Fifteen Candles Read online

  Monday was the first day of her internship, and Alicia was dressed to impress. She’d put on a pale pink seersucker jacket, white pants, and her favorite beaded Alice + Olivia T-shirt. Her father had offered her a ride to the office, but Alicia wanted to make her own introductions, not just arrive as the daughter of the deputy mayor. So she’d taken the bus and arrived at 8:15 a.m., even though her letter said she wasn’t due until nine.

  The intern supervisor, Lori Evans, came in at 8:45, and Alicia jumped up to meet her, shaking her hand vigorously. Lori was a tall blond woman, dressed in a taupe linen suit that only served to highlight the fact that she was the palest human being in the Greater Miami area. She spoke in a flat South Florida drawl as she led Alicia back to her office, which Alicia was pretty sure had recently been a broom closet. Alicia had to wonder if it was the humble surroundings, or just her personality, that caused Lori to behave like the grinch that stole summer vacay.

  “You know,” Lori said, as Alicia sat, slightly tremulous, across from her, “I’m too busy to hold your hand, so pay attention. Coffee machine is over there. Copy machine is in the back room. Don’t steal supplies, because I’m watching you. Don’t come in late, because I’m watching you.”

  Alicia decided it wouldn’t be wise to mention the time she’d gotten in. She’d dealt with this kind of attitude before. Sometimes, when people knew who her father was, they went out of their way to give her the rich-girl smack-down. She had learned to ignore it. Instead, she simply nodded and took careful notes on Lori’s instructions.

  “Don’t try to kiss up by writing down every word I say,” Lori growled. Her fingers fiddled with a cigarette that she seemed to be longing to smoke.

  Alicia tried to keep from collapsing like a soufflé at the thought of spending the summer under the thumb of an angry-at-the-world human ashtray. She put her pen down.

  “The copy machine requires a personalized code,” Lori continued. “I track expenses, so don’t think you can get away with making color copies of your favorite Jonas Brothers pictures.” Lori paused to type something into her computer. She looked up at Alicia. “Your code is A51221.”

  Alicia nodded and tried to think of a system for remembering the code: A, her grade point average, if you didn’t count physics; five, the number of inches tall her Mom’s Fendi logo heels were; twelve, the number of Jesus’s disciples; and twenty-one, the age she’d be when she graduated from college. Easy. Sort of.

  “Aren’t you going to write your code down?” Lori asked. “Do you think I have nothing better to do than to keep looking up a code you’re going to need a hundred times a day?”

  Alicia turned bright red. “But you said not to write everything down!”

  Lori made a dismissive motion with her arm, as if Alicia were dumb as a board. “Go to your desk, Miss Cruz, and make yourself useful. Did I tell you where the coffee machine is?”

  Alicia nodded. “Yes, but I don’t drink coffee.”

  “Not for you, for me,” said Lori. “I require a fresh cup of coffee with hazelnut creamer and four teaspoonsful of sugar every three hours. Don’t make me ask twice—and don’t leave the coffee to get cold if I’m out on a smoke break. Wait till I get back, got it?”

  Alicia assured her that she had.

  All that had been exactly seventy-six minutes ago, and apart from her father’s calling to check on her (“Yes, Papi, I’m fine—just peachy. Lori? She’s a hoot.”), Alicia had done absolutely nothing at her fancy internship but make regular updates to her Facebook page.

  Alicia Cruz Is excited to be starting an internship in the mayor’s office of the best city in the world—Miami!

  Alicia Cruz Hopes that she gets to work on some fun projects.

  Alicia Cruz Doesn’t drink coffee, but may need to start because the boredom is deep.

  Alicia Cruz Is wondering if anyone would notice if she slipped out for un rato to go to the beach.

  “The answer is yes. They’d notice.”

  Alicia jumped. She hadn’t realized there was a girl standing behind her. She was petite, with straight brown hair. She was also curvy in all the right places—like Salma Hayek’s mini-me. She was wearing a girlie pink blouse with ruffles and an orange bouclé skirt. It wasn’t Alicia’s style, but the girl was rocking it.

  “You must be Alicia Cruz,” the girl said confidently.

  “That’s me,” Alicia said, reaching out to shake the outstretched hand.

  “I’m Sarita Lopez. I just moved to town from Atlanta, and, since my school got out earlier than almost everyone’s, I started working here, two weeks ago.”

  Sarita took a seat at the next desk, and it was all Alicia could do not to jump for joy. Maybe there was hope for this internship after all.

  “So, have you met Lori?” Sarita asked as she sorted through a huge stack of papers on her desk.

  “Uh, yeah,” Alicia said. “I’ve also been sitting here, staring at my computer screen, for nearly two hours now. I say hello to people, but nobody stops to talk or to give me something to do.”

  “Trust me, I know,” Sarita said. “I spent my entire first week getting Lori coffee and hanging out on Facebook. The thing is, everyone here is too busy to deal with the interns, even the intern supervisor. You’ve got to just go to a department and tell them you’ll do anything: get them lunch, make copies, do research at the library.”

  Alicia nodded. Sarita’s advice made sense. “It would’ve been nice if my dad had given me a heads-up,” she said. But then it hit her: her father had no clue what life was like as a lowly intern. He was one of the busy people.

  “Does your dad work here?” Sarita asked.

  Alicia nodded. “Yeah, but he’s in a different department.”

  Of course, at that very moment, Lori walked by. “Her father is the deputy mayor,” she said. “So don’t let her try to get you to do all of her work.”

  It took every ounce of control for Alicia not to roll her eyes.

  Lori walked away, and Alicia wondered if Sarita were now going to start giving her attitude. But Sarita just said, “Deputy mayor, nice.” Then, turning toward Lori’s closed office door, she added, “Don’t hate the player, hate the game, honey.”

  Alicia grinned. Sarita was cool. “So, what are you working on?” she asked.

  Sarita smiled and began stapling sheets of paper. “I talked my way into a hybrid-and-alternative-fuel project with the Miami Green department.”

  Alicia was impressed. “That sounds pretty sweet,” she said.

  “I’m a science geek, so it’s perfect,” Sarita said, shrugging.

  Alicia flipped through the departmental guide to the mayor’s office. “I have no idea where to begin.”

  Sarita took a break from her stapling. “Well, what do you like to do?”

  Alicia took a big breath. That was a complicated question. She decided to go with the simplest answer. “I’ve been taking dance classes since I was a kid, and I love to choreograph things for the annual school talent show. And I love pop culture. I was going to do an internship at Ocean Side magazine, but this was an opportunity too good to pass up. Oh, that, and Ocean Side denied me. But I figure this internship will help balance out all my dancing when it comes time to apply to college. I’m hoping for Harvard.” Alicia smiled, suddenly sort of embarrassed. She’d just spilled—a lot. Luckily, Sarita seemed unfazed.

  “Well, the Office of Film and Cultural Affairs is always looking for help,” Sarita pointed out.

  Alicia shot out of her chair, her eyes shining. “Oh, my God, I’m so there. Thank you.”

  “No problem,” Sarita said, returning to the stacks of files on her desk. “You know, for an environmental department, Miami Green still generates a heck of a lot of paperwork.”

  An hour later, Alicia’s desk was as crammed as Sarita’s.

  “What’s all that?” Sarita asked.

  “Film permits for people who want to film music videos in Miami.” Alicia smiled.

  “Anyone I wou
ld’ve heard of?”

  “Hmmm, yeah,” Alicia said. She began to rattle off a list of names: “Miley Cyrus, Lupe Fiasco, Franz Ferdinand, but even more, there are requests from groups I’ve never heard of, from all over the world—Japan, Brazil, Sweden, Jamaica, Bermuda.”

  “That’s crazy; who knew Miami was so popular?” Sarita said.

  “Not me,” Alicia said. “I grew up here, and I love it, but I tend to take it for granted.”

  For the next few hours, Alicia and Sarita worked side by side in happy silence. Then Alicia realized that it was two in the afternoon and she hadn’t had any lunch. “I’m starving!” she cried, glancing around the nearly empty office.

  “Me, too,” Sarita said. “Let’s go up to the cafeteria. We can grab something and bring it back to our desks. Lori won’t mind.”

  Just to be sure, before they went anywhere, Alicia made sure that Lori had a fresh cup of coffee, with hazelnut vanilla cream, and four sugars.

  A few minutes later, they were back at their desks chowing down on City Hall burgers and Town Crier fries as they caught up on their personal e-mails. They both agreed that the Food Services attempt to give every item on the cafeteria menu a catchy name was a little corny.

  Suddenly, Sarita let out a groan. Alicia looked up. “I’ve got a million things to do for my quince,” Sarita said. “My mom e-mails me about it every hour on the hour. Since we’re new, we don’t even know where to start. My uncle lives here; he’s one of the mayor’s aides, that’s how I got this internship. But he’s single, and he doesn’t have kids, so he knows nada about quinces.”

  Alicia smiled. This was something she could handle. “I could help you out if you needed it. I am something of a quince expert, you know.”

  Sarita looked impressed. “Expert, huh? Did you have multiple quinces or something? I heard that girls down here are serious about their quinceañeras.”

  “Actually, I took a trip abroad for my quince, but I’ve been to hundreds of them,” Alicia said.

  Sarita raised an eyebrow. “Wow. That is a lot of friends.”

  “Who said anything about friends?” Alicia cracked. “Maybe it’s not hundreds, but believe me, I’ve been to a lot. So, when is your quince?”

  “In a little over a month,” Sarita said.

  Alicia tried not to fall off her very unergonomic office chair. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Nope. Five weeks from Saturday. My mom’s already invited all of our relatives in Atlanta, and they’ve booked their tickets. We just need to find a place.”

  Alicia looked stricken. What had Sarita and her mother been thinking? There was planning to be done. Dresses to be bought. Dances to be learned. It would take months!

  “Five weeks isn’t enough time to plan a quinceañera,” Alicia said, trying to sound calm.

  “Sure it is,” Sarita said. “We don’t have a ton of money, and I’m not planning on anything fancy.”

  Alicia breathed a sigh of relief. If small was the plan, maybe Sarita could pull it off. She’d honestly been afraid that her sudden panic was going to cause some very unsightly sweat marks on her seersucker jacket (which, to be perfectly honest, was her mother’s seersucker jacket that she’d sort of borrowed). “So you’re having a house party?” she asked.

  Sarita shook her head. “No can do. Me and my mom are in a tiny condo on the beach, and we’re expecting more than seventy-five people.”

  Alicia pulled her dark hair up into a ponytail. It was time to get down to business. She liked Sarita, and moreover, she felt as though she could really help her.

  She began with the basics. “Okay, you need a hall. So what’s your theme?”

  Sarita shrugged.

  Then Alicia asked, “Well, what kind of dress are you going to wear?”

  Sarita shrugged again.

  “And your quince is only five weeks away?” Alicia said. “What are you thinking, niña?”

  “I don’t know. In Atlanta, none of my friends had a quince. That’s why they’re all excited to come down here for mine.”

  Alicia nodded, but she couldn’t help thinking that Sarita’s friends were going to be sorely disappointed in a quince that had been put together with spit and Scotch tape in five weeks’ time.

  She took a deep breath. She wouldn’t let that happen. “Your quince’s going to be great,” she said, her voice full of determination. “And I’m going to help you.”

  “Believe me, chica. I appreciate it,” Sarita said, jumping up. “But right now it’s time for Lori’s afternoon coffee, and trust me, we don’t want the natives to get restless!”

  LATER THAT night, on Facebook, Alicia researched quinceañera planning online. She was shocked to see that the My Quince Sux group had 15,000 friends! It was full of girls whose quinces had caused them more drama than the antics of Britney, Paris, and the Gossip Girls combined. There were also ads for girls who were desperately seeking help in planning their Sweet Fifteen parties. It turned out that Sarita was far from being the only quince in distress. In the Miami group’s page, Alicia found a lot of cries for help.

  Una Flaca Desesperada wrote

  DESPERATELY SEEKING DJ AND DANCE CREW FOR SOUTH BEACH SWEET 15!

  I love cumbria, hip-hop and reggaeton pero my familia doesn’t have the Benjamins to get a big name group like the Barranquilla Boyz or Luis Boom. Newbie talent that can rock to a Latin beat would be fine with me. If you have any suggestions, please contact me lo más pronto que posible! Gracias!

  Lola wrote

  Hey, my quince is on November 10 and I have no clue how to do it. Can anyone recommend a step-by-step guide to hooking up a cool quinceañera? Please, I’m begging you! My mom has no idea either, ’cause she didn’t do it for my sister and now I’m getting a double dose of her tacky ideas. What kind of other themes can I do besides the played out (and super childish) Cinderella? Sooooo boring and I hate pumpkins. Please help me ASAP.

  Sylvia wrote

  Hey, I’m in trouble. My family thinks a Sweet 15 dress has gotta be pink! I HATE PINK except as a hair color. All the padrinos and padrinas are probably going to be dressed in pink too. The decorations, which my mama has already bought, are pink, and the cake she ordered is pink too. What do I do? Does anyone have any idea on how to save me from this cotton candy nightmare quince? THANK YOU IN ADVANCE!!!!

  La Recesionista Fashionista wrote

  OK. Where to start? Here’s my problem. I will be having my quince años in March. I already have chosen the color theme and dresses—ivory for the damas, with azure scarves hanging down the back, and for the chambelanes—ivory suits with azure hankies in the pocket and azure feathers in their fedora hats. Yes, people, the clothes at my quince will be banging! But aside from the outfits, I’m completely lost. My parents are divorced and I live with my mom. She’s not Latin like my papi and until I brought it up, she’d never even heard of a quinceañera before (fijase, chicas!). Me and my mamacita need MAJOR help with EVERYTHING! (Except for the clothes, which, as I’ve mentioned, are bangin’!)

  Alicia stayed up until two in the morning reading the message boards. By the time she went to sleep, she knew what she had to do. She was going to do more than just help Sarita pick a space for her quince. She and her girls, along with Gaz—and her brother Alex, if she could convince him—were going to take quinceañeras in Miami to a whole new level. She was going to start Amigas Incorporated, and it was going to be the hottest party-planning business in town.

  The next morning, Alicia found Maribelle in the kitchen, making breakfast.

  “Buenos días, Maribelle,” Alicia said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. The older woman was like a grandmother to her, especially since both of Alicia’s abuelas had passed away before she was born.

  Maribelle handed her a plate. “Banana pancakes, but I made yours special, with strawberries,” she said, in her warm, gently accented voice. “It’s a beautiful day. You eat outside with your parents.”

  “Gracias,” Alicia said, taking the pan
cakes and OJ that Maribelle handed her.

  “You’re welcome,” Maribelle said.

  “You’re the best.” Alicia planted a besito on Maribelle’s cheek.

  Maribelle put one hand on her hip and gave Alicia a saucy look. “And you think I need you to tell me that? Vaya.”

  Her parents were having breakfast by the pool. When she joined them, Enrique Cruz was reading the Miami Herald, and Alicia’s mom, Marisol, was reading the National Law Journal. They both put down their papers when they saw their daughter.

  “So, ready for your second day at City Hall?” Enrique asked.

  “I’m loving it, Papi,” Alicia said. “The Office of Film and Cultural Affairs said they have enough paperwork to keep me busy all summer long, and I really like the other high school intern. As a matter of fact, I’m helping her with a special project.”

  “Oh, really?” Mrs. Cruz said, raising an eyebrow. “What’s that?”

  “I’m helping her plan her quince,” Alicia said, nabbing a piece of her mom’s toast. “I’m thinking if it’s a hit, then me and my friends could even make it a business—a quinceañera-planning business.”

  Her parents exchanged glances. Alicia knew why. This wasn’t the first business that she had started and, in short order, abandoned. In sixth grade, she had started a dog-walking service and worked her way up to walking five dogs every day, after school. Two weeks later, she’d quit, once it had become clear that the logistical nightmare of walking five dogs at once was nothing compared to the smell bomb of cleaning up five dogs’ poop.

  In eighth grade, Alicia and Carmen had started a babysitting business. But two weeks and twenty-four explosive diapers later, they’d come to the same conclusion—babysitting, like dog walking, involved a whole lot of poop for not a lot of cash.