Page 43 of The New Place

“Did I?” Ned asks. “The recipe is on my phone. Can I see it?”

“They’re different.” Peggy dumps more flour into the bowl. “Soda and powder. You have to be careful.”

“How many grams does it say?” Abbot pulls out Ned’s phone and unlocks it.

Peggy leans close to read the screen. “Three hundred.”

“And how many does the scale say is in the bowl?”

“Oh.” Peggy grabs a spoon. More flour dusts the counter as she enthusiastically digs scoops out of the bowl. “After this, we’ll make the cupcakes.”

“No dirt,” Ned repeats. “Who’s texting me?”

“We can make kaiserschmarrn another time, too,” Abbot says as if there’s not a notification right there on Ned’s screen. “It’s pancakes you tear up.”

“I can tear up a pancake,” Peggy says. “I can tear up these. And when we have dirt on the cupcakes, we put worms on them. We had them at Esther’s party. They’re dirt-worm cupcakes.”

“Oh, the ones with crushed chocolate cookies on top?” Dad asks. “I know those. Here.” He holds up his phone with a picture of a chocolate cupcake, a gummy worm on top.

“Yes, those,” Peggy says. “Abbot, can we make them?”

“Those are a different sort of worm than vermicelles,” Abbot says.

“I have them, so we can do both,” Peggy says.

“Oh, you’re bringing the worms?” Abbot asks. “How very obliging. I haven’t seen this confectionary before, I’ll admit.”

“Remember Abbot didn’t grow up here,” Ned says. “Though c’mon, you’ve got to have some ridiculous word for them.”

Abbot makes a show of considering Dad’s phone screen. “Schmutzküchlein,” he says.

“That sounds like a sneeze,” Ned says. When his phone buzzes again, he reaches for it.

“Or perhaps drecktörtchen?” Abbot says without handing it over.

“Can I see my phone?” Ned asks.

“I’ll get the worms and bring them down,” Peggy says.

“You have these worms?” Ned turns to her, letting Abbot keep his phone if he wants it so bad. “Here?”

“No,” she says quickly.

“Down from upstairs?” Ned prompts.

She shakes her head. “Uh-uh.”

“Peggy, do you have Halloween candy stashed in your room?”

“I don’t have anything,” Peggy says. “Daddy, do you even know the difference between baking soda and baking powder?”

Ned opens his mouth, and then has to pause. “Um.”

Peggy giggles. “You don’t.”

He dips his finger in the flour and touches her nose. “Do you?”

“Of course,” she says and laughs again.