I Couldn't Help Myself

I COULDN’T HELP MYSELF

Now

“Hello, Mrs. Wright. My name is Detective Terry Waits. This is my partner Detective Carlos Ito.” Waits nodded towards her partner. “We’d like to ask you a few questions about the death of your husband, Craig.”

Maisie looked from one detective to the other.  

“Why?” she asked. “He died of anaphylaxis. That’s what the paramedics said. Because he ate the pie.”

Waits smiled. She never wanted to seem threatening to people she was interviewing. Especially on the worst day of their lives.

“As far as we know, you’re right. He died from ingesting nuts.”

Maisie shook her head.

“Idiot man! I told him not to eat the pie. Does he ever listen to me? No, he does not. Now look what happened.”

1997

Maisie and Craig had been dating for a couple of years, and now they were getting married — tomorrow! Maisie was excited. Everything was ready — she was on top of it all. There wasn’t a detail she hadn’t considered. All she had left to do was her hair, and that appointment was for tomorrow.

She walked into her kitchen, and screamed.

“Wha?” asked Craig, mouth full, chewing.

“What are you doing?”

Craig swallowed.  

“I know that I’m not supposed to see you on the day before the wedding, but, I couldn’t stay away.”

Maisie’s mouth hung open in shock.

“That’s not what I’m talking about, Craig.”  

She stood there, dumbfounded, shaking her head, tears welling in her eyes.

“What have you done?” she asked. Her tears started to fall. “What have you done?” she asked again.  

Craig looked at her, confused. He shovelled another forkful into his mouth.

“Wha?”

Maisie’s hands flew up to her face, and she started to cry in earnest. Craig got up from the table and moved to comfort her. He was still confused, but he knew it was the right thing to do.

Maisie dropped her hands, and backed away.

“How could you?” she asked.

Craig stood there, looking around.

“What did I do?” he asked. 

She looked at him. “You’re eating our wedding cake!”

He looked from Maisie to the wedding cake.

“That’s our wedding cake? I didn’t know.”

Now she was angry.

“How could you not know! There’s a bride and groom on top!”

“Oh, that’s what those are.” He tried to look sheepish. “I’m sorry. But you make such fantastic cakes, and it looked so good. I’m sorry. I couldn’t help myself.”

2005

Maisie’s friend Jenna always raved about Maisie’s pies and cakes. She said they were the best she had ever eaten. The crusts on the pies were light and fluffy, the cake moist and delicious, the cookies chewy and soft.  

Jenna was having an engagement party. She and her long-time boyfriend were getting married, finally. They were having a party to celebrate the upcoming nuptials. And she asked Maisie to make the cakes and pies and petit fours and cookies — everything — for the party. All the desserts were going to be made by Maisie. And she would pay Maisie, handsomely! This would be Maisie’s first paid baking gig. She was super excited. 

If this goes well, Maisie thought, maybe I can make baking my second act after I retire.  

When she told Craig all about it, he was almost as excited as Maisie — but for completely different reasons — Maisie’s delicious, irresistible baking would be available. Sorta.

Maisie took two days off from work to get a head-start on the baking. Most of the things had to be baked the night before, but she could assemble the ingredients, and make the icing and the fondant, and the jam for the petit fours, even the pie crusts. That way, she’d be able to hit the ground running.

Maisie worked tirelessly. Jenna was expecting about one hundred people to the party. That meant six pies, four dozen petit fours, eight dozen cookies, and one spectacular three tier cake made to Jenna’s exacting standards, with roses and vines and the couple’s names in cursive encircling the cake. It took Maisie almost twelve hours to bake and decorate the cake alone.

She turned to look at Craig, who was watching intently from the doorway of the kitchen.

“Don’t you even think about it!” she said.

Craig knew Maisie’s serious face, and he was looking at it.

“Cross my heart, hope to die,” he said literally crossing his heart. “I will not even look at the cake!”

The next morning, after baking well into the early hours of Saturday, Maisie finished up all the last minute details, and started to load the goodies into her car. Because she was also a guest she had to drop off the pastries and set up the dessert table, and still have time to get back home to get ready.

She picked up the first box of cookies.

“No, no, no, no!”  

It felt light. Each box held three dozen cookies. She opened the lid and counted. Two dozen.

“Craig!” she yelled marching through the house, carrying the box. “Craig!”

“What?”

“Explain how, after you promised you wouldn’t eat any of the desserts, you ate a dozen — any entire dozen — cookies?”

Craig looked confused.

“I said I wouldn’t touch the cake, I didn’t say anything about the cookies! I couldn’t help myself.”

In that moment, Maisie knew that she could commit murder.

2020

Maisie was doing more baking than ever. In fact, she had more customers she knew what do with, especially around the holidays. She had retired early from her job as an epidemiologist (just in time, it would seem), and had started a commercial bakery in her basement. There was no storefront, just word-of-mouth and social media. Maisie met with customers at their homes or offices, and showed them examples from her portfolio.

One man who had been referred to Maisie by Jenna (the missing dozen cookies notwithstanding), had wanted to surprise his partner on Valentine’s Day. He and Maisie planned an elaborate red velvet cake, a dozen chocolate covered strawberries, and a dozen truffle hearts with the corny sayings from SweetHearts candies on them. It was going to be perfect.

By this point in her marriage to Craig, Maisie knew to check her finished product well before the customer was expected to arrive. In the years that she had been baking commercially, there had been too many times that Craig had decided that he deserved the baking more than the customer did.  

She counted the chocolate covered strawberries — twelve. Perfect. Then the truffles — twelve as well. When she opened the box that held the cake, her face fell.

How could he?

Did he disrespect her that much?

Craig had very precisely carved off a half inch on the bottom of the cake. To look at it, you couldn’t tell based on height, but he’d messed up the icing hearts that encircled the cake — there was half a heart instead of a full heart. It was going to take hours to redecorate the cake.

Maisie put down the cake, and stomped upstairs where she found Craig watching something stupid on television.

“Out!”

“What?”

“Get out! Now!”

“What?”

“This is the last time that I am going to have you sabotage my work. I want you gone! Now!”

Craig got up.

“I couldn’t help myself,” he said as he went upstairs to start packing his clothes.

2022

“Okay, Maisie, why are you here today?” asked Dr. Marion Peters.

Maisie looked from the therapist to Craig.

“I want a divorce. Craig doesn’t. We’re here to see if we can work it out. Craig’s idea, not mine.”

“Okay. Thank you,” said the doctor. “And Craig, why are you here?”

“Because I love my wife. We’ve been separated for two years, and now Maisie wants a divorce. I think, with your help, we can make this work again.” He looked to Maisie. “I love you and miss you.”

Dr. Peters looked at Maisie.

“How do you feel about what Craig just said?”

Maisie shrugged. “I don’t think this is going to work, but I’ll try.”

“Good, good,” said the doctor. “An open mind is important. So, Maisie, why do you think that this isn’t going to work?”

Maisie turned to look at Craig before she returned to look at Dr. Peters.

“Because he can’t be trusted.”

Dr. Peters looked confused, and skimmed her notes.

“Craig, were you unfaithful to Maisie?”

“No. No. Never. I love Maisie with all my heart. It’s just she doesn’t feel like I respect her.”

“How so?"

“Well, Maisie is the best baker in the world. People from all over order her cakes and desserts. She's amazing. It’s just,” he paused, considering his next words. “It’s just that I love her baking, as well. To paraphrase Kathy Bates in Misery, ‘I’m her number one fan.’ And sometimes I just can’t help myself. I’ll sneak a little taste of what she’s baking, and that angers her. A lot.”

Maisie looked at Craig, blinking her eyes, not believing what she just heard.

“You’re kidding right?” She turned to look at the therapist. “He ate our wedding cake the day before our wedding. It took me all night to remake the cake.”

“You could have covered up where I took the slice out of, with, I don’t know, a bunch of icing, or something. It wasn’t a big deal.”

“Not a big deal?” Maisie shot Craig daggers. “Not A Big Deal? Are you kidding? It was our wedding cake. Everyone knew I made it!”

“Okay,” said Dr. Peters. “I can see that this is still a sore spot with you. What else Maisie?”

“Once I started baking professionally and charging people for the product, Craig would think nothing of helping himself to a dozen cookies, or a slice of pie, or an assortment of goodies that I cooked, meaning that, at the last minute, I had to redo the order. He once ate a dozen cookies. A dozen! Who does that? That’s NOT sneaking a little taste!”

Craig looked sheepish, but equally peeved.

“You know, Maisie, you never once offered to make me all the goodies that you make for other people.” He crossed his arms across his chest. “Book club, bake a pie, but nothing for Craig. Someone died, make something for the family, but nothing for Craig. Bake sale at the school, lots and lots of cakes and pies to sell, but nothing for Craig. How am I supposed to feel?” Another pause. “Neglected, Doctor, that’s how I feel.”

He looked from Dr. Peters to Maisie, but once he got a look at her face — her angry face — he switched his gaze back to the therapist. He continued, “You know, it wouldn’t kill her to make a bit more for me, would it?”

Maisie took a big, deep, breath before she started to talk, centring herself, trying to regain her calm.

“Are. You. Kidding. Me? You can’t be serious. First off, baking is my job — JOB! I get paid to do it. I don’t sabotage your job. But you are constantly sabotaging mine. And second, you have more than enough baking from me. Who gets all the trial desserts? You. Who gets any cancelled orders? You do. And, do I not ask you what I can bake for you? Even now that you’re living in the garage, I still bake for you.” Maisie mimicked Craig’s crossed arms. “Tell the doctor I don’t bake for you. I dare you!”

Craig’s face lost its bravado. He slumped in his chair and put his hands in his lap. “It’s like I only get the not-good-enough treats — the seconds. Just once I’d like you to make me a red velvet valentine’s day cake, not some stranger.”

Maisie looked at Craig, and shook her head. “You are such a baby. That’s the reason we’re not together. Eating the desserts is just a manifestation of your childish behaviour. You seem to think that my job is just a hobby. You hate it that people love my baking as much as you do, and are willing to pay for it. I think that you want me to only bake for you, because if I did, it would prove to you that I love you the most, and you are the most important person in my life.” She took a deep breath. “You were the most important person in my life, until you started sabotaging my work. That’s the reason that we separated — not your eating the desserts I prepared for others, even though I begged you hundreds of times not to touch the food. You just couldn’t help yourself. Boo hoo hoo. Babies can’t help themselves. And I don’t need to cajole a man-baby because his ego is too fragile to handle the concept that I am independent and that people like my baking.”

Now

“I understand that you and Mr. Wright were estranged,” said Waits.

“We are … were separated. He lives in the apartment above the garage. He has his own entrance.”

“And you run your business out of your home?”

“I do. I have all the proper permits, and I am subject to regular health department checks.”

“Good, good.” Waits looked down at her notes. “Can you explain to me how Mr. Wright happened to be in your work kitchen. Does he work with you?”

Maisie shook her head. “Noooooo. I’d never make any profit if Craig worked with me. No. He has keys to the house, and I have keys to his place. It’s just more convenient that way.” She paused. “Although we have an understanding that we can’t go into each other’s home without permission.” She paused. “We had an understanding. He wasn't supposed to be there.”

Waits took out a number of photos from the commercial kitchen, and turned them around so that Maisie could see them. There was Craig, laying on the floor, facedown, a smashed plate with the remnants of pie beside him, a fork on the counter beside the pie with one piece missing. The pictures also showed the an EpiPen clenched in Criag’s hand.

“What was Craig allergic to, specifically?” Waits asked, pointing to the EpiPen?”

“Nuts. All nuts.”

“There were nuts in the pie?”

“Yes. In the crust.”

“And you left it out, knowing Craig was allergic?”

“He wasn’t supposed to be in the kitchen. Plus, if you look at the counter—” Maisie pointed to the photo. “The pie was covered with a glass cloche, and—” she pointed to another photo, “I put a warning on the cloche: ‘DO NOT EAT THIS PIE, CRAIG! THERE ARE NUTS IN IT! LEAVE IT ALONE!’ But he ate it anyways. And died.”

“Your fingerprints are on the EpiPen. Why is that?”

“I have EpiPens all over the kitchen. This is not the first time that Craig has eaten something with nuts in it, after I’ve told him not to. He’s been to the hospital a number of times because of it.”

“But he died this time. Why do you think that happened?”

Maisie looked up at the ceiling. “He ate the pie, knowing it had nuts in it. I guess he couldn’t help himself.”

*****

Waits and Ito watched Maisie through the one-way glass.

“Do you think she did it?” asked Ito.

“Yup,” said Waits.

“Why?”

Waits thought for a moment. “If, like she said, he’s gone into anaphylaxis before, why did he die this time? Why didn’t the EpiPen work? He had time to call nine-one-one, but he still died before the paramedics arrived. The EpiPen should have saved him.”

Ito shook his head. “She was at a consultation when he died. How could she have done it? She couldn’t have set up the scene.”

“Her finger prints weren’t of the glass pie cover.”

“The cloche?”

“Yeah, the cloche,” said Waits. “But they should have been. It’s her kitchen.”

Ito thought a moment. “True.”

“But,” said Waits, “I don’t think we can prove she killed her husband. Unless she confesses, or we find some other evidence that points to her guilt, like she tampered with the EpiPen. I think she’s going to walk.”

“Shame,” said Ito. “I hate it when that happens. Why do you think she did it?”

“I think we’re gong to find that she couldn’t help herself.”