Whipped Cream

A Story by SilverInk

“Stupid cat!” Liz spat at Milquetoast. “Get away from my shoes!”

Elizabeth “Liz” Hart just hated it when her cat tried to get at her shoes. “Everyday, Milquetoast? Go rip up Luke’s football or something.” she would say. But could one blame her? The shoes had belonged to her mother, who had gone to France last month on another one of her world travels.

Milquetoast bolted out the door to Lizzie’s room and down the stairs. Thankful for the silence, Liz flopped onto her bed and closed her eyes.

Liz skipped down the stairs, feeling excited and ready. Her cupcakes were supposed to be ready any minute now. Her mother was coming back from another trip halfway across the world, and Liz wanted to surprise her with cupcakes.

Liz stood in front of her EasyBake oven, awaiting the “ding” that would signal her cupcakes were ready.

“Ding”.

There it was! Liz carefully lifted the lid with steady six-and-a-half-year-old hands and took in the scent of freshly baked cupcakes.

But the smell wasn’t at all what she had expected. It smelled pungent and curdled. What had happened? She had followed the recipe exactly!

Luke, who was also awaiting the baked cupcakes, entered the kitchen, only to find his sister in tears. It

was all his fault.

“Liz, the cupcakes! I’m sorry. I thought it wouldn’t be so bad.”

Liz turned around, obviously confused at what role her brother had in ruining the cupcakes.

“I added whipped cream to the batter because it’s Mom’s favorite.” Little did he know, the whipped cream had expired days ago. “But I’m sure we can fix this.” Liz looked at him.

“Together.”, she said.

In two hours, the twins had made their own whipped cream and used it to frost over a new batch of

cupcakes, When Mom came home, she took a bite of one and said -

“Dese awe gweat! What’d wu put in wem?”, her mouth stuffed with cupcakes.

Luke and Liz smiled at each other and said, “Whipped cream.”

Liz awoke suddenly. She had to remind herself that things weren’t like that anymore. She and Luke were no longer friends. To herself she said, “Silence is rare with a cat and a -”. Her train of thought was terminated at the sound heavy footsteps on the stairs. “Brother.” she sighed, as the door opened.

“What did you do to Milquetoast?” Luke Hart, her twin brother, shouted at her.

“Nothing, stupid. How about asking what Milquetoast did to me?” she retorted.

Milquetoast leapt from Luke’s arms hid under Liz’s bed. “Look at how scared he is.”

“Don’t you know what ‘Do Not Disturb’ means?”

Luke stomped out of the room, Milquetoast close behind. Two can play that game, he thought to himself. Two, indeed.

It was Sunday, the day of the garage sale. Luke had big plans for today. And not the good kind.

Liz and Dad were carrying boxes outside for sale. As usual, Liz ignored the fact that he wasn’t there. Luke crept behind the tables and into the house, up the stairs, into Liz's room. As expected, Milquetoast was already trying to reach the high box in which the ballet shoes were held. Luke stood on his toes and reached for the box, setting it on the floor. Carefully, he opened it, and gave the shoes to Milquetoast. Milquetoast immediately began tearing them up.

Luke smiled to himself. Revenge is sweet.

Meanwhile, at the Garage sale, Liz had her own diabolical schemes. At the bottom of the box, she had hidden her brother’s favorite football, signed by Rashad Jennings. She set it on the table, and almost instantly, a little girl walked over.

She yanked a pink lollipop from her mouth. “I’m Rebecca. That’s a pretty football.”

The girl had long platinum blond pigtails tied with hot pink ribbons. Rebecca had round blue eyes and was dragging a red wagon.

Liz grinned at the small child. “Five dollars.”

Rebecca handed Liz the money and dumped the football in her wagon without a “goodbye” or a “thank you”, but Liz didn’t care. All that mattered was that the football was gone forever.

Luke ran back up to his room after the garage sale. He was extra tired from helping Dad sell all of his useless stuff. It was finally time to take a nap and-

Something’s wrong, Luke thought to himself. There was a strange imbalance in the room, as if something were missing. Then, he realized.

His football was gone. His ancient football signed by Rashad Jennings was gone. He knew what had happened to it.

“That little brat!”, Luke said to himself as his stormed over to his sister’s room. “When I get my hands on her I’m going to-”

Luke opened the door and froze. His sister was on her knees in tears, the ruined ballet shoes in front of her. She was whispering something inaudible to herself and was oblivious to Luke’s appearance. Forgetting why he had been angry at her, Luke reached out to touch her shoulder.

“Liz, the shoes! I’m sorry. I think it would be so bad.”

Liz spun around quickly and slapped his hand away. “It was you, wasn’t it?!” she screamed at him. “You. You gave my shoes to the stupid cat. Don’t you care how important they are to me?”

“You sold my football at a garage sale! A garage sale!”

“Who cares about your stupid football? Those shoes were all I had left of mom.”

Luke stepped back and almost tripped. “But- m-my football..”

“Ugh, you’re so difficult! Why don’t you just run off like mom did, you a*****e!” Liz’s tears took a pause and she looked around the room. “Where’s the cat...”

Luke didn’t answer.

“I asked you where the cat is!”

“I don’t know!”

Their eyes met again, as their thoughts connected. Milquetoast had run away.

Liz and Luke bolted down the sidewalks of L.A. searching far and wide for their beloved Milquetoast. Everywhere they went, they asked, “Have you seen our cat?” or “Could you keep an eye out for a gray cat?” or something of the sort. But almost an hour had passed and Milquetoast was still nowhere to be found. After pacing blocks and blocks of the huge city, they found what they were looking for. But it was not exactly what they wanted.

Milquetoast was there, alright. But he was held by someone else. “I’m Rebecca.”

“Rebecca?” Liz blamed herself. Milquetoast must have jumped into her wagon when she left the garage sale. “Sorry, but that’s our cat.”

“Really?” Rebecca said with mock innocence. “Are you theirs, kitty?” Milquetoast hissed in response. “I guess not.”

Rebecca skipped down the sidewalk, Milquetoast in her arms. “I think I’m going to name you… oh, who cares what your name is?.” She smiled at the twins. “Buh-bye!”

Liz and Luke looked at each other. “We’ll fix this.” he said.

Liz smiled faintly. “Together.”

“You have a choice. You can either focus on what’s tearing you apart or what’s holding you together.”

-Unknown

© 2017 SilverInk

Author's Note

I would love for you to review on this story more than any other, poured my heart and soul into it!

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Reviews

J. B.

Greatly written piece! very colorful and in-depth writing :) I am really looking forward to reading more of your work, and thank you for sharing this story. :)

also, I am from NYC. feel free to read some of my work when you get a chance and tell me what you think :)

Posted 6 Years Ago

6 Years Ago

Thanks, sure thing!

Elizabeth Mars

Wow! A very sweet and heart warming piece, I love how you were able to convey the semi bitter/sweet relationship between siblings while throwing in a relationship with their mother, further complicating things. I enjoyed the story as a whole but it did move a little bit fast, I would love to read an extended version that continued their relationship with even more ups and downs! Another quick note, you moved between using "Liz" and "Lizzie" a few times, not a lot, but to make the story as easy to follow as possible I'd recommenced with sticking to just one of the spellings. Overall, I enjoyed the story! I also thought the image of whipped cream at the end was a bit funny, great characters and good sense of humor! I can't wait to see future work!