Everyone Wants Holly Parker's Cake
Snoot Story #30
HOLLY PARKER boarded American Air flight 642 to Atlanta at 10:35 a.m. She was exhausted-10 a.m. to a night owl felt like 5:45 to a normal person. She shuffled to seat 14B, where two mildly annoyed businessmen registered her presence and inched over like giant caterpillars. She sat down, their warm, suit-covered flesh hulking on either side like meat walls. The one solace Holly took on these flights to visit her aunt was the German Chocolate cake she always made for herself. Smiling broadly, she opened the brown Trader Joe’s bag between her legs. Her face fell flat. Inside were just the ingredients for German Chocolate cake- she had only dreamed she baked it the night before. The whole scene, the whole morning, her whole life seemed to wilt against her. She felt like crying. The engines roared, the plane lurched, the captain mumbled some nonsense about the weather, and the plane soared into the sky. Then, an idea popped into her head, so vivid and striking that she gasped.
DING. The seatbelt sign went off. She turned to her bemused seatmate and asked if she could borrow his Tupperware. Rushing to the bathroom, she washed it out, returned, and began mixing. Laughing and smiling, cake batter flew into the air from her makeshift spatula-a seatbelt. The whole plane watched in bewildered excitement. The flight attendants brought her tools, water, trays, and utensils. When the batter was ready, they put it in the warmers to bake. Soon, the plane smelled like a jet-powered chocolate factory, rich and thick with love and sugar. An elderly woman filmed the whole thing, and the video went as viral as viral could go: happy passengers eating cake, laughing, and sharing stories.