Strawberry Ice cream

Chapter 14

After four days of reciting lines and the boys (mostly Harry) helping me with rehearsing along side practicing our songs, Friday is suddenly here and I'm more anxious than I was before.

It's 2:30 and me and the performing arts team are in the theatre, getting things ready. We place the first back drop into position on the projector- Charlie's house and get into costume.

I'm shoving the plum purple top hat on top my head behind stage when Leah barges in, panic shearing her eyes. Her bottom lip begins to wobble.

"I've lost it!" She shouts in hysterics. "I've lost it and now my costume won't be complete, I'd probably get conducted points because of it and it's all fucking falling fucking apart!" She slumps into the chair beside me, leaning her elbow against the desk, placing her temple against a closed hand.

"What you lost?" I query, getting up and kneeling beside her, I rub her arm reassuringly.

"The bloody fur coat! I thought I left it here last night on the stage before we left after rehearsals but when I checked there just now, it's just gone!" Tears fall down her cheeks and I give her a quick hug

"We can find it, come on, Daniel is finished with dressing, we can ask him to help. I only have my coat and cane to put on." I help her up and she grabs onto my left wrist, I hold back the wince as she places pressure on the new shallow wounds I did a couple hours ago in the boys bathroom.

We walk over to where Daniel is sitting at a table behind stage, flipping through his phone.

"Charlie Bucket. Would you mind helping me and Miss Veruca Salt in finding her fluffy coat?" I ask in my Willy Wonka voice. Tom told us to stay in character as much as possible to get us ready.

"Why certainly Mr Wonka. And might I ask where she may have seen it last?" He replies innocently, settling down his phone and gripping onto his brown waist coat, a patch covering the left breast.

"I don't need any help..." Leah stomps her foot, deciding to come into character with us. "My daddy will find it for me, we last saw it on the stage so he's bound to have picked it up over there." She shoves her nose into the air and wanders with us to the stage.

We brush past the behind the scenes team, lighting technicians shouting at each other to and from the stage and tech booth. There is in fact no fur coat but instead an old creaking table to the side with chopped cabbage, a fake stove and a queen sized bed in the middle of the stage.

"Told you." I tap her arm to tell her to follow.

"We should ask the Oompa Lumpas if they've seen it anywhere." I make a funny noise with my tongue and Hannah and Josh- the two closest of the Oompa Lumpa characters- come running over. "Would you help us find Veruca's coat?"

They cross their arms across their chest and back down to their sides and I do the same. The commotion of the missing coat taking my mind off the whole performance all together momentarily, making me feel quite fine besides the niggling feeling at the back of my mind that something terrible will happen. Which I in fact feel almost every single day.

I go over to the racks of costumes, carefully pulling the hangers with the costumes on from one side to the other to see if I can find it.

"Mr Wonka, Mr Wonka!" Fred calls in the best German accent he can muster.

"Yes child?" I look over at him with slight disgust, seeing all of Wonka's chocolate smeared around his mouth. He has padding under his clothes to make him look fatter.

"I think I may have found that girl's coat. It's down by your chocolate fountain that I couldn't wait to eat from."

With that, he guides me over to where the boat for the chocolate fountain scene is, the wood spray painted pink (thanks to the art department's help aka Zayn and Harry). I look into the boat and see the fur coat screwed up beneath one of the benches. I grab it and run it back to Leah.