Love Stinks! (6 page)

Authors: Nancy Krulik

BOOK: Love Stinks!

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And of course, all the kids had decorated their beanbag chairs with the cards they’d given one another.
All the kids except Katie
,
that is
. Her beanbag wasn’t decorated at all.

Katie spent most of the morning watching the door to her classroom. The candy hearts would be delivered sometime today. She didn’t know when. But she did know that once they were, there would be big trouble.

The boys were already sick of all the girls looking at them and giggling. When they got those candy hearts, they were going to go
crazy
!

But there weren’t any special deliveries that morning. By lunchtime, Katie began to relax. Maybe the hearts weren’t coming after all. Maybe Katie had gotten something wrong on the address labels. Or maybe the school didn’t let kids get mail during the school day, or ...

No such luck!

As soon as the fourth grade entered the lunchroom, Mrs. Davidson, the school secretary, walked in. She was carrying three big boxes.

“I have special packages,” she announced. “Will Jeremy Fox, Andrew Epstein, and Kevin Camilleri come get their mail?”

Katie gulped. This was the moment Katie had been dreading.

Jeremy was the first boy to open his box. “Oh, no, it’s a heart,” he groaned.

Becky ran over to him. “It says just how I feel.”

“Ooooh,” the boys teased.

Jeremy read the message on the candy.

“Huh?” Jeremy asked.

“She thinks she can crush you,” Kadeem laughed. “That’s just wrong, dude.”

Katie looked over at Jeremy. He looked furious!

Becky looked down at the heart. “That’s not the message I wrote,” she insisted. She sounded like she was going to cry.

Andrew was the next to open his box. “Who is this from?” he asked.

“Mandy,” Suzanne and Jessica shouted out.

Mandy blushed. Andrew blushed harder as he opened the box.

“Love your what?” Andrew asked her.

Mandy looked at the heart curiously. “That’s not right. Cinnamon was supposed to write ‘Won’t You
Be
Mine?’ ”

“Well, I won‘t,” Andrew told her.

Now it was Kevin’s turn.

“Oh, look, it’s
another
lover boy!” George squealed, making his voice go up really high.

“Ooh, Kev’s got a girlfriend,” Manny added.

“Why me?” Kevin moaned. As he opened his box, Kevin looked like he was going to be sick. But when he read the heart, a smile returned to his face.

“I don’t have a secret admirer after all,” he said as he held up the candy heart. “This isn’t for me!”

Kevin turned proudly to the guys. “See, it’s for some people named Val and Tim.”

“It’s not supposed to say that!” Jessica announced suddenly. “It was supposed to say ‘Love, Your Secret Valentine’!”

Oops!
Now everyone knew Jessica was Kevin’s secret admirer.

“Jessica and Kevin sitting in a tree,” George began to sing. “K-I-S-S-I-N-G.”

That made Kevin plenty mad. “Stop it, George. Or I’ll tell everyone you still sleep with a teddy bear.”

That sure made Kadeem laugh. “A teddy bear! What a baby!” he exclaimed.

Now George was mad. “You swore you’d never tell,” he shouted at Kevin.

“
I’ll
tell you something. I’m never going back to that candy store!” Becky announced.

“Me, neither,” Mandy agreed.

“I’ll never forgive Cinnamon for this,” Jessica added.

Katie frowned.
This was so not good
.

Chapter 11

After school, Katie went to the mall with her mother. Mrs. Carew had to stop by the Book Nook to wait for an order of books that was due to arrive.

As they passed by Cinnamon’s Candy Shop, Katie got very sad. Usually, the store would be filled with kids buying penny candy. But today there were only adults in there—buying last-minute gifts, Katie guessed.

“Katie!” Cinnamon came running out of the store as Katie and her mom walked by.

“Oh, hi,” Katie said quietly.

“Weren’t you going to visit me today?” asked Cinnamon.

Katie had been too ashamed of what she had done to visit Cinnamon. “Well, I, uh ...” she began.

“You know, it’s the strangest thing,” Cinnamon told Katie and her mother. “None of the fourth-graders have come to the store today. Usually they’re here by now.”

“That is strange,” Mrs. Carew agreed. “Your store has become quite a hangout.”

“I know. But today, they all just walked by. Some of the girls even looked angry with me.”

Now Katie felt
really
bad. “You don’t think you’ll go out of business, do you?” she asked nervously.

Cinnamon smiled kindly. “No, sweetie. I actually make most of my money from adults who buy chocolate gift boxes. I just like having the kids around. That’s why I opened a candy store. Kids always come when there’s candy around.” She paused for a moment. “At least they did until now.”

“Do you have any idea what might have changed?” Mrs. Carew asked.

Cinnamon shook her head. “That’s the strange thing.”

Katie knew what was wrong. She also knew it was all her fault.

Just then, Katie got one of her great ideas. “You should have a party!” she blurted out.

“A party?” Cinnamon asked.

Katie nodded. “A great big Valentine’s Day party. With balloons and music. I’ll bet the kids would come to that. I could call all the fourth-graders and invite them.”

Cinnamon thought for a moment. “I could give out little bags of candy hearts as favors.”

Katie flinched. “I think the kids have had enough of those,” she said quickly. “Maybe you could just give out regular candies.”

Cinnamon shrugged. “Okay. I’ll do it. I hope this brings the kids back to the store.”

So do I,
Katie thought to herself.

“But you
have
to come, Suzanne,” Katie begged her best friend. The girls were talking to one another on the phone later that evening. “If you don‘t, nobody will.”

“Well, I
do
set the trends in our grade,” Suzanne agreed.

Katie sighed. Suzanne was such a show-off. But she wasn’t wrong. Most of the girls did copy whatever Suzanne did.

“Still, Cinnamon really messed things up,” Suzanne continued.

“Not for you,” Katie told her. “Your heart came to your house Wednesday night. It said exactly what it was supposed to.”

“I guess,” Suzanne agreed. “But ...”

“Cinnamon probably only made the mistakes since she was rushing. You guys did have a last-minute order, after all. Cinnamon is a really nice person,” Katie said. “She keeps secrets really well.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Suzanne asked.

“She didn’t tell anyone about your secret admirer,” Katie told her.

“She said she couldn’t.”

“I know,” Katie agreed. “But
I
can tell if I want to.”

“Tell what?” Suzanne sounded nervous.

“Who your secret admirer is. I figured it out. But I kept your secret. And so did Cinnamon. You owe us.”