CHOCOLATE BIRTHDAY CAKE

"...So, this is going to be for MY party; and it HAS TO BE 'epic'!"

Cassie Cline glanced across the lunch table at Catie Caron and Dana Bragg. The trio of ten year olds (with Cassie being the one about to turn eleven) were at their exclusive table in the cafeteria. Even at ten years old, Cassie thought that she deserved the notoriety of such exclusivity.

Dana sort of disagreed with the lead girl's mindset; but understood that it was more Cassie's mother's doing that her daughter already felt so self-important. Besides, today was about strategizing for her party and that did deserve a degree of privacy. Even Cassie's father had promised to come home for the party; that did make this an important event. Dana could have this argument with Cassie later.

Catie didn't really understand much, socially or otherwise; she did get a sense that she could enjoy at least a bit of notoriety by towing Cassie's line just long enough. She quietly sat and bobbed her head as if she had understood.

"...Let's talk the guest list." Cassie ordered/instructed.

"Everyone in class?" Catie asked, hopefully.

Dana silently nodded her own assent of the suggestion. She didn't even need to look into Cassie's face to know what her answer would be.

"Inclusion?" the ten-year-old-future-pop-princess sneered. "Please; people need a ruling class to look up to!"

"Oh." Catie answered.

It was time for Dana to reenter the conversation.

"Wait a minute; last year, it was okay to have everyone there." she reminded her.

"...and this year, for your birthday, maybe it will be again." Cassie retorted. "I'll phone in my regrets."

"Okay; short list." Dana amended.

"Only the best!" Cassie declared, "I want my mom to know that I only make time with the best of the best of our classmates; and my father will see that too."

Suddenly, Cassie's mindset did make sense. Dana nodded in acceptance. Besides, this strategy meeting was keeping her from her lunch...

"What about Cara Tesh?" Catie asked as Dana took the lull in her part of the conversation to snake her slice of pizza off of the tray.

"The policeman's daughter; seriously?" Cassie demanded, pounding on the table; then, to Dana: "Seriously, Barge-girl; in the middle of game planning?"

Dana heard the misnomer and knew exactly what Cassie had meant by that. She replaced the pizza (now cold anyway) on her tray and brushed some grease off of her hands.

"She's cool." Catie supplied (Cara; not Dana).

"She...She's just not the type of girl that I want at my party; y'know what I mean?" Cassie asked.

Asking Catie if she knew what someone else meant was more of an invitation for the other party to keep speaking as Catie pondered the meaning. Besides, Dana already knew what Cassie had meant; and her distaste for Cara may not have even originated in her own mind, but it had nothing to do with her father being a policeman...

"Let's keep planning." Dana provided, taking the notebook guestlist and pen into her own lap and preparing to write. "A great guest list leads to the best eleventh birthday of the Spring season..."

"...Best party EVER!" Cassie amended. "I like your thinking. Now, party guests..."

With the party three days out, this was, of course, all about guests. Fashion would be dealt with the day before the party; and catering, naturally, fell on the family in the first place. Dana began writing down names to list off. One particular name, without being recited, was "Cara Tesh." She and Catie both agreed on that one and Cassie, "Madame Birthday Girl" or not, was outnumbered...

*******************************************

Saturday arrived. The popular, pretty, and pristine (for a fifth grade class) descended upon Linda Cline's home; in honor of her oldest daughter. Linda glanced out the window for a moment as guests began pouring in; then, she scooped up her youngest daughter, Molly. Her oldest daughter, her heir to her greatness, needed some reminders on etiquette...

Cassie was still in her room prettying up for her party. "Make an entrance," her mother had always said. She knew that preparing her entrance now was keeping her peers and friends waiting. However, they were there in her honor; they would wait. Besides, she had yet to see her father show up; a man who she hadn't seen much of in eighteen months...

Cassie tried to situate the faux tiara on top of her curls as the guest of honor when there came a bang on her door. Oops.

"Cassandra-Marie, your guests!" her mother shouted through the door.

"Cassandra." Maybe making an entrance was a lesson meant for another time.

"Coming!" Cassie called back, checking her beautiful white blouse one final time in the mirror and nodding in satisfaction.

She even ditched the tiara before leaving her room and finding her mother with both hands on her hips and Molly squirming under one arm. Cassie glared indignantly at her younger sister. Couldn't she have just stayed with grandma today?

"Honestly, Cassie!" Linda loudly objected to where the guests in the hall could hear her as she used her spare hand to fix her daughter's hair. "Your guests are not here to see me!"

They hadn't come to see Molly either; and yet, there she was. However, Cassie did her Walk-of-Shame down the hall; then put on her bravest, most self-important face in the entry way to greet her acolytes.

Dana and Catie stood in the forefront of the group of students. Cara was hidden in that group somewhere. Dana knew in the back of her mind that she had done the right thing; and she had only kept it from Catie so that she wouldn't blab. So why had she been so afraid to share with Cassie???

Cassie descended upon her group of peers; and had stopped dead in her tracks at the sight of Cara Tesh in her residence. Her mother had been following in her daughter's footsteps to make absolutely positive that her protege was using every social norm that she had been taught and, sure enough, the mother copied her daughter's reaction. Smackdab in the middle of the popular peers was Cara Tesh, Officer Ron Tesh's daughter. Cassie and Linda stood frozen amidst the festivities; and that was the image greeting John Kline as he entered the mansion that he had once shared with his full family...

"Happy birthday, Princess!" John declared.

"Dad!" Cassie answered, passing Cara right on by and shifting back into her welcoming persona.

"John." Linda grumbled the name.

Dana and Catie merely exchanged a glance. Maybe Dana hadn't done the right thing. Part of the whole facade had been to tell Cara she'd be welcome here; and that had messed with her emotions as well. Had Dana Brag, at the age of 10 and 10 months, just messed with not only the social cycles of their fifth grade class but race relations as well...?

"Great party!" Catie chirped.

Dana glanced cock-eyed at the other girl for a moment, then finally threw a friendly arm around her shoulder.

"I love your outlook on life!" Dana answered with a chuckle...

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In Cassie's father's presence, she did kind of ignore all of her peers. However, she continued to go the extra mile to treat Cara as an after-thought to every other after thought. Linda's behavior (sure enough) matched her daughter's own and John hadn't noticed anything different in a home that he had returned to for Thanksgivings and Christmases for the past year and a half. Therefore, instead of addressing any infractions on the issue, he held Molly under one arm and used his spare hand to signal back to the kitchen...

Finally, Cassie had been pristine and polite for long enough. She glanced out at her guests; and one of them sure hadn't been invited by her, not to this party! Her father was there to see a "less-than..." in their home; at HER party!

Cassie signaled for Catie and Dana for backup, then marched her way through her party guests to get through to Cara...

Her father emerged at that moment with a tray of a beautiful, meticulously decorated chocolate cake. That tray slammed his daughter, a popular, pretty, perfect girl on a mission to amend her party's guest list. Cara had seen Cassie coming and, a wise girl for her young years, backed away some as if something was about to transpire. Then, instead, Cassie slammed into a rolling tray of chocolate cake.

The black mess was all over her face, in her curls, and on her blouse. The guests, her guests, could not contain themselves at the age of ten and were laughing. This was correct, right; how many times had Cassie led these same peers in laughing at others? John Kline, with no other idea what to do since his daughter was unharmed, covered up his own smile. Linda was not smiling.

"Black; all over my rug!" Linda shouted. "All over my...will you go clean yourself up, girl?"

John glanced across the room at one particular party guest and cleared his throat.

"Chocolate, Linda; the cake was called Choc..." he answered.

"You! I told you to get vanilla!" Linda hollered as Molly began to cry in an attempt to be heard over her mother. "Vanilla doesn't stain the carpet or walls so!"

"Seriously? Then host her next birthday at a restaurant where your home will remain pristine and immaculate enough for you!" John answered in a very public performance just for Cassie's friends. "By the way, Cassie happens to like chocolate cake!"

"Good; she's wearing enough of it!" Linda huffed.

Cara decided that this public display had not been in mind for the party. She made her way forward amidst the giggling and pointing students and arguing parents to help Cassie up by one arm as Catie took the other and the three girls disappeared into the washroom. Then and there, Dana decided that she needed to do something as well. This had happened because of her. Dana shot a glance around the room and, maybe because the source of everyone's amusement was gone, the sound did die down. Then, Dana took an experimental crumb of the now fractured chocolate cake and took a nibble. Satisfied with its taste, she then disappeared down the hall to go be with her friend in her time of need. Maybe she'd be lucky and Cara wouldn't let slip what Dana had done behind Cassie's back. Even if she didn't, Dana couldn't return to the mansion again; on principle alone...

************************

"There!" Cara finally said in her soft-spoken delivery as she hung up the washcloth.

They could see Cassie's face again, devoid of makeup anymore but unblemished by chocolate just the same. Catie had brought in a light blue blouse and white skirt combo. Cara had even managed to brush the chocolate goop out of her hair.

"Thanks." Cassie managed from her seat on a stool in by the sink.

"Anything for the birthday girl." Cara replied. "But, seriously, can we talk...?"

Cassie took in the invited question and gave the last answer she thought she'd ever say.

"Sure." she replied in an eleven-year-old's textbook watershed moment of changing race relations.

"Thanks." Cara answered, running the comb through Cassie's bangs one final time. "Now, what is the deal with Dana Burger?"

"I know right." Cassie giggled back.

"She's so fat!" Catie supplied the exact same point that everyone else had been making; yet in words that she could understand.

"She is though, right?" Cassie asked.

"Mm-hmm." Cara answered. "And, you know that all of the cool groups only have room for three, right?"

Cassie glanced about the tiny bathroom at the two girls who had gone of their way to help her at her party and even get her cleaned up from the chocolate cake debacle...

"Besties?" she asked of them both.

"For life, girl." Cara answered

"So fun!" Catie supplied.

...Dana had paused mid-knock before she had heard the crux of that conversation. At this point, it wasn't even worth entering to see if her friend would be okay, let alone to debate the points that they were all making together. She had heard the giggles (let alone the subject of those giggles) and Cassie was doing just fine. Dana officially couldn't be friends with Cassie or Cara again; and after everything she'd ever done for either of them. She turned around and walked out of the mansion smackdab in the middle of the party. She could walk the couple of miles home rather than have to dread the phone call home and explanation for it; the walk, after all, could only pay off one day...