12 Stake Out - My Sister the Vampire (5 page)

‘No, silly. I’ve brought decorations, to make everything look fabulous!’

As Sophia took out a pile of Tupperware boxes from her bag, full of tiny, crystallised cake decorations shaped like black bats and red castles, Ivy looped one arm around her boyfriend’s waist.

‘Hope you’re hungry!’ she said perkily, channelling Olivia’s most cheerleader-bright tone.

Brendan gave a half-hearted smile. ‘I’m here, aren’t I?’

The next moment, Camilla was barking orders from the doorway, her face hidden by her video camera. ‘Focus, everyone! This is for posterity.’

They all groaned, but not too hard – they knew Camilla too well to argue. And as Ivy looked around the kitchen, she had to admit it really was a scene worth filming. Olivia had covered every available surface in wipe-clean tablecloths and put out bowls of strawberry and lemon sweets, milk chocolate discs, and pink-and-blue decorations. It was like a picture from a magazine, pretty, neat and perfectly organised – just like Olivia herself.

‘Come on, everyone!’ Olivia said. ‘I’ve got ingredients for crispie cakes and chocolate-chip cookies.’ She pointed at the different stations she’d set up around the room. ‘Everyone take their places!’

‘Brendan’s brought something too,’ Ivy said, and nudged her boyfriend even as Sophia got to work on freezer cakes.

Brendan’s grin was real this time, as he held out his bag. ‘Double-00 flour: the best of the best!’

‘Aha.’ Ivy’s eyes narrowed. ‘So
this
was your secret to those unbeatable macaroons, huh?’

I can bake macaroons just as good as his, no matter
what he says
 
!
Ivy reached for the bag, fired up by her competitive instinct – she hadn’t forgotten his challenge! – but Olivia’s hand closed around it at exactly the same time.
Oops
 
!
Ivy let go, stepping back to let Olivia take the bag . . . just as Olivia let go, stepping back to let
Ivy
take it.

The two girls’ eyes met. Then the bag landed on the kitchen floor, exploding and spraying clouds of flour all over both of them.

Ivy heard Olivia draw in a breath. Sophia gasped – perhaps a little too melodramatically. The flour had fallen fast, but not so fast that one of the three vampires in the room couldn’t have caught it before it hit the floor. But with Camilla filming, they had to let the mess be made.

‘This is priceless!’ Camilla yelled. ‘Movie magic!’

‘Magic, huh?’ As the cloud settled, Ivy looked at her flour-covered twin and began to laugh.
So much for staying neat
 
!
‘You look like the Abominable Snowman.’

‘So do you,’ said Olivia. ‘You’re not a goth any more! I can’t see a single speck of black on you.’

‘Actually,’ Sophia said, ‘covered in this much flour, even
I
couldn’t tell you two apart.’

‘And I have it all captured on film,’ Camilla said with satisfaction.

The doorbell rang. One of Olivia’s white-dusted hands flew to her floury face.

‘Don’t worry,’ Ivy said. ‘I’ll get it.’ Still grinning, she went to the front door. When she glanced back over her shoulder, she could see a trail of white footprints on the carpet.

Maybe it’s a good thing Dad is in Groomzilla mode. With any luck, he won’t even notice the mess
 
!

She opened the front door and found Holly wearing a sunny yellow top and a wildly colourful skirt. Her long, shining blonde hair was set off perfectly by subtle red streaks, and she was carrying . . . a pizza box?

‘Hi!’ Holly said. ‘Sorry, I don’t really have time to bake today, but I thought we could all get stuck into pizza.’

Or you can just look perfect and popular, when the rest
of us get messy
, Ivy thought sourly, as flour flaked off her hand on to the door handle.

But, no
, she told herself,
that wasn’t fair
. Olivia was right – Ivy was just overreacting to Holly . . . probably.

Even as she thought that, Holly leaned closer to peer at Ivy’s face. ‘You know what?’ She laughed, but it sounded uncomfortable. ‘I can’t even tell which twin you are, under all that flour! Is that . . . is that Olivia?’

Ivy gritted her teeth. Clearly, Holly was really,
really
hoping it was Olivia. So much for giving each other a chance! ‘You look nervous,’ she snapped. ‘Are you worried you might have to make conversation with a goth?’

‘Ivy!’

Uh-oh
. Ivy turned to find her twin standing right behind her, mouth open in shock.

Oh, great
. Just what she needed! She’d left Transylvania to escape all the watching eyes and strict codes of behaviour – but now that she was back in Franklin Grove, it was just as bad! Speaking her mind was somehow upsetting people.

What was the point of coming home at all
 
?
Ivy thought.

Deep down, she knew her anger really stemmed from guilt at her own bad behaviour. But right now, she didn’t want to listen to the reasonable thoughts in her head. Instead, she turned on one heel and stalked back down the hallway to the kitchen.

‘Here’s Holly,’ she said curtly to all the others, and then she went straight to a mixing station, turning her back to the group. Beating eggs really hard was strangely fun.

Behind her, her friends seemed to have turned themselves into the perkiest welcoming committee ever.

‘Holly!’ Sophia said warmly. ‘Perfect timing.’

‘Hey, it’s good to see you again,’ Brendan said. ‘Is that pizza? Awesome.’

‘We should talk!’ said Camilla.

Ivy scowled down at her mixing bowl.
Has this girl cast a charm spell over everyone
 
?
Or maybe Ivy’s friends were just easily excited by pizza?

‘It smells delicious,’ Olivia said. ‘What’s in it, Holly?’

‘Oh, you know . . .’ Ivy could hear the smile in Holly’s voice. ‘A little bit of everything.’

‘Ivy?’ Olivia said. ‘Do you want to cut the first slice?’

There was no polite way to refuse, not without everyone really thinking she was a monster. ‘Fine,’ Ivy growled, and took out a knife from the cutlery drawer.

At least Brendan was actually looking forward to eating something, for once. That was her only consolation.

The moment the pizza box opened, the smell seemed to rise out of it like a wild animal. It was so pungent and intense, Ivy could barely breathe. What in the world had Holly put in here? No matter what it was, Ivy would have to eat it and pretend to like it, just to keep Olivia happy. Gritting her teeth, Ivy sliced into the pizza . . . then almost gagged . . .

Oh no
 
!
This was even worse than she’d anticipated.

‘Wow.’ She fought to keep her voice bright, even as she tried not to inhale. ‘Look everybody,’ she said. ‘Holly’s stuffed the pizza-crust with
garlic
.’

Turning away, she slapped her hands to her face in a gesture of amazement, as a cover for the fact that she was blocking her mouth and nose. What was it about bunnies and
garlic
 
? Did they really have to put it on
everything
 
?

As Brendan and Sophia, the other vampires in the group, absorbed the news and tried not to retch, the room went dead silent. Ivy spotted Brendan turning to lean heavily over the sink. Oh no, just as she was trying to reinvigorate his love affair with food! Ivy dug her black-painted nails into the palms of her hands.
One more mark against Holly
 
!

Then her friends swung into action.

‘You know what? I think I’ll just open the window,’ Sophia said. ‘This summer heat is really getting to me.’ Her tone was light, but Ivy saw her lean out the window as she opened it, taking deep, desperate breaths of air not contaminated by garlic.

At the same time, Brendan shifted to the other side of the room, raising one hand to his face, pretending to scratch just above his nose.

‘You all really have to try this,’ Holly said, oblivious to the panic. ‘Honestly, it’s great! I used my dad’s recipe – that’s why the crust is stuffed with garlic.’

Without waiting for any response, she took the knife from Ivy’s hand and started cutting into the pizza, sending more whiffs of garlic into the air. ‘Here, Ivy.’ She held out a plate. ‘You take the first slice.’

‘Um . . . I think I hear the doorbell.’ Ivy fled to the front door before she could do anything worse.

From a safe distance, she watched the others trying to avoid eating garlic – and not just the vampires. Camilla was human, but that didn’t stop her from promptly slipping her piece into a houseplant pot. Brendan smiled through gritted teeth and made a big show of cutting his slice up into tiny portions – ‘To make sure I savour every crumb of garlicky goodness’ – before rushing into another room. Only Olivia was gamely eating two slices, trying to cover up for everyone else . . . but Ivy could have sworn she saw her twin’s face turning green, even beneath the layer of Double-00 flour. Olivia might not be allergic to garlic, but Ivy knew she was hating every bite.

This was a nightmare – a Holly-shaped nightmare!

As Ivy stood holding open the front door, someone arrived – her dad! Ivy hadn’t even known he’d slipped out.
He must have been running yet more wedding errands.

‘Oh good, pizza!’ Charles said, hurrying past her towards the kitchen. ‘Just what I need!’

‘Dad, wait!’ Ivy said. But it was too late. He was already accepting a slice from Holly, who beamed at his enthusiasm.

‘Yum!’ Charles said, and lifted it to his mouth. All the fresh air from the open windows must have wafted the scent of garlic away from him.

There was only one thing Ivy could do. She threw herself at her dad, full-body, and knocked the pizza out of his hand.

‘It’s garlic!’ she whispered into his ear, too quietly for anyone else to hear. Then, as she straightened, she said loudly: ‘Sorry about that. I guess I tripped.’

‘Tripped?’ Holly put her pizza box down, her smile drooping. Charles’s slice of pizza lay on the floor between them, abandoned in the mass of flour, as he backed swiftly out of the room. Holly was still staring angrily at Ivy. ‘From the
hallway
 
?’

‘I’m sure that –’ Olivia began.

‘No, listen.’ Holly jerked her chin up proudly. ‘I know this was supposed to be a baking party, but I just wanted to try something different. I wasn’t showing off, or being difficult – or whatever else Ivy thinks of me. I just thought it’d be fun. That’s all. But I guess I was wrong. Ivy clearly doesn’t want me here.’

‘Holly, wait!’ Olivia said.

But she brushed past her without a word. Seconds later, the walls of the house shook as the front door slammed shut. Olivia swung around to face Ivy. ‘Is Camilla still filming us?’ she asked stiffly.

Ivy glanced around. ‘Um, no. She’s in the living room with the others – they all slipped out when things got . . . awkward.’

‘Good.’ Olivia shook her head. ‘Because I need to tell you something, Ivy: you were really obnoxious to Holly! I know you had to avoid the garlic, but couldn’t you have been polite about it?’

‘
Polite
 
?
’ Ivy stared at her. ‘What do you think I was supposed to do? Poison myself, just so I wouldn’t hurt her feelings?’

Olivia crossed her arms. ‘Did you
really
have to make such a big show of stopping Dad from eating that pizza? You actually threw yourself across the room to knock it out of his hands, right in front of her! What were you thinking?’

‘You know I couldn’t let Dad eat it,’ Ivy said.

‘Well, what happened to subtlety?’ Olivia asked.

She’s never been like this with me – ever
, Ivy thought. A lump seemed to be forming in her throat, but she swallowed hard.

‘Hey, guys?’ Brendan stood in the doorway, looking awkward. ‘The others are ready to go home now. I think your dad’s a bit, um, twitchy about the mess.’

Olivia let out a groan, then turned to go play hostess.

As they all said their goodbyes, Ivy fought to hide the hurt brimming inside her. The whole time she’d been at Wallachia, she’d dreamed of coming home to be with her twin again. She’d assumed that Olivia would feel the same about having Ivy back.

It looks like I was wrong about that
, she thought. A lot of things had changed while she was gone – like Olivia putting a stranger’s feelings before Ivy’s.

At last, the front door closed for the final time, leaving the twins on their own with Brendan to clear up the mess.

As he and Ivy knelt together to scrub the flour off the kitchen floor, he nudged her gently. ‘Hey, it was a great party until the end, wasn’t it?’

‘I guess.’ Ivy shrugged one shoulder.

‘So why the deflated look?’

She just shook her head and scrubbed harder. She was afraid she would embarrass herself by crying if she tried to talk.

Olivia moved around them with a swish of her flour-covered apron. Ivy bit her lip and kept scrubbing.

Brendan sat back on his heels. ‘You know,’ he said gently to Olivia, ‘you might have been embarrassed, but none of this was Ivy’s fault – she was just trying to stop your dad from having a really bad allergic reaction.’

‘I guess,’ Olivia said eventually. Ivy wasn’t taking her eyes off the floor, but she could hear the shrug in her sister’s voice. ‘I just wish everyone could get along.’

‘Me too,’ Ivy said quietly.

She waited for Olivia to come and give her a hug, but instead she heard her twin wiping her hands, taking off her apron and heading into the living room without a word.

‘Come on, Brendan.’ Ivy pushed herself to her feet, ignoring the dull ache just below her throat. ‘I’ll see you to the door.’

When they were standing on the front step, she finally let herself lean into his shoulder. ‘Olivia and I have never fallen out over another friend before,’ she whispered.