Free A Spoonful of Sugar by Kerry Barrett Page A

in the middle, and a coconut chicken curry pot pie on the bottom. It was a family recipe, passed down from his Jamaican mum and he was very secretive about it.
    ‘I’m not saying anything,’ he teased Harry as she asked him about it. ‘Ask June about hers.’
    Frustrated, Harry turned her attention to June, who was more than pleased to chat,
    ‘I’ve got pie tins that belonged to my grandmother,’ she said. ‘They’re iron. Very heavy – you wouldn’t want to drop them. They’d cost a fortune if you bought them nowadays.’
    ‘How lovely,’ Harry said. ‘I’m using one of my mum’s recipes, too.’
    I was a bit cross I hadn’t thought of doing that, but I pretended not to hear their conversation, as I pored over my notes, once again convinced that I’d be going home for good at the end of the day.
    Actually, things didn’t go too badly to begin with. I started out making my pastry. All three of mine had the same crust, which is why I was worried I’d over-simplified things. Everyone else was making three different types of pastry so it seemed I was right to be concerned, but it was too late to change it now. I simply had to make sure it was the best it could be.
    Like this morning, everything went well. I put my pastry in the fridge to chill and started making my fillings. I was frying off my chicken when Harry appeared at my side.
    ‘I’ve forgotten my sodding heart-shaped cutter,’ she hissed. One of her pies was filled with strawberries. Its lid was made out of overlapping hearts cut from the pastry and sprinkled with pink sugar – which looked amazing and which would obviously be a complete nightmare to do if she had to cut each tiny heart by hand.
    ‘You can get it,’ I said under my breath. ‘Just do it subtly.’
    ‘I can’t do it subtly,’ Harry said, nodding back to her bench where Peter was peering at her chopped-up apples. ‘Because sodding Peter thought he was helping and he unpacked my bag for me. He knows there’s nothing else in it.’
    I smiled at her.
    ‘Want me to get it?’ I asked.
    Harry looked annoyed.
    ‘Well, obviously,’ she said.
    ‘Say please,’ I said.
    ‘Oh for god’s sake,’ said Harry. ‘I’ll get it myself, I just need your bag.’
    I giggled and picked up my enormous canvas bag, which was tucked under my bench, and delved inside.
    ‘Yes, I picked up your heart-shaped cutter,’ I said more loudly. ‘It’s in here somewhere.’
    Inside the bag, I waggled my fingers and felt the slight shudder as the magic worked and my hand closed round the cutter. I pulled it out and gave it to Harry. She gave me an affectionate punch – at least, I thought it was affectionate – and went back to her workbench, glancing at June as she went by. She’d filled one of her grandmother’s tins, and the others lay on her bench waiting for their pastry.
    I carried on cooking my chicken, trying not to look at Wilf. He was creating something of a masterpiece, arranging his bacon, eggs and sausages inside his breakfast pie. I knew he was a better baker than me and that he should really make the final three but I still felt a flutter of competitiveness inside.
    ‘How are you getting on?’ Peter and Lizzie were on the prowl and had come to see what I was up to.
    I ran through my pies and winced as Peter frowned.
    ‘Same pastry for each one?’ he said.
    ‘Yes,’ I said, my chin lifted in defiance. ‘But it’s really good pastry.’
    He gave me a brief, humourless smile. ‘It had better be,’ he said.
    They went to move on to see what Wilf was doing, but as they turned to go, there was a huge clatter, like the clang of a gong.
    We all whirled round, to see June flat out on the floor, one of her grandmother’s tins spinning next to her. She was clutching her foot, which I could see was already turning purple and swelling furiously.
    ‘Oh Lord,’ said Lizzie, rushing to June’s side and kneeling down – the woman was amazingly flexible for her age. ‘What