowly peeling away from the towering stack. “What made you decide to learn how to bake?”

Suddenly, Uncle Rob was very interested in the pan of cold, congealing pastry cream. He picked up a wooden spoon and poked at it, keeping his gaze averted.

A slow grin spread over my face. “Did you make that cock-on-boosh for a lady friend, Rob?”

“It’s croquembouche, you heathen,” he said, then grunted. “I may have met a nice lady at pickleball a few weeks ago.”

“Oh yeah?” My grin widened as I pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and sat down, not realising it was covered in a fine layer of burnt strings of caramel until I rested my arms on it and they got stuck. “What’s she like?”

“She’s a fae.” He shook his head and reached for the fridge. “Prettiest thing you’ve ever seen. Got this… big explosion of puffy white hair. Like cotton candy. And she’s French. Moved here recently.”