Author Games: On Air

Task Two - Get This Party Started - Males

KAEDAN OUSLEY - ElfOfResilience

Wait, we have to make a party for ourselves? What is this madness? If I’m going to a party, I don’t want to have to make things. Then again, what I want isn’t what other people want, and I have to accept that. Besides, it may give me the opportunity to get to know someone.

It would’ve been nice to have spent more time with Jackson; he was evicted last night along with a bunch of other people. The others weren’t people that I got to know. Maybe it was for the better – you don’t want to make too many friends just to watch them leave before you.

Turning to Lara and Halyn, who seem to be on a mutual agreement – they’ll get along, but they won’t rely each other for much – I mouth one word to them: cake. As a child, my favourite activity to participate in with my mother was baking, and making large cakes was always fun. You had a birthday party that needed food? Just contact my mum and we’ll make a cake for you.

Before anyone else can even argue, I rush away from them all; the childlike side I have begins to emerge. Out of all of the rooms in this house, I think I spend more time in the kitchen than anywhere else. Instantly, I pull the eggs from the fridge and beckon other people this way to help us with the food for the party. Of course, random sweets that we find around the house will be thrown around for everyone, but we need to make something look good if we want to stay in the competition.

What do you need to make a good cake? Flour, sugar, eggs, butter, baking powder and milk, the main ingredients for a cake. Some people don’t use the last two, but the internet is where our recipe came from and we don’t receive complaints about our cakes. I hope that mum makes a cake for me when I return to her.

Lara strolls into the kitchen, looking happy that she didn’t have to deal with decorations or anything. “Hey, Kaedan, do we need to wear costumes?” Shrugging, I look at her and notice that she’s wearing a mask over her head. She holds another one for me: it’s not even related to something stereotypically scary.

“Of all the masks that you choose, you decide to give me the horse mask,” I say, laughing slightly before taking the mask from her. I absolutely adore animal masks; maybe she found this out by stalking my social medias overnight. “Thank you, Lara.”

She smiles at me, showing the side of her that isn’t like her: shy, embarrassed. She then makes her way over to the oven and whips out the baking tray. “Hey, if we’re doing a big cake, we should do little cakes to match. And caramelised apples! What else do people eat on Halloween?”

“Not a clue.” I come across blunter than intended as I speak; I try and correct myself. “I mean, I’ve seen some amazing ideas before, but I want ours to be blatantly obvious. Like, bananas with chocolate button eyes – there you have a ghost. Oranges with green sweets pushed in the middle – there you have a pumpkin. Simple things can be fun.”

“You can also do strawberries dipped in white chocolate, and then chilled – we did those at a party once and they were perfect.” A pen and paper sit on the worktop where we’ll be working. Making a note of all of these, I listen to other ideas she has. “Mini pizzas; the cheese will look like the paper that mummies are covered in. Sausages with dough wrapped around them: more mummy ideas.”

Halyn busts into the kitchen, holding a barrel of apples. “I split these with a couple of people; there’s going to apple bobbing and caramel apples!” I leave her to get on with her business in the corner while I start making the cake mix. If I’m going to make three batches of cupcakes – thirty six in total – and one large cake that consists of two bases, if you get what I mean, then I’m going to need five times the amount of what I would need for a one-layer cake.