by Nancy Krulik
“That was a close one, Louie,” one of the kids in the audience said, laughing.
Katie blushed.
“Boy, that oven must be extra hot today,” one of the adults said aloud. “Look how red Louie’s face is.”
“Come on, Louie, let’s get going!” Suzanne pleaded. “Kevin is so ready.”
“So’s George,” Jeremy added.
Working near the big hot pizza oven made Katie very nervous. She wasn’t supposed to use any oven without a grown-up. Her mother had made that rule very clear. But she had to break her mother’s rule—just this one time.
Katie used a pizza cutter to divide each of the four cooked pies into slices. The ten runners grabbed slices and raced them over to the contestants. As they ate, Katie slid four more of Louie’s pre-made pies into the oven.
The contest had begun!
Chapter 10
“Send another one this way, Louie,” Jake Lawrence, a teenager who was one of the contestants, called out. Jake had ten empty plates stacked beside him. That meant he’d eaten ten whole slices of pizza. So far, he’d eaten the most.
But Carolyn Evans, a tall thin blond woman, wasn’t far behind. She’d eaten nine slices. And Neal Flemming and Bryan Sander had each eaten seven.
“Another slice for my man Kevin, please,” Suzanne called out as she patted Tomato Man on the back, and counted the empty plates beside him. Wow! Kevin had eaten six slices.
“Suzanne, I don’t think I can eat any more,” Kevin groaned.
Suzanne looked at the next table, where George was scarfing down his seventh slice of pizza. “Yes, you can,” she said. “You don’t want Jeremy . . . I mean, George to beat us, do you?”
“Us?” Kevin asked. “Just how much pizza have you eaten?”
“You know what I mean,” Suzanne told him.
“All I know is that if I eat another bite, I’m going to explode.” He turned toward where Katie was standing. “Count me out, Louie,” he told her.
Katie nodded. She reached over and took away his plates.
The contest had been going on for a while now. Kevin was the fifth contestant to drop out. Jeremy smiled as Kevin waddled away from the table. “Another one down, George,” he happily told his client.
George didn’t answer. He just kept chewing. But he was slowing down. Finally, he looked up at Jeremy. “I’m sorry,” he said, his face turning green. “I think I’m going to be sick!” He jumped up and ran toward the bathroom.
“I’m not feeling too well, either,” Bryan Sander added, after taking just one bite of his eighth slice. “I’m done.”
“It’s down to three!” someone in the crowd shouted out.
Katie looked over toward the counter. There was only one of Louie’s pre-made pizzas left, and the three remaining contestants showed no signs of slowing down.
Someone’s going to have to make some more pizzas, Katie thought to herself. Then she realized that “someone” was her.
This can’t be too hard, Katie tried to convince herself, as she picked up a ball of dough. I’ve seen Louie do this a thousand times.
Katie floured the cooking board, and threw down a ball of dough. She pounded the dough just the way Louie did. Then she stretched out the dough, and tossed it gently in the air. Phew! She caught it.
Katie threw the dough up in the air again. “Wow, this is fun!” she exclaimed as she caught it once again.
Whee! Katie tossed the dough, higher this time, and twirled her body around in circles, just like Louie often did. But Katie wasn’t Louie. She had no practice in tossing pizzas. It wasn’t so easy to catch the dough as you twirled around.
Plop! The pizza dough landed right on top of Katie’s head!
Katie shivered as the thick, damp, raw dough stretched down slowly over her face. It felt all gooey and disgusting—like some sort of weird, edible Halloween mask.
Suddenly, people started applauding. They thought it was a show—like the clowns outside Olives and Oregano.
But Katie knew it wasn’t a show. It was a big mistake.
Katie pulled the thick, gooey pizza dough from her head, and threw it in the trash. Then she reached into the refrigerator and pulled out a ball of dough. She floured the counter, and pounded the ball flat. Then she tossed the dough, ever so slightly—she wasn’t taking any chances this time.
“Hey, Louie, how ’bout a song?” one of the audience members asked.
Katie gulped. Louie always sang Italian songs while he made pizzas. Katie didn’t know any.
“Yeah, come on, Louie!” Ian Camilleri called out.
Katie racked her brain, trying to remember the words to one of Louie’s songs. But his songs were always in Italian. The words never meant anything to her.
Finally, Katie sang the only song she knew that might work. She changed the words a little bit, just to make it seem more like something Louie might sing.
“On top of pizza, all covered with cheese,” she began. “I lost my poor meatball while somebody sneezed.”
The crowd started laughing.
“Boy, Louie’s in a funny mood today,” Katie heard one teenage boy comment.
“It rolled off the table,” Katie continued singing as she carefully ladled tomato sauce on the circle of dough. “And under a bush. And then my poor meatball was nothing but mush.” She sprinkled cheese on the pie.
Katie looked at the finished pizza. It was kind of lopsided, more like an oval than a circle. But there was plenty of sauce and cheese on it. It didn’t seem too bad. She opened the oven door.
“Hey, Louie, don’t forget your secret spices!” Ian Camilleri shouted out.
A wave of panic washed over Katie. The secret spices! She had no idea what they were. Louie didn’t tell anyone what spices he used to make his pizzas different from the rest. That’s why they were called secret.
But Katie had to do something. Everyone was staring at her. Frantically, she reached out and grabbed the first spice shaker she saw. She sprinkled a brown spice on top of the cheese and sauce, and slid the pizza in the oven.
“That’s it for me,” a teenager named Jake Lawrence announced as he got up from the table and handed Katie his plate. “I give in.”
The crowd applauded for Jake. Katie joined in. He’d eaten ten slices of pizza. That was a pretty good try.
Now there were only two contestants left—Neal Flemming and Carolyn Evans. Katie placed more pizza slices on their plates, and watched nervously as the two competitors chowed down. Those were the last slices Louie had made himself. The next pie was the one Katie had thrown together.
And judging from the strange, unfamiliar smell coming from the oven, that pie was not going to be as good as the real thing.
Chapter 11
Katie opened the oven door and slid the pizza onto a tray. It looked very strange. There was a brown coating on top of the cheese. It looked kind of like melted caramel. Katie hoped the last two contestants wouldn’t notice.
But they did. As soon as she placed the fresh slices in front of her, Carolyn sniffed at the air. “Trying something different this time, Louie?” she asked.
Katie just shrugged.
Neal took a bite. “Hey, this is different. It’s sweet . . . kind of sugary.”
Carolyn bit into her pizza. “I think I taste some cinnamon,” she noted.
Katie gulped. Oh no! The brown spice. It must have been the cinnamon and sugar mixture set out for the coffee!
Katie could feel a tear fall from her eye and settle into Louie’s moustache. Suddenly, she forgot that she was supposed to be a grown man. She felt very much like the eight-year-old girl she was inside. And so she did a very kid-like thing. She ran into the storeroom, slammed the door, and started to cry.
“Everything’s ruined!” she blubbered, as she sat down on one of the cardboard boxes in the storeroom.
Kaboom! The cardboard box collapsed beneath her.
Katie cried harder. Her rear end hurt. Her feet hurt. Her hands were covered with flour
, and she was very, very tired.
And for what? When word got out about how bad that last pizza had been, Louie would be out of business. He would have to retire and move away.
Suddenly, without any warning, a fierce wind blasted through the storeroom. The breeze circled around Katie ferociously, like a tornado. Katie shut her eyes tight and grabbed on to a nearby cabinet to keep from being blown away.
The magic wind was back!
There was no way to predict when the wind would come . . . or when it would stop. So Katie wasn’t really surprised when the wind died down without any warning.
Slowly, she opened her eyes and looked around. She was still in the storeroom. She felt her face. No moustache. She looked at her hands. They were small, with chipped red nail polish and no flour in the fingernails.
She was Katie Carew again.
And Louie was himself, as well. “What happened?” he moaned. “How did I get in here?”
“Don’t you remember?” Katie asked nervously. There was no way she was going to be able to explain about the magic wind to Louie.
“Well, I sort of do,” he said. “I mean, I think I remember making a pizza for the contest and . . . ” He stopped midsentence and jumped up. “The contest! I’ve got to get out there!”
Quickly, Katie followed Louie out of the storeroom. Carolyn and Neal were still at the table, chowing down on the pizza Katie had made. Finally, Carolyn leaned back in her chair. “That’s it for me,” she said slowly. “That cinnamon pizza did me in, Louie.”
Louie looked confused.
Katie almost started crying again.
“Hey, then I’m the winner!” Neal cheered. “I’m the pizza king of Cherrydale!”
The photographers’ cameras started flashing. A news reporter shoved a microphone into his face. Everyone was cheering.
Everyone but Katie, that is. She was busy staring at Louie. The pizza chef was holding the cinammon and sugar shaker in his hands.
He looked very confused.
Chapter 12
The next morning, Katie tried to stay in bed as late as she could. She didn’t want to wake up and face the bad news, so she pretended not to feel Pepper’s wet nose on her cheek when he tried to wake her up to play. She covered her ears with her pillow so she couldn’t hear her mother’s cheerful singing as she cooked breakfast. And she didn’t move a muscle when she heard the phone ring in the kitchen.
Katie wasn’t getting out of bed. No way. She didn’t want to see anyone. She didn’t want to talk to anyone.
“Wake up, sleepyhead,” Katie’s dad said, as he walked into her room and opened the blinds.
“It’s Sunday. I don’t have to wake up,” Katie moaned.
“You’ve already had two phone calls,” her father told her.
“I don’t want to talk to anybody.”
“They were from Louie,” Katie’s dad continued. “He wants you to come down to his store. He said he has something important to say to you.”
Katie frowned. Louie wanted to tell her that he was going out of business.
“I’ll see you downstairs at breakfast,” Katie’s dad said. “Mom will drive you to the mall when she goes to work.”
Katie wasn’t the only kid Louie had called that morning. By the time she and her mother arrived at Louie’s Pizza Shop, Suzanne, Jeremy, Becky, George, Kevin, and Ian were already there. They were all sitting at the counter. Suzanne, Jeremy, Becky, and Ian were eating pizza. George and Kevin were eating Italian ices.
“I need a break from pizza,” George told Louie.
“Katie, there you are!” Louie gave her a big smile.
He’s so brave, Katie thought sadly.
“I have something to tell all of you—especially you, Katie,” Louie announced.
Katie gulped. Louie was blaming her for everything. Well, why not? It was her fault, wasn’t it?
“Louie, I never meant for . . .” Katie began. But before she could finish her sentence, the phone rang.
Louie reached for the phone. “Louie’s Pizza Shop,” he said into the receiver. Then he listened to the caller. “No. Not at all. Just come whenever you want,” he told the person on the other end.
Louie hung up the phone and grinned. “That’s what I wanted to tell you about.”
“What?” Katie asked sadly. “Was that the movers coming to get everything?”
“The movers?” Louie asked. “Why would I need movers?”
“Aren’t you retiring?” Katie asked him.
“No way,” Louie assured her. “That contest was a brilliant idea, Katie. The phone’s been ringing all morning. People want deliveries; they want me to cater parties. That call was from a woman asking if she needed a reservation to get a table here!”
“But the cinnamon pizza?” Katie asked. “Wasn’t that awful?”
Louie shook his head. “I don’t know what made me do that,” he said. “But it was great. Did you know that Carolyn Evans is the food reviewer for the Cherrydale News? She wrote a whole article about my pizza. It’s in today’s paper!”
He handed Katie the newspaper. Sure enough, there was a picture of Carolyn eating Louie’s pizza.
“Read the last paragraph,” Louie said, handing the paper to Katie.
“The best part of the contest was the dessert pizza Louie served,” Katie read aloud from the article. “It was sweet and tangy. I’d never had anything like it before. It made losing the contest easier for me to bear. I recommend it to anyone who likes pizza and dessert.”
Katie looked up at Louie. “Wow!” she exclaimed.
“I’m adding a dessert pizza to the menu,” Louie told the kids. “I think I’ll call it the Katie Special.”
Wow! A pizza named for her. Katie smiled proudly.
“I’ve got one in the oven,” Louie said. “We can celebrate.”
“I’d love a slice!” George exclaimed.
“I thought you were taking a break from pizza,” Becky said.
“I did. I didn’t eat any all morning,” George responded, laughing.
Katie giggled.
As Louie opened the oven door, Katie prepared to feel the heat from the oven. Instead, she felt a cool breeze on the back of her neck.
Oh no! Was the magic wind back? Was it going to turn her into someone else? Right here in front of her friends?
“I’m so glad they finally turned the air-conditioning on in the mall,” Suzanne said. “It sure gets hot in here.”
Katie sighed with relief. It wasn’t the magic wind at all. She was going to be able to sit here and enjoy a Katie Special dessert pizza with her friends. She was Katie Carew and she was going to stay that way.
At least for now.
Pizza Recipe !
You will need:
3 English muffins
1 jar pizza sauce
1 teaspoon oregano
1 12-ounce package of shredded mozzarella
Toppings (sliced pepperoni, sliced mushrooms, chopped green pepper, meatballs)
2 cookie sheets
Here’s what you do: Split each English muffin in half lengthwise so that you have six round pizza doughs. Place the muffin halves on the cookie sheets. Use a spoon to cover each piece of bread with tomato sauce.
Sprinkle oregano over the sauce. Pile your favorite toppings on each piece. Top each pizza with two tablespoons of shredded mozzarella cheese. Ask an adult to preheat the oven to 325º F. Then have the adult place the cookie sheets in the oven. Bake your pizzas until the cheese is bubbly (about ten minutes). Ask the adult to remove the pizzas from the oven.
Enjoy!
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