Pride & Princesses (18 page)

   
Meanwhile, Mouche was worried and on the verge of panicking.

   
Her senses were in overdrive. Although she’d never admit it to Jet, she had been having very intense dreams lately and had woken up that morning with the idea that something might go wrong during the day if she and I were separated.

   
‘I just can’t imagine where she might have gone. We should go look for her. Phoebe would never go off alone and stay away without saying goodbye,’ Mouche said, as she and Jet dried off and hastily pulled their clothes on over their damp swimsuits. Then she had a vision of a CD outlet and said, ‘hurry, we should go up to the business centre beyond Santa Monica Boulevard...’

   
‘How do you know?’

    
‘I just...remembered, Phoebe said something about...buying some CDs...’

    
So, I guess you could say, by the time I entered the small music store I had three people already searching for me, which could only have been a good thing.

   
There was a grungy looking man sitting behind the counter, at least ten years older than me, wearing a t-shirt advertising dog fights. He was sort of creepy so I hovered near the entrance, wondering why this store had to be the only one open for business on a Saturday.

   
‘Hi,’ he said, and looked up. Music blared out.

   
‘Hi,’ I said hesitantly. I hope he couldn’t tell just how freaked out I was about losing my purse, or rather, having it stolen from me. ‘I’m just wondering which direction the pier is? Someone...a little kid, stole my purse.’

 
   
He looked concerned.

   
‘Hey, do you wanna use the phone or something?

   
‘Uh, okay,’ I said hesitantly. I was glad I had committed Mouche’s cell number to memory. As I took steps forward, he moved off his chair and opened the latch that led to the area behind the counter.

   
‘It’s back here.’

   
Suddenly, I was wary.

   
‘Can I use your cell? I’ll pay you.’

   
‘No problem, except I don’t have one.’

   
Who doesn’t have a cell? I was backing out the way I came in when I heard a child screech. I looked above me to the open loft in the upstairs section of the store. A child looked down at me, I saw his reflection on the television screen. He was playing a computer game. It was the kid that stole my purse.

   
‘That’s him! That’s the kid who has my stuff.’

    
It may have been unseemly but I actually pointed towards him.

   
‘Really?’ the man said innocently, ‘He’s my nephew, I don’t think...’

    
Suddenly, I had this odd feeling Mr Music Store owner was running some kind of pickpocket racket when suddenly I took a step back into another person and turned around to see the face of Mark Knightly.

   
‘Hey, what’s going on?’ he said in his rich, low voice.

   
‘That child stole my purse.’

    
Quick as lightening, Mark said, ‘wait outside,’ and pushed past me to race up the stairs.

   
I heard a child throwing a tantrum and about ten seconds later Mark emerged with my tote bag in his hands.

   
‘Is this what you were looking for?’

    
He didn’t say anything for at least three minutes as we walked back through the alley way, me trailing along behind his manly strides.

    
‘You shouldn’t be hanging out in this area,’ he felt the need to chide me. He seemed angry.

    
‘Excuse me. It’s a free country last time I looked.’

     
I would’ve said ‘thank you’ more profusely by now but he barely seemed to notice me. He was distracted by a text from Jet.

     
‘Everything’s okay, we have to get back to Sunrise. I’ll drop you home. Your friend is going ballistic, seems she thought you’d been kidnapped. You shouldn’t have just wandered off like that alone.’

     
I was stunned by his near total lack of empathy.

     
‘Well...if you’d been where you said you were going to be, I might have gone swimming and never had my purse stolen in the first place!’

    
Mark looked annoyed.

    
‘Do you want to report this? I mean, to the Police.’

    
‘What’s the point, they’ll just deny it.’

     
‘I’ll get my aunt to make an anonymous complaint to child protection. It’s probably better that way,’ Mark said.

     
‘Why do you say that?’

     
‘Well...um, I’m sort of on probation and that guy had a gun under the counter...’
 

  
We arrived back at Mouche’s house late-afternoon. Mark hardly said a word to me except, ‘put your seat belt on,’ on the way back. He was treating me like a child and I really wasn’t impressed. It was a thrill to be in his sleek car but I wasn’t sure just how much more of his conceited personality I could tolerate.

   
I was relieved when we pulled up at my house. Mark deposited me in the driveway before I could say ‘thank you’. Mouche arrived about ten seconds later. Jet followed behind in his car. Mouche waved to him as we opened the gate and the boys drove off without even bothering to come inside.

Chapter 10

The End of The Day

   
Trey was sitting on the porch helping Wednesday to paint her face with glitter and non-toxic substances when we arrived. He gave Mark a quizzical stare, but Trey had ignored me for most of my life so, I pretended not to care. The boys said a brisk, ‘see ya,’ to Mouche and me, then left as quickly as they’d arrived.

   
Mouche’s brother looked up at both of us with what could only be described as amusement and derision. I mean, Trey had something of the authority figure aura about him. On this particular day, I have to tell you something I’d refrain from telling
Mouche
; he looked totally buff. He had his
shirt off because he’d been swimming and his muscles were all big and cut...mmm. Kind of like how Mark might’ve looked without his shirt, only older.

    
But Trey was angry. He had a dark, cute little cloud forming over his face and a wrinkle of exasperation between his eyes like he was ready to verbally lose it.

   
‘You guys said you would be back at one. Here.’ He deposited Wednesday’s paintbox in Mouche’s hands as if he was glad to be free of it.

   
‘Take it. I’ve decided child minding is ‘women’s work.’

   
‘So-rry. Someone’s chauvinistic brother is in a bad mood,’ Mouche added sarcastically.

   
‘Yeah, yours. I’m going out.’

   
‘Oh, it must be that skinny buck-toothed girl who also takes pre-med. She’s always coming around,’ Mouche said with a clever little sister smile. Mouche was particularly outspoken with family members and Trey was usually a safe target.

   
He grabbed her sun hat and she chased her brother up the stairs but when he locked the child-proof fence behind him, Mouche screamed until he threw her hat back at her.

   
Trey pretended not to notice me after that.

   
Later,
Mouche
and I occupied Wednesday by allowing her to play with our makeup, while we compared shoes and ate gummy candy.

   
When he was ready to go out, Trey left a slightly sweet smell in the hallway. As he walked past us, the air reeked of aftershave.

   
‘Wearing the latest ‘perfume for men’ are we? Oh, he’s so manly,’ Mouche teased.

 
 
I swooned. Poor Trey just went all red and bolted out the door.

   
Mouche and I both laughed and Wednesday clapped her hands again. She really was the smartest almost-three year old in the world.

   
When Wednesday was born, Mouche and I applauded Mouche’s mom for her original name choice. Mrs Mouche liked to watch re-runs when she was a little girl of this classic show on television where the child was called, you guessed it, Wednesday. So, Mouche’s little sister is not just named after the day she arrived in the world. In any case, I’ve offered to babysit tonight, because Mouche has a ‘date.’

    
We have planned to go for a swim. After that, I’ve promised to teach Wednesday how to become a star.
 
Some teenagers don’t like little kids but I love hanging out with Wednesday and if I didn’t want to be an actress, I might even become a nursery school teacher.

   
Mouche has her ‘practise date’ organised for this evening from 6pm to 8pm with Scott Riley who lives across the road because, according to
Mrs Jones’
guide, ‘
a first date can often go badly.
..
always have your next date planned, that way you won’t fret if the first one doesn’t work out...there are plenty more fish in
the sea.
’

   
Mouche gives her date with Jet priority so she’s practising with Scott. She suggested I also go with them to the ‘Midnight-Zoo’ (the Sunrise baby-animal zoo opens late once a year) but I don’t want to be the ‘third wheel’ again. Besides, I’ve been reading all about Africa in geography. One day I intend to go on a safari so I won’t be missing anything I can’t see in future.

   
‘I wanna come too,’ Wednesday says as she watches Mouche run the straightening iron through her hair.’

   
‘Oh, you get to stay with me, Wednesday. Lucky you...’ I say.

   
‘Lucky-me! Lucky-me!’ Wednesday says, clapping her hands. Children are so cute when they are pre-school age.
 

    
‘How do I look?’ Mouche says ten minutes later.