Page 5 of The Killer Cupcake
The 1949 Cadillac Series62 sat curbside like a pearl dropped from heaven—pristine white with chrome that gleamed under the Louisiana sun. A white man in a rumpled seersucker suit blocked the sidewalk as Janey ushered the girls toward the magnificent machine.
"Dégage, connard," Janey muttered under her breath.
The man sneered, and Kathy could see Willa shrink next to her and lower her gaze. Kathy looped her arm around Willa’s and pulled her close as they prepared to walk around him, but Janey, who led them, nearly bumped him over as she kept walking straight. And he had to step aside. The girls mimicked Kathy’s aunt’s confidence. And soon she felt Willa’s spine straighten and her walk with confidence as well.
For Willa, the car's interior was a revelation that bordered on the sacred. She ran her fingers over the upholstery, softer than anything she'd ever imagined, struck speechless as they glided past St. Charles Avenue's towering antebellum mansions—palatial homes.
For Kathy, New Orleans revealed itself as Harlem's more elegant, yet infinitely more dangerous, cousin. Gas lamps flickered off over elaborate wrought-iron balconies as the night gave way to day; talented Black musicians played sultry jazz for clusters of white tourists on street corners, their music floating through the humid air like liquid soul. But she couldn't ignore how eyes followed Janey's Cadillac—some filled with friendliness, others with naked hatred.
Janey lit a cigarette with a golden lighter that flashed like captured sunlight. She exhaled smoke through slightly parted lips. "Y'all can breathe now, darlings. In my car, you belong to me. Ain't no Jim Crow laws in this Caddy—just my rules, and my rules say you're royalty."
They turned into Tremé, and suddenly the world transformed into a symphony of visual and auditory delights: Creole cottages painted in sherbet colors lined tree-shaded streets, and the mouthwatering aroma of beans simmering with cayenne pepper. It filled the air.
Then Janey's house rose before them, regal and royal.
It was a three-story "shotgun mansion"—an impossibility that shouldn't exist but stood there nonetheless, painted adefiant periwinkle blue with intricate white gingerbread trim that looked like lace frozen in wood. Wrought-iron galleries on each level dripped with emerald ferns and purple bougainvillea. Through a gate adorned with gildedfleur-de-lis, they glimpsed a hidden courtyard where a fountain sprouted, cooling the air with its water.
Willa stopped dead on the sidewalk, her eyes wide as saucers. "This... this is a colored house? Sweet Jesus, it's bigger and prettier than anything in Butts!”
Inside, Kathy felt her breath catch and hold.
Chandeliers hung over mahogany floors that gleamed like dark mirrors. Oil portraits of Creole elite who weren’t Janey's ancestors—proud men and women in satin and silk, their eyes blazing with the fire of rebellion—gazed down from gilded frames that probably cost more than most families earned in a year. Where a cotton scale might have dominated the corner of a Mississippi parlor, a magnificent grand piano stood like a shrine to culture and refinement.
Janey tossed her gloves onto a Louis XVI settee with casual elegance, the gesture speaking volumes about a life where luxury was routine rather than aspiration. "Welcome to Liberté,mes petites. My husband bought this from one of the wealthiest Octroons in all of Louisiana. Her great-grand-mère bought this land in 1829—paid in gold coins. That’s the story they tell.”
A Black maid in a starched white apron trimmed with delicate lace appeared as if summoned by magic, offering sweet tea in cut-crystal glasses that caught the light like liquid amber. Willa approached the piano and pressed one key with a finger. The note sang pure and clear through the magnificent room, and tears glistened in her eyes. "I never knew... I never dreamed our people could live like this. Like kings and queens. No one ever told me.”
"We don't just live,ma chère. We thrive. We take what the world says we can't have and make it ours through grit like Big Mama, through pain like my Mama, and sometimes a little bit of wickedness like me.”
Kathy frowned. She had heard an earful from her mother about the wickedness in Janey. Some of it she refused to believe. But looking at her life, and the unapologetic way she moved through it, she had to think the word ‘wicked’ should be replaced with ‘wonder’.
Kathy approached the wide picture window overlooking the courtyard's orange trees, their fruit glowing like lanterns in the gathering new day. Suddenly, Carmelo's world—violent yet lavish, dangerous yet defiant—crystallized in her understanding. She remembered visiting his house for the first time and being awestruck by the opulence.
This wasn't simply a house or even a home. This was a declaration of war won through wallpaper and chandeliers, a testament to the power of refusing to accept limitations imposed by others based on race.
Questions burned in her mind. How did Boanno find her aunt after he left Butts all those months ago? Why didn't he take her to Paris like he promised? Was she still in trouble with the law in California?
"Kathy?" Janey spoke.
"Yes'm," Kathy turned.
"Carmelo's here," Janey said.
Willa looked up from the piano bench.
Janey's sly smile was slick with mischief. "Not here in the house, but in the Quarter. He'll be arriving soon. You’ve traveled far, baby. Don't you want to change for the reunion?"
Kathy nodded eagerly.
Janey's gaze slipped to Willa. She was the darkest of the three of them, her beauty covered by her meager existence on theJensen farm, never pampered, never nurtured. "You girls have to look and behave like royalty here. I have a reputation with these Creoles. Come with me, Willa."
Willa got up from the piano and walked over to Janey, who took her hand. "I'll work on you myself." She then addressed Kathy. "Your clothes are in the room to the right on the second floor. You will know it when you see it. That is yours and Carmelo's room, and Pinkie will make sure she has everything you need."
Willa looked at her with eyes stretched wide and pleading for help. Kathy smiled. "It's okay, Janey will be gentle."
Janey tossed out a playful laugh and walked away. Kathy glanced at the servant and then at the stairwell that led up to her new wardrobe. Thrilled, she hurried up each step.
CHAPTER 4
