by Sheryl Berk
“My mom could sew them,” Jenna volunteered. “No problema. I’m thinking some really loud Hawaiian print tops, silk flower leis, and grass skirts.”
“Just make a skirt long enough to cover Sadie’s cast,” Delaney reminded her. “It kinda clashes with the rest of the outfit.”
Sadie rolled her eyes. Delaney was always concerned about looking stylish!
“No te preocupes,” Jenna insisted. “Not to worry.”
Herbie held up his hand in protest. “Oh no! I draw the line at wearing a coconut-shell bikini top.”
“You’re off the hook, Herbie,” Kylie assured him, trying not to crack up. “You can drive us to the country club where they’re having the party, but we’ll do the actual hula entrance and cupcake handoff.”
“Phew!” Herbie mopped his brow with the back of his sleeve. “I’d be happy, however, to accompany you on the ukulele for your presentation.”
Sadie rolled her eyes. “You play the ukulele? Seriously?”
“I’ve been known to dabble,” Herbie answered.
“Sand…hula skirts…Hawaiian flavors…Herbie’s ukulele…” Kylie jotted down a list. “Are we leaving anything out?”
“Hello? The big 3–0!” Lexi reminded her. “It’s a thirtieth birthday party. How do we represent that?”
“We could use thirty ingredients in each cupcake!” Delaney piped up.
“And we could be up all night baking!” Jenna corrected her. “That’s a whole lotta ingredients to pack in one tiny cupcake.”
“What about arranging the cupcakes so they form the numbers three and zero?” Sadie said. “I’m no math genius, but I think that’s a simple solution.”
“Sadie scores again!” Lexi patted her friend on the back. “That’s perfect. We could build a wooden sandbox, fill it with our cookie crumb sand, and arrange the cupcakes to form a thirty in it.”
“Then it’s a plan,” Kylie said, shutting the cover to her Peace, Love, and Cupcakes club binder. “And a pretty cool one at that!”
Jenna insisted the girls meet extra-early Saturday at Kylie’s to try on their Hawaiian costumes.
“This is yours,” she said, handing a light-pink floral crop top to Lexi. Each top had a matching grass skirt. “And this…” she announced, pulling a baby-blue shirt with dolphins on it and an extra-long skirt out of a bag, “is yours, Sadie.”
“What about me?” Delaney asked, trying to sneak a peek in the other bag Jenna had brought with her.
“Paciencia!” Jenna said, playfully slapping Delaney’s hand. She handed Kylie a bright-green top with palm trees on it and donned her own royal-blue shirt, dotted with the Hawaiian Islands.
“Last but not least,” she said, pulling a bright-red halter top covered in sequined flowers out of her bag, “this is for Delaney!”
“Whoa!” Delaney said, holding it up for size. “This is so me!”
“That is so loud!” Lexi gasped, shielding her eyes. Even the grass skirt was made of red metallic fringe instead of the ordinary green.
“Like I said, it’s so me!” Delaney squealed with delight. She threw her arms around Jenna. “Thank you, thank you!”
Jenna squirmed. “De nada! I thought you’d go loco for it.”
“Are we ready to head out?” Herbie asked, inviting himself in to gather the girls and the cupcakes. “I’ve got my ukulele all tuned up.”
“In a sec,” Sadie said, placing her crutches under her arms. She watched as her friends each took a box of cupcakes. She felt useless.
“It’s okay, Sadie.” Kylie read her mind. “We got it.”
“I know. I just wish I could pitch in more. I’m not used to being on the bench.”
When they arrived at the party, the birthday girl’s bestie, Bernadette, was in the party room shushing everyone and instructing them to duck under tables and behind chairs. The girls found a large table in the center of the room and arranged the cupcakes in the sandbox to form the numbers three and zero.
“Oh, these are amazing—and you guys even dressed the part!” Bernadette exclaimed.
“I choreographed an authentic Hawaiian hula for us to do for the birthday girl,” Delaney bragged.
“Wow, that’s what I call a special delivery,” Bernadette replied. “Melanie will love it.”
“Melanie will be here any minute,” a guest said, waving her watch in Bernadette’s face.
Bernadette flew into action. “Oh my gosh! Shut off the light! Hide! We don’t want to ruin the surprise!”
The PLC girls did as they were told, scooting behind the long red velvet curtains in the party room. The room was now pitch-dark.
“I love a surprise!” Delaney said, barely able to contain her excitement.
“Here she comes!” another one of the friends whispered. “Everybody, on the count of three, yell ‘surprise.’ One…two…three…”
“SURPRISE!” the guests all shouted—but the lights didn’t come on. Melanie couldn’t see a single decoration or partygoer.
“Um, who’s there?” she asked, confused.
“Someone get the light,” called a voice from across the room.
“Don’t you think I tried?” moaned Bernadette. “There’s something wrong with it.”
Sadie came out from behind the curtains and hobbled her way over to the center of the room, using her crutches to feel the way in front of her. She leaned on one crutch while she held the other one high above her head, trying to reach the light fixture hanging from the ceiling. She was tall, but the ceiling was nearly seven feet high.
“I’ve almost got it.” She strained, trying to reach while keeping her balance. Finally, the rubber tip of her crutch tapped the fixture and the light flickered on.
“Hooray!” the crowd cheered.
Sadie smiled. For the first time in a long time, she felt useful.
“How did you know what to do?” Kylie asked her.
“It happens all the time with our basement light,” Sadie explained. “The bulb sometimes gets a little loose and you have to jiggle it.”
“Good show, Sadie,” Herbie commended her. “You saved the day.”
“No,” Delaney corrected him before picking up a cupcake to hand out. “You saved our hula! Hit it, Herbie!”
Dr. Cohan examined Sadie’s X-ray one more time. “I think it’s time we took that cast off,” she said brightly.
“Today? You can take it off today?” Sadie’s eyes lit up. She had waited patiently for nearly six weeks to hear those words.
“Of course, you’ll have to go easy on your foot at first. No running down the court and no skateboarding till it gets stronger,” the doctor told her. “And I’ll want you to start physical therapy—”
“Anything!” Sadie cut her off. “Anything at all. Just as long as I can toss these crutches out the window!”
“How about you toss them in the closet instead,” Dr. Cohan suggested. “Just in case you ever need them again.”
“Oh no,” Sadie vowed. “I learned my lesson! From now on, no crazy stunts that can land me in the hospital!”
Mrs. Harris smiled. “Can I get that in writing?”
• • •
Sadie couldn’t wait to go to the PLC meeting at Kylie’s that night and show all her friends she was back.
“No more cast!” Kylie cheered as Sadie skipped into the living room. “I’m so happy for you!”
“That makes two of us,” Sadie said. “I feel light as a feather.”
“How long till you can play basketball?” Jenna asked. “Coach Walsh will be psyched.”
“At least another month.” Sadie sighed. “But it’s so close, I can taste it!”
She decided she’d go to her coach’s office the next morning and share her great news. She found Coach Walsh sitting at her desk, taking notes and studying her laptop screen.
“Did you hear me? I can come back to the team in a few more weeks,” Sadie said.
“I heard you,” her coach replied, still staring down. “The Bears will be very happy to have you back.”
Sadie couldn’t believe her ears. Has she said or done something wrong? “But, aren’t you happy to have me back?”
Coach Walsh sighed and put down her pen. “Sadie, there’s something I need to tell you. I’m not going to be coaching the team for a while.”
Sadie shook her head. “What? Why?” She couldn’t imagine the Blakely Bears without Coach Walsh.
“I have to take a break,” her coach said softly.
Sadie’s heart did a flip-flop in her chest. “What do you mean a break? Why would you do that?”
“I’m going on a leave of absence for a while,” her coach explained. “I haven’t told any of your teammates yet, so please keep this between us until I do.”
“But, Coach,” Sadie said, “we need you!” She could feel tears stinging the corners of her eyes. What she really wanted to say was, “I need you!” When she’d been so scared of her surgery, her coach was the only one who knew how to help her through it.
“I don’t want to leave,” Coach Walsh said. “Believe me, it’s the last thing I ever wanted. But I don’t have a choice, Sadie.”
Sadie tried to wrap her brain around what her coach was saying. Why wouldn’t she have a choice to stay or go? Then she saw what her coach was jotting notes on—a cancer awareness website—and it came to her.
“You’re sick, aren’t you?” Sadie said, the tears now flowing freely down her cheeks. “Is that it?”
“Doughnut worry, okay?” Coach Walsh said, forcing a smile. “Remember what I told you about staying positive?”
That was easy to say when it was a broken bone. But Sadie could tell that her coach was putting on a brave face for her.
“Will you be alright?” Sadie asked her.
“I hope so.”
“But you don’t know for sure?”
“Sadie,”—Coach Walsh put a hand on her shoulder—“nothing in life is sure. And to be honest, I prefer it that way. If you knew you would win every basketball game, what would be the point of playing? Isn’t not knowing part of what makes it exciting?”
“And scary,” Sadie added.
“Yes, and sometimes scary. But like I told you once before, you have to face the fear head-on. I’m going to fight this. In the meantime, I’m trying to find a coach to replace me.”
“No one could replace you,” Sadie insisted. “That isn’t possible.”
“I appreciate that. But I still need to find someone fast.”
• • •
The entire day, Sadie couldn’t shrug off the heavy feeling weighing her down. She had no idea how to help Coach Walsh—or if she even wanted Sadie’s help. She couldn’t bear the idea of her coach not getting better. And she’d promised to keep this a secret, as hard and painful as that was.
Kylie spotted Sadie at her locker and raced over to show her a crazy cupcake order that had just come in over email. “You won’t believe this,” she said. “This lady wants us to bake cupcakes for her pet rat! What flavor are we supposed to do? Stinky cheese? Garbage?”
Sadie was too distracted and upset to care. “Whatever,” she said.
Kylie knew instantly something was up. Usually Sadie would have laughed and tossed out a few funny suggestions. “You okay, Sadie?” she asked gently. “I thought you were so happy about getting your cast off.”
“I was. I am,” Sadie replied.
“Well, you have a funny way of showing happy. You look like you just lost a friend.”
“Don’t say that!” Sadie snapped at her. “Mind your own beeswax!”
Kylie raised an eyebrow. “Sadie, what’s wrong?”
“I have to go,” Sadie said, pushing past her. “I’m late to class.”
She knew Kylie meant well, but it hurt too much to think about losing Coach Walsh—for the rest of the season or forever.
Kylie wanted to call Sadie and talk things over—they’d never had a fight before or gone three days without speaking. But it was clear from the cold shoulder her bestie was giving her that she needed time to cool off.
“Why’s Sadie late today?” Lexi asked, noticing the clock on the teacher’s lounge wall.
“Beats me.” Kylie covered for her. “She’s probably so happy to be back at basketball practice she lost track of the time.” She hoped the argument between them hadn’t kept Sadie away.
“We have to be out of here by five,” Herbie reminded them. “The custodial staff will have my head if we’re not.”
Kylie sighed. They did have a lot of business and baking to do. There were orders to discuss, cupcakes to taste test, even a new piping-bag tip to try out.
“I say we start baking without her, and she can jump in when she gets here,” Jenna suggested. She held up a package of semisweet chocolate chips. “I’m starving and I’m about to break into the ingredients.”
“Oh, no you don’t,” Lexi said, snatching the bag out of Jenna’s hands. “Those chips are the spots on my ladybugs.” She held up a sketch she’d drawn of a cupcake frosted red with black dots.
“Yeah, you can’t make a lucky ladybug without spots,” insisted Delaney. She studied the order sheet. “That’s like a tiger without spots.”
“You mean a leopard,” Lexi corrected her. “Tigers have stripes.”
“If Sadie doesn’t get here soon, I’m going to start seeing spots,” Jenna complained and pretended to swoon. “I’m so hungry, I feel faint.”
“Give her five more minutes,” Kylie insisted, handing Jenna a banana.
“This isn’t as appealing as those Callebaut Belgian chocolate chips,” Jenna said. “Get it? Banana? A-peel-ing?”
Kylie giggled. “I get it. And I’m sure Sadie has a perfectly good reason for running late.” She glanced at the clock one more time. “I’ll go look for her.”
She figured the gym was her best bet, but when she peered inside, it appeared quiet, dark, and empty.
“That’s weird,” Kylie said to herself. “Sadie? You in here?” she called.
There was no answer, but Kylie thought she heard a noise—a drumming of sorts—coming from the far side of the gym. She walked in and found Sadie sitting on the bleachers, dribbling a ball at her feet.
“Hey,” Kylie said, taking a seat next to her. “Did you forget we had a PLC meeting after school today?”
Sadie shook her head. “No, I didn’t forget. I just didn’t feel like going, that’s all.”
Kylie looked confused. Sometimes Sadie’s basketball and baking schedules conflicted, but she was always a loyal teammate, both to the Blakely Bears and to PLC.
“You didn’t feel like it? Why not?” Kylie asked. “Are you still mad at me? Honestly, I didn’t mean to make you so angry.”
Sadie stood up, tied her hoodie around her waist, and walked to the door. In the light shining in from the hallway, Kylie noticed that her eyes looked red and puffy.
“Sadie, were you crying?” she gasped. “What’s wrong?” She’d never seen her friend so upset. Sadie was always the strong one.
“Let’s go,” Sadie said. “You’re right. I shouldn’t be blowing off our meeting.”
“Never mind the meeting,” Kylie said, grabbing Sadie’s arm. “I’m your friend. Please, talk to me!”
Sadie took a deep breath. “If I tell you, you can’t tell anyone, okay?” She knew she had told her coach she’d keep quiet, but she had to confide in someone! If there was one person she could trust, it was Kylie.
Kylie crossed her heart with her fingertips. “I promise.”
“It’s Coach Walsh,” Sadie said. “I think she’s really sick. She told me she has to take a leave of absence, and I noticed a site up on her laptop screen that was talking about cancer.”
Kylie stood there, frozen, too shocked to say a word. Her heart was breaking for both Coach Walsh and Sadie.
“Are you sure?” she finally asked.
“Nothing in life is sure,” Sadie answered. “Coach Walsh told me that. But yeah, I’m pretty sure.”
“I think you should tell Lexi, Jenna, and Delaney. And Herbie! We have to figure out some way to help Coach Walsh.”
Sadie took Kylie by the shoulders. “There is no helping, Kylie. There’s nothing anyone can do. That’s why I’m so upset. I feel like someone stole the ball out of my hands and won’t give it back! I feel useless.”
Kylie thought for a moment. “That’s not true, Sadie. There’s always something you can do. Think about how awful you were feeling after your accident and how Coach Walsh was there to cheer you on.”
“You’re saying I should be there for her?”
Kylie nodded. “Yes. And let us all be there for you.”
They returned to the teachers’ lounge and Sadie took a seat. “Coach Walsh asked me not to tell until she was ready, so I don’t know if I should…” she began.
“Sadie, if there’s something we can do to help,” Herbie suggested. “I’m sure Coach wouldn’t be mad at you for sharing it with us.”
Sadie finally filled them in on everything she knew.
“Oh, poor Coach Walsh!” Delaney exclaimed. “It’s so unfair!”
“She’s really stressed out about finding a new coach for the team,” Sadie told them.
“Well, I have a solution for that,” Herbie said.
“You do? You know someone who could coach a girls’ basketball team?” Sadie asked, hopefully.
“I do. Me.”
Kylie had to cover her mouth to keep herself from laughing out loud. “You? You play basketball?” While their advisor was a whiz with robotics, she had never heard him discuss the score of a game or witnessed him shooting a hoop. In fact, she wasn’t sure he even owned a pair of sneakers. Most of the time he wore shiny penny loafers.
