two

The first thing DiDi did when I handed her the maraschino cherries was hold them way up high and sashay across our kitchen calling out, “Sweet Stuff coming through!” Then she peeked back over her shoulder and did a little bam-bam with her hips. “And I’m not talkin’ about the maraschino cherries.”

DiDi is always cracking jokes like that. Like at dinner last night, she yelled out, “Hot Stuff coming through!” Big wink. “And I’m not talkin’ about the tuna noodle casserole.”

Of course, she didn’t think it was all that funny last Thanksgiving when she was sweating under that heavy platter and I yelled, “Big Turkey coming through! And I’m not talkin’ about Thanksgiving dinner.”

DiDi set the cherries down on the counter and got right to work making Mama’s Famous Twinkie Pie. We usually only have Twinkie Pie once a year for our birthdays, which are exactly nine years, nine days, and nine hours apart. But today, DiDi made an exception because she wanted to bring it to Welcome Night at my new school, where all the parents would get to meet the teachers and stuff. It was hosted by this committee that I guess controls the universe, seeing how much DiDi wanted to impress them.

Whenever DiDi makes Mama’s recipes, she likes to pretend she’s starring in her own TV cooking show. Sometimes she even puts on a nice shirt for the occasion. I told her she should let her curls go all loose and pretty, which would look great on camera, but I don’t think there’s been a day in her life she didn’t have them pulled back in a tight little knot.

I got myself nice and comfy. My job is to watch and DiDi’s is to ignore any suggestions I might make.

“Now remember, GiGi,” she said in her cooking show voice. “The secret to Twinkie Pie is to make it just like Mama did, and that means using maraschino cherries so you can make your whipped topping the perfect shade of pinky-red. Just like—”

I said the next part with her: “Cherries in the Snow!”

Ever since I was a little bitty thing, whenever DiDi made Twinkie Pie, she’d tell me the story of Mama and Revlon’s Cherries in the Snow lipstick.

“Cherries in the Snow was Mama’s favorite lipstick and the only one she’d ever wear. Why, if she walked into a drugstore and they were out of it, she’d walk right out that door and down the street to the next store and the next and the next until she found it.”

I remember how happy it made me to imagine my mama being so particular about her lipstick. I imagined she looked just like DiDi with her tilty nose and curvy top lip. I’d pretend the little pink candles DiDi put on top of the Twinkie Pie were tiny lipsticks, pulling them off and spreading the frosting on my own mouth. “I wish I had Cherries an’ Snow.…” I used to say.

“I wish you did, too, baby girl,” she’d answer. “But no one does anymore. The good people at Revlon haven’t made that lipstick in about a hundred years.”

Of course, I found out later it was nowhere near a hundred years, but it didn’t matter either way. It was gone. When she lit the candles, DiDi would lean in close and say, “Make a wish, G. Only… well, you don’t want to go wasting a perfectly good birthday wish on—” Then she’d put her cheek next to mine and whisper, “Why don’t I just make one for the both of us?”

And we’d blow out the candles together. Even as a little girl, I knew what she was worried about. Me wishing for things that would never come true. That would never come back.

I watched as DiDi set out all her bowls and mixing spoons in a nice tidy row. She winked up at her imaginary camera. “Now, I always like to make the pudding ahead of time, so it’s nice and chilled when I’m ready to get started.”

I was sitting on one of our new twirly bar stools. They slid under this counter that’s like a big window between the kitchen and the living room, so you can pass food out to the people sitting there like you’re at the diner. Before we moved, our friend Lori found the stools in the Dumpster behind this bar she used to go to. She was pretty handy now that she was on the wagon, and she gave them nice new seat covers. Except for some scratches on the legs, they were perfectly fine.

“Did I tell you the thing Lori said when she called?” I twirled a little bit right. Then left. And then right again.

DiDi’s behind was sticking out of the fridge, where she was looking for the pudding. “What’s that, baby girl?”

“It’s no biggie… but, well, you know that salesman she dated?”

“Lori dated lots of salesmen, honey.”

“The No-Good Lying Son of a Walnut who was married with like ten kids.”

“Oh. Him. Go on.”

“Well…” I paused for a second. “He calls on all the big drugstores, and he told her that makeup companies sometimes bring back old colors—the really special ones, anyway.” I peeked over at her to see what she would say.

DiDi had set the pudding on the counter and was now unwrapping Twinkies and slicing them up. “Now, there are a lot of Twinkie pies out there in the world, but Mama’s is the only one that’s double-decker. Isn’t that right, G?”

“Uh… yes. I guess.”

“After you have your crust and your Twinkies all set up, go on and get your maraschino cherries.” DiDi looked up and snapped her fingers at me. “Earth to G. Pass the cherries, please.”

“What? Oh.” I looked over at the jar of cherries, but instead of reaching for them, I got up and went to a Super Saver bag I’d left by the sofa. I held it out to her.

“What’s that?”

I poured it out on the counter. A jumble of ruby-red cherries tumbled out, fresh and shiny, rolling all over DiDi’s neat work space. “They had them at the Super Saver. I wanted to surprise you—I thought maybe—”

DiDi put a hand out to stop them. “The recipe says maraschino cherries, G.”

“Maybe you could use both—or maybe you could just put these on top or—”

DiDi quickly gathered the cherries together and put them back in the bag. She rolled the top down nice and tight. “Why don’t you stick these in the fridge? You can have them for a snack later.”

I nodded and took the bag.

“I can see you pouting from here, G. Don’t you like having Mama’s recipes the way she made them? To remember her?” One curl slipped out of her bun. She reached up and tucked it back in.

“I know, D, it’s just that you never—Nothing.”

I put the bag away, handed her the maraschino cherries, and sat back down.

DiDi watched me for a second, then sighed and got back to work. I twirled a few more times, then reached out toward Mama’s Cookbook and gently ran my fingers over it.

“Can I?”

DiDi paused in the middle of fussing with her cherries. “Okay, G, just please—”

“I know, I know. I’ll be careful. I promise.”

On the outside, Mama’s Cookbook is just a regular old three-ring binder like you have at school. But inside are Mama’s recipes, all nice and typed up or handwritten with little cutout pictures and notes and such. You can tell exactly what Mama was like by looking through it. She didn’t do anything unless she thought it was special and fun and one of a kind with some sort of little twist. I think she would’ve wanted DiDi to change things up every once in a while, but that wasn’t happening anytime soon. DiDi could move us 800 miles. But she couldn’t put fresh cherries into Twinkie Pie.

I turned the pages carefully, making sure I didn’t bend or wrinkle anything. Mama’s Cookbook is like the fancy room in a house where I’m only allowed to go if I promise not to touch any of the fussy throw pillows. It’s the only thing of Mama’s that DiDi and I have. And it was plain dumb luck that our babysitter, Miss Linda, asked DiDi to bring it to her place that night when she was watching me. The night of the fire, I mean. I was only a little baby, so I don’t even remember any of it. DiDi tells me the worst part was that it took everything. We don’t even have a photo of Mama. Sometimes I squeeze my eyes shut and try to see if I can picture her face. But it never works. DiDi says I don’t need a dumb old photo. Every time we make her food, it’s our way of remembering the way she was.

I only ever asked once about having a daddy, and DiDi said, “Best forget about him, GiGi. Everything you got in the brain department you got from Mama. She may have been a hairdresser, but she was brainy like you and had big plans.” I liked that.

After a while, I peeked out. DiDi was finishing up the pie, but her yakky cooking show voice was gone.

You don’t exactly have to be a government agent to figure out that DiDi is super-sensitive about people messing with Mama’s recipes. Adding fresh cherries to Twinkie Pie is practically the same as suggesting she throw in a sardine or two. I don’t even know why she watches that Mystery Basket show, seeing how much she hates surprise ingredients. Surprises of any kind, really.

Except for maybe when we won that one million dollars last spring.

Of course, DiDi says she wasn’t surprised at all. She had planned on winning. We don’t talk about it to anyone. But if we did, I guess most people would be wondering what millionaires living on the North Shore of Long Island are doing in a one-bedroom apartment above the salon where DiDi cuts hair. Going about life like we were still in that trailer park back in South Carolina.

My Famous Twinkie Pie

• 3 cups vanilla wafer cookies, crushed to make 2 cups of coarse crumbs, plus 6 cookies crushed and set aside for garnish

• 6 tablespoons butter, melted

• ¼ teaspoon salt

• ¼ cup instant vanilla pudding mix (about half a box)

• 1 cup cold milk

• 2 cups heavy cream (divided into ½ cup and 1½ cups)

• 7 Twinkies

• 2 bananas, sliced

• 10-ounce jar of red maraschino cherries, drained and stemmed (save 2 tablespoons of juice and set one cherry aside for garnish)

You’ll need a 9-inch springform pan.

Preheat your oven to 350°F. For the crust, mix the 2 cups of cookie crumbs with the melted butter and salt. Press it into the bottom of your springform pan. Put it in the oven for 12 minutes until it’s golden brown. Take out the pan and let it cool. Meanwhile, make your pudding. Whisk the pudding mix with the cold milk for 2 minutes until it thickens. In a separate bowl, beat the ½ cup of heavy cream until stiff peaks form (about 2 minutes on an electric hand mixer). Fold the whipped cream into the pudding mixture, and put it in the fridge for now.

Go on and find your favorite knife, and slice those Twinkies in half so they look like little thumbs. Line them, thumbs up, all around your pan in a circle on top of the crust. Then—you guessed it—arrange the banana slices in a nice layer. Then pour the pudding over everything.

Here’s my special touch: Put the cherries in the blender—except for one cherry for the top of your pie! Add the 2 tablespoons of cherry juice, and just zap them up into cherry puree. In a fresh bowl, whip the remaining 1½ cups of heavy cream into stiff peaks. Then fold in your cherry puree until it’s the perfect shade of pinky-red—just like Cherries in the Snow lipstick. (Now, I know you swear by your Love That Red, Mary Elizabeth, but don’t you dare cross out my Cherries in the Snow and fill that in! There. I’ve said it plain and clear for anyone to see in case you do have the nerve to put your chicken scratch in here next time you borrow this.)

Anyway, pour your pinky-red topping over the pie and smooth it out. Garnish with the remaining crushed cookies. Top with one cherry.

Refrigerate till firm. Enjoy!

Serves 8–10.