A Companion Book to Cake Pop Crush, You’re Bacon Me Crazy, Hot Cocoa Hearts, Macarons at Midnight, and Donut Go Breaking My Heart.
Available for purchase through Scholastic Reading Club and in bookstores and online.
Rocky road ahead!
Malie’s mom manages an ice cream parlor, but Malie’s real love is ballet. She dreams of landing the lead in an upcoming production of Cinderella and dancing onstage while her boyfriend, Ethan, cheers from the audience. But Malie’s mom is less than supportive.
Then cute new boy Alonzo arrives from Italy. His true love is ice cream—gelato, to be exact. Alonzo offers Malie a deal: If she lets him help out at the parlor, she can take dance lessons from his mom, a famed ballerina.
As Malie pirouettes between the parlor and the ballet studio, things start to spin out of control. Does she have feelings for Alonzo? What about Ethan? And if she doesn’t get a role in Cinderella, can she find her happily ever after?
“My mother searches for new talents,” Lanz continued. “If she sees you dance, perhaps she may take you as a private student.”
I shook my head. “I already told you. The tuition—”
Lanz waved his hand. “This is where my idea comes for helping each other. You can let me help you at Once upon a Scoop, because ice cream is what I love. And in return, my mother teaches you.”
“But . . . we couldn’t pay you. And I can’t pay her.”
“I only want to make ice cream. And my mother, she wants me to have a tutor. To help me with my English. So . . .” He snapped his fingers. “I will practice English with you and work at this parlor, for free. You will practice dance with my mom, for free. Capisce?”
It seemed too much to take in at first, too impossibly lucky that this chance should fall into my lap. My heart thrilled. The world, which had seemed darker this morning, brightened again. I could keep dancing, and maybe even talk to Lanz’s mom about Cinderella, to see if I could still audition. Possibilities pirouetted before my eyes.
Then just as quickly, my hopes fizzled. I couldn’t work with Lanz. If I did, well . . . I’d have to be near that charming smile, and those curls, for hours at a time. Suddenly, a vision of Ethan appeared before me, his eyes full of purpose and scientific calculations.
No, I told myself. Working with Lanz was not a good idea. It was a very bad one. But . . . if it gave me a chance to dance again? How could I possibly say no?