Cracks in the Cone

by Coco Simon

  That was the first interesting order I’d taken all day. The Kitchen Sink had a classic vanilla ice cream base, but it was also loaded with crumbled pretzels, potato chips, fudge, and caramel. “Five points for originality!” I cheered, and Sierra laughed.

  The woman smiled. “I’m not sure what I did to deserve that, but I’ll take it,” she said.

  The next few orders were not as interesting. Two vanilla cones. One chocolate shake. One chocolate cone. I wanted to offer Strawberry Shortcake or Hokey Pokey samples, but I was worried what Allie might say.

  Then a woman came up to the counter wearing pink nursing scrubs. She looked tired, like she had just come off a long shift, maybe. I guessed that she had come to Molly’s to add a little bit of happiness to her day.

  “Hello. How can I help you?” I asked in my most cheerful customer-service voice.

  “I’ll just have a little strawberry ice cream in a cup,” she said.

  How disappointing! I thought. Was that the best she could do? Was she just ordering the strawberry ice cream because it was a habit? Or maybe she wanted to match her scrubs? Was pink her favorite color, and she always ordered her ice cream to match? I looked at her face carefully and noticed there was a unicorn barrette in her hair. Maybe she was a pediatric nurse, or she just liked unicorns.

  Then I remembered a photo that my friend MacKenzie had sent me. “Hold on,” I said, and took my gloves off. I quickly scrolled through my phone and brought up the pic.

  “If you want, I can whip up this,” I said, and held up the phone. The picture showed a unicorn sundae. There were lots of ways to make them, but this one had pink and blue ice cream topped with mini-marshmallows, whipped cream, and rainbow sprinkles. The mini-marshmallows looked like unicorn ears, and three mini-marshmallows were stacked high for the horn.

  The woman’s eyes got wide.

  “That’s very pretty,” she said. “But I don’t know if I could eat all that.”

  “Of course you can!” I said. “It’s a unicorn sundae, a special treat for a special person. And that person is you.”

  The woman scrunched up her face, thinking. “Weeeellllll . . .”

  Allie spoke up behind me. “Tamiko, I’ve got the next milkshake ready. And no cell phones while you’re serving customers.”

  I ignored her, because I could see that I almost had this woman convinced.

  “You’re obviously a hardworking woman,” I said. “Don’t you deserve a special treat? Something happy to brighten up your day? Since you spend time brightening up everyone else’s.”

  That did it. The woman smiled. “Yes, exactly!” she said. “It’s been a rough week. One unicorn sundae, please.”

  A few people in line behind her laughed and applauded.

  “One unicorn sundae, coming right up,” I said. I took the milkshake from Allie.

  “How exactly am I supposed to make that?” she hissed at me.

  “One scoop of strawberry, one scoop of Lemon Blueberry, topped with mini-marshmallows, whipped cream, and rainbow sprinkles,” I said, showing her the photo. “We can charge her the medium sundae price.”

  Allie’s eyes brightened a little when she realized this. A medium sundae cost more than twice as much as a single scoop, which meant more profits for her mom’s shop.

  I delivered the milkshake to its owner and turned back to the line, where a dad with two little girls was waiting.

  “What can I get for you?” I asked.

  “Well, we were just going to get cones, but I think now we’ll get three unicorn sundaes,” he said.

  “Yay!” the little girls cheered.

  “You got it,” I said, and I turned back to Allie. She was just starting to put the toppings on the first unicorn sundae.

  “We need three more,” I told her, and now her eyes got wide with fear. “Let me know if you need help.”

  But Allie was a trooper. She nodded gratefully. “Thanks, but I think I’ve got it.”

  Allie added the mini-marshmallows and whipped cream to the first sundae and topped it off with a flourish of multicolored sprinkles.

  “Perfect!” I said. I took it from her and handed it to the nurse. “Have your sprinkle of happy!” I said, and she smiled at me.

  “You too!”

  Now Allie was working on the three unicorn sundaes. I glanced at the line and saw that it was stretching out the door at this point. Awesome for the shop, but not so awesome for me and Allie!

  I took the next order. “One vanilla cone with chocolate sprinkles, one cup of chocolate ice cream,” I told Allie.

  Then I gave the finished sundaes to the dad with the little girls. “Have your sprinkle of happy!” I repeated, and I heard a lady in line say, “Oh, the girls who work here are just so sweet!”

  Maybe we were too sweet, because the next four orders were all unicorn sundaes! I saw some of the customers snapping photos of the first ones we had already made.

  “We need to keep up!” I urged Allie. “Let me help you with those.”

  “I got this,” she said, scooping out the ice cream into four cups.

  I started topping the sundaes with the mini-marshmallows. Allie wiped her hands on her apron.

  “I can finish topping,” she said. “Go take the next order.”

  “You got it, boss,” I said, and then I turned to help a mom with two little boys who were running around her in circles and screaming. “Chocolate peanut butter! Chocolate peanut butter! Yum!”

  “Chocolate peanut butter what?” I asked.

  Then I heard Allie’s voice behind me. “Four unicorns ready!”

  I spun around, and she thrust two sundaes into my hands. I handed them over to the customers, and then when I spun around again, Allie thrust two more into my hands. But I didn’t get a good grip on one of them, and it fell to the floor with a sickening plop! Oh, no, I thought. Why did this have to happen now? Allie was already a little annoyed at me today. A couple of customers in line gasped. I decided to try to make a joke out of the situation.

  “Unicorn down!” I yelled, and the customers in line laughed. So did Sierra. But Allie wasn’t laughing at all. In fact, she was frowning.

  “I’ll get the mop,” Sierra said quickly, and she dashed off while Allie went to work on making a replacement sundae. Her mouth was a thin line.

  Honestly, I did not understand why Allie was so upset. It was just one sundae—a sundae that the shop would not have sold if I had not been inspired to convince the nurse to order one. Now we had a shop full of people ordering expensive sundaes instead of plain cups of ice cream. So we lost one—big deal! Hadn’t I been making extra money for the shop all day? She should be thanking me instead of giving me dirty looks.

  Allie finished the new sundae and handed it to me.

  “Be careful with this one,” she said.

  I rolled my eyes at her. But when I faced the customer, I made sure to have a big smile on my face.

  “Here’s your sprinkle of happy!” I said, smiling big.

  CHAPTER THREE

  WHAT IS ALLIE’S DEAL?

  “What gave you the idea for the unicorn sundaes?” Allie asked me when we finally had a lull in customers.

  It was almost five o’clock, our end-of-shift time. We had been cranking out unicorn sundaes like crazy for almost two hours, and then business had slowly died down. We were wiping the tables, and cleaning the ice cream drips on the freezer, and crushing cookies for the toppings.

  “MacKenzie found them online,” I replied. “They’re trending. And I just had a hunch that that nurse would go for one.”

  I watched Allie’s face carefully when I mentioned MacKenzie. Kenz (what I mostly called her) was a new student at MLK Middle School. Sierra and I had made friends with her because we’d been thinking of Allie and how hard it must be to be the new kid in school. But Allie had been kind of jealous of MacKenzie at first.

  “It is a good idea,” Allie replied after a moment, and she seemed to be cool with the fact that it had come
from MacKenzie.

  Mrs. S. came out of the back room, stretching.

  “I thought I’d leave hours of paperwork behind me when I stopped working for your dad’s company, Allie,” she said. “But there’s a lot more than I bargained for, running this shop. Making the ice cream is the best part.”

  “Mrs. S., if you’re still filling out orders, you might want to order some more mini-marshmallows,” I said. “We’re low.”

  She frowned, puzzled. “But I just bought some. They don’t usually run out so fast.”

  I showed her the picture of a unicorn sundae on my phone. “That was before we started selling unicorn sundaes. They’re very popular now. You might want to get them on the menu board.”

  “So that’s what all the fuss was I heard out here,” Mrs. S. said. “What kind of ice cream did you use?”

  Allie answered. “The strawberry and the Lemon Blueberry,” she replied. “People really seemed to like them. I can show you how to make one.”

  “Thanks, but not right now,” Mrs. S. said. “The girls’ moms will be here soon, and, Allie, your dad is on his way with Tanner.”

  “But I could stay and help you,” Allie said. “There’s a lot of cleanup to do, and you’re going to get an after-dinner rush.”

  Mrs. S. hugged her. “I’ve got it, Allie. Don’t worry. I’m going to handle the after-dinner crowd and close around seven. It won’t be too busy on a Sunday night. You need time to relax before school tomorrow. Plus your dad has a special dinner planned for you and Tanner.”

  Allie nodded, but I thought she looked a little sad. I tried to imagine what life would be like if I had to spend one weekend with my dad and another with my mom. Getting a break from Mom didn’t seem so bad, but like I said before, it’s always different when it’s your parents.

  Mrs. S. put on an apron. “Sierra, can you please cash out for me before you go?”

  “Sure thing,” Sierra replied, and she started pressing some buttons on the computerized cash register.

  “Thanks so much, girls,” Mrs. S. said. “I’m going to get some more stuff from the supply cabinet before you go. Call me when you cash out, Sierra, so I can pay you all for today. And don’t forget to split your tips.”

  “Can you count the tips, Tamiko?” Sierra asked, nodding to the tip jar next to the register.

  “Absolutely,” I said. I brought the jar to one of the tables and dumped it out. Dollar bills spilled out, along with coins, which started rolling all over the checkered floor.

  “Whoops!” I cried, and scrambled to pick them up. I didn’t want to lose any of our tip money!

  I gathered up the coins and divided them into piles. It was taking forever! While I was still counting, Sierra spoke up.

  “The register’s a little short,” she said. “I’m off by ninety-seven cents.”

  “That’s not a big deal,” I said.

  Allie, who was wiping off the counter, stopped. “ ’Not a big deal?’ ” she repeated. “Don’t you realize that all these things add up? Like dropping ice cream onto the floor, and giving huge samples, and now coming up short on the register? This is a real business, you know. It’s not a game or a silly MLK homework assignment!”

  I looked at Sierra, and her eyes were as wide as mine. Was Allie really freaking out over one dropped sundae and ninety-seven cents? Didn’t she realize that I had been helping her mom do more business by up-selling product all day?

  “Jeez, Allie. If I wanted to get yelled at, I would have stayed at home so that my mom could yell at me,” I said. “I’ll pay for the sundae that I dropped. Even though you were the one passing it to me too fast.”

  “What? I did not!” Allie snapped.

  “And you can take a dollar out of my tips,” Sierra said. “I probably charged someone for a small cone instead of a medium, or something like that. It was such a crazy day, and I was nervous about keeping up. I didn’t mean to. I’m sorry, chica. We all want to make this work for your mom.”

  Allie’s face softened then. Sierra was always a lot more understanding than I was. Me, I was pretty blunt. But Sierra always seemed to know just how to say things.

  “Listen, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell,” Allie said. “Don’t worry about it, okay?”

  Sierra and I didn’t say anything for a few seconds.

  “You want me to see if my dad will take us all out for pizza or something?” Allie asked.

  I genuinely believed that Allie felt bad. But I felt like I had been stung by a bee, and now there was a tiny painful spot that I couldn’t ignore.

  “Well, maybe some other time,” I said. “I mean, our moms are already on the way. Plus your mom said that your dad had something special planned.”

  “Right,” Allie said. “Maybe next Sunday. We can plan it in advance.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Sierra said.

  I quickly finished counting the tips in silence. Then I handed out the cash to everyone.

  “We each made fourteen dollars and thirty-two cents in tips,” I said. “But I’m putting six dollars of mine back into the register to cover the sundae.”

  I waited for Allie to say, “No, don’t worry about it. It was an accident,” but she didn’t. She nodded at me like that was what I was supposed to do. And then that little painful spot flared up again. Why did Allie have to be so mean?

  “Here’s my dollar,” Sierra said, adding a bill from her tip money to the register. “You can keep the extra three cents.”

  Allie’s face was red now, like she felt awkward about the whole thing. But she didn’t stop Sierra from returning the money either.

  Mrs. S. returned from the back room. “All done, Sierra?” she asked.

  “All ready for you,” Sierra replied.

  Allie’s mom opened the cash register and gave us each the hourly pay that we’d earned, on top of our tips. It took away some of the sting of having to pay for the dropped sundae, but not the sting from feeling slighted by one of my best friends in the world.

  “One step closer to my mini-moto,” I said, carefully placing the money into my purse. Last Christmas break I’d visited my cousin Hayato in Japan, and he’d had this cool tiny moped that we’d all taken turns on. I’d wanted one of my own for months now, even though Mom had said, You’ll ride one over my dead body. I’d told her that I would need a ramp to do that, since, you know, I’d be on a moped. She hadn’t laughed. Still I kept thinking that if I paid for it, she wouldn’t be able to say no.

  Sierra motioned to me. “Want to wait outside for our rides?” she asked.

  “Sure,” I said. “So long, Sprinkle Sundays sisters! See you next Sunday!”

  “Thanks, girls!” Mrs. S. called after us. Allie just waved.

  We stepped outside.

  “Well, that was awkward,” Sierra said. “Sorry. I just had to get out of there.”

  “What is up with Allie?” I asked. “She used to be so chill. But this whole uptight-boss-lady act is not working for me.”

  “Well, she’s going through a lot,” Sierra pointed out. “You saw her face when her mom said she couldn’t stay at the shop longer.”

  “I guess,” I said. “But that’s between her and her parents. She shouldn’t be yelling at us. We’re her friends!”

  Sierra just shrugged.

  Then my mom’s white SUV pulled up, and I flashed Sierra a peace sign.

  “Later,” I said.

  It was only when I climbed into the passenger seat that I realized that while I had sold a bunch of unicorn sundaes, I had not even tried one! What was the point of working in an ice cream shop if you didn’t get to stuff your face with ice cream?

  I put on my seat belt.

  “No sprinkle of happy for me today!” I said, and sighed.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  FAMILY NIGHT

  “No sprinkle of happy?” Mom asked. “Is this job too much for you, Tamiko?”

  Ugh. This was why I shouldn’t have said anything out loud. My mom loved to talk abou
t everything—and I mean everything.

  “No, no, no,” I said quickly. “It’s not too much. But you know, it’s work. Work isn’t always fun.”

  “No,” she agreed. “That’s why it’s called work. But I hope that when you grow up, you’ll be able to do work that you love. Then it won’t feel as hard.” She glanced over at me and smiled. “Like maybe you could become a professional toilet seat customizer.”

  “Why, yes,” I said, playing along. “I was thinking of majoring in that in college at Toilet Customization School. It’s really far away, so you won’t be able to visit.”

  “Seriously, Tamiko, I don’t like you staying up so late,” Mom said. “I got up to use the bathroom at one o’clock, and I saw the light still on under your door.”

  “When the muse strikes, I must listen,” I said.

  “I did not know there was a toilet seat muse,” Mom replied. “Interesting.”

  But then she let it drop.

  “What’s for dinner?” I asked as we pulled into the driveway.

  “Dad made hiyashi chuka, since it was so hot out today,” Mom replied. Hiyashi chuka was one of my favorite foods, so I heard my stomach rumble and get excited. It was a cold noodle dish made with ramen noodles, but these were nothing like the super-salty ramen sold in those little dehydrated packets. Ramen was just a kind of noodle, and hiyashi chuka was cold ramen with a soy or sesame sauce dressing topped with stuff like cucumbers, ham, and cooked egg. Me? I was a vegetarian by choice, so I usually went for tofu instead of ham. The hiyashi chuka smelled really, really good. “The game just started, so I’ll put on the TV in the kitchen when we get inside.”

  “The game!” I cried. “I almost forgot!”

  I belonged to a family of baseball fanatics. We all loved the game—except for Kai. Sometimes Kai was kind of like an odd duckling at our house. We would watch almost any major-league game that came on TV, and because there was no big-league team in our state, we were a house divided. A few years ago Mom’s and Dad’s favorite teams faced each other in the postseason, and when Mom’s team won, Dad didn’t say a word in the house for a whole thirty-seven hours. I knew because I counted the hours. Actually, it was thirty-six and a half hours, but I liked to round up.