It will be fun, you said, as we squeezed onto the sardine-tin tram. Elbows and rucksacks vied with my Waitrose cream cake fragile on its crystal glass stand. You carried the folding table under your arm, commuters tutting and swivelling their heads to catch glimpses of our awkward furniture transit. They hurled arrows of disgust and a volley of clucks as they fought their way in and out the doors, ducking under the cream cake and hurdling the wooden table.  

When we reached the final station the crowd thinned, the doors released the pent-up air of pre-work anticipation and sweating frustration. You sat at ease and erected the table in the middle of the carriage. The scarf so artfully tied about your baldness fell to the floor and you didn’t notice. Our rucksacks contained Tupperwared sandwiches, lid burped, two China plates, and linen napkins in silver rings. Our re-usable mugs in hues of green and amber full of ginger ale, perched beside the cream cake resplendent on its glass pedestal stand as the tram set off on its return journey. 

You offered sandwiches on tiny napkins decorated with Thomas the Tank engine to those passengers still with us. A few cited allergies and, wide eyed and salivating, watched the others eat.

You took an anti-nausea pill and bowed to the cake and then sawed into it with your penknife, the miniature blade gouging its way through soft sponge and whipped cream. More passengers boarded, the shopping crowd with their wheeled trolleys in forlorn tartan were forbidden passage by our table. They muttered as table legs rattled perilously close to their ankles as we clicked and clunked over points. 

This cake was not for sharing.

The strawberry jam squeezed out as you pushed the over-wide cake slice into your mouth, you giggled and snorted cream making your eyes water. I took photographs and encouraged your gluttony, for I knew that later the chemo would make you bring some of this back up.  I sang Happy Birthday. Then you licked the smear of jam off my nose as I kissed your softness to my tongue. Many selfies later we packed up and left, trailing along the platform, hugging our gone-viral likes and retweets. 

Behind us the tram, bereft of your fun, trundled on, new passengers missed the spectacle of your party, but the ghosts of drips of cream, the crumbs of sponge and the sweet smell of jam lingered on.