CHAPTER 14
The Toscani family was due to move into Miss Myrtie Mae’s old house during spring break. Their last name was all we knew about them, but everyone figured they must have kids since they chose that week.
Spring break week also meant Mom, Dad, and I would take turns at the snow cone stand. Usually I hated having to spend my break working because that robbed me of time hanging out with Twig, but now I looked forward to it. Selling snow cones would give me something to do.
That first morning, I started for my shift and saw an unfamiliar burgundy SUV with a Vermont license plate easing down our street. Twig and I could finally cross Vermont off our list. But what would she care now? It was a dumb game anyway.
When the SUV turned at our corner onto Cottonwood Street, pulling into Miss Myrtie Mae’s driveway, I realized the car must belong to the Toscanis. Before I took off for the stand, I told Mom that I thought the new neighbors had arrived.
Mayzee slid down the banister. “I want to see them!”
She’d been told a million times not to do that, but never got into real trouble.
“Mayzee Wilson,” Mom said, “what did I tell you, young lady?” She turned back to me. “I’ll make a carrot cake for them. Don’t worry, I’ll make one for us, too.”
Mom’s carrot cake was her specialty. Double cream cheese frosting, cake so moist it melted in your mouth. No one knew the recipe. Ferris had begged to have it for years. After the hundredth time that he asked and she declined, he took a stab at it.
When Mom tasted his attempt, she told him, “Nope, that’s not it.”
“Yeah,” Ferris said, “I reckoned that.”
He even promised to put her name on the menu if she’d give the recipe to him. “I’ll call it Tara Wilson’s 24k Carrot Cake.”
“Nope,” Mom had told him. “That recipe’s going with me to the grave. How do you think I got my husband? That cake is guaranteed man bait.”
If another year went by without getting my first kiss, I might need that recipe. Although I was pretty sure the cake didn’t have anything to do with Mom plucking Dad’s heartstrings. The story I’d been told was that Mom had been crazy for Dad most of her life, but she was seven years younger and he’d never paid much attention to her.
They only lived a few blocks apart, and would see each other often around town. But years later they bumped into each other at the Dallas–Fort Worth Airport. Dad was traveling home from a history teachers’ conference, and Mom had celebrated graduating from college by visiting Aunt Scarlett, who was living in New York at the time. When Mom spotted Dad at the departure gate, she plopped herself next to him, starting a conversation. Because of bad weather, their flight time to Amarillo kept being postponed. They waited it out, making their way around the airport, eating nachos for dinner, drinking coffee later, and sharing an ice cream sundae.
Their flight was officially canceled at midnight, and they were rescheduled the next morning. When the airlines brought out cots for the passengers, Mom and Dad put theirs side by side.
Dad insisted he didn’t get a wink of sleep because he wanted to make sure Mom’s purse and bag didn’t get stolen, but Mom claimed she didn’t dare blink the entire night, staring at Dad as he slept, thinking how lucky she was to have spent an entire day with Toby Wilson. They were married three months later. That may not sound like a fairy tale to most people, but to me, it was pretty romantic.
Before I left for the stand, I told Mayzee to find out if someone my age had moved into Miss Myrtie Mae’s house.
She was stretched out on the couch, flat on her back, reading a picture book, holding it high above her head. “It will cost you,” she said, not bothering to glance over at me.
Her piggy bank was for only one thing—a trip to Disney World. She was determined to get there, one nickel at a time.
“I’ll pay you fifty cents,” I told her.
“No deal!” She raised her legs to the ceiling, flexing her feet.
“Okay, a dollar.”
Mayzee dropped the book. “Deal!”
By the time the ice machine was turned on and the OPEN sign was facing out, I had my first customer. It was Vernon. Before he and Twig started hanging out, he hardly combed his hair. Now he heaped on so much product that in a gust of wind, his hair flapped, saluting.
“Medium Lemon Tang,” he said, “and an extra-large Bahama Mama.”
He didn’t have to tell me who wanted the Lemon Tang. I glanced around for Twig, but she was nowhere in sight.
I pulled two cups from the stack.
Vernon smirked. “So have you heard, those New Yorkers are moving in today?”
I started to nod, then changed my mind. Maybe he knew more about them. Trying not to sound interested, I said, “Really?”
“Yep. Heard it’s a mom and her son,” he said.
I gave him a deadpan stare and handed him his Bahama Mama snow cone with such a skimpy amount of syrup it looked pink. He must have noticed because he pushed it back at me. “A little extra, like how you made hers.”
I drenched it with the red syrup and when he asked how much he owed, I added in a dollar.
“Did your prices go up?”
“For the extra syrup. It’s not free.”
Our menu board confirmed the additional costs, but we never enforced it. Until now.
He dug in his pocket and threw the dollar bills on the counter. I hated when people did that, like you weren’t good enough for them to place the money in your hand. Then like a big shot, he dropped a quarter into the tip jar.
I watched him leave to see if I could spot Twig’s hiding place, but he left the square and slipped around the corner.
The afternoon dragged, with hardly any customers. I was disappointed because I wanted to learn more about the Toscanis. A train passed by with its ka-nunk, ka-nunk, ka-nunk. Not a single car traveling down 287 stopped at the stand. We didn’t get that many out-of-towners anyway. Most of them stopped at Allsup’s. To make time pass, I wiped down all the syrup bottles, turned the radio up, and sang “Survivor” with Destiny’s Child. The radio played the song so often I was sick of it, but I sang anyway, adding in a side shuffle with shoulder action.
Then a tap, tap, tap interrupted me.
I swung around. The bottle slipped from my hands and broke on the asphalt.
“Sorry,” the guy at the counter said. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
He appeared to be about my age. His dark hair was cut close to his head, except for a tiny braid touching the back of his collar.
“You didn’t.” I glanced down. Blueberry syrup spread at my feet. “How long were you standing there?”
“Not long.” He grinned. He’d heard.
“Nice song,” he said.
My face burned.
“What flavor broke?” His voice was different—raspy, with no Panhandle twang.
“Blueberry.” I started to pick up the pieces. It was a clean break, three pieces in a puddle of dark purple. Carefully, I picked up the glass and dropped it in the garbage can, and wiped off my hands with a wet rag. “What can I get you? We have everything except Cotton Candy today.”
“And Blueberry,” he added.
“What?” I looked down at the purple splatters on my shirt. My face was a furnace running full blast.
“Right. We’re out of Cotton Candy and Blueberry.” My voice came out deep and formal. “We have some new flavors, too. Honey Pickle Juice and Burnt Marshmallow.”
He scowled. “I’ll pass on those.”
I glanced around for his car, but he was too young to drive. Where had he come from?
He leaned over the counter and read the new board silently.
“What is a Bahama Mama?” He had an unusual accent.
That stupid tickle in my throat showed up, and after four er-ums, I began to explain in a high-pitched voice I didn’t recognize. Instead of just listing the ingredients, I told him the entire story of our business, how there used to be a snow cone stand here owned by Wylie Womack, known for its Bahama Mama snow cones, how my family bought a stand since my parents were teachers and it was our whole family’s side business now.
I couldn’t stop talking.
He smiled, and when I finally shut up, he said, “I’ll have the house special.”
“What’s that?” I asked.
“The Bahama Mama?” he said slowly.
“Oh, of course.”
“Make it a large.”
“You bet.”
While I waited for the ice to drop into the cup, he remained quiet and gazed around, past the square, looking toward the highway.
I poured the regular amount of syrup. Then I added a little more.
“What’s down the road?” He tilted his head west.
“Amarillo,” I said, handing him his snow cone.
“Nowhere, huh?”
I didn’t know what to say to that. To us, Amarillo was the big city.
He paid me, but before he walked away, he asked, “Is your little sister Mayzee?”
“Yes.” I knew exactly where he came from.
He punched his spoon through the ice. “She said you owe her a dollar.”