Page 51 of Sawyer
Everyone stared at her like she had spoken in Martian.
Confusion wrinkling her brow, Lovie asked, “Zupe it? What does that mean?”
Wow. This was worse than Lele thought. “You know…zupeit. You have tozupeyour spaghetti noodles.”
Lovie still looked confused, along with everyone else at the table. Her face heated. Everyone was staring at her like she was a few sandwiches short of a picnic.
Sawyer put his hand on her thigh under the table and gave her an encouraging squeeze. “I've never heard of zuping spaghetti either, Half-Pint. How do you zupe something?” Unwillingly, she found herself reassured and appreciative of his support.
Well, fudge nuggets. She never thought that she would be the one to enlighten people on such deep-seated cultural norms, but it seemed like no one else at the table knew what zuping spaghetti was either.
This couldn’t stand. She had to reach out and educate her new friends on the joys of zuping spaghetti. They were missing out.
“Okay, when you zupe spaghetti, you eat one noodle at a time. And this spaghetti is great for zuping because it's really long.” She held her hand in front of her, spread apart like a fisherman bragging on a fish he’d caught. “You put one end in your mouth and then you suck the rest of the noodle in as hard as you can. The harder you suck, the faster the noodle zupes into your mouth! With a little practice, you’ll become a champion zuper like me. I can zupe four noodles in a row without taking a breath.” She probably shouldn’t brag. That was a pretty high standard for beginners to shoot for.
Bliss squealed. “I know what you’re talking about now. We just never called it that where I grew up.”
Several of the others nodded. The rest just sat there and stared at her. Well, some of the Daddies were shifting in their seats.
Yep, she should have kept her zuping to herself. She stared at the plate of spaghetti Sawyer had placed on the table in front of her. All those noodles, waiting to be zuped.
But she couldn’t zupe by herself. That would be weird. Shoulders slumping, she picked up her fork and mentally prepared herself to eat noodles the grown-up, boring way.
“Wait,” Georgia said. “Let me try.”
Using a fork to separate a loan spaghetti noodle, she put the end in her mouth and sucked the noodle in. Her eyes widened as she swallowed the noodle. Sauce coated her lips. She grinned. “You're right! That was great!”
“I'm not sure it's great,” Hutch said. “You have spaghetti sauce all over your face.”
“Faces don't matter when you're having fun, Daddy. Come on, everybody, see if you can zupe a noodle.”
“Stop,” Gage said. “No one is zuping anything without bibs to cover your clothes.”
Gage motioned the waiter over, and before they knew it, they’d all donned protective gear, AKA plastic bibs that tied around their necks.
Within seconds, all the girls around the table were sucking noodles in as fast as they could. Soon, forks were abandoned while their Daddies looked on with what could only be described as loving disgust.
Once everyone had the hang of it, Lele took them to the next level. “Now that you know the basics of zuping your noodles, we can have a contest.”
Suzi looked suspicious. “What kind of contest?”
Lele nodded. She could appreciate an achiever like Suzi. “Okay, when you zupe your noodle really hard, the end of the noodle flicks up and hits you on the forehead. But you have to be careful. Sometimes when you zupe too hard, the noodle goes down your throat, and it can make you gag. So be careful. When someone saysgo,we’ll all zupe as hard as we can. When time is called, whoever’s spaghetti mark is highest on their forehead wins.”
“This screams bad idea,” Gage said.
“I may never eat spaghetti again,” Deke grumbled.
“As soon as we leave the restaurant, everyone head to the garage,” Reid said. “We have a power hose we can use to hose them all down. I hope everybody wore clothes they don't mind getting wet.”
Connor smirked. Almost under his breath, he said, “As soon as we leave this restaurant, I’ve got something else that needs zuping.”
Hutch smacked Connor on the back of the head. “Time and place, man. This is neither.”
Lele had the best night of her life. She had no idea who won thegame. It didn’t matter, they were all howling with laughter by the time it was over.
The Musketiaras were so much fun. And they liked her. She wasn't even sure what to do with that. It hadn’t happened since she was in elementary school.
If she were able to stay in Darling, they might have even become good friends. They might have invited her to be a Musketiara, too, and give her a pretty sparkly crown. She would have loved to have a sparkly crown.
