Mia a Matter of Taste by Coco Simon

smiling really hard, like she was trying not to laugh. I gave Chris another little wave and almost ran out of the office.
    Then Mom took me right to Katie’s house, where Katie, Alexis, and Emma were already starting to decorate.
    â€œWe get to decorate twenty-five cupcakes each,” Alexis informed me. “We saved yours.”
    She pointed to a tray on Katie’s table with an assortment of vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry cupcakes on it. There were bowls of icing and all the decorations we had played around with the week before, plus more.
    â€œThis is awesome!” I said, taking a seat. I picked up a bowl of icing that had been dyed blue and started to frost a vanilla cupcake with it. I thought I’d do a sky with fluffy marshmallow clouds.
    â€œIsn’t this the best?” Katie asked, making a pattern of colorful candy-coated chocolates on top of a chocolate-iced cupcake. “I think I could make a thousand of these, and they would all be different!”
    â€œTotally,” I agreed.
    We were so into what we were doing that we didn’t talk much, except to show off what we had done. I decorated my cupcakes one by one and then put them in the cupcake carrier. I just had one last little cupcake left, a vanilla one. I spread some vanilla icing on top, looked at it, and then packed it.
    â€œAren’t you going to decorate that one?” Alexis asked.
    â€œI don’t think so,” I replied. “It’s ‘Come as You Are,’ right? So maybe someone wants to come, youknow, plain. Like an almost-naked cupcake.”
    â€œBut you don’t like plain anything!” Katie exclaimed.
    â€œTrue,” I said. “But sometimes plain is all you need. No embellishment required.”
    Alexis nodded. “Perfect. Now we really have something for everyone.”
    â€œAnd even if it’s not perfect, it’ll still be good, right?” I teased, thinking about the twins’ party.
    Alexis smiled. “Of course!”
    And I guess that’s kind of how I was feeling about myself. I wasn’t perfect anymore (and I probably never was to begin with). I had braces. I had glasses. That sure wasn’t perfect.
    But it was still really good.

CHAPTER 19
Come as You Are
    W ow, it looks really awesome this year!” Katie said.
    We had just pulled up to the school in Katie’s mom’s car. Emma’s dad parked next to us in his van. We had a lot of stuff to set up.
    The carnival was on the school field, which was filled with colorful booths, tents, and games. As we carried our stuff to our table, we passed a dunk tank with a sign over it that read DUNK THE TEACHER . There was a big board with balloons on it for dart throwing, a cotton candy machine, and a cart selling cold drinks.
    â€œMaybe we can take turns selling cupcakes, so we can all explore the carnival a little bit,” Katie said, looking around.
    â€œLet’s set up first, and then we can make up a schedule,” Alexis suggested.
    The school clubs were assigned tables under a big canopy. We found a table with a paper sign with CUPCAKE CLUB written on it and then put our stuff down.
    â€œOh boy,” Alexis said, nodding to the table next to us. “Looks like the BFC are our next-door neighbors.” She didn’t sound happy.
    â€œI hope they’re not doing cupcakes again,” Katie said. Once, the BFC had decided to make cupcakes at the fall fund-raiser to compete with us.
    â€œProbably not,” Emma guessed. “It didn’t work out too well for them last time.”
    â€œCome on, let’s get everything ready,” I urged. I was anxious to see how things were going to look.
    We covered the table with a plain white tablecloth, because we wanted a neutral background for our colorful cupcakes. But I had made an equally colorful sign for the front of the table.
    A SUMMER OF CUPCAKES
    COME AS YOU ARE!
    Eat what you want!
    The Cupcake Club
    I had written