The Cupcake Diaries

by Darlene Panzera

  Like the smile on the tall, dark-haired cowboy who brought in a trailer full of horses to take the tourists on trail rides down the beach.

  Or the smile on the surfer dude who had bumped into her at Dave’s stand.

  “Sorry I didn’t introduce myself,” he said, leaning a gloriously bronzed arm across her cupcake counter. “I was having a bad day.”

  “So was I,” Stacey said, grinning back at him.

  “My name’s Zach.” His fingers played over hers, his touch soft as a whisper.

  Her pulse doubled. “I-I’m Stacey.”

  “My favorite name.” He smiled at her again, his teeth brighter than the streaks in his sun-bleached hair. No—brighter than the sun itself.

  She stared, mesmerized.

  “How ’bout you give me a cannoli cupcake?” he asked.

  She took one out of the box beside him. “That will be $3.25.”

  Zach dug into the pocket of his bathing suit. “Oh, man. Must have left all my coin in my backpack.”

  “You have a backpack, too?” Stacey wondered if she’d just met her soul mate.

  “Yeah, but it’s down the beach.” He looked genuinely disappointed as he leaned in and looked at her with his big brown eyes. “I don’t have any money.”

  “That’s okay,” Stacey said, lowering her voice. “You can have the cupcake for free.”

  “Are you sure?” Zach asked, his face brightening once again.

  “Oh, yes.”

  He gave her a quick wink as he took the treat from her hands. “Thanks, Stacey. I won’t forget this.”

  I should hope not, she thought dreamily as he strolled away. Maybe she’d have a date for Kim’s wedding after all.

  She turned her head and caught Dave watching. He, too, smiled, but not in a good way. How dare he mock her! Squaring her shoulders, she pretended to ignore him. She wouldn’t let him sour her mood. So far, this day had been a success . . . in more ways than one.

  Then the clouds moved in, chasing her customers off the beach and her anticipated sales along with them. She tried lowering the price, even though she’d have to make up the difference out of her own salary. Better than paying for them all, she reasoned. But reducing the cost didn’t work.

  Why was Dave still selling? What was it about ice cream that drew more people to him than to her cupcake stand?

  A group of teenagers remained on the beach about fifty feet in front of her. She bet they’d like cupcakes, especially if she brought some out to them. Picking up an open box of marshmallow fudge sundae cupcakes, she left the Volkswagen bus and walked out on to the sand.

  But even the seagulls were against her. They gathered together out of nowhere and swirled in a gray-and-white mass above, squawking back and forth to each other, as if discussing the best plan for attack.

  Suddenly, they dive-bombed, one swooping down toward the cupcake box, then another doing the same. The wings from one of the birds brushed over the top of her head. She tried to swat them away while protecting the box at the same time.

  It didn’t work. A seagull’s sharp beak nipped at her arm. The pinch startled her, and she lifted the cupcakes higher. The birds must have thought the gesture was one of surrender because at least six of them flew down, tore the edge of the box, and pecked the cupcakes apart in a frightening feeding frenzy.

  Stacey shrieked, dropped the box, and ran for cover. She must have smelled like cupcakes, because some of the birds followed her. She screamed again, waving her hands this way and that, to ward off the terrors. Then someone threw half of a sandwich past her, and the birds left her alone to devour the new eye-catching feast.

  Dave smirked as she ran past him, but she didn’t care. Her heart pounded in her chest. Blood rushed up to her ears. Her head felt as unbalanced as her feet. She’d never seen such mean, spiteful birds. As a final insult, a lone gull flew over and pooped on the cupcake counter.

  Stacey sat on an overturned five-gallon bucket to regroup and watched Dave throw his brown paper lunch bag in the trash.

  “Thank you for calling off your minions.”

  “They don’t work for me.” He laughed, then gave her a direct look. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Dave didn’t look as if he believed her. He grinned. “Well, you finally got some customers.”

  Stacey scrunched her face to show him what she thought of his joke, and his grin broadened. Then she took out the Cupcake Diary that Andi had given her and with a pen wrote:

  Dear Diary, this is not going so well. I think Dave hates me. The seagulls definitely hate me . . . but love the cupcakes.

  Some adventure. What she really longed for was a domestic adventure. Instead of writing, Stacey dreamed of the new apartment she’d move into once she paid off Pam. It didn’t have a fenced in yard, but she would have her own mailbox. And someday, when she bought her own house, she’d plant a flower garden, maybe tomatoes, and get herself a real pet—maybe a bird-hunting dog. She’d make sure her home had a stone cellar for all her survival supplies and . . . she’d become a hoarder.

  She’d fill one entire room full of canned food. Another with—her thoughts broke off as she spotted the old woman who tried to salvage her cupcake box from the trash can on Ocean Avenue. The woman’s drawn expression suggested she was sad, lonely. Maybe hungry. Stacey had one small box containing four cupcakes left in the back of her stand and decided to give them to her.

  The woman appeared wary at first, but after she realized the cupcakes were once again a gift, she relaxed and introduced herself as Gladys.

  “I have a gift for you, too.” Gladys reached into the pocket of her faded floral dress and produced four frosted pieces of beach glass: one blue, one green, one amber, and one white. Each one was smoothed by the tumbling waves at the water’s edge.

  “There aren’t as many of these as there used to be,” Gladys said. “In the past, the pieces of glass would wash ashore from broken bottles smashed at sea. Now a large percentage of glass has been replaced with plastic, which many think is safer.”

  “But not as beautiful,” Stacey said, as she admired the handful of treasure that Gladys placed in her hand.

  “No,” Gladys agreed and took the box of cupcakes.

  THE SEA GLASS wasn’t the only thing at Cannon Beach that was broken. Stacey’s pink-and-white Volkswagen bus got a flat tire on the ride home. She’d managed to pull over to the side of the road, but the wheel’s lug nuts were stuck, and she wasn’t strong enough to budge them.

  A bright yellow, open-topped Jeep approached, and she waved her arms in the air to signal she needed help. Could her eyes be deceiving her? No, they were not; it was the gorgeous surfer who she’d served a cupcake to earlier that afternoon with what looked to be three of his buddies. Thinking this disaster might turn into a golden opportunity to score a date, she gave them a big smile.

  Which they returned, before they laughed and one of the three friends crooned, “Hey, baby, how ’bout you give me a free cupcake?”

  More laughter followed as the Jeep sped past her and out of sight. For a moment, Stacey stared down the vacant road, her mouth open, and her heart ready to cry.

  Then she heard another vehicle approaching, and when she turned to see who it was, her humiliation deepened tenfold. Dave’s ice cream truck. Would he whiz right on past her, too?

  Yup, there he went.

  There was no question he saw her. His gaze collided with hers right through the front of his windshield.

  Could this day get any worse? Not only did men run away from her at restaurants, but now she had them speeding away and leaving her stranded along the side of the road. Maybe she should stop trying and just accept her fate. Maybe she was meant to be alone, like Gladys, the homeless woman wandering the beach.

  Whoops, maybe not. The red brake lights on the back of Dave’s truck lit up, and he slowed to a stop. Then he backed up.

  Stacey suppressed the flutter of hope that danced in her chest the moment Dave st
epped from his vehicle. Hope had proved to be unreliable time and time again. Instead she tightened her grip on something more solid—the tire iron in her hand. “If you’ve come back to laugh, go ahead, get it over with, and then please leave. It’s been a very long day.”

  He drew closer. “I’m not here to insult you, Idaho. I’m here to help.”

  “Really?” She didn’t mean to sound so surprised, but, well . . . she was.

  He gave her an exasperated look, then grinned. “Just give me the tire iron.”

  Chapter Five

  * * *

  Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.

  —Martin Luther King Jr.

  OVER THE NEXT two weeks Stacey and Dave worked together amicably enough with their vendor stands side by side. But he didn’t go out of his way to talk to her, and she still harbored a secret jealousy toward him over sales.

  This Saturday she was determined to lure the majority of the customers to her stand. Thousands of people were expected to attend the Cannon Beach sand castle competition, partly because the weather forecasters predicted sunshine and blue sky and partly because this year was the fiftieth anniversary of the event.

  According to Rachel, in 1964 a tsunami generated by the Good Friday earthquake took out the bridge north of town, broke power lines, and flooded the area. Afterward the residents of Cannon Beach held the sand castle contest to attract tourists, and it became an annual tradition.

  Stacey prayed that history would not repeat itself and that instead of water, a tsunami of customers would flood her stand. After all, with Andi’s new golden orange cake mix, Kim’s fondant octopus, seashell, and sand castle creations atop the frosting, and Rachel’s promotional coupons, how could anyone not want to buy their cupcakes?

  “Here’s another three dozen,” Andi said, setting them down on the Creative Cupcakes counter. “Rachel will go to the competition with you, and Kim and I will stay here and—oooh.”

  Andi cringed and clutched the edge of the counter.

  “Are you okay?” Stacey asked and reached out a hand to steady her. “Is it the baby?”

  Andi shook her head. “I’m not due for another two months. The doctor called these little twinges Braxton Hicks contractions, which means false labor pains. But they don’t always feel false.”

  “Should I call Jake?”

  “No, he’s already at the beach. His editor wants him to write a feature article on the master sculptors for the front page of the Astoria Sun.”

  Andi’s three children carried more cupcake boxes to them from the kitchen, and Stacey loaded them into the back of the Volkswagen bus outside.

  She envied the way Andi and Jake had brought all the kids together to form a family. Andi’s seven-year-old daughter, Mia, came from her first marriage. Jake’s daughter, Taylor, the same age, came from his. And together they adopted thirteen-year-old Max, a boy formerly in foster care, just this past Christmas. Andi and Jake’s new baby would make child number four.

  But what really brought out the green monster in Stacey was seeing how close they were to one another, much closer, she thought, than she was to her tornado-torn family.

  Andi’s pain must have subsided because she gave Stacey a devious smile. “You know, Caleb, one of the photographers at the newspaper, will also be at the competition. You might consider asking him to escort you to Kim’s wedding reception.”

  “Caleb’s got a girlfriend,” Mia told them.

  Andi frowned. “How would you know?”

  Max nudged Mia and teased, “Mia’s a big know-it-all.”

  “She is,” Taylor agreed. “She also knows what Aunt Trish and Uncle Oliver were arguing about on Sunday.”

  “Don’t worry, Stacey,” Mia said, looking up at her with big blue eyes. “Uncle Oliver wants to go to a motocross event the same day as Kim’s wedding, and just like you, Aunt Trish might have to go alone. You could sit with her.”

  Well, that was . . . um, comforting? Stacey knew Mia meant well, but the fact that she didn’t have anyone to accompany her to the wedding niggled at her more than ever. Maybe she should make “getting a date” her second goal for the day. Maybe she could charm a cute sand-carving artist. Maybe.

  Martha Slater, the coordinator for the state cupcake competition, drove up, parked her car next to the Volkswagen bus, and blocked her in.

  “I have to leave,” Stacey told her, closing the back doors of the vehicle. “Can you please move your car forward so I can get out?”

  “I’m sure you can wait a few minutes,” Ms. Slater said, her tone icy cold. “Especially since I’m here to deliver the official registrant documents and contestant number.”

  Didn’t the woman know how to email? Why deliver the documents in person? Stacey followed her through the front door of the shop and wondered if she were some kind of competition spy.

  Once Ms. Slater left, Rachel threw her arms in the air and twirled around. “Once we win the state title, we’ll compete in regionals, then nationals. New York, here we come!”

  Stacey nodded, hoping at the end of summer there would still be a “we.”

  AN HOUR LATER, Stacey and Rachel opened the cupcake stand for business and watched the competing master teams take positions inside each of their thirty-by-thirty-foot designated roped-off sandy squares.

  “I wonder if the cupcake competition will be anything like this,” Stacey mused.

  “Both competitions will be timed,” Rachel told her. “The sand castle builders start early when the tide is out. They’ll have only about five hours. Then the teams will stop around noon, and their creations will be judged before the incoming high tide washes them away. Like the cupcake competitions, the winners receive trophies, ribbons, and bragging rights.”

  Stacey glanced back and forth as the team members carried buckets of water from a deep-dug water basin near the surf to the sand sculptures. Mermaids, dragons, the sharp chiseled faces of sea captains, and, of course, tall, turreted castles slowly took shape, decorated only with natural items like sticks and stones, seaweed and shells.

  She sighed. “My new apartment will be my castle.”

  Beside her, Rachel craned her curly red head over the counter and glanced to the right for the third time.

  “What are you looking for?” Stacey asked, puzzled.

  “Do you smell that?” her cousin crooned.

  Stacey sniffed the cupcakes on the counter in front of them. “The gingered maple smells all right to me.”

  “No, I meant . . . the ice cream.” Rachel licked her lips. “He has fresh whipped, creamy chocolate chip mint over there, and it’s driving me crazy.”

  Stacey rolled her eyes. “It’s only ice cream. Our cupcakes taste better.”

  “I haven’t had homemade ice cream in ages,” Rachel continued, her eyes wide. “And look. There’s Guy Armstrong in the stand with him. What’s he doing there?”

  “Do you want me to go find out?”

  Stacey hoped Rachel would say yes so she’d have a legitimate excuse to talk to Dave.

  “No,” Rachel said, taking off her apron. “I’ll go.”

  She returned fifteen minutes later holding a spoon and a bowl of ice cream.

  Stacey gasped. “You’re supporting the enemy!”

  “He can’t be an enemy if he makes ice cream this good.”

  “He’s taking all our customers.”

  Rachel pursed her lips. “Our business is a little slow.”

  “This weekend is supposed to be the busiest all summer. If we don’t rack up sales today, we never will.” Frustrated, Stacey threw her hands into the air. “So why is the tattoo artist helping Dave?”

  “Guy and Dave are friends,” Rachel replied, “and on a big weekend like this, Dave needs him.”

  Just like, Stacey thought, she’d need Rachel. Her cousin took another spoonful of ice cream and made a yummy noise, like a toddler. It wouldn’t look good if a customer approached and saw Rachel devouring Dave’s ice cream
, but . . . no one came.

  Dave drew near to place a garbage bag in the trash can between their stands and shook his head.

  “Sorry, girls,” he said with a wicked grin. “Cupcakes have no place on this beach.”

  “See?” Stacey whispered to her cousin. “He is the enemy.”

  “A very good-looking one,” Rachel reminded her.

  “If only his attitude matched his appearance,” Stacey muttered.

  When Dave said cupcakes had no place on the beach, did he really mean cupcakes, or did he mean her? Fearing he meant the latter, her defenses shot up, and heat filled her veins.

  Stacey glanced at the smiling, hand-drawn face decorating the rock on her counter. She could almost hear it say, Buck up. Be the Kate Jones of your own life.

  “I’ll show him cupcakes do have a place on this beach,” she said, more to herself than to Rachel. “I’ll show Mr. Wright that he’s . . . wrong!”

  Rachel paused with her spoon halfway to her mouth and stared at her. “How?”

  Stacey’s gaze fell on the spoon, and she drew in a breath. “I just got a great idea.”

  A SHORT WHILE later, when Grandpa Lewy arrived at the stand with Bernice and Sarah, Stacey asked him for help.

  “Don’t you want to hear about the winner of the sand castle competition?” Grandpa Lewy asked. “It was a sea monster, twenty feet long, with triangular scales all over its skin.”

  “You can tell me all about it later, Grandpa,” Stacey told him. “Right now I need to draw in customers. Do you remember how we used to play spoons?”

  Stacey sat outside the stand on one of the wooden stools and hit a set of metal spoons against the palm of her hand and her knee the way Grandpa Lewy had shown her when she was a young girl. She’d always been good at it, but the talent wasn’t something she’d brag about at school or put on a job résumé.

  Grandpa Lewy spooned along with her, and the tinkling percussion sound gathered a crowd around them to observe. When they stopped, the people clapped and cheered, but best of all they bought cupcakes. Stacey’s fingers were tired, but the customers demanded that she and her grandpa continue. Even Dave stepped out of his stand to listen to them play.