The Cupcake Diaries Collection: Katie and the Cupcake Cure; Mia in the Mix; Emma on Thin Icing; Alexis and the Perfect Recipe by Coco Simon Read Free Book Online Page B

another page. “This is really fun,” she said. “You create an avatar of yourself and then you get to try on different outfits to see how they would look.”
    Mia made my avatar: skinny, medium height,wavy brown hair, brown eyes. Then she started clicking on clothes, and they appeared on my avatar’s body.
    I couldn’t tell what was wrong with other people’s clothes, but it was cool to experiment and see what different stuff looked good on computer me. I had to admit that part was pretty fun. Well, for a while. Then it got a little boring. After I tried on a leather skirt, flowered dress, and five different pairs of boots, Mia looked at me.
    “Want to play with the dogs?” she asked.
    “Yes!” I answered gratefully.
    The dogs were completely adorable. Mia said they were Maltese dogs. They could both roll over and sit. Then Mia did this trick where she sneezed and the one called Tiki ran to the tissue box and took a tissue out of it.
    “That is truly amazing,” I said.
    Before I knew it, Mom came to pick me up. On the drive home, she asked me the usual questions about how things went. Then she sneezed.
    “That’s odd,” she said. “My allergies usually don’t bug me this time of year.”
    I knew the dog hair on my clothes was probably making her sneeze, but I didn’t say anything.
    I wanted to be sure I could go back to Mia’s.



CHAPTER 10
The Best Club Ever
    T he next night I made a batch of cupcakes for Cupcake Friday. I remembered that I hadn’t made chocolate cupcakes in a while. They’re one of my favorites, and I don’t even need Mom to help me make them.
    I thought I knew the recipe by heart, but while I was adding the ingredients to the big mixing bowl, I realized that I didn’t know how much baking powder to add. So I took the big binder of cupcake recipes from the kitchen shelf and looked up the chocolate cupcakes.
    Recipes amaze me. If you follow the directions exactly, you can make something completely awesome.
    There should be a recipe for middle school, I thought. Follow the steps, one by one, and you’d have a perfect middle school experience.
    So far, my middle school experience had been kind of a mess. If I had been following a recipe, it probably would look something like this:
    Mix together:
    1 evil locker
    1 confusing best friend
    3 mean girls
    1 strict math teacher
    2 silly arms
    Bake until it hardens. If you overbake, go directly to detention.
    Luckily, the recipe for the chocolate cupcakes is much better. Soon the whole house smelled like chocolate. After the cupcakes baked and cooled, I spread chocolate icing on them. Then I used a white icing tube to write a name on each cupcake: Katie, Mia, Emma, and Alexis.
    Mom came into the kitchen as I was icing.
    “Are these the girls you eat lunch with?” she asked.
    I nodded.
    “You forgot one,” Mom said.
    I counted again. “No,” I said, and then I realized where she was headed.
    I froze. Was she going to start asking me about Callie again?
    Mom picked up the icing tube and started writing on one of the cupcakes: M-O-M. I relaxed.
    “This is going in my lunch bag tomorrow,” she said. “Hey, would it be okay if I decorated some for everyone who works in the office?”
    “Sure,” I said. “I’ll help. We can both do Cupcake Fridays.”
    That’s one of the best things about cupcakes. When you make them, there’s always a lot to share.
    At lunch the next day, I hadn’t even sat down yet when everyone started asking about cupcakes.
    “So, did you bring them?” Mia asked.
    “What kind are they?” asked Alexis.
    “I bet they’re delicious,” added Emma.
    “I went for the classic chocolate today,” I announced. I opened the lid, and everyone started to ooh and aah.
    “We should save them for after lunch,” Alexis said.
    “Are you kidding? I can’t wait!” Mia took hers out of the box.
    “I’ll wait,” Emma said. “I like to save the bestfor last—especially in this case. They smell delicious