It's Raining Cupcakes (2 page)

“Mom's getting a new one made. Guess what she's calling the shop?”

“Caroline's Cupcakes?” Sophie asked.

I shook my head. A worker carrying a can of cream soda walked by. I waved at him. He waved back.

“Cupcakes R Us?”

I shook my head again. “You'll never guess. So I'll just tell you. It's Raining Cupcakes.”

“It's Raining Cupcakes?” she asked. “That's the name?”

“Yep. You know, 'cause it's almost always raining in Willow. Now it'll be raining cupcakes.”

“Riiiight. Okay, show me your room. Can we take the fire escape?”

“Sophie, are you kidding? Dad would kill me. We have to go the normal way.”

“Have you met Stan?” she asked, pointing to the sign S
TAN
'
S
B
ARBER
S
HOP
on the building next door to ours.

“Yeah. He's round and bald and has a big, bushy mustache. And he's really nice.”

Stan and his wife live upstairs, in an apartment down the hall from us. The first time I met him, I
knew I'd like him. He smells like shaving cream, and he loves to tell knock-knock jokes. When I told him my name, he told me this one:

“Knock-knock.”

“Who's there?”

“Isabel.”

“Isabel who?”

“Isabel out of order? I had to knock!”

I led Sophie between the two storefronts to a door. Behind the door is a little room that doesn't hold much of anything except mailboxes along one wall and the stairs that take us up to the apartments. Dad told me they constructed buildings like ours to make the most out of the space, and to allow people other than the owners of the shops to rent the apartments above them.

“Then why did we move?” I'd asked him. “We could have stayed where we were and rented the apartment out to someone else.”

He just smiled and said, “Your mom liked the idea of walking to work.”

Living at work is more like it
, I thought.

As Sophie and I walked up the old, creaky stairs,
she whispered, “Chickarita, this place is majorly cool.”

We got to the top and turned to the right. As we approached the door, we heard Mom humming a tune, happy as a sparrow on a spring day.

“Wow, guess cupcakes really do make her happy,” Sophie said.

“For now.” I didn't have to say any more. Sophie knew. My mom has more moods than there are sparrows in Oregon, and that's a lot.

When Sophie and I walked into the tiny family room, I noticed it still didn't feel like home. It felt like someone else's place with our worn-out furniture and some of the equipment Mom had bought for the bakery.

The fan hummed in the corner, adding more noise to the room than cool air. Dad swore we'd get an air conditioner for the window as soon as we could afford it. Until then, during the hot months of July and August, we'd have to dream of cold December days and drink lots of ice-cold drinks.

Mom sat in the old, tan La-Z-Boy, with a cookbook in her lap and a whole pile of them stacked beside
her on the end table. “Girls, do you think pineapple cupcakes would be good?” she asked.

“My mom and I make pineapple upside-down cake all the time,” Sophie said. “My little brother thinks it's disgusting. But it's my dad's favorite.”

“Oh, you're right,” Mom said. “I don't think Isabel and I have ever baked pineapple upside-down cake. Have we, Is?” I shook my head. “Hmmm, I wonder why. Anyway, they wouldn't be quite the same, but I bet they'd still be good. I'm adding it to the list.”

“How many flavors are you up to?” I asked, walking toward the kitchen. “Hey Soph, you want a root beer?”

She gave me a nod and followed.

“Seven,” Mom said. “I figure I need at least eight to start with. Of course, we'll have to come up with new ones as we go along. Fun, exciting flavors will keep people coming back. Isabel, you can help me come up with catchy little sayings to go with them. You're good at that kind of thing.”

“Sure,” I said. “I can do that.” I reached into the fridge, grabbed two cans of root beer (my favorite), and handed one to Sophie.

“How about if you have a flavor of the month?” Sophie said, popping the top. “You know, like the ice cream shops have?”

Mom gave a little squeal. “Sophie, that's brilliant! Flavor of the month. Why didn't I think of that? So, what should our first month's flavor be?”

“When are you opening?” asked Sophie as she sat down on the plaid couch.

“Should be August fifteenth,” Mom said. “They're working fast and furious down there to make it happen.”

“Hottest month of the year,” I said. “Maybe something with ‘cool' in the title. Cool as a Cucumber?”

“Ewwww,” they said at the same time.

I laughed. “Okay, maybe not.” I took a drink of my root beer. “What about root beer cupcakes? Or iced tea?”

“I know!” Sophie said. “Strawberry lemonade! Nothing says summer like strawberry lemonade.”

Mom clapped her hands together, “Yes! I can cut up some strawberries and add a splash of lemon. Perfect! Sophie, you're a genius.”

Sophie hadn't even been there five minutes and my
mom had already called her brilliant and a genius. But that's Sophie for you.

Mom set the cookbook down and jumped up. “I think I'll go buy the ingredients right now and make some. And I need some new cupcake pans, since the ones I ordered for the bakery are too large and don't fit in the oven up here. If you two are still around, you want to help me? It'll be fun. We haven't baked together in a while, with the move and everything.”

I had to admit, strawberry lemonade cupcakes sounded pretty good to me. “Sure, Mom. We'll probably be here.”

“Okay. If you need anything, your dad is downstairs, going over some things with the contractor. I won't be gone long.”

After she left, Sophie said, “Wow, she really
is
happy.”

I nodded. “She's never been this excited about anything. I just hope it lasts.”

“Okay,” Sophie said, pulling on my arm, “show me your room!”

“Close your eyes,” I said.

“What?”

“Come on, just do it. I'll lead you. Trust me.”

She put her hands over her eyes while I gently pulled her behind me down the hallway and into my room.

“Okay, you can open them.”

Now it was her turn to squeal. “Isabel, it's totally purplicious! How come you didn't tell me?”

“ 'Cause I wanted to surprise you,” I said. “Isn't it just so cool?”

We stood there, admiring the pretty walls, partially covered with posters of the places I dreamed of visiting: the Space Needle in Seattle, Niagara Falls in New York, the Dover Castle in England, the Swiss Alps in Switzerland, and lots more.

The person who lived in the apartment before us had painted the bathroom and the two bedrooms really bright colors. Mom and Dad's room was turquoise. The bathroom was orange. And my room was purplicious, as Sophie and I liked to say. Our favorite color.

I walked across the room and turned on the fan. Sophie chugged the rest of her root beer, then did a belly flop on my freshly made bed. “Lucky girl. You
get to have a cupcake shop where you can eat all the cupcakes you want
and
the most fabulous room I've ever seen.”

I set my can on the nightstand and sat down beside her. “I guess. I miss the old neighborhood, though.” I reached over and grabbed her hand and squeezed it. “I miss you, Sophie Bird.”

She laughed and rolled over. “You haven't called me that in a long time. Oh my gosh, remember that day?”

How could I forget? We'd climbed a huge oak tree at the park down the street from our duplex. I stopped at about the fifth branch up because it was high enough for me. But not Sophie. She wanted to go higher. She went so high, I yelled up at her, “What do you think you are, a bird?”

It took her forever to get down. At one point I thought I was going to have to get help. But she did it. She's amazing that way. She accomplishes whatever she sets her mind to.

In fourth grade she'd wanted a puppy. Her mom was allergic, so she'd always said no when Sophie asked. But Sophie decided she couldn't live without
a dog any longer, and researched and researched until she found a great breed that doesn't shed and is hypoallergenic. Within six months, she had her very own Havanese puppy named Daisy.

In fifth grade she decided she wanted to be the school's spelling bee champion. She studied words from the dictionary every day for months. It didn't surprise me at all when she won and went on to the state championship.

In sixth grade she ran for class president. She wrote speeches, made posters, and went on campaign walks down the hallway, shaking people's hands. They said she won by a landslide.

As I sat there with her, I wondered what she would accomplish in seventh grade. And I thought maybe, just maybe, I could get her to help
me
accomplish something.

I envy birds who can fly.

I want to fly too.

On an airplane.

—IB

I
need to find a way to make some money,” I told Sophie as she picked up a
National Geographic
from my nightstand. Mr. Nelson, my sixth-grade social studies teacher, had given it to me.

“Won't your mom pay you for working in the cupcake shop?”

“I don't think so. They have to pay back the loan
they've taken out, and there won't be a lot of money left over. Besides, I'm not old enough to work, so it's not
really
working, you know? And I bet it won't be very often. I mean, I have school. I have a life!”

“And turtles!” Sophie said, as she picked up one of my many stuffed turtles that lay at the end of my bed. “You can't bake cupcakes, Chickarita. The turtles need you!”

I snatched the turtle from her hands. “Yeah, to save them from the turtle haters of the world like you!”

My grandma got me a stuffed turtle for my fifth birthday. I sort of became obsessed with them. She still gets me one every year, so now I have, like, a whole army of turtles.

Sophie sat up and tossed the magazine back where she found it. “Okay. So what do you need the money for?”

I bit my lip. I wasn't sure if I should tell her. What if she didn't understand?

“Don't laugh, okay? I want to go on a trip. It's so pathetic that I've never been anywhere outside of Oregon!”

She sat up straighter. “Ooh, a trip! How fun! Maybe you can go to Disneyland. I had so much fun when we went a few years ago. Okay, so Hayden screamed like his arm was being cut off at the sight of Mickey or Goofy, or any of the other characters, but still. It was a blast.”

I decided not to tell her that a trip to an amusement park wasn't really what I had in mind. She kept talking. “Well, I know Mrs. Canova across the street from us is looking for a mother's helper to watch her three-year-old twins. She's doing cooking shows and selling kitchen tools in people's homes a couple of nights a week. She wants someone to come a few hours a day and watch the boys while she works in her office, making calls and doing computer work. She asked me to do it, but I'm leaving for camp in a few days.”

I felt my stomach tighten up. I'd forgotten she was going to camp. “How long are you going to be gone?”

“Three weeks. Well, camp is for two weeks, but after Mom and Dad pick me up, we're going to the Grand Canyon for vacation.”

My stomach got even tighter. “You get to see the Grand Canyon?”

She stood up and stretched, her arms clasped above her head. She reached to the right just slightly, reminding me of a tall, lean ballerina.

“Yeah. If I survive the car ride. Hayden's latest obsession is the solar system. The whole way there, I'll have to listen to him spout off facts about Saturn and Mars and every other planet in the galaxy. I don't get it. Who cares about planets that are millions of miles away?”

“Girls,” Mom called from the other room, “I'm back. Want to come help make the cupcakes?”

I looked at Sophie and shrugged. “You want to?”

She started walking toward the door. “Sure. But wait. Are you gonna go see Mrs. Canova?”

“Yeah, I probably will, if Mom and Dad say it's okay. Little kids aren't my most favorite thing in the world, but how hard can it be?”

She laughed and threw her arm around me as we walked down the hall. “Oh, sure. A piece of cake. Or should I say, cupcake?”