Cricket turned bright red. Someone had sent her a card. Someone liked her, even if Greg Cheechia didn’t. Whoever it was had even pasted the stamp on upside down. Everyone knew that an upside-down stamp meant “I love you.” She wondered who had sent the card. Because the message, like her name and address, was printed, she couldn’t use the handwriting to figure out who her secret admirer was. It had to be one of the boys in her class. Lucas? Julio? Arthur? She didn’t think she liked any of them. Still, it was nice to know that someone cared about her. Someone. Who?
The more Cricket thought about it, the more she found herself hoping the card had been sent by Lucas. Lucas could be a real pain sometimes. He was always making jokes and fooling around. But on the other hand, he was much better than he used to be. The old Lucas Cott had been terrible. But the new Lucas Cott, the sixth grader, sometimes said very clever things in class. He was really quite smart. Of course, he wasn’t as smart as she was, but he probably was the smartest boy in their class. Also, come to think of it, with his blond hair and blue eyes, he wasn’t bad-looking.
It wasn’t until Cricket looked at the card for the fourth or fifth time that she realized that the word sweetheart was misspelled as sweatheart. That could be a clue, she thought. She wondered about the spelling skills of the different boys in her class. Lucas Cott would never make a silly mistake like that.
All through supper and as she practiced for her piano lesson and as she did her homework, a part of Cricket’s brain concentrated on her mysterious boyfriend. Arthur was an atrocious speller. Cricket could remember back in second grade, when he even spelled his own name wrong: He kept writing Aurthr on his papers. Nowadays, of course, he knew how to spell his name. But did he know how to spell sweetheart? Probably not. Cricket put down her pencil. She knew that as much as she complained about Lucas, she’d much rather that her valentine be from him than from Arthur.
Then a wonderful thought came to her. Lucas Cott was so smart that he’d know she would guess he sent the card. So he must have deliberately misspelled a word so she wouldn’t think he’d sent the valentine. Lucas sure was clever, she thought, smiling to herself. But the truth was, no matter how clever he was, she was even smarter. Maybe I’ll tell Zoe, Cricket thought. But I’ll never tell Lucas, she decided.
Quickly Cricket finished her homework assignment. Then, when she could bear it no longer, she went to the phone. She didn’t call Zoe.
She dialed the number of Lucas Cott.
“Hi, Lucas,” she said to him.
“Hi,” Lucas responded.
“We haven’t done any cooking in a long time,” Cricket reminded him. “I was thinking that it would be fun to cook something sweet together. Do you want to come over on Saturday? We could make some kind of cookies or cake or even candy.”
“Sure,” Lucas agreed readily. “That sounds great. My mother says I’ve got a real sweet tooth. But I think all my teeth are sweet. Could we make fudge?”
“I’ll look in our cookbooks. Maybe I’ll find something different. Something you haven’t tried before.”
“Great,” said Lucas. “I’ll tell Julio. And you tell Zoe and Sara Jane. We always have a lot of fun when we cook together.”
For a moment Cricket was disappointed that Lucas wanted their classmates to join them. You’d think that if he liked her, he would want to spend some time with her alone. But then she realized that it was really clever of Lucas to say that. If he was going to be her secret boyfriend, he needed to have other people around to cover up how he really felt.
“Okay,” said Cricket. “You call Julio.”
And then Lucas really blew his cover.
“No sweat,” he said.
Sweet Kisses
Ingredients
2 egg whites, at room temperature
1∕8 teaspoon salt
1∕8 teaspoon cream of tartar
½ cup sugar
1 cup chopped walnuts or chocolate chips (optional)
Cooking Directions
• Preheat oven to 300 degrees.
• In bowl, beat egg whites with an electric mixer. (Or use an eggbeater and a lot of energy if you don’t have a mixer.) Add salt and cream of tartar; continue beating until egg whites are very foamy and begin to thicken. Add sugar a little at a time and beat well each time after each addition.
• When egg whites are very stiff, add walnuts or chocolate chips, if desired. Drop by teaspoons onto greased baking sheets. Bake for 25 minutes.
• Turn off oven and open oven door slightly. Cool kisses in oven; when completely cool, remove from baking sheets.
• Makes about three dozen kisses.
“Be My Honey” Cookies
Ingredients
1 stick butter or margarine, at room temperature
½ cup white sugar
½ cup honey
1 egg
2 cups sifted flour
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ginger
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 egg white, slightly beaten
¾ cup finely chopped salted peanuts
Cooking Directions
• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Mix butter or margarine, sugar, and honey together in a bowl until light and fluffy. Add egg and beat well.
• Sift flour, salt, ginger, cinnamon, and baking soda together into separate bowl. Add to honey mixture and mix well.
• Drop dough by level tablespoons onto greased baking sheets. Flatten cookies with bottom of glass; brush with beaten egg white and sprinkle with chopped peanuts. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes.
• Makes about 3 dozen cookies.
Chocolate Truffles
Ingredients
3⁄4 cup butter (one and a half sticks)
3⁄4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 can (14 ounces) condensed milk (do not use evaporated milk)
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
3⁄4 cup cocoa powder or confectioners’ sugar or finely chopped nuts
Cooking Directions
• In a saucepan, melt butter over low heat.
• Add cocoa. Stir until smooth.
• Blend in condensed milk; stir constantly until mixture is thick, smooth, and shiny. This takes about four minutes.
• Remove from heat; stir in vanilla.
• Chill in refrigerator for three to four hours or until firm.
• Shape into small balls; roll balls in cocoa or confectioners’ sugar or chopped nuts. You can buy miniature muffin cups in which to place each chocolate truffle ball, and they will look very elegant when you serve them.
• Chill until firm. Store, covered, in refrigerator.
• If you didn’t cheat and eat as you were working, and if you make the balls small, you should have about 30 chocolate truffles.
“Let’s Make a Date” Nut Squares
Ingredients
2 eggs
1⁄2 cup sugar
1⁄2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1⁄2 cup flour
1⁄2 teaspoon baking powder
1⁄2 teaspoon salt
1 cup chopped walnuts
2 cups finely chopped dates
1 tablespoon confectioners’ sugar, for sprinkling
Cooking Directions
• Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
• In a bowl, beat eggs until they are foamy. Add sugar and vanilla and blend well.
• In a second bowl, mix flour, baking powder, and salt. Stir into egg mixture. Add walnuts and dates and blend well.
• Spread batter in well-greased, 8-inch-square pan. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. While still warm, cut into squares.
• Remove from pan. Put confectioners’ sugar in a small strainer and shake over the squares to dust them with the sugar.
• Makes 16 squares.
FOUR
April Food’s Day
It was an ordinary math class, of all things, that led Cricket and her classmates to begin planni
ng an extraordinary party for their teacher.
It was all because the sixth graders were having a lesson in probability one day in March. Everyone, including the teacher, wrote the number of the day of the month when their birthday fell on a piece of paper. What was the probability of two people being born on the same day of the month? When the numbers were tallied, it turned out that Mrs. Cheechia was the only person whose birthday fell on the first day of the month.
“Not just any month,” she told the students. “It’s April first.”
So one day late in March, the sixth graders began talking about making a party for their teacher.
“I bet it’s fun to have your birthday on April Fools’ Day,” commented Julio. “You could tell your friends that you’re not having a party and then fool them by making a party after all.”
“Yes, but it could work the other way too,” Lucas pointed out. “What if you invited your friends to a party on April first, and no one came because everyone thought it was an April Fools’ joke and there wasn’t really going to be any party?”
“Oh,” said Julio thoughtfully. “Well, then you could eat as much cake and ice cream as you wanted.”
“And get good and sick!” said Cricket.
“And besides, you’d be disappointed not to have your friends there with you,” commented Zoe.
“And no presents from your friends either,’’ Lucas agreed.
“What are we going to do about Mrs. Cheechia’s birthday?” Cricket asked. “Should we give a party?”
“Should we buy her a gift?” added Lucas.
“Maybe she’ll surprise us and make a party for herself,” said Zoe. “Remember last year in fifth grade, when Mr. Flores brought his guitar to school on a Tuesday? And then he surprised us by giving out cookies and ice cream at two o’clock in the afternoon.”
“Right,” Julio responded. “It was the middle of January, and we couldn’t figure out what we were celebrating.” We didn’t know until the end that it was Mr. Flores’s birthday.”
“Let’s have a surprise party for Mrs. Cheechia,” said Zoe.
“Let’s make it an April Fools’ Day surprise birthday party!” said Lucas.
“What’s the difference?” asked Sara Jane.
“We could bring surprising foods,” suggested Zoe.
“We could act in surprising ways,” said Lucas. “We could all pretend we hadn’t done our homework the night before. You know, things like that.”
Cricket looked suspiciously at Lucas. Since when did he need an excuse to fool around? she wondered.
April first was a week away. The students whispered plans to one another in class.
“Could you make that zucchini pie?” Julio asked Cricket. “That’s a good April Fools’ joke.”
“I like to try making new things,” Cricket observed. “But there are probably other things we could make that would be surprises.”
“All the food could be jokes,” said Lucas.
“Did you ever see those peppermints that look like green peas?” Arthur asked. “The green peas are really mints, and they’re sold mixed with tiny orange squares of candy that look like diced carrots. I’ll bring a package of them.”
“That’s a great ideal” said Julio.
Cricket was pretty certain that she could find a new recipe that would have a surprise twist to it. If she couldn’t get zucchini, she could make a carrot cake, for example. But maybe she could make something that would really fool everyone.
Soon the search for surprising recipes became competitive.
“I’ve found a perfectly super and surprising dessert recipe,” Zoe bragged to Cricket. “You’ll love it, but you won’t know what’s inside.”
“Why won’t you tell me? I won’t give away the secret,” begged Cricket. What were best friends for if not to share secrets?
“If I tell you, it won’t be a surprise,” Zoe explained. “I’ll give you the recipe after the party. But I want you to be just as surprised as Mrs. Cheechia and everyone else in our class.”
“Guess what?” Sara Jane told her friends. “I found a recipe for something called Gooseberry Fool. Doesn’t that sound like just the right thing to eat on April Fools’ Day?”
“What are gooseberries?” Cricket asked. “I’ve never seen or eaten any.”
“Me neither,” Sara Jane confessed. “I thought maybe you would know where I could buy some gooseberries.”
Cricket shook her head. “Don’t ask me. You’ll have to ask a goose,” she said, giggling.
Sara Jane looked disappointed and didn’t laugh at the joke.
Cricket kept checking out cookbooks from the library. “You must be quite a cook,” the librarian observed when Cricket staggered out with six thick volumes of recipes.
Cricket smiled proudly. She was getting to be pretty clever in the kitchen these days. Maybe when she was president of the United States, she could cook dinners for all the heads of the other world powers. That would be a first, she thought.
Sure enough, Cricket’s persistence paid off. One evening, going through still another cookbook, she discovered the perfect April Fools’ cake. She wondered if it was the same thing that Zoe was making. She rushed to the phone and called her classmate.
“Does the April Fools’ recipe that you’re making for Mrs. Cheechia’s birthday have a crazy ingredient in it?”
“What do you mean, crazy?” asked Zoe.
“You know. Something that no one would ever dream is inside a cake?”
Zoe thought for a moment. “Not really,” she said. “Besides, what I’m making isn’t exactly a cake.”
“Cookies?” asked Cricket.
“No. Now don’t ask me any more questions. I told you I want to keep the dessert I’m making a secret.”
“That’s okay,” said Cricket. “I’ve got a great recipe myself.”
Finally it was time to tear off the March page from the calendar. April first had arrived. All the class members had arranged with some of their teachers from years past to leave the boxes of goodies in their classrooms.
Cricket’s head felt like it was about to burst with all the plans. Lucas had given her so many instructions about what to do and what to say. In the past she would never have paid any attention to what Lucas told her. But ever since she had received the unsigned valentine, which she was still convinced came from Lucas, she found she treated him a little bit more nicely than she used to.
“This is going to be fun.” Sara Jane giggled as she took her seat.
Mrs. Cheechia walked into the classroom. Cricket took a deep breath and began moving her mouth up and down as if she were chewing a piece of gum. All around her the other students, instructed by Lucas, were doing the same thing. At first it didn’t appear as if Mrs. Cheechia noticed anything. She hung her coat in the closet in the back of the room and walked toward her desk.
“Julio, are you chewing gum so early in the morning?” Mrs. Cheechia said.
Julio shook his head. “I’m not chewing any gum,” he announced to the teacher. His mouth continued moving as before.
Mrs. Cheechia looked around the room. Every mouth was in motion, up and down. “What’s going on here?” she asked. “Are you all chewing gum? You know that is one rule I strictly enforce in my class. All gum goes in the garbage can. Right now.”
“April Fools’!” the children shouted in unison.
Mrs. Cheechia let out a gasp. “Well, you really fooled me,” the teacher admitted, smiling.
Cricket was glad that joke was over. Her jaws ached from all that pretend chewing. But there were lots of other jokes to come. When Mrs. Cheechia asked for the homework papers to be passed forward, the students sat motionless.
“Where are everyone’s papers?” asked Mrs. Cheechia.
Lucas raised his hand. “I had to take care of my little brothers last night. So I couldn’t do my homework.”
Julio’s hand went up next. “My grandmother was sick, and I had to take her to the doctor,”
he explained. “I couldn’t do my homework either.”
One by one the students gave their excuses. “I was too busy practicing the piano,” said Cricket. She felt her face turning red as she recited her line.
“My gerbil ate my homework,” said Arthur.
“My mother threw my homework in the garbage by mistake,” said Zoe, trying to keep from smiling.
“My little brother scribbled all over it and then he tore it into little pieces,” said someone else.
Mrs. Cheechia began laughing. By now she knew it was a joke. “Any other excuses?” she asked. “I must say, I’m very impressed with the power of your imaginations.”
“My uncle took my homework to the North Pole,” said one boy.
“My mother cooked it with the other ingredients for supper,” said someone else.
Finally, when every single student had given a reason for not handing in his or her homework, Lucas stood up. It was the signal for everyone else to stand too. “April Fools’!” they shouted together.
Mrs. Cheechia was laughing so hard that there were tears in her eyes.
The students laughed too. It wasn’t every day that they could make jokes with their teacher. They all sat down and located their homework pages to pass in. All except Arthur. “I got confused,” he said. “I really thought we weren’t going to do the homework last night.”
“Oh, Arthur,” moaned Cricket. “It was just a joke.”
“April Fools’!” Arthur shouted. And suddenly he pulled his homework out of his desk. Not only had he fooled Mrs. Cheechia, he had fooled Cricket as well.
There were several other April Fools’ jokes played by the students during the morning. They all gave the wrong answers on purpose during social studies, and they made silly “errors” during language arts time. Cricket found it quite exhausting trying to think of mistakes to make. She was a very good student, and the correct answers, like correct behavior, came naturally to her. Misbehaving and making mistakes were hard work!
Finally it was lunchtime. The students could hardly wait for lunch to be over. Mrs. Cheechia hadn’t mentioned that it was her birthday, and none of the students had let on that they remembered. The biggest surprises were to take place in the afternoon.
The Just Desserts Club Page 4
