With that said, Hannah removed the berries and stared down at the brightly colored parfait. There were three layers. The top was red, the middle was green, and the bottom was yellow. But she couldn’t think of any ingredients that would add up to only twenty-five calories. What was it? Plastic? She dipped her spoon in cautiously and raised a bite of the ruby-colored top layer to her lips.

“Raspberry,” she said, immediately recognizing the flavor of one of her favorite berries. “It’s raspberry and…something else.”

“What does the something else taste like?” Norman asked.

“I’m not sure, but it makes my tongue tingle. I like that. It’s fun. What is it?”

“Sugar-free raspberry Jell-O and soda water.”

“So that’s the fizzy part.” Hannah dug down with her spoon to taste the green second layer. “Lime?”

“Lime with Diet 7 Up. Try the third layer. That’s my favorite.”

Hannah excavated to the third layer, the sparkling yellow one. “Sugar-free lemon Jell-O,” she guessed after she’d tasted it. “But there’s something else, something tingly and zingy.”

“It’s diet ginger ale,” Norman told her. “Sally thought the ginger taste would go well with the lemon.”

“Sally’s right. It does.” Hannah spooned up another bite of her dessert. It was dessert. She felt she was ending her meal with a parfait loaded with yummy calories, but she wasn’t. “Are you sure that this is less than twenty-five calories?”

Norman nodded. “Sally and I figured it out.”

“Wonderful!” Hannah said, spooning up another bite. It was amazingly exhilarating to feel indulgent and virtuous at the same time. “Only twenty-five calories,” she repeated, giving Norman a big smile. “In that case, I might just have two!”

GUILT-FREE PARFAIT

1 small box sugar-free lemon gelatin***

1 small box sugar-free lime gelatin

1 small box sugar-free raspberry gelatin

1 cup boiling water for each package of Jell-O (3 cups in all)

1 cup cold diet ginger ale for the bottom layer (Sally used diet Vernor’s)

1 cup cold diet lemon-lime soda for the middle layer (Sally used diet 7 Up)

1 cup cold soda water (Sally used Canada Dry Seltzer)

Hannah’s Note: You can use any flavors of sugar-free gelatin you wish, but it’s prettier if the layers are contrasting colors. You can also use any carbonated diet drinks that you wish in the gelatin layers.

Sally’s Note: Use canned diet soda whenever possible. It has more fizz than the large bottles. If you can find it, use a small bottle of soda water or seltzer rather than the 2-liter type.

Norman’s Note: Of course you could make this dessert in a dish using just one flavor of sugar-free gelatin. Making it with three layers gives you three flavors and three colors and makes you feel as if you’re eating something very special.

Get out six small parfait glasses. You can also use large balloon wineglasses if you don’t have parfait glasses.