Cupcake and lollipop flash sheet

Your parcel came on Tuesday with the tape half off and the sweets squashed flat in their paper, but I ate the lot before the kettle boiled, so don't say I never thank you. The pink lolly wrapped in cellophane twists was the best of them. Nobody sells those on the estate any more since Mr Akhtar shut the corner shop, so I walk down to the Co-op on Coldharbour Road every morning like a girl going to school.

The lift in Block C has been broken since August. The caretaker has stuck a sign on the doors that says Please Use Stairs Responsibly, and somebody from fourteen has added an I in biro so it reads Irresponsibly. I count the landings on the way up, eleven of them, and by the eighth I'm talking to the carrier bags. Priya on nine has asked me to help with her Kieran's birthday in the community room on Saturday. He wants cupcakes with a red heart on each one and a lollipop as big as his head, so I said yes before she finished asking.

Mum's old tin is in the cupboard above the cooker, the one with the bow painted on the lid. I found it when I was sorting the drawers and nearly cried, because she always made the cakes for the church bring-and-buy and piped the icing with swirls like soft-serve. I've got a bag of heart sprinkles from the market stall with the blue awning, and I've been practising the swirls on greaseproof paper every night after Coronation Street.

Come up when you can. I'll make you a pink one and you can carry it down all eleven flights yourself. From the top landing, if you stand on your toes by the window, you can just make out the sea past the gasworks. I've been practising that too.

Love, Joan