Birthday Games

58. Pink

Again, it seems I have to choose between two chapters, with one vote for each. I really hoped people would be more into this, but perhaps Wattpad isn't the right platform for it. So, after tossing a coin, here is the chapter that ShadeQueen99 requested.

"It's got to be pink," Karin grinned, "It's the sweetest colour, right?"

Birthday nodded enthusiastically. She wasn't quite sure herself why pink should get to sit in a place of honour, as the cutest colour. But if Karin wanted to make pink cakes, then pink was what she would get, and there was no doubt that all the guests at the party would appreciate it. So the fairy flew all around the kitchen, gathering up the pinkest ingredients she could find. They started with a couple of drops of the food colouring, and then a couple more. Three times, Karin mixed in the colouring and then declared that it wasn't quite as pink as she'd hoped.

The fourth time, she put in nearly twice as much pink as Birthday advised. By the time she'd finished stirring the mixture this time, there was no doubt that the cake was going to be pink. And there was pink cake mix all over the table, and the windows, and Karin, and even a few blobs of sticky pink mixture on the ceiling.

"It's pink enough," she admitted, and then started going through all the other things she could think of adding. There was pink sugar, little flavoured crystals. Pink sugar strands, and pink metal balls, and pink jelly diamonds. It seemed that just from looking through the kitchen cupboards in a Princess's palace, you could find a pink version of every possible form of cake decoration.

Karin did think about just mixing them all together. But she knew that if she put everything in, Daddy might not be able to count all the different things, and he might miss some of them. If she really wanted to impress him, then she would need to pick the very best pink ingredients; things that would go together really well and remind Daddy what a good cook she could be.

She found that mixing up each set of ingredients was a lot of fun. She might realise after that she hadn't quite got it right, that there was something she needed to add or take out, but that didn't matter. Because whenever she was stirring her pink bowl of pink mixture, she could just think about mixing. She could stir as fast as she possibly could, and wonder if she would ever be able to make the wooden spoon move as fast as the magic mixers that the kitchen fairies used. She was even tempted to try using the mixer, she was sure she could work out the right spell, but Birthday said no. That would just make it too easy to make a mess.

"But making messes is how you learn!" Karin protested.

"And it's fun too," Birthday nodded, as if she completely understood, "But today you're trying to impress Daddy, aren't you? If you want to show off, then you need to do your best to make the cake without making a mess too, so Daddy will be surprised in a good way."

Karin would probably have agreed, now she had time to think about it. But before she opened her mouth, she heard the sound of movement on the other side of the kitchen door. That was an immediate cause for panic. She knew Daddy was home, because he was putting up all the decorations for the party. She'd just assumed that he wouldn't come in the kitchen, because he surely didn't need to put up decorations there. But as she saw the door handle start to turn, Karin knew she'd been wrong after all.

She could easily imagine how angry Daddy would be when he saw the cake mix splattered around the room, that he'd probably have to clean up. But then, she could imagine he would be really impressed when he saw that his special Princess had made a special cake just for him. She didn't know what to do now, but she knew there was no chance he wouldn't notice. Between a bowl of cake mixture in the middle of the table, and almost as much mixture all over the room, she couldn't imagine him coming into the room without knowing she'd been there.

"He won't mind, maybe?" Birthday suggested, but it was easy to tell she wasn't at all confident in the idea. "I mean, he'll be proud you're making a cake for him, it's not like you made a mess on purpose. You should tell him you're making a surprise, and he'll have to let you get on with it. And then you can tidy up afterwards, and not get in trouble."

"I don't know," Karin said, looking at the mess she'd already managed to create. "If I keep on making it, I'll probably make even more mess. And it might spoil the surprise if Daddy's got to help me tidy up after it. Maybe I should say sorry first, and try to tidy up before I finish the cake."

"Oh, that's a good idea," Birthday nodded, "But you don't know if there'll be time to finish it once you did the tidying." Karin thought about it some more. It was like the scenes in some of her cartoons, where a character had a little angel sitting on one shoulder, and a devil on the other. Except she didn't have an angel or a devil, the only advisor on her shoulder was a mischievous fairy who couldn't sit still long enough to stay on one side or the other, and Karin had to think of one side of the argument herself.

That was a nice picture to imagine, but she didn't have time to think about it for long. The door was already starting to swing open now, and she had to decide if she was going to focus on Daddy's surprise, or on not leaving him with an untidy kitchen to sort out. She would have loved it if she could do everything right, and given him a surprise and a tidy kitchen too, but looking at the chaos around her it was pretty clear that she needed to pick one or the other, and she only had a second left to make her decision now.

If Karin should try to tidy up, turn to chapter 63

If she would prioritise finishing the baking, turn to chapter 59

And if the chapter you want isn't published yet, you can vote for it by leaving a comment on the chapter titled "Interactive story / Vote here for next chapter". It isn't practical for me to go through the book every week counting votes left in different places.