Stay Sweet(2)

I wasn’t listening. My stomach was in a knot as I unscrewed the cap and pulled off the crank. Though the thought did occur to me that if this batch of ice cream tasted terrible, Tiggy’s idea of my selling it might disappear.

Tiggy crawled over and dipped her spoon right in, helping herself to the first taste. Her eyes rolled to the back of her head and she made “mmMMmm” sounds that had the girls squealing and huddling up for a taste. They’d never had anything like it, they said. What was in it? What was this flavor? Their eyes were wide, smiles big.

I figured they were being polite until the ice cream finally came back around to me.

But it really was terrific.

The best I’ve ever made!

The girls were clamoring for seconds and thirds and fourths, telling me that I just had to sell this. I’d make a fortune, guaranteed. And it would be such a help to our boys.

Tiggy made a joke then, reaching for yet another taste. “Boys? What boys? I’ve got everything I need right here,” she purred, and naughtily licked her spoon.

The girls giggled, but I gasped and put my hand on Tiggy’s leg. “Tig, that’s it. My banner could say ‘Ice Cream So Sweet, You Won’t Miss Your Sweetheart.’?”

Everyone went quiet. I closed my eyes.

I could paint the words in pink on some muslin.

I’d have the girls wear their white graduation dresses and curl their hair.

We’d set the ice cream out in rows, perfectly round scoops in thin china. Mother wouldn’t want me using her good dishes, but I knew I could make her feel guilty enough to let me. I’d bet the other girls could persuade their mothers too.

How much could we get for a dish?

Thirty cents?

Fifty?

Just as there’s a moment in the churning when you first feel the cream and sugar thicken, I could sense the potential of what this could be take hold. I felt happier than I had in months, until the sound of sniffling made me open my eyes.

Tiggy and the rest of the girls were in tears.

“I’m so sorry,” I told them, my face burning. “?Please forget I said that.” Ice cream was supposed to be our distraction from thinking about the war.

Tiggy wiped her eyes with her handkerchief. “?Don’t apologize. It’s perfect,” she said, taking my hand in hers and squeezing it. “I think this is going to be big, Molly.”

If it were only Tiggy saying so, I’m sure I wouldn’t have believed her. Not because she’s a liar, but she’s my best friend. But the other girls crowded around me with their spoons, wiping their tears and reaching for more.





CHAPTER ONE


AMELIA VAN HAGEN IS KNEELING on the floor in her bra and a pair of khaki shorts, brown hair neatly split into two fishtail braids, a polo shirt draped over her lap. She smooths it, then gently plucks off a tiny fuzz ball and flicks it away.

When Frankie Ko gave her this Meade Creamery polo on her very first day, it was the exact same shade of pink as a scoop of strawberry ice cream. Now, four summers later, and despite the dim morning light of her bedroom, she sees that the pink has faded to a much softer hue, a color closer to cotton candy.

There are lots of summer jobs for the teens of Sand Lake and each comes with its own perks. Being a lake lifeguard means your tan lasts until October. The mall is air-conditioned and employees get a discount at the food court. Babysitters can make serious cash, especially if they get in good with the tourists. But Amelia always dreamed of being a Meade Creamery girl.

The Meade Creamery ice cream stand has employed all girls and only girls since it opened, way back in the summer of 1945. And though the draw of the place is solely the ice cream, each time her parents would take her, and as soon as the line would bring her close enough, Amelia would lift up on her toes and study the girls working inside. Though the faces changed each summer—as the oldest ones left for college and the newbies struggled to keep up with the pace of things—the vibe between the girls stayed the same. Amelia liked how they talked to each other, a mix of codes and inside jokes, how gracefully they moved in such a cramped and frenzied space. How much fun they seemed to have, despite the heat and the crowds, despite their crappy radio with the foil-covered antenna.

Amelia pulls the pink polo over her head. It sort of feels like cotton candy too, soft and light from what probably adds up to a billion trips through the wash between her very first day and this one, a Meade Creamery girl’s endless fight against the speckling of caramel dip, of hot fudge, of the bright red juice that the maraschino cherries float in. What hasn’t paled, not even four summers later, is the thrill she gets from wearing it.

Frankie Ko handed this very shirt to Amelia four years ago. Frankie was Head Girl that summer, and she had been lying on top of one of the picnic tables, sunning herself while she waited for the newbies to arrive. Her shiny black hair was as long as her perfectly frayed cutoffs were short. She wore ankle socks with little pink pompoms at the heels and she had four, maybe five, woven string friendship bracelets tied around each wrist. She was half Korean, impossibly beautiful, effortlessly cool. That’s how every newbie feels about the Head Girl her first summer, but Frankie, Amelia’s sure, broke the mold.

Amelia cringes, remembering with embarrassing clarity how she herself looked four years ago, getting dropped off by her dad, lips slick with the peachy lipstick she’d bought to match her eighth-grade dinner dance dress, hoping it would make her seem older and cooler. Funny that it never occurred to her to remove her retainer, which she was so dutiful in wearing that most of her classmates hadn’t yet realized she’d gotten her braces off.