#5 Icing on the Cake

by Stephanie Perry Moore

  Trying to calm her, I shouted, “I’m not saying it’s me!”

  I could tell she didn’t believe me, but, grinning, she said, “Oh, okay. Well whoever it may be needs to come to someone they trust like their parents. Seriously, Yuri, is there something you want to talk about? Something you need to say? I know I’ve been a million miles an hour. It seems over the last few months, you girls have been going through so much.”

  My mom was right. If it wasn’t Shelby being caught in the middle as her boyfriend dealt with a domestic violence situation or Ansli having to deal with a homeless boyfriend, it was Slade mixed up with some guys dealing drugs or Sloan uncovering all kinds of corruption going on at school. Now it seemed to be my turn. I had three big things on me. I was scared for Logan. I was petrified of Ms. Pinky’s ways, and I still was really worried about my dad’s health.

  Before I could figure out a way to just talk to her, Sloan busted in her office and said, “There you are, Yuri! Come here, I need you to see something.”

  “Well, let it wait for a minute, honey. I’m talking to your sister.”

  “It can’t wait, Mom. It can’t wait,” Sloan screamed in a panic.

  “Is everything okay?” she asked Sloan. I wondered the same thing.

  Sloan nodded, but the panic was all in her face. Something wasn’t right. So I kissed my mom on the cheek and followed my sister upstairs to her room.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  Sloan pointed. “Look, online.”

  “What am I looking at?”

  “Read it,” she said as her body started shaking like she was having a conniption.

  My sis had me worried. I looked at the screen. I held my breath, seeing there were several negative comments floating around out there about Logan from her being a freak to her being an imbecile. It just was stupid nonsense, but the negative posts were growing.

  The last one said, “She’d be better off dead than to show her face back around Marks High School. Marks is no place for sluts.”

  “But then look at this post from Logan,” Sloan said, pointing to the computer screen.

  My heart dropped when I saw the words Logan had typed “I’m done.”

  I couldn’t hold back the emotion. It was the weekend, and I didn’t have Logan’s number, but, instantly, I needed to talk to her. I needed to make sure what I was assuming she was saying wasn’t really how she felt. Helping her was what I had to do.

  “I got to talk to her. I got to calm her down. This isn’t good!” I squealed.

  Sloan bellowed, “For sure you’re right. This isn’t good.”

  “Is she going to take her own life, Sloan? Oh my goodness! Why are these people being so mean on here?” I asked as my eyes watered.

  “People who know they can get to you, they gnaw and pick until you have nothing left. You know I learned that going through that stupid scandal.”

  My sister was right. She had always been a tough girl, but having naked images of her floating around the school made her feel like worthless. But she kept her head up high, and we Sharp sisters supported her, and she got through it. People really felt bad for her when it was all revealed that she didn’t even take the picture of herself. Sloan texted a couple of other people. Somehow my sister got Logan’s home number.

  As soon as I dialed it, I heard a male voice say, “What now?”

  His harshness made me barely want to speak, but I mustered up the strength because I knew I needed to. “Can I please speak to Logan?”

  He shouted, “You leave my daughter alone!”

  “Sir, I’m a friend of hers,” I said, hoping that would make a difference.

  “Yeah right, a friend? Who are you?”

  “My name is Yuri Sharp. I go to school with Logan. Can you please tell her I want to talk to her?”

  “No! And don’t call this house again!”

  “But sir, I need to make sure she’s okay!”

  “Don’t call this house again,” her father barked, slamming the phone down in my ear.

  I got off the phone even more worried about Logan because she had to live with that tough man. No telling what thoughts were going through her mind. But there was nothing I could do. I just had to hope she was going to be alright.

  “Come on, Yuri. Avery’s here!” Slade knocked on my door and screeched out.

  Avery was my sister’s boyfriend, and while Slade could sing, Avery could blow. He actually had a record deal with Mundy Records too, but his was not just for distribution. He was their new up-and-coming artist. His new single dropped the month before, and it was blowing up.

  “Come on. Come on!” Slade pounded and said again.

  “She’s coming, goodness,” Sloan told her.

  “Yeah, I got to make sure baby sis is just right,” Shelby said, as she tweaked and tweaked and tweaked on my outfit.

  I had to admit, I looked fly. Sporting a black, short, leather skirt, some black tights that had a design on them, sweet, funky wedge boots, and a sweater shirt that Shelby created that hung just low enough to be cool and just high enough to be sort of sexy. Slade was getting so upset because my door was locked. My sisters knew they weren’t turning me loose until they were ready for me to go, and Ansli stood at the door once Shelby was finally done and snapped tons of pictures.

  “It’s not like I’m entering into a fashion show or anything,” I said to them.

  “You’re going on your first date. We’ve got to capitalize on this moment,” my sister said to me as she hugged me tight.

  Ansli whispered, “Mom and Dad would be so proud.”

  I knew she meant our biological parents. We very rarely talked about them, but every now and then, when it was a special moment, we both connected … hating that they weren’t there. I probably moved past it a little bit more than my sister. She was a couple years older than me, so she remembered our parents more than I did. She also took it pretty hard when she learned that they didn’t just die in an accident. When we did more digging, we learned that my dad was depressed when he got released by one of the NFL teams for taking steroids. Somewhere along the way that messed him up. He became angry, bitter, and depressed. He took my mom’s life and then his. As I pulled back from Ansli and saw the tear in her eye, I knew she was thinking about all of that. But we were okay now. We were still alive, and we did need to make them proud and remember the good.

  Finally when we opened the door, Slade yanked me out of it. She was running and not letting go of my arm. We almost tripped going down the stairs.

  “Slow down,” my mom said to both of us, dipping her head to the left so we could see we had company.

  There was her date standing at the door. I guess Slade thought he was in the car. She stopped running down the stairs then. My sister was all smiles, looking at the hottie who was becoming a rising R&B star.

  “You both look lovely,” Avery said, making us both blush.

  Slade reached in and gave him a big hug. She looked back at our mom before exiting and winked. My sister liked this guy. The smile in his eyes made me know she had feelings for the right one.

  “Take care of your sister tonight,” my mom said to Slade.

  Slade was locked arm in arm with Avery and jabbed, “I got her, even though she made him wait.”

  “Oh no, it was no problem,” Avery said, another reason why I liked him.

  When we got to the tree lighting ceremony, Avery kissed Slade on the cheek and said,

  “I got to go to the back. Mr. Mundy told me they want me to sing.”

  “Are you late?” Slade said, looking over at me.

  “No, no, no, I’m cool. It was last minute, so they’re just happy I can do it,” he said, and I stuck out my tongue at my sister.

  “Cool. I’m gonna find Charlotte, and we’ll see you out here for ice skating.”

  “Ohhhh, I can’t ice skate,” he said to his girl.

  “If I’m going to ice skate, you’re going to do it. We’ll fall down together,” Slade said,
looking at Avery all goo-goo eyed.

  “That’s wassup,” he said, as he kissed her and dashed off.

  “You really like him,” I told my sister.

  “Well, you look cute. But next time we got to go, don’t let our sisters make you late. It’s not cool.”

  “I’m sorry. I am nervous though.”

  “Don’t be. You’re adorable. This guy wanted to go out with you. I only met Charlotte’s brother once, but he’s a cutie. I just didn’t know you were into the vanilla like that, girl. I like my coffee like mom.”

  She nudged me, and I nudged her back and said playfully, “With a little cream in it.”

  “Uh oh little sis!”

  “Whatever, you’re not that much older than me.”

  “Right, right, right.”

  “There he is! There he is!” I said, with more excitement than I knew I had as I saw Paris skating extremely comfortably. “I can’t skate like that.”

  “Well, it looks like you’ll have him to hold you up. Where’s his sister?”

  We both looked for her singing partner, and I froze when I spotted her. “I see Charlotte and umm …”

  I didn’t know how to describe it so I just pointed. Charlotte’s lips were on another girl’s lips. Slade was clearly shocked. Her eyebrows raised, and her mouth hung open.

  “Oh my gosh! What is she doing? We got to end this. She can’t be out in public kissing on a girl. I thought she was here with her date.”

  Popping her in the side, I said, “It looks like that is her date.”

  “Oh, nu uh. I am not having this,” Slade said, wiggling her finger back and forth.

  “You might own the record label, but you don’t own Charlotte. What’s wrong with it anyway? What if she is with a girl?” I questioned.

  “Uh!” Slade yelled out, heading straight over there to Charlotte.

  I tried to stop her, but she headed straight to Charlotte. “What’s all this? Who is this? I thought I was meeting your boyfriend.”

  “No, I told you I was coming with a date,” Charlotte calmly told her, holding the taller brunette’s hand as they swung them back and forth, obviously smitten with each other.

  Slade got louder, working her neck and hips, trying to tell Charlotte what to do. Paris startled me when he came up behind me. I turned around.

  “You look beautiful,” he said.

  “Thanks,” I bashfully uttered as he leaned in and hugged me.

  Slade said, “See that Charlotte, that’s what’s natural. What you’re doing is crazy? I’m not going to be in a group with somebody who is …”

  “What? You can’t accept me? Then I don’t need to be in a group with you. You’re not my dictator, Slade. Come on, Jenna,” Charlotte said to her date, and they were gone.

  “Oh so you just gone walk off and leave?” Slade yelled from behind, but Charlotte didn’t turn around.

  It was getting ugly. I was so excited when the music started playing and Avery came on the stage. All Slade’s yelling halted when she gave in to his beautiful voice.

  I leaned over to my sister and said, “Now you see, that’s what Christmas is about, loving on people, accepting them for who they are.”

  “Don’t start, Yuri. We have an image to uphold. Charlotte’s ticking me off. We’re not staying because I don’t want to run into her tail no more. You’ll have to see this Paris guy another time.” Slade walked towards the stage.

  My sister and Charlotte were at an impasse. Paris and I were caught in the middle. I was a little disappointed that I wasn’t going to get to hang out with him. However, I was so nervous about skating and having his arms wrapped around me that I was okay with having to postpone.

  “At least let me buy you hot chocolate or something. You can come with me while I take my skates off,” he said, overhearing that I had to go soon.

  “I just don’t know what my sister’s problem is.”

  “Uh, my mom has the same problem, but Charlotte is her own girl, and Jenna’s cool,” Paris explained.

  “They seem happy.”

  “I want to be happy with you. Can we talk about that?” he said, getting closer.

  “Can we get some hot chocolate?” I laughed and said, before I was startled, looking up to find Ms. Pinky with another stand.

  The lady was everywhere. Paris sat down on a nearby bench and took off his skates. I walked to the dessert stand. She dropped two cookies, picked them up, blew them off and put them back inside a plastic bag to sell. I was stunned.

  “I know you’re not going to sell those,” I yelled out.

  Ms. Pinky either didn’t see me or ignored me. She went around back, completely ignoring me. The lady was crazy, and so was Slade. And maybe so was I, more ready to leave a date than try and enjoy one. What a crazy night.

  “Girls, it’s time to go,” my mother yelled out the next evening when we had to accompany my parents to the Christmas party.

  As the mayor-elect, my dad was the special guest, and he was on program to give a speech. None of us wanted to go. The designer Shelby was working with was having a Christmas party. Shelby and Ansli wanted to go to that. Avery was preforming at another party, and Slade wanted to accompany him. Sloan wanted to be at a Marks High School basketball game. Reese was playing, and she wanted to see him. I too had other plans I could have entertained. Paris called earlier, and his parents were going to take us to dinner. My parents weren’t budging. They knew if they let one of us go our own way, all of us would have to be let off the hook.

  “The limousine is here, girls. Your dad is not going to wait,” my mom called out.

  “I’m down. It’s the other four,” Slade said as she passed my door.

  “I’m out too,” I said, remembering what she told me yesterday about not letting my sisters make me late.

  I mean sometimes there just wasn’t that much primping in the world. Shelby and Ansli had no excuse in my opinion because the two of them shared a bathroom. Slade, Sloan, and I had to share one bathroom. Yet when Sloan came down, it was the two older sisters who were taking the longest. When we got in the car, my mom was fussing at our tardiness, but I noticed my dad was so quiet. None of us had really seen him much the last week, he’d been so busy. The others didn’t know what I knew about some of Dad’s health issues.

  I still wanted to ask him, “So did you get to the doctor? What did the doctor say? Do you need some medicine? Have you taken the proper rest? Talk to me.” But he could barely hold his head up. He was sweating. It was cold. In the bar of the limousine there were bottles of water. I took one, opened it, and drank a little.

  “Anybody else want some?” I said, hoping my dad would say yes.

  When he didn’t, I just handed him a bottle. He refused it and handed it back to me. I was so frustrated.

  As soon as we got to the Christmas party, my dad perked up. I could not explain it, but it was like he knew when to shine. He was waving, shaking hands, and doing everything a politician should.

  I knew we were big time when we got announced on the loud speaker, “Mayor-Elect Stanley Sharp and his family!”

  People stopped in the ballroom and just started clapping. I knew I was going to have to get used to the attention. However, I just wished people wouldn’t make us into such a big deal.

  “Yuri, there you are!” Ms. Pinky squealed coming out of nowhere.

  I could have thrown up. What was she doing at the mayor’s party? Why did I have to know her? I wanted to choke her for selling dirty cookies.

  She continued, “Hello, dear! Your dad’s gone up ahead, darn! But I’d love to meet your mother.”

  “My mom’s way up ahead too,” I told her.

  “Well honey what good is it going to do me to work with you if I’m not going to get the perks in public? If all my friends around here see me talking to the first family-elect, my stocks stay up.”

  “What are you doing here anyway, Ms. Pinky?”

  “I’m a vendor for the city.”

  “You
?”

  “Yeah, I cater a lot of the parties. I’m not catering tonight but … oh quit talking and take me up there to your mom.”

  “I don’t even see them anymore. I have to introduce you to them later.”

  “Whatever!” Ms. Pinky said as she briskly walked away, heading to cozy up to someone across the way that she deemed important.

  “That lady is a little snooty,” Sloan said.

  “Yeah, you only know the half of it.”

  “Watch your back with her.”

  “I don’t want to work for her,” I said, noticing she had sashayed on up to my parents on her own.

  I realized she was not going to let me stand in the way of her own personal agenda. Sloan was dead on. Ms. Pinky had to be watched.

  Finally, we got to our table. The table sat eight. There were seven of us in my family, so we had one extra seat. I didn’t even want to stay there when Ms. Pinky walked over with my parents.

  My mom said, “Yuri, look who’s going to join us. Girls change up the seats so that Ms. Pinky can sit beside Yuri.”

  I looked at Sloan like “don’t you dare move,” but my sis had no choice. There I was, having to sit beside the phoniest woman in the city of Charlotte. She talked our ears off throughout dinner. I was so happy when it was my dad’s time to give his speech.

  My dad took the mic and said, “I love this time of year, the holiday season, so merry and bright. It makes me think of the future of this great city. The sun is shining our way, Charlottians, and I am just honored to know our current mayor has done a great job. And I am honored and humbled that you all have given me a chance to pick up where he … where he …”

  My dad started stuttering. Then he was shaking, and the next thing you know, he was flat on the ground. My mom stood in horror. My sisters were in shock. The crowd was in awe. I was miserable. Clearly, he hadn’t gone to the doctor. Surely, I shouldn’t have kept what I had known about his health to myself. As all of us rushed to the stage, I stopped dead in my tracks. I hated that I let my dad talk me into keeping his ill health a secret. I felt worse than horrible wondering why did I yield?