Lights! Camera! Cook!

by Diane Muldrow

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Copyright Page

  chapter 1

  chapter 2

  chapter 3

  chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  chapter 6

  chapter 7

  chapter 8

  chapter 9

  chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Cooking tips from The Chef Girls!

  Instant messaging and e-mail dictionary!

  For Elizabeth lozzino—D.M.

  Special thanks to

  Pam Griffifhs and John Klindworth

  The scanning, uploading and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  Text copyright © 2003 by Diane Muldrow. Illustrations copyright © 2003 by Barbara Pollak.

  All rights reserved. Published by Grosset & Dunlap, a division of Penguin Young Readers Croup, 345 Hudson Street. New York. HY. 10014. GROSSET & DUNLAP is a trademark of Penguin Croup (USA) Inc. Published simultaneously in Canada. S.A.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publicafion Data is available.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-16072-5

  A B C D E F C H I J

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  Version_3

  chapter 1

  “Who-oa-oah!” cried Molly Moore, pitching forward as the tip of her skate caught against the smooth ice. Stumbling, she grabbed for her twin sister’s hand.

  “Don’t pull me!” shrieked Amanda. She struggled to stay upright.

  The girls were moving too fast toward a cluster of slow-moving kids.

  “Watch out!” Molly called to the kids.

  Somehow, the girls managed to miss the other skaters, but now they were headed straight for a corner wall.

  “Eeeeeeee!” they screeched.

  Their hands broke free from each other.

  Thud! Molly’s hip and upper arm hit the wall. Luckily, she’d managed to grab the handrail first, so she didn’t go down. Amanda crashed into Molly, then clutched for the rail.

  “Whew, they said together, breathing hard. Then they began to giggle.

  “I’m gonna so be black-and-blue tomorrow! exclaimed Molly, pushing back her dark hair. Well, at least we didn’t wipe out,” she added.

  “And bring a bunch of people down with us,” Amanda said, wrinkling her freckled nose. She brushed the ice flakes off her velvet jeans and said, “Come on, let’s get something to eat! I could really go for some hot chocolate.”

  The twins headed carefully toward the nearest exit, staying close to the wall as other skaters whizzed by.

  “Where is everybody?” asked Molly, happy to feel the sturdy vinyl mat under her blades. She reached her hand out to help Amanda off the ice.

  Amanda turned back toward the rink. Her green eyes went straight to an orange-and-white striped shirt in the middle of the rink. “There’s Shawn,” she said, pointing.

  It was easy to find their friend, Shawn Jordan. She stood out in the crowd. Her lime-green cat glasses and bright top looked so great against her deep brown eyes and coffee-colored skin. And her flared blue jeans hit at the perfect place above her white skates.

  The twins watched as Shawn waved and headed toward them, flashing a perky smile.

  “Snack?” Molly called to her, pointing toward the snack bar.

  “Okay,” Shawn called back. She glided gracefully through a cluster of skaters and right onto the vinyl mat.

  She’s so cool, thought Amanda for the zillionth time. But Amanda looked pretty cool herself, with her velvet jeans, red denim jacket, and glitter in her hair. She’d tried to get Molly to dress up today, saying, “Come on, Molls, it’s our class party! But Molly had shrank back when she saw the hair glitter come out, and insisted on wearing her favorite old jeans and a ribbed turtleneck from last year. ”This is dressy,” Molly’d insisted as she put the top over her head. “It has stripes!”

  “It’s packed in here,” Shawn commented as the girls made their way over to the snack bar. “but I just love this new indoor rink.”

  “It is fun to ice skate in April,” said Molly nodding. “It was a good idea to have our sixth-grade Celebration here.”

  Just then, a shrill voice called, “Yo, Shawn!”

  The twins’ hearts sank as they turned around to look at the rink.

  The high-pitched voice belonged to Angie Martinez, Shawn’s friend from cheerleading. Angie’s long, sun-streaked hair flew behind her as she whizzed by with her hands on her hips. Her brown eyes flashed.

  She’s probably mad that Shawn’s getting a snack wilh us, thought Amanda. Gimme a break.

  The twins were glad to see that Shawn just shrugged and kept walking with them. Molly and Amanda had been best friends with Shawn since they were little and had helped her through some tough times—like when Shawn’s mom died of a long illness.

  All the twins wanted was for their friendship to stay the way it had always been. But now Angie was in the picture. And Angie wanted Shawn all to herself-and was always finding ways to be mean to Shawn’s other friends, especially Amanda.

  And every time it happened, Shawn stayed out of it.

  Amanda and Molly looked at each other and sighed. Once again, they were doing “the twin thing”—thinking the same thing at the same time.

  This Angie stuff is getting old.

  “A pretzel, please?” called Molly moments later at the snack bar. “And a hot chocolate?” She had to speak up over the noise of the shouts and shrieks of hundreds of sixth-graders.

  “Me too, please,” Amanda told the teenage girl behind the counter. “Oh, and a hot dog, too. With mustard.”

  “No candy bars? No ice cream?” Shawn teased her, poking her arm.

  “Later,” replied Amanda with a grin. Amanda loved sweets more than anyone, even more than the twins’ little brother, Matthew.

  “A hot dog and potato chips and a cherry soda, please,” Shawn told the teenager. She turned to the twins. “Hey, where’s everyone else?”

  Just then, someone rushed up behind them. It was Peichi Cheng, bubbly as ever.

  “Hi, everybodeeeee!” cried Peichi, her black ponytail swinging crazily. “I just got here! Guess what! I have huge news! You won’t believe it! I’m—”

  “There you guys are!” broke in another voice.

  “Hi, Natasha!” cried the friends.

  Natasha Ross’s pale blue eyes brightened as she greeted her friends. “I thought my mom would never let me out the door! Wow, is this place packed!” She reached her arm over Molly’s tray for one of Shawn’s chips.

  “Quick” ordered Molly, nodding in the direction behind them. Balancing their food, the girls tottered on their skates toward an empty table.

  Peichi was almost bursting with excitement. “So, you guys, guess what!”

  The girls looked at each other and chuckled. Peichi was so funny. She was always up, always excited about something.

  “We give up!” said Molly, pulling off her navy fleece sweatshirt.

  “We’re going to China! This summer! In June for eight whole weeks! Isn’t that cool?”

  “Wow!” exclaimed the girls. They knew Peichi had always wanted to visit China.

  “Yeah! We’re going to visit Mom’s family,” Peichi went on. “We’ll visit the cities of Shanghai and Beijing. Do you know how old those cities are? It’s a really long flight—like, twenty-four hours! And we’re going to visit the Great Wall o
f China! I can’t wait to see that!”

  “Um, what’s the Creat Wall of China?” asked Molly, her mouth full of chewy pretzel.

  Peichi looked surprised. “Oh, it’s the coolest! It’s one of the ancient wonders of the world. And it’s so big and long that astronauts can see it from space! It was built to keep out enemies, and it’s like two thousand years old. I can’t wait to videotape this whole trip! Just think, I’ll get to see where my mom was born.”

  “That’s so cool. Wasn’t your dad born in China, too?” asked Natasha from beneath her shock of blonde hair. She was lacing up her skates.

  “No, he was born right here in Brooklyn...Oh, hi, Angie.”

  The hair on the back of Amanda’s neck stood up. She could feel Angie standing close behind her.

  “Shawn,” said Angie, ignoring Peichi, “Come back out to the ice! I want to show you how to spin.”

  “Okay,” said Shawn, shifting in her seat. “In a minute.”

  “Hurry up, girlfriend.” With that, Angie walked off.

  “Hurry up, girlfriend,” joked Molly, imitating Angie’s shrill voice and sneer.

  Shawn just rolled her eyes. She crumpled her napkin in her hand, then slowly stood up. “Well, I’ll be back,” she said, “you know, in a little bit.”

  As Shawn walked past the girls, they heard her sigh.

  Molly spoke up to break the tension. “Well, anyway,” Molly said, trying to ignore what had just happened, “that’s so cool, Peichi. I guess Dish will have to get along without you for a while.”

  “That’s all right,” said Peichi. “Business has been slow, anyway! And it’ll probably slow down even more in the summer, with people going on vacation.”

  Molly, Amanda, Peichi, Shawn, and Natasha—who called themselves the Chef Girls—had their own business, called Dish. Since the summer before, they’d been earning money by making meals for families in their Brooklyn neighborhood. Lots of people in Park Terrace were busy with their jobs and their kids, just like the Chef Girls parents, and were willing to pay for some home-cooked meals to be delivered.

  Sometimes the girls cooked for free, to welcome a new family, or if a neighbor was in crisis. Last summer, the family of Justin McElroy their new classmate (and Amanda’s crush), had an electrical fire in their kitchen. The McElroys had just moved to Brooklyn from Chicago, but then had to move into an apartment while their kitchen was completely remodeled.

  The twins’ mom had thought it would be nice to help the McElroys by making a week’s worth of meals for them. With her help, Molly, Amanda, Peichi, and Shawn cooked a ton of food. That was the beginning of Dish. Since then, they’d brought in Natasha, their former arch-enemy who’d slowly become a good friend. And they’d gotten to know Peichi a lot better. It had been a real adventure—between schoolwork, music lessons, and after-school activities, the Chef Cirls had made good money by cooking for big families, a school event, and even a Christmas party!

  But as Peichi had just pointed out, business was slow these days.

  “Maybe we should put flyers around the neighborhood,” suggested Molly. “Or at least give out our business cards.”

  “I’ll bet we have enough money right now to pay for an ad in the Park Terrace Press,” added Peichi. She was the treasurer of Dish and kept track of the money the girls earned. After every job, when the girls got paid, they gave Peichi some money for the treasury, so that Dish would always have money for food and supplies.

  “Let’s just put up flyers,” suggested Natasha. “It’s cheaper than running an ad.”

  “Okay,” the girls agreed.

  Peichi stood up. “I’m ready to skate!” she announced. “Let’s go!”

  Molly’s green eyes twinkled as she pointed at Peichi’s feet. “Um, maybe you should put your skates on?”

  “Oh, yeah!” giggled Peichi, slapping her forehead. “Go ahead, I’ll meet you out there.”

  As the twins and Natasha stepped carefully onto the ice, Amanda’s eyes went straight to Angie and Shawn. Angie had taken over the exact middle of the rink. She was gliding and spinning as Shawn and some other girls clapped. Then she stopped to teach Shawn something.

  Why does Angie always have to show off? wondered Amanda. Oh, whatever. I hope Shawn comes back home with us after skating. Just then, she spotted a familiar head of reddish-brown hair on the other side of the rink.

  “There’s Justin,” announced Amanda, forgetting all about Angie and Shawn. “When did he get here? Wow, he’s a good skater.”

  Molly batted her eyes and said in a dreamy voice, “Wow, Justin, where’d you learn how to skate like that?” She couldn’t help teasing Amanda sometimes.

  Amanda ignored Molly and watched as Justin skillfully sliced through the crowd and came to a sudden stop near his buddies, his hockey skates spraying an arc of ice shavings.

  “Let’s go say hi,” suggested Amanda. “Omar and Connor are there, too.” She waved at the boys, trying to get their attention.

  The girls had met lanky, dark-eyed Omar Kazdan and husky, freckle-faced Connor Kelly in their cooking class last summer. The boys had quickly become the class clowns—and had to be separated more than once! A few months before, while they were sidelined by the flu, the Chef Girls had hired Omar, Connor, and Justin to help out with a big cooking job. Natasha worked with Justin on the school paper, and some of the gang shared a few classes and teachers.

  But as the girls skated over and said, “Hi, guys,” the boys took off, their hockey skates scraping loudly against the ice.

  Natasha’s mouth dropped open. She turned to the twins and said, “Did you see that?”

  “Is it just me, or did those guys just totally ignore us?” asked Molly indignantly.

  Amanda shrugged. “Oh, they just didn’t see us, that’s all,” she said hopefully.

  “Hello-o-o-o, Amanda,” said Molly and Natasha, giggling. “They looked right at us!” Molly finished.

  “No, they didn’t” insisted Amanda. “Look, they’re coming back this way. They’ll say hi now.” The three boys were skating close together, dodging people left and right.

  “There you are,” called Shawn, skating quickly over to the girls. She’d stolen away from Angie, who wasn’t exactly the most patient skating instructor.

  Shawn didn’t see the boys behind her. They were coming up really fast.

  “Shawn, watch out!” cried Molly. “Get out of the way!”

  “What?”

  Molly grabbed Shawn, and all four girls stumbled out of the way just as the boys whooshed by, laughing loudly, without even a glance at them.

  “Hey!” shouted Shawn after them. “Look where you’re going!” But the boys were already on the other side of the rink.

  The third time around, the boys did stop just as Peichi came skating over. “Hi, guys!” she called.

  “Wanna play crack-the-whip?” asked Omar. He held out his hand to Peichi, whom the girls knew he had a crush on.

  “Okay!” said Peichi happily, clueless about what had been going on.

  “Don’t do it!” cried Molly

  “Don’t be a baby, Molly,” said Connor. “Come on.”

  “No way. You guys are crazy.”

  “I’ll do it,” said Amanda coolly. She skated over to Justin so that she could hold his hand.

  “Me, too,” said Shawn.

  As Molly and Natasha watched, the gang picked up a few more kids to make a long chain. Omar was at one end, and Amanda was at the other end.

  Her little plan had backfired. Justin had let in Sandra, a pretty girl from his math class, who now got to hold his hand...which meant that Amanda had to hold Sandra’s hand. Fuming, she looked around and realized no one else was joining them.

  Oh, no, thought Amanda. I’m on the end! I’m gonna die! She’d been on the end before, and had learned the hard way that the last person always got whipped around the hardest.

  But it was too late. The group began to skate faster and faster.

  “Okay, now!” cried
Omar.

  Then, with a big shout, Omar and some of the boys whipped the group around. The chain of hands broke and kids went flying, including Shawn and Amanda, who were pushed with such a force that they couldn’t stay up.

  “Ow!” cried Amanda as she landed right on her behind.

  Shawn closed her eyes and held her hands out in front of her face as she careened into Peichi.

  “Ooof!” cried Peichi, who fell down hard. Instinctively, she moved her hands underneath her so that no one would accidentally skate over her fingers.

  “Peichi, I’m so sorry! Are you okay?” cried Shawn.

  There was a pause.

  “Uh-huh,” replied Peichi slowly, as she struggled awkwardly to turn around. “Ouch...Are you okay?”

  “I’m okay,” giggled Shawn as she helped Peichi up. “You made a nice cushion!”

  Meanwhile, Amanda had to help herself up. Justin was long gone with the other guys, who were still skating fast in a large group.

  “I cant believe those guys!” shouted Amanda as Molly and Natasha skated over to her. “They’re being such jerks!”

  Just then, a whistle blew. A burly teenage guard skated quickly over to the boys, who stopped and huddled in a corner. All laughter and shouting stopped as everyone turned to watch.

  “Ha-ha,” sang Molly. “They’re in trouble now!”

  “Cut the horseplay,” the guard tersely ordered the boys. “I want all of you off the ice for fifteen minutes. Come on, move it.”

  Omar, Justin, Connor, and some of their buddies slowly skated off the ice and went inside.

  “Where’s that guard been?” asked Natasha. “This is the first I’ve seen of him!”

  “Yeah, it’s about time he did something,” said Amanda. She was still smarting from seeing Justin reach for Sandra’s hand...and her buns weren’t feeling so great, either.

  “I’ve had enough skating!” declared Peichi as she and Shawn met up with Natasha and the twins in a corner of the rink. “I know I just got here, but I’m sore all over!”