THE COMPETITION NEXT DOOR

SATURDAY, 13 FEBRUARY, CONTINUED

At first glance, it looked innocent enough. The woman with the little girl must have met an old friend. She was smiling and talking to another lady while her little girl tugged impatiently at her hand. Behind them, a platoon of Lorent ladies began setting up their booth.

Technically, they had four stalls in the row. While our little stall had a leaf banner on it, their stall only had the stands, but one of them set up a small step ladder and another one climbed up - in her dress, no less - and they put up a garland of pastel patterned flags and flowers, stringing them from one stand to the other, combining the four stalls in a row into one large booth.

Even while they did that, a few more ladies started shaking out large white table cloths. So much table cloth! It was like enough to cover the entire hospital lobby if you laid it all out on the floor, but of course they didn't do that. They made up the tables, folding the thick white material into envelopes to cover the entire table.

Meanwhile, still more ladies begun setting up tiered trays of different heights. The table nearest to us had a round one that was so large, it took most of the table. The ladies who finished hanging the garlands, were now using the step ladder to set up the top trays of the display.

And then more table cloths, gauzy gold ones crumpled and laid out like rivers between the display stands, and heavy square brocade laid upon the white cloth below. More platters and trays, and then some one came with flower delivery. Now there were matching flower arrangements placed in strategic position across the tables.

I watched as the entire space became transformed - it was like they were fairy godmothers suddenly appeared. If anyone could make a pumpkin pass off as a royal coach, I was sure it would be these ladies.

By the way, they did know this was a bake sale right?

Meanwhile, the woman with the little girl (aka my first customer) was tsking with admiration at the Lorent booth. It's alright, she was probably just making polite conversation with her old friend.

The other ladies left the scene and I breathed out a sigh a relief and sat down next to Ben who was just powering on his laptop. He had found a power point, and and extension wire, and these two stools... I guess that was his idea of setting up.

The rest of our stall was just as we had set it up to be. Uncovered, with rows of boxes of identifiable baked items. I mean, I thought the leaf banner was cool and besides the banana bread, the rest of our items looked and smelled yummy, but now, next to the Lorent booth, it kind of felt like we were selling leftovers.

The ladies reappeared, marching in with trays of baked magic. I watched as they carefully arranged their items, each type of baked item on their stand, with a little label naming and pricing them.

Zoom in 5x:

"Strawberry Dream Cupcake. $5"

$5 for a cupcake with a single strawberry on top? Presposterous! But $5 for a strawberry dream cupcake? Tempting...

I prodded Ben with my elbow, "Hey, check out the Lorents."

Ben didn't look up from his laptop, "Just ignore them."

How could I? I watched as customers started milling around even before they had finished setting up. No one even noticed our stall...

And then some of the ladies began cutting little pieces of samples for the breads, and my first real customer and her little girl waved and left with two white paperbags, with clear windows so I could see they bought mini crossionts and chocolate chip cookies.

Noooo... That was my customer! I watched haplessly as my customer entered the first lift that opened and disappeared. I guess they were going to bring their breakfast surprise up to the little girl's daddy now. That was nice. I'm glad they found something good, but why didn't they find it at my stall?

I sulked.

"What is it, Sam?" Ben asked, without taking his eyes off his computer screen.

I crossed my arms, "We're doing this will wrong."

Ben took a quick glance at my direction, and then at the Lorent booth that I was glaring at, "They aren't our competition, Sam. Plus I doubt their sales would cover their set up cost."

I guess that was true and I know they won't be in the running for prizes Mrs Beta had dangled in front of us, BUT I hate this feeling.

I hated being the sad, pathetic, stall in the corner. I hate sitting with my tail between my legs, watching someone else getting all the action.

Grrrr.... This was annoying!

"Whoa..." Ben leaned to the side, but once he was sure my hair was still just hair, and not knives, he returned to his screen.

Tap tap tappity tap.

"What are you doing?" I snapped at my beta.

Ben was unperturbed, "I'm posting our bake sale."

I leaned closer to look. Ben's screen had some kind of screen protector over it so unless you were facing it directly, you couldn't see what was happening on it.

"Bake sale today. Gate City Hospital Main Lobby. Next to fancy Lorent's booth. Authentic home bakes." I read, "Shouldn't you post a picture?"

I wasn't like an expert or anything, but I thought that much was obvious.

Ben got up with his phone and tried to take some pics but our authentic home bakes looked very... Home made even in the photos. It just looked blah.

Meanwhile, the Lorent booth was the perfect backdrop for photos and the Lorent ladies were proudly taking selfies with their baked goods flower arrangement display as their backdrop, or zooming in on the little pieces of deliciousness sitting pretty on laced dollies on their display stand.

I watched as customers bought stuff, and then took selfies eating in front of the shop.

Pathetic (our stall, not them). Grrr... I hated losing.

I sat back down on my stool and sulked. Ben came back round with his phone. He then uploaded a pic of our chocolate fudge with the caption, "To die for."

How was that going to sell anything? Selling stuff just wasn't our thing, but at least Ben was doing something. I was just sulking, but what could I do?

For the next hour, we sold Jonah's banana bread, but even our own people would just buy the banana cake and maybe be pressured, I mean persuaded by Ben to pay an additional $2 for five pieces of chocolate fudge. And then they would go over to the Lorent booth to "check it out" and leave with pretty white paper bags filled with pretty looking cookies and stuff.

Its a pity Night Leaf served everything in plain ol' brown paper bags. Even Esther's beautiful white swan cupcakes would be sold in them. I know its the content that counts, but it wasn't helping sales at all.

And then it hit me like a ton of bricks, I mean metaphorically, it's not like anyone dropped Jonah's banana bread over me - I really want to know how they managed to slice it, it was truly an unbreakable thing. Ben had bought our share and we spent the lull minutes in a game of "who can break the banana bread." There was no winner here, because neither of us had a jackhammer. Laura might want to try using her batter to make pavement - but we would have to use the pack house ovens for something large enough to fit a piece of future pavement.

Just as I thought the last of my happiness would completely dissipate, Dean showed up, "Hey Sam. Sorry I'm late. Mrs Beta told me to join your stall."

I felt a smile immediately form on my lips, "Hi, Dean. Long time no see."

"Yeah, you're that late. But whatever, its not like you missed anything." Ben shrugged, "You can watch the stall. I have work."

Was Ben giving up already?

I showed Dean that the price was written on the box, and where to put the money, and updated him about Jonah's Top Secret Banana Bread Mission, as well as the plan Ben had.

"I don't think we're going to win the most sales anymore." I told Dean.

"Don't worry, Lizzy and Savy's stall is nailing it." Ben showed me his phone. There was a photo of Lizzy and Savy smiling and holding out a box of bright icing cookies in popular emoticon designs. I wanted the happy face one immediately. But then I saw one of the comments, "It's all sold out T.T" and then Lizzy's reply, "Thanks for your support everyone!"

T.T indeed.

I'm stuck here not getting to buy any of the good stuff. Worse, I'm not selling any of the good stuff either.

"Anyway, you don't get a share, Dean. You were late." Ben informed Dean, "Just sit back and wait for lunch time."

This was bleah. Ben was being a totally strategic general - let Lizzy and Savy take first place in sales. Let Jonah's box sell out first (no rush, since its the only thing we were really selling). And not do anything, since the results would be the same - we would have the same amount of prize shared among the same number of people.

"It's okay, Dean. I'll share mine with you." I mindlinked so that Ben wouldn't hear it.

Its not that I was afraid of my Beta, but I knew that if Ben knew, he would end up letting Dean in. And to an extent, that wouldn't be fair to the others either. I didn't want the others to feel they had to take a smaller prize just because Dean joined us.

"Thanks, Sam." Dean responded back. He seemed surprised.

"Why are you so surprised? We're partners, of course I'll share with you."

"Ah no, its not that. I'm just surprise you're mindlinking me. You usually ignore all my mindlinks since that run..." Dean faltered.

I did? I shook my head, "I usually have my mindlinks sealed. I didn't know you were mindlinking me."

"Why would you seal your mindlinks?" Dean sounded completely taken aback now.

Why would I seal my mindlinks, the basic form of communication between wolves of the same pack, the proof that we were link by a common packhood? I couldn't think of an answer at that point.

I guess it just happened. There was that thing about sitting next to Maria, and having vamps in my school, and it's noisy and distracting to have someone mindlinking something to you when you're busy, and there's the risk of leaking feelings into it, especially the darker ones I didn't want to worry the world with, and let's not forget my gift of "insight" that might rear up its ugly head anytime to listen in to other wolves private mindlinks. I'm better off without it, really.

"I'm tuning out." I told Dean and resealed my mind quickly - just in case I heard anything that would put me in a worse mood than I was currently at now.

But just as I thought it couldn't get any worse, one of the Lorent ladies next door felt sorry for us and gathered a few pretty cookies and a couple of friends to come visit their poor neighboring stall, "Hello, excuse me. We're from the Lorent stall next door."

I sighed inwardly, but stood up with a smile plastered on my face, "Hi! Thanks for coming over."

Ben got up too, but I put up my hand before he said something dumb like, "Go away."

"Uh, hi ladies." Dean managed, "Would you like to buy anything?"

The ladies tittered, "Oh my, so young. Are you kids helping your mums take care of the stall?"

"We're volunteering." I asserted.

"What good kids." One of the ladies praised.

"We have some extras, if you don't mind helping us eat them, you can have them." The first lady offered the treats she had picked from their booth - I saw her pick them out for us. They weren't extras at all.

"Wow, thanks!" Dean accepted them with two hands and a bow, "They look great!"

Traitor.

The ladies smiled brightly at us.

The next time I totally wipe my competitors out, I was going to do this too - be super kind and gracious so that it would kill your enemy to hate you for it. I was going to call this the "heaping burning coals graciously move."

"It's so nice to have young people who are willing to spend their Saturdays volunteering for a good cause." One lady sighed at the other.

"I know... I couldn't get my own son to come." Another one said. Was she human? She had a pack scent, but no wolf - human. Definitely, but mated to a wolf.

The first one smiled at me, "My dear, I like your hair. Is that a popular look now in Night Leaf?"

"Oh yes, like LuvMuunMuun." Another one said.

"Oh, you're so on trend with the youngsters!" The third one praised her friend.

You know what, let's call these ladies Peach, Pear, and Plum, because that was the color of their dresses under the white apron, and their general shape and vibe. Don't ask me what a Plum vibe was.

"Oh perhaps, your Alpha Princess is also a fan of LuvMuunMuun. She also has blue hair now and looks like the moon goddess herself." Pear asked,

"Shush..." Peach quickly said to her friend.

"I'm only asking, I mean no disrespect, of course." Pear argued back.

"It's fine." Plum reasoned, "They're just kids. We're just chatting."

Ben, Dean, and I exchanged looks. So we're just kids? Heh heh heh...

I smiled and carefully double-checked to make sure Boo was nicely hidden from their wolves, "Our Alpha Princess is just normal looking. You wouldn't even realize it if you met her along the street."

Ben opened his mouth, and shut it again. What? It's true. For example, right now. Hahahaha. So funny.

"But I heard from that our delta families have met her. They say the girl was so beautiful and lovely that the young alpha James was completely enchanted by her." Pear said.

"Poor Cynthia." Plum sighed, "Even though she was his soul mate too!"

"Hush now, we don't know that for sure." Peach said.

"Her mum told me so herself!" Plum said.

"Huh! If that were true, wouldn't they be mated last year?" Pear challenged.

I guess the ladies didn't just bring "extra" goodies for us to eat, they also brought some "tea". I wondered what they expected us to say. I was the Alpha? Hahaha.

Oh well, for some reason, Boo surfaced just a bit, I pushed her back and decided to change the subject, "Pretty ladies, can you help us? I want to make our stall look nice too."

Peach, Pear, and Plum stopped in mid-conversation. I gave them my best puppy dog eyes. Okay... I know, I know, that look had never quite played out for me the way I wanted it to, but I didn't have an arsenal of charm tactics. I wasn't Ki.

The ladies looked at me, and then at the stall, and then back at us again.

"I don't know if we could be much help." Peach admitted finally. She didn't have to say it, it was written on all their faces. Our stall was quite dismal.

"But maybe, we could help you sell one of your items from our booth." Peach offered kindly.

"Yeah, okay." Ben picked up a box of chocolate fudge squares.

I shook my head, "No, Ben. We've got to do this on our own."

Ben stopped. Hahaha. He didn't want to though. In his mind, this was one easy win for us.

"What do you mean, child?" Peach asked, "How else could we help?"

"Do you have extra tablecloth and stuff you can lend us?" I decided.

"Well we brought a pink table cloth by accident..." Pear said.

"Oh, but its a shocking pink." Peach bemoaned, "We can't give them something like that! These kids are trying hard."

"We have extra trays - just the large ones though." Plum said.

Okay, that'll do.

"Can you lend us the table cloth and trays please? We'll clean it and return it to you, promise!" I tried in my best Lizzy impersonation.

Peach looked reluctant, "Do you really want something like that?"

I nodded, "Yep! I've got an idea! It's not going to be like your store, but it'll help us sell our stuff better."

"Oh." Peach said, "Well, alright. I'll go fetch them for you."

"So cute, this girl." Plum sighed to Pear.

"Too bad we only have sons." Pear sighed.

Oh right. Lorent's hadn't had any female pups since Bell was born. Maybe that's why they thought I was cute, the lack of sample size, and the fact they hadn't met the likes of Lizzy and Savy yet.

Peach came back with the table cloth. She was not kidding about it being shocking. There were three trays, but they were big enough to cover our entire table. She also felt so bad for us that she bought us a bunch of brightly colored balloons from the hospital gift shop.

"Thanks! That's perfect." I decided, "You boys stay here and man the stall, I'll be back."

Then I ran off, I turned back to call out, "Thank you, pretty ladies! I won't forget your kindness!"

I didn't stop to watch them titter, but I was smiling, my good mood had returned.

Sometimes, it's not about the winning or losing. Sometimes, its about doing your best - and even if you didn't win, at least you weren't the sad and pathetic loser.