Peppermint Cocoa Crushes

by Laney Nielson

  I hadn’t done a secret gift exchange since the third grade, when the person who had me forgot to get me anything, so the teacher gave me a granola bar that had been sitting in her desk drawer for two months. But still, it had been fun. I had baked cookies and thought up elaborate clues for my secret person.

  “The reveal will be after the show, during the reception.” Ms. Kumar nodded at me. “Speaking of the reception, Sasha, we need to talk about the refreshments. Did you receive the email with the names of students who are willing to bake?”

  “Um, yes,” I said. Hadn’t I? I was still thinking about Secret Snowman, wondering who would pick me.

  Ms. Kumar walked around the room, holding out the bag. One by one, the kids reached in and pulled out a slip of paper. When Kevin picked his, I watched, and as he silently read the name, his face broke into a wide smile. Could it be me?

  When it was my turn, there were only three names left. I closed my eyes and pulled out the first piece of paper I touched.

  It was Kevin.

  Yes! I knew instantly that that was the way I could tell him how I felt—my Secret Snowman gifts would be a series of hints that I liked him. And then, after the show, when it was time to reveal my identity, Kevin would know my secret.

  It was a perfect plan.

  Chapter Seventeen

  THE POWER OF A STICKY NOTE

  It was after eleven o’clock at night when I finished putting everything together: a mug filled with chocolate kisses; a box of Swedish fish with the note, “I’m hooked on you”; a one dollar bill where I’d written “You’re the” and then circled the ONE with a Sharpie; a bottle of Orange Crush (not only was it Kevin’s favorite soda, but crush, get it?). I’d even made a playlist on Spotify and a fake email address so I could send Kevin the link anonymously.

  It was the perfect lineup of “Secret Snowman/I Like You” gifts.

  Okay, so maybe the Swedish fish note was a little corny, and I may have included one too many love songs on the playlist, but I’d tried being subtle before and that didn’t get me very far. Plus, Kevin appreciated over-the-top. I knew Kevin. He’d love it.

  Getting into bed, I felt ready for the rest of the week. Even my science grade was back up to a 94—and I’d already started studying for next week’s test. I was feeling good about everything.

  Well, everything except Karly. I’d avoided her all day (including ducking into the library when she was headed toward me in the hall after third period). And I hadn’t returned any of her texts or phone calls. She’d even tried to FaceTime me twice, but I ignored her.

  Tomorrow, I told myself. I’d figure it out tomorrow.

  But the next day, I was so busy I didn’t have time to think about Karly.

  That was until I opened my dance bag at JayJay’s and found my first Secret Snowman gift. The red and white striped tissue paper reminded me of our Holidaze Spectacular costumes and inside was a really cute to-do list pad and a package of pencils. Each pencil had a different inspirational saying printed on it: YOU GOT THIS! YOU CAN DO IT! GO FOR IT! They were adorable! And they were just the sort of thing Karly and I would give to each other. I looked around, half expecting Karly to be standing there. Of course, I knew she couldn’t have given them to me—she wasn’t in the gift exchange, but maybe she had told Kevin to get them for me?

  Oh, what was I going to do about Karly? I was still mad, but I also missed her. A lot. And it wasn’t just since Sunday’s blowup. We hadn’t really been our BFF-selves since Thanksgiving. We used to tell each other everything, and share everything. Things had really changed.

  When I arrived at the Hall’s house to practice with Kevin that evening, Karly wasn’t home yet. I couldn’t figure out if I was disappointed or relieved. On the one hand, I wanted to see her. On the other hand, I didn’t know what I would say. Every time I tried to let go of my anger, it popped right back up.

  “Karly will be home for dinner.” Mrs. Hall touched my hand (a total clue Karly had told her mom what had happened). “And I hope you’ll stay.”

  “Okay. Thanks.” Dinner at the Hall’s always sounded good to me, and maybe this was the perfect way for Karly and I to make up.

  In the basement, Kevin and I ran through the whole routine. The dancing was pretty tight, but with only the two of us, the singing was a lot harder. There were a bunch of seriously cringe-y spots.

  “I think we should drop the singing,” Kevin said. “The sound equipment is good in the auditorium. It’ll sound better. Better than us.”

  “But—”

  “You know,” Kevin glanced over at the keyboard. “We could ask Karly to help. She could play the keyboard and sing. And we could focus on our awesome dancing.”

  “No. Absolutely not. She quit.”

  “Really?” Kevin gave me a funny look. “It sounded like you fired her.”

  “She was going to quit. I just beat her to it.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “Yes.” Though, actually, maybe Kevin was right. During our fight, I had sort of interrupted Karly mid-sentence.

  Kevin shrugged. “Anyway, I bet she’d do it. And she does have the best voice out of the three of us.” He flicked my arm. “Come on, think about it.”

  “I don’t know.” I knew it was a good idea, but …

  “We can ask her at dinner tonight.”

  “Maybe.”

  When Kevin and I were done rehearsing, we headed upstairs. That’s when Mrs. Hall told us Quiz Bowl practice was running late (surprise, surprise) and that Karly wouldn’t be home for dinner after all. Mrs. Hall looked at me like she wanted to say, “I’m sorry.”

  I again felt disappointed and relieved at the same time. Being mad at your best friend was seriously confusing.

  But dinner ended up being fun—it was hard not to have fun at the Hall’s. Plus, I sat next to Kevin. He teased me about how he wanted his top hat back and how maybe I’d taken it because I wanted to wear it. Then he talked about what his Secret Snowman gave him. He sounded excited, which made me feel happy.

  “You know who has me, don’t you?” he asked in a way that made me think he might be guessing it was me.

  “I’m not telling.” I thought about what I’d received. “Do you know who has me?”

  “Yup.”

  “Who?”

  He gestured that he was locking his lips. “Not telling.”

  “Fine,” I said, hoping it was him.

  On Wednesday, I put the box of Swedish fish on Kevin’s chair in math class.

  On Thursday, I slipped a paper heart into his reading book, replacing the torn-up piece of paper he was using as a bookmark.

  On Friday afternoon, I emailed him the playlist.

  I was feeling really good about the whole thing. Every day, Kevin told me what he’d received from his Secret Snowman, even reading me my note on the Swedish fish and laughing like it was an inside joke between the two of us.

  He knew it was me. I was sure of it.

  Meanwhile my Secret Snowman (Kevin, I was pretty sure) was hard at work.

  On Wednesday, he left me an awesome dance poster on the outside of my locker.

  On Thursday, he sent me a playlist (only one love song). Most of the music was indie rock, songs I didn’t know Kevin even liked (he was full of surprises). I kept shuffling the playlist, reading his feelings for me into each song. It wasn’t easy: Turning “Supermarket Smash Up” into a love song was a challenge, but I did it.

  On Friday, he left me a homemade bookmark. I found it after school when I was dumping out my backpack, trying to find my earbuds. The bookmark was a paper candy cane. Super cute! It reminded me of the candy cane appliqués we’d glued onto our costumes. It even smelled like peppermint.

  Meanwhile, Karly continued to reach out to me. On Wednesday, she left a two-minute voice mail apology in which she recited a poem she’d written about our friendship called “My Bae” (I did crack a smile listening to it). On Thursday, she sent me a text: Can we talk?

&nbs
p; I wanted to talk but … every time I was about to call her, I got angry all over again.

  Then, on Friday afternoon, when I was rustling through my dance bag, still trying to find my earbuds, I found a yellow sticky note stuck to the bottom of my jazz shoes. It was one of Karly’s Quiz Bowl questions. I read it and then I stuck it on my bulletin board, right next to a photograph of Karly and me from Halloween in fifth grade. There we were, standing side by side in matching white wigs and mustaches and lab coats. We both held up clipboards where we’d written formulas and famous Albert Einstein quotes. I’d forgotten that back then we both wanted to be scientists just as much as we wanted to be dancers.

  “I’m going to pick up a pizza for dinner.” Mom peeked her head into my room. “Do you want a side salad too?”

  “Sure.” I turned away from the bulletin board. “Thanks.”

  When Mom left, I did some stretches and then once I was warmed up, I practiced my leaps. I didn’t know how long I had before our downstairs neighbor started hitting the ceiling with her broom, but I needed to take my chances. I wanted to get some more height on the calypso and the only way I’d get it is if I practiced. Over and over again, I worked through the steps: first position, tendu, tombé, right leg kicks up, left leg up, arching back …

  I worked on it until Mom came home. Yay! I’d made it through an entire practice without our downstairs neighbor complaining. I wasn’t sure if I was learning to land quieter or if our neighbor was out, but it didn’t matter; my calypso leap was feeling better, much better. And so was I.

  We ate at the kitchen counter. (We did everything at the dining room table except actually eat.)

  “I ran into Mrs. Hall at Salvatore’s,” Mom said as she blotted the grease off a piece of pizza with a paper towel. “You didn’t tell me Karly was competing in the televised Quiz Bowl tournament. That’s so exciting!”

  “Yeah,” I said, thinking about another text I’d ignored—one from Mira and Anna asking if I wanted to get a ride from Anna’s mom to the tournament the next morning. They’d even texted me a photo of the sign they’d made that said GO KARLY!

  “Mrs. Hall said you can get a ride with them, but they’re leaving pretty early.”

  I chewed my pizza slowly, focusing on the flavor.

  “Sasha, you are going, right? I know you’re still upset, but Karly is your best friend.”

  I swallowed, then said, “I’ll think about it.” But I’d already made up my mind.

  After dinner, back in my room, I took the yellow sticky note off my bulletin board. I was pretty sure Karly knew the answer, but still … I pulled out my phone and texted her the question: What country hasn’t been in a war since 1847?

  She responded right away: SASHA! And a string of hearts and my favorite dancer emoji.

  I smiled wide as I called her.

  “Wrong,” I said when Karly answered. “The correct answer is Switzerland!” And we both laughed and laughed. It felt good to be a best friend again.

  Chapter Eighteen

  ONE STEP FORWARD, TWO STEPS BACK

  The auditorium was packed, but Anna, Mira, and I had arrived early enough to score seats in the third row. We were decked out in our school colors, red and blue, and I’d even put a ridiculously big red bow in my hair (saved from fifth grade when Karly and I used to wear them for real). Mira brought pom-poms for us to cheer with, and when the television camera swept over our section, we went wild.

  When Karly came onto the stage, I was so nervous that I grabbed Mira’s and Anna’s hands and squeezed them tight. But Karly didn’t look nervous. And when it was her turn to introduce herself, she smiled and sounded confident.

  “Look at her,” Anna whispered in my ear.

  “I’m so proud,” Mira said, sounding more like a mom than a friend, but to be honest, I felt the exact same way.

  Mrs. Hall, who was sitting in the row in front of us (next to Kevin and Mr. Hall), turned around and winked at me, and I smiled back. I knew how hard Karly had worked for this moment, and now it was here!

  In the first round of toss-up questions, Karly buzzed in three times with two correct answers. Yay! During the bonus questions, the team had five seconds to confer, but it seemed like a lot longer to me. My palms were sweating as the team whispered. I noticed Karly and Ahmed’s heads touched as they discussed the answer, which Ahmed gave—correctly!

  I smiled. They go well together, I thought.

  The competition continued until the two teams were tied before the final question:

  Edelweiss is the national flower of what two countries?

  Karly buzzed.

  “Austria and …”

  I held my breath. My heart pounded.

  “Switzerland,” she said.

  I stood up to cheer; Mira and Anna and I all hugged as the host announced our team as the winners.

  “We did it!” Mira yelled.

  Outside the auditorium, we waited in the lobby while Karly and the team took photos. Mrs. Hall was clicking away and Kevin was hamming it up behind her, making sure everyone on the team was smiling, if not cracking up, in every photo.

  When Karly was finished, she walked over to us.

  “Thanks for coming, you guys. It means a lot to me.”

  “You were so awesome!” I said, and gave her a big hug.

  “I knew you would win it,” Mira said. “I just knew it.”

  Anna opened up her arms wide and said, “Group hug!” The four of us fell into each other, swaying from side to side and laughing. It was the best feeling.

  In the afternoon, I headed over to Sugarman’s to meet up with Pete before going to the Hall’s to rehearse with Kevin. Pete and I needed to review the promo video one more time before we uploaded it. But when I entered the market, I didn’t see him.

  “Is Pete here?” I asked Mr. Sugarman, who was wiping down the counter in the back. I was pretty sure he didn’t have a basketball game until later, but maybe he was at practice. I hoped not.

  “Uh …” Mr. Sugarman hesitated. “Yes.” Then he turned toward the storage room in the back. “Pete! Sasha’s here.”

  A few seconds later, Pete appeared. He stuffed something into his pocket and then headed over to me.

  “Is this an okay time?” I asked.

  “Yeah, it’s good.”

  “Great.” I dropped my dance bag down next to one of the tables, and Pete brought over his computer.

  “I changed the beginning a little.” He pressed PLAY. “But everything else is pretty much what we came up with last time.”

  I watched, blushing at the opening clip. It was a shot of me, standing outside the door of the auditorium, opening the door and saying, “Follow me!” I didn’t even remember him filming it.

  When the video finished, Pete asked, “What’d you think?”

  “I love it!” I said. It was really good. “The only thing I would change is the end—we should do a close-up of the flyer to make sure people can see the details: date, time, and place.”

  We chatted about school while Pete figured out how to zoom in. “Okay, what do you think?” He turned toward me. “Is that close enough?”

  “Perfect,” I said. “Let’s upload it.” Thanks to a friend of Ms. Kumar’s, our video was going up on a couple of local sites, and it was also going to air on our cable station.

  As Pete sent the link to Ms. Kumar, I started humming “Supermarket Smash Up,” one of the songs my Secret Snowman (Kevin, I was sure) had put on his playlist for me.

  “That’s a good tune.” Pete leaned back in the chair.

  “You know it?”

  “Know it? They’re like my favorite band.”

  “The song was on the playlist my Secret Snowman made. I like it!”

  “Your Secret Snowman must really like you.”

  “You think?” I smiled. “I hope so.”

  Pete smiled back at me, and I felt my cheeks heat up.

  “So, what have you gotten from yours?” I asked.

  “A pa
ck of gum.”

  “That’s it?”

  “Yeah.” Pete shrugged. “It’s no big deal.

  No big deal? It might not be for him, but for me, it sure was. A lot (everything!) was riding on Secret Snowman.

  I glanced at the clock and realized how much time had passed. “Oh! I need to head out now.” I stood up to go, and Pete looked surprised.

  “Dance practice. We only have a few more days.”

  “Ah. By the way, when I was dropping cookies off at the Senior Center this morning, Big T gave me the mittens and hats they made for the tree. I’ll bring them to school Monday.”

  “Thanks!” I swung my bag onto my shoulder and waved goodbye. I was surprised how disappointed I felt to be leaving. Usually, dance was what I wanted to be doing most.

  Kevin and I only had a few practices left before the dress rehearsal and I was, well, starting to freak out a little. Was our dance good enough? Were we good enough?

  And as soon as I reached the Hall’s basement, I had a bigger freak out. Ryan was standing next to Kevin.

  “Sa-sha!” Kevin said my name as if he were saying ta-da.

  “Hey.” I turned to Ryan and nodded. “What’s up?”

  I was trying to stay calm but really I was thinking: What—I mean, what—was Ryan doing practicing in the Hall’s basement? This was our space. And even though Kevin might be popping into Ryan’s act to do a couple of acro moves, this was a competition. Ryan was one of our biggest competitors.

  “We learned this really cool move in the acro workshop,” Kevin said. “We’ve been practicing it a lot, and I was thinking we could use it as the finale in our act.”

  I swallowed hard. “You mean Ryan’s act?”

  “No. Ours.”

  “What?” I took a step back. “We have an ending. We choreographed it days ago.”

  “Sash, just listen. You know how we’ve been thinking the ending could use a little something extra—well, Ryan will just pop in at the end. You know, a cameo, like I’m doing in his.”