Cupcake by Rachel Cohn Page B
Authors: Rachel Cohn
Tags: United States, Fiction, General, Family & Relationships, People & Places, Family, Juvenile Fiction, Children's Books - Young Adult Fiction, Travel, Children: Young Adult (Gr. 10-12), Social Issues, Interpersonal relations, New York (N.Y.), Northeast, Middle Atlantic, New Experience, Dating & Sex, Parenting, Lifestyles, City & Town Life, Social Issues - Dating & Sex, Stepfamilies, Social Issues - New Experience, Lifestyles - City & Town Life, Stepparenting
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most fashionable places to see and be seen in the city--at least based on the line of customers out the door and down the street. The line confounded me because (1) the cupcakes from that place are not that tasty, and I should know, because I've tried them all, and (2) the attitude from the wait staff is ridiculous--you'd think they were selling Tiffany tiaras and Rolls-Royce cars and not tiny round pieces of cake with frosting gobbed on top. If I hadn't made it my new mission to avoid Danny
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and his rules, I would so take him up on the offer to go work with him part-time instead of taking on the LU_CH_ONE_TE gig. Danny and I could expand his cupcake business beyond selling to small retail outlets and into our own empire.
"Why would I be disappointed?" Sid-dad asked.
"Because I'm not some go-getter who's all perky and like 'I'm going to get a job in the mail room at some superfantastic corporation and work my way up to the top, no matter how long it takes, gosh darnit!'"
He laughed. "I'm just happy you're working. And I think you might be more of a go-getter than you yourself realize. You just need to do it on your own timetable. Will this new job allow you the time off work to come home for Christmas? We've got the baby's room set up for its impending arrival in December, and Ash and Josh can't wait to see you ..."
"I still haven't changed my mind that Ash can't have my bedroom." I have no intention of moving back home to San Francisco, but that doesn't mean I don't want the option to remain available to me. Just in case.
"Noted," Sid-dad said. "Just don't come home and expect to find your childhood Barbie collection in the pristine condition in which you left it in the box at the top of your closet. There may have been a massacre when Ash was denied the room change. Let's
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just say certain doll parts were roughed up, and clothes violated, and leave it at that."
Good ol' Ash. Bless her heart and her macabre Barbie fixation. I miss home.
When Autumn arrived for our regular park-sitting during her ditching of her Lit Hum class (and I still don't know what "Lit Hum" means, but I am imagining pornographic poses amongst philosophizing old white guys who like to hum together while they bang each other in that fine ancient Greek tradition), she asked, "Why are we here instead of Central Park?"
I pointed to the cupcake eaters on the bench opposite us. "I hate those people. They need to be destroyed."
"The cupcake eaters or the cupcake makers?"
"Makers. And also, I've decided Central Park is too far to go. Aaron said I would turn into one of those New Yorkers who does not like to go beyond a ten-block radius of my apartment, and it turns out he's right. Besides, don't you agree the rainbow mecca of Greenwich Village is way cooler than Central Park?"
"You're just being lazy and you know it. But I don't mind the travel because the farther away from that college campus I go, the happier I am. So listen. I have to come out to you about something."
"You're straight? Is it because you never got over when you
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were in fourth grade and wanted to marry Justin Timberlake?"
Autumn shoved my side. "Get over yourself. I wanted to marry Kylie Minogue. No, what I have to come out about is that I made a big decision after midterms, but I've been holding off on telling you because I wanted the idea to settle and feel right. And now it does. I'm not coming back to New York after final exams."
"No way."
"Way. I talked it out with my dad, and he supports me. I'm going to go back home to San Francisco, work and take some courses at City College next semester, then hope to transfer to Berkeley in the fall. They accepted me last year, so hopefully they will again this year. Then I can stay living at home, but afford to go to college. And afford not to be so stressed all the time that I can't concentrate on school."
I let out a major Nancy-level sigh. But I placed my arm around Autumn's shoulder and pulled her tight. She rested
120
and his rules, I would so take him up on the offer to go work with him part-time instead of taking on the LU_CH_ONE_TE gig. Danny and I could expand his cupcake business beyond selling to small retail outlets and into our own empire.
"Why would I be disappointed?" Sid-dad asked.
"Because I'm not some go-getter who's all perky and like 'I'm going to get a job in the mail room at some superfantastic corporation and work my way up to the top, no matter how long it takes, gosh darnit!'"
He laughed. "I'm just happy you're working. And I think you might be more of a go-getter than you yourself realize. You just need to do it on your own timetable. Will this new job allow you the time off work to come home for Christmas? We've got the baby's room set up for its impending arrival in December, and Ash and Josh can't wait to see you ..."
"I still haven't changed my mind that Ash can't have my bedroom." I have no intention of moving back home to San Francisco, but that doesn't mean I don't want the option to remain available to me. Just in case.
"Noted," Sid-dad said. "Just don't come home and expect to find your childhood Barbie collection in the pristine condition in which you left it in the box at the top of your closet. There may have been a massacre when Ash was denied the room change. Let's
121
just say certain doll parts were roughed up, and clothes violated, and leave it at that."
Good ol' Ash. Bless her heart and her macabre Barbie fixation. I miss home.
When Autumn arrived for our regular park-sitting during her ditching of her Lit Hum class (and I still don't know what "Lit Hum" means, but I am imagining pornographic poses amongst philosophizing old white guys who like to hum together while they bang each other in that fine ancient Greek tradition), she asked, "Why are we here instead of Central Park?"
I pointed to the cupcake eaters on the bench opposite us. "I hate those people. They need to be destroyed."
"The cupcake eaters or the cupcake makers?"
"Makers. And also, I've decided Central Park is too far to go. Aaron said I would turn into one of those New Yorkers who does not like to go beyond a ten-block radius of my apartment, and it turns out he's right. Besides, don't you agree the rainbow mecca of Greenwich Village is way cooler than Central Park?"
"You're just being lazy and you know it. But I don't mind the travel because the farther away from that college campus I go, the happier I am. So listen. I have to come out to you about something."
"You're straight? Is it because you never got over when you
122
were in fourth grade and wanted to marry Justin Timberlake?"
Autumn shoved my side. "Get over yourself. I wanted to marry Kylie Minogue. No, what I have to come out about is that I made a big decision after midterms, but I've been holding off on telling you because I wanted the idea to settle and feel right. And now it does. I'm not coming back to New York after final exams."
"No way."
"Way. I talked it out with my dad, and he supports me. I'm going to go back home to San Francisco, work and take some courses at City College next semester, then hope to transfer to Berkeley in the fall. They accepted me last year, so hopefully they will again this year. Then I can stay living at home, but afford to go to college. And afford not to be so stressed all the time that I can't concentrate on school."
I let out a major Nancy-level sigh. But I placed my arm around Autumn's shoulder and pulled her tight. She rested
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