Puddin'(75)

“‘Happy birthday, Ashley Cheeseburger’?” Ellen asks as she reads the cake from over my shoulders.

“Oh my God.” I cover my face with both hands. “Dad, what the hell?”

He laughs. “When Callie was a little girl,” my dad says, “she was very upset that she didn’t get to name herself, so she demanded that everyone call her Ashley, her name of choice.”

“And Cheeseburger?” asks Millie.

Abuela lets out a big belly laugh. “Well, we told her she’d have to pick out a new last name too.”

I turn to my dad, waving my hands in the air. “You named me Calista because Mom was an Ally McBeal fan. No one even knows that show anymore!”

“Calista Alejandra Reyes,” says Abuela.

“So you chose Ashley Cheeseburger?” Hannah shakes her head. “That’s amazing.”

I shrug. “The other kids in my kindergarten class didn’t exactly have an easy time pronouncing Calista, okay?”

“Middle name Puddin’,” says my dad. “That was her grandmama’s nickname of choice. On her mother’s side.”

Millie snorts knowingly. “Oh, that’s good. Ashley Puddin’ Cheeseburger.”

“Whatever,” I say. “Just sing to me before these candles melt all over the cake.”

They all obey my command, but definitely not in unison. “Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you, Ashley Cheeseburger!”

“Ha. Ha,” I say. But I can’t help the smile on my face.

“Happy birthday to you!” they all finish.

“Make a wish!” shouts Amanda.

I pull in a deep breath and blow out every one of my seventeen candles. I don’t make a single wish, because I don’t believe in them.

Or do I? Because all I do right now is go to school, work for free, and go home, and sometimes my mind wanders to Mitch and what the hell his deal was when he turned me down under the bleachers. So maybe a small, little wish wouldn’t hurt. But as I sit here with every one of my candles blown out, I guess it’s too late to bother with wishes.

My dad circles around the table and gives me a big hug before smashing something on my head. Confetti streams down over my face, tangling in my hair and sprinkling the ground.

I scream, shrieking with laughter, and touch my fingers to the top of my head to find cracked eggshell. “Dad! You jerk! You’re dead, old man!”

Everyone is silent, except Willowdean, who gasps like she’s watching the best kind of guilty-pleasure reality TV. (Which is obviously The Bachelor, just to be clear.)

Abuela places two egg crates of cascarónes on the table, which are hollowed and dried-out colorfully dyed eggshells full of confetti. “No need to wait for revenge!” she says.

Cascarónes are my favorite Mexican Easter tradition, and since my birthday always falls around Easter, they’ve become a birthday staple. Plus I dare you to find something more satisfying than cracking an egg over an unsuspecting person’s head.

Dad backs away slowly. “Respect your elders,” he reminds me, bouncing on his toes.

I grab two eggs and stand, my chair falling over behind me. “No mercy,” I tell him, and race around the table. Just like when I was a little girl, he lets me catch him, and I smash a cascarón on either side of his head.

All the girls sit frozen, except for Hannah, who reaches for an egg when no one is looking and crushes it against Amanda’s hair.

Amanda gasps and turns to Hannah, who is absolutely gleeful.

Amanda grabs an egg, and Willowdean and Ellen are quick to follow. I get Millie, and Abuela even cracks one down the back of my shirt.

It’s like a water-balloon fight, though, and while it’s furious, the cascarónes are gone in a matter of minutes.

We all collapse into our chairs, the carton of eggs sitting empty and stray confetti littering the table and the floor.

“How about some of that cake?” asks Willowdean, a little breathlessly.

“Save me a piece,” says Dad. “I’m gonna take the four-wheeler out to the barn to scare up some camping supplies for y’all.”

I hold up the knife. “Dibs on a corner piece.”

After we eat cake, our hair full of confetti, and help clean up the mess we made, we all spray ourselves down with bug spray as Abuela pulls out her big torches to give us some “mood lighting,” she says.

Setting up the tents is lots of trial and error, and by the time both tents are put together, all of our bedding is set up, and we’re all changed and ready for our night in the wilderness, it’s half past midnight.

The six of us lie out on a huge blanket for a bit and watch the stars while Dad and Abuela go inside and get ready for bed.

“Oh my gosh, Callie!” says Millie, shaking my shoulder. “I think that’s a shooting star.”

Willowdean props herself up on her elbows. “I don’t know. That might just be a tiny plane.”

“For the first time in my life, I actually agree with you,” I say.

Millie nudges me in the ribs. “You should make a wish just in case.”

I look up to the flickering light in the sky and I am 99.9 percent sure that Willowdean is right, but on the off 0.10 percent chance that she’s not, I suspend my disbelief in wishes and close my eyes.