The Cupcake Witches

By Suzanne Schultz Pick

Delia Bright isn’t like most of the other students at Pineapple Beach Junior-Senior High. She doesn’t have a fancy condo on the beach, and her parents run a hot dog shack. Her best friend, Travis, is too busy with Track anymore so she has to find someone else to hang out with. But how can she? The Beach Girls are plotting against her, and the Freaky People only hang out with other Freaky People. It also doesn’t help that she’s fallen for, William Goldwin, the most popular boy in town.
She at least has her new friends from Home Economics class are outcasts too. That’s fine except for one, little catch --

They’re witches!

Delia has one extraordinary gift that makes her more special than anyone else in Pineapple Beach. She has a talent for baking and poetry which, together, make things happen.

This is just the beginning of how Fern, Irene, Agnes, and Delia join forces to become The Cupcake Witches...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Suzanne Schultz Pick
• Release date: Oct 31, 2012
• ISBN: 9781301106325

Suzanne Schultz Pick

Suzanne graduated from the University of Central Florida with a Bachelor’s in English Literature. She continued her education online by completing a Master’s of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from National University and a Master’s of Library Science from Texas Woman’s University. She was raised in Logan, Ohio but considers Titusville, Florida as her hometown. Suzanne lives with her husband Steve and their cat, Jake, in NewcastleGateshead, England.Visit her at http://www.missusp.com or contact her at [e-mail]

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The Cupcake Witches

by Suzanne Schultz Pick

Published by Happy Hippo Press at Smashwords

Illustrated by Steven Pick

Text copyright © 2012 Suzanne Schultz Pick

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

No part of this book or its cover may be reproduced in any manner without written permission from its creator.

For more information and to contact the author go to:

http://www.suzanneschultzpick.com

For Steve, as always.

What’s mine is yours.

Chapter 1

A new day, a different year. Will I stand, or run in fear?

The morning I started seventh grade, I woke up with the house all to myself. Mom and Dad had already gone to the restaurant, and I was old enough to not have to go to Nanna Rose’s before school. I did have Cocoa, who was lying in her bed on the floor. Her big, bulging eyes rolled up at me. I took her outside and looked over at Travis’s house, which was still dark. I heard nothing but air conditioners running and traffic from the main road outside of our neighborhood.

On the map, the northern part of Pineapple Beach looked less populated and woodsier than the touristy area of town. Like all places in Florida, it got insanely hot in August when school started again so it never felt like our summer vacation had ended. The night before I had sat with Travis and his sister Mindy on a picnic table in the pavilion, feeling like it was any old day; not the day before school.

Travis and I had been in the same class at Sunnytide Elementary School but since we started seventh grade that year, we had to go to Pineapple Junior High instead. That meant a bus ride down the coast a bit until we got closer to downtown Pineapple Beach. It also meant that the tiny group of us who had been in sixth grade together was now going to be thrown in with kids who had gone to elementary school in Pineapple Beach the year before.

I got to the bus stop early because I was used to being at Nanna Rose’s by sunrise. I had gotten her house by five in the morning when I was too young to be left alone (as my mother had said.) Usually I helped her around the kitchen or in the garden then I’d draw in my notebook or read my poetry books until the bus picked me up for school. Most weekdays it wasn’t until dinner time when I would take the bus or Travis’s mom would pick me up at and bring me back home before my parents arrived hours later.

Travis wasn’t anywhere in sight, so I sat at the picnic bench at the pavilion again and opened up my lunch bag. I had brought muffins back from Nanna Rose’s house the day before, and I shared them with Travis and Mindy. Today I had one left so I made it my breakfast. It was sweet and buttery with a ton of blueberries. I tasted plenty of muffins, cakes and cookies before in my life but none were as good as Nanna Rose’s.

I heard a door swing open way up the road through the mobile home park. Travis had on his new school clothes and book bag. His hair was wet, and he still looked tired. I took a last look at the picture I drew in my notebook and carefully closed it, so I didn’t smudge the ink.

No, let me see, Travis said as he sat on the bench.

I opened the notebook back up and showed him. It was a little map of Pineapple Beach.

You forgot to add the marina. He pointed with his long finger. His dad worked as a fisherman. He always brought home fish and shrimp encased in ice in big, white barrels in the bed of his pickup truck. My mom would take some to the restaurant for deep frying. The fish sandwiches she made were amazing, but she hadn't done anything other than hot dogs for a while.

What time is the bus supposed to turn up? he asked me, checking his new watch. It wasn’t anything pricey, but it was digital and probably more than his mother had wanted to pay for it.

Should be here any minute, I said. I packed the notebook and walked with Travis to the bus stop.

We looked both ways down Ocean Boulevard. The four-lane road was pretty quiet because there wasn’t much up where we lived except the convenience store. The library and the elementary school were on another side road, so we usually walked across the road to the other side. That’s why they put the risen walkway there a while ago. Parents were mad about having to cross all the way down at the light or walk through the grassy median just to get to the other side of the street. Since we weren’t in a populated area, the City of Pineapple Beach didn’t pay much attention to us until we brought up the need for a walkway.

The diesel engine of the bus echoed to the south, and we saw it inching its way toward us. Travis adjusted his watch on his wrist. I could tell he was nervous, and it made me even more nervous just watching him twisting the black, plastic band.

So we’ll have history together, I assured him.

Yeah, that’ll be cool.

Do you know who else will be in your other classes? I pulled my long sleeves to my wrists.

A couple of the guys from the track team will be in a few of them.

Travis had tried out for the Pineapple Junior Track Team over the summer. As tall and muscular as he was, he was good at running. He took long strides as he walked so keeping up with him was hard when he was in a hurry.

When is your first meet? I asked.

He lowered his blue eyes in thought. I'm not sure. I’ll let you know though.

The bus pulled to a stop, and a lady with white hair opened the doors.

Good morning, she called out happily. She was about Nanna Rose’s age, and I vaguely wondered if the driver knew her.

There were only a handful of kids on the bus. I recognized most of them from Sunnytide, but it was no one I really hung out with a lot before to consider a friend. Travis noticed a boy from our class last year, Xavier Young. Xavier’s blonde hair was cut short, and it made him look more grown up. Travis ducked his head and sat next to him. I sat by myself across the aisle.

People had asked us before if Travis and I were boyfriend and girlfriend. I think my parents sort of assumed we were, but we weren’t. Travis had just always been my friend. He was the only person my age in the neighborhood. Actually he, Mindy, and I were the only kids in the trailer park. Everyone else was a retiree who stayed in their trailer off and on. Usually they lived there in the winter to avoid the harsh snow of Michigan, or Indiana, or wherever they were from originally.

The bus was full of chatter. Kids were talking to each other about what classes they were in and where they went for lunch. I sat in the seat alone and looked over my poetry book from the library. Day approaches and newness is accomplished, one of them said.

Seventh graders and eighth graders are different on the first day of school. Eighth graders have been through the halls for a whole year. They already knew the teachers, each other, and that they’ll be getting out soon and going to the high school. They laugh, talk, and feel at ease on the first day of school. Seventh graders, on the other hand, are timid and unsure.

When the bus pulled up in the bus loop, my stomach did a somersault. I looked over at Travis, who just smiled reassuringly and brushed his shaggy brown hair out of his eyes. The handful of us packed into a group of kids from other buses, and we marched into the double doors to the side of the school.

I dug through my pockets to find my schedule that the school sent in the mail to me a few days before. My locker number was 137, so I’d search for that first. It was weird going into a place and not knowing where you were going or what to expect. I glanced over at Travis, who was still walking and talking with Xavier and a couple of other boys. I walked on alone.

Pineapple Junior High was built as an empty square so all the classes were along the side, and the middle was open. That meant that the fresh, salty smell of the ocean was strong when you walked through the halls. There were lockers all around the perimeter so finding the 100s was easy. My locker was on the north side by the Math classes. Some other kids were hanging around, looking at combinations and having excited conversations with one another. It was more comforting to be together since the eighth graders were on the opposite side of The Square on the south side by the cafeteria. At the west was the school library, and the east was the gym with big double doors. Above the doors was a banner that looked like an old flag with a ship logo that said, Home of the Pirates.

After trying my locker combination a couple of times, I opened it, looked inside at the empty yellow box, and then closed it again. That was one thing figured out. Next was Homeroom in 149, which, according to the school map, was to the left of the gym entrance into a room separate from the science wing next door. Teachers stood around talking to one another outside their doors as kids walked together all around The Square, so they could see who was where. I could see taller, older kids walking around too. Outside by the gym there were walkways that lead to and from the senior high building. There was a whole other world yet to be explored for me later in that building, but since I still had the junior high to tackle, I headed toward Room 149 for Homeroom. Outside the door was a friendly looking teacher with big glasses and short, curly hair. She had on a bright yellow shirt that said, Pineapple Pirates.

Good morning! she chirped as I approached. Are you a B.?

Um…

She looked at me sympathetically as I looked at my schedule, confused. No, dear, I mean, does your last name start with a B?

Oh, I said quietly. Yes.

The teacher stood smiling at me for a minute, waiting. Well, I’m Mrs. Vaughan.

I smiled back. Delia Bright, I replied.

She looked at a piece of paper in her hand. First seat in the fourth row, she pointed to the big desk inside the classroom.

The classroom was not a regular class but like a big kitchen. I looked at Mrs. Vaughan confused. This is Homeroom? I asked her.

She kept her smile wide, Oh yes. This is the right room. I teach Home Economics too, she explained.

I have Home Ec. first period, I told her.

Mrs. Vaughn looked at my schedule as I held it up. That’s right. You do. Just stay here after the bell rings then.

I thanked her and went to the front desk closest to the ovens. It was warm and humid inside because it was close to the gym tracks and, ultimately, the beach. With the front door open and the side windows cracked an inch or so, the whole room felt like one large, inviting kitchen. It was too hot for my cardigan sweater that I had over my shoulders, but I still kept it on. I looked out the window and saw Travis heading through the side doors towards the boys' locker room. I decided that the Cs must have homeroom in the gym.

I didn’t like feeling Travis being so far from me. Now that we were in a new, bigger school, we were probably going to see less and less of each other, and it made me feel empty inside. He had track and team mates to hang out with now, and I didn’t like it at all. The sky was bright blue with only a few, puffy white clouds across the field and over the ocean. I concentrated on the ebbing flow of the waves in the distance, and wished the skies were darker and rumbling like the water. Today was too beautiful of a day to be alone.

For a while, I sat there in silence, looking out toward the water. I started writing about Travis in my notebook and wishing he could stay with me just like he always did. I noticed that Mrs. Vaughan leaned through the doorway, smiling at me.

Delia, you see that batch of cookies there, she pointed toward the counter along the wall.

I nodded as I spotted a tray with a few drops of cookie dough on it next to a glass bowl.

Would you mind doing me a favor and putting the rest of them on that tray for me? You can do that for me, right? She looked reassuringly at me.

I got up quietly and headed to the bowl. In it was a mix of what looked like sugar cookie mix and a wooden spoon. I started to stir it around and noticed it was a bit dry from sitting there. A carton of milk and some butter was sitting on a counter on the opposite side of the oven, so I brought the bowl over to them, spooned out some more butter and poured a half of cup more of milk and stirred until the mix was ready.

A loud, metallic sounding bell rang through the school. Other kids came into the room, all quiet and confused. Mrs. Vaughan greeted each other them with the same friendly smile and pointed them to their seats. She saw me dropping the cookies onto the sheet and smiled approvingly. After I had the cookies dropped onto the sheet, I took the sugar from the shelf overhead and sprinkled a bit across them to make them a little sweeter from the extra milk and butter. The sunlight moved across the room and mixed with the overhead lights so the sugar on the cookies took on a shimmery look.

I left my cookies and returned to my seat. I looked in my notebook again and started drawing my own map of the school next to my poem about Travis. It seemed pretty simple but when you are trying to get somewhere among a sea of newness, it’s not that easy.

The bell rang a second time and a little television flickered on the screen. There sat a big, gray-haired man in a suit and a bright yellow tie. Welcome to Pineapple High, he began. He introduced himself as Mr. Bailey -- the principal. Mrs. Vaughan flicked an oven on and thanked me quietly as she admired my work on the counter.

You left the milk and butter out, I whispered.

She shook her head and thanked me again, putting them into the refrigerator.

Mr. Bailey was still on the little television, explaining to us that while this year, we were allowed to wear sandals, but we were not allowed to wear short shorts, spaghetti-strapped tank tops or swim attire of any kind. The thought of people going to class in swim suits made me want to giggle but like everyone else, we were too confused and somewhat scared to do anything but listen.

After the announcements on where the track team would meet and how the Journalism Club would be accepting new members. Mrs. Vaughan took roll and gave us five minutes to study even though we didn’t have any homework yet. We all sat there nervously quiet while she went to the cookies on the countertop, checked the oven and slid the tray onto the top rack. I noticed a glimmer of the sugar before she shut the oven door. I continued writing in my poem about how I wished Travis didn’t have to go to track, and then I colored in the water on my map with dark waves. I stayed in the same position as the bell rang for everyone to head to their next class.

Chapter 2

Pineapple, oh Pineapple. Let me hear your Pirates shout!

When the room was quiet, I felt a little more aware of the breeze that had kicked up outside. A light rain started hitting the windows, and I saw Travis running back from the locker room to the school with his bag over his head, so he didn’t get wet. The wind kicked up, and a few papers on Mrs. Vaughan’s desk fell on the floor.

She came back in to shut the windows and I got off my stool to pick up the yellow handouts that had scattered around her desk. You are just some help today, aren’t you, Delia? she asked with her constant smile.

At the doorway, someone cleared their throat and we both looked up. There stood a tall, thin girl with glasses and medium brown hair, wavy around the forehead but otherwise knotted in a tight bun on top of her head.

I presume this is Home Economics, the girl said.

Why yes it is! Mrs. Vaughan walked towards her to greet her. And what’s your name, dear?

Fern Jonsdotter, she said curtly. And you are… she looked seriously at her schedule, Mrs. Vaughan?

Mrs. Vaughan, that’s right. I don’t think we have many students in this class so you can sit anywhere, Fern.

The girl looked straight at me, the empty chair at my table, and then carefully sat at the table in the absolute center of the room. She sat still with her head held tensely on her shoulders and looked at me sideways with her icy gray eyes from her wire rimmed frames. She wasn’t dressed more like a teacher than a student. Her straight skirt and button-up blouse were very different from the typical shorts and t-shirts that a kid at Pineapple usually wore.

Outside the wind howled, and the rain pummeled the windows. Mrs. Vaughan opened the oven, and a warm, sweet aroma poured out. A girl with short, black hair appeared through the room quietly except for the clanking of the zippers on her pants and the badges on her book bag. Without looking up, she took a seat behind me. Fern’s long neck twisted sideways to watch the girl for a moment. When Fern’s eyes caught mine, she frowned and snapped back and stared straight towards the front of the room again.

As the bell rang for a second time, a short girl barged into the room. The first thing I noticed about her was her bright-red lipstick over her large mouth. She looked towards Mrs. Vaughan and gave her a huge, buck-toothed grin.

Sorry, but I was late… I went to the wrong class. She laughed loudly with a low tone like that of a cow mooing. I looked to Mrs. Vaughan, who smiled uneasily and pointed to a seat next to Fern. Fern stiffened and sighed as the girl threw her book bag on the table and fell into the seat.

At the front of the room, Mrs. Vaughan had put the cookies on a plate and said, This is the kind of baking you’ll be doing this term.

I can do that, the buck-toothed girl announced.

Mrs. Vaughan stopped and checked her roster. Yes, dear, I’m sure you can, um...

Agnes Kruckow, the short girl said smiling so that her two-front teeth stuck out further.

Great. I think it is a good idea to introduce ourselves first since our class is so small. I’m Mrs. Vaughan, and I’ve been teaching Home Economics here at Pineapple Junior and Senior High for at least 10 years. I love baking, and I hope you girls end up loving baking as well. She looked down at her roster again through the large lenses of her glasses. Now, Agnes, you say? Why don’t you start and tell us a little about yourself?

The wind outside still blew strong enough that I could hear the waves from the ocean through the closed windows.

The short girl stood up and looked around the room triumphantly. As you all know, she looked at me for a second and added, ...well most of you know, I am Agnes Kruckow. I was in the chorus the whole time I was at Orange Grove Elementary and so, of course, I’m in the choir here too. She laughed with a horsey laugh to herself. My family is from New York, but I was born here. My Dad does the building for all the houses around here so basically everyone knows us. I’ve been with my boyfriend for almost two years now...

The black-haired girl snorted behind me. Agnes stopped and shot her a dirty look. Fern sat still with only a quiet eye rolling.

That’s fine, Agnes, Mrs. Vaughan stopped her at the chance.

The thin girl in the middle of the room carefully stood up and adjusted her straight skirt before saying, I am Fern Jonsdotter. She enunciated