𝐃𝐔𝐂𝐊𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆 ; 𝓶𝓲𝓰𝓱𝓽𝔂 𝓭𝓾𝓬𝓴𝓼

Exploration

Connie makes the winning goal against Italy, 8-2. We all cheer and celebrate the victory. Bombay let us have a free day as he had to do commercials or something like that.

    Jesse invited me to go with him, Dwayne, Averman, and Goldie into Beverly Hills. "This don't look like rodeo drive to me."

    "It's ro-day-o drive." I correct him.

    Dwayne scoffs slightly. "You cant fool me. I saw it on the sign. Rodeo Drive." Averman tries to explain to him but ultimately gives it up.

    "I dont get it." Jess looks around the street. "This is Beverly Hills! Where's all the hills?"

    We reach the sidewalk now. "Where's that 90210 school?" Goldie wipes his mouth.

    "Or the hillbilles?" I add on to them. "The movie stars? Aren't famous people like Johnny Depp or like Winona Ryder be walking around?"

    Averman says something about the captain from The Love Boat. "Hey, how bout we check out some stores?"

    Me and Goldberg both agree with that as we had to buy our mom's souvenirs.

    We reached a fancy looking shop with 'Chitra's' in the window. Jesse goes for the handle and it was locked. "Maybe they're closed?"

    Goldberg clicks a gold doorbell on the wall. "I'm sorry we do not allow unsupervised children into the store." It spoke back. Goldberg asks if they could make an exception. "No, now go away before the police will be called."

    We follow Dwayne to some cars. "If we were in Texas, this wouldn't have happened." He makes the mistake of leaning on a car. The alarm goes off and we run from it.

    We start messing with the doorbells on the stores, mostly me and Averman. We pranked a store about being fake famous people, a drive-thru, and fundraisers.

    We reached another store and Goldberg gave me the great idea of being some dudes niece. "I'm sure Uncle Aaron will be pleasantly upset to hear we are being treated with this amount of disrespect." I pretended to sound of high class when talking.

    "Aaron? Aaron Spelling?"

    I roll my eyes. "No, Hank Aaron-obviously Aaron Spelling!" The door buzzed and we were let inside.

    An elegant lady showed us in. "Now, I want you to make yourselves comfortable-Carole, beverages-" she wraps her arm around me. "And I'll be with you in a moment." She walks away.

    We get orange juice in fancy cups and we take a seat on this bench thingy. "Hey, I know you kids!" A very ugly old lady points at us.

    "Yeah, Im Aaron Spellings niece."

    She waves her hand. "No, you're Team USA hockey! You guys are amazing!"

    The boys panic and start saying a bunch of 'thank yous' and stuff. The lady comes back and shows us some 'mother gifts.'

    Models come out wearing this lady's private collection and the boys were absolutely drooling, especially Dwayne.

    For a long story short, Goldberg gets us kicked out the store for asking about bikinis. Stupid Greg.

    "Good going, Goldberg." I snark at him. The others agree with me.

    Goldie shakes his head. "What'd i do?"

-

    We get back from the stores with a few bags. I got my mom a snow globe and a shot glass and Elio got a soccer ball that was white and gold.

    The other bags were things the guys bought for their parents and various foods Goldberg tried. I go up and put the stuff into my bag (i had to shove the ball into it) and go down to the lobby.

    "Ice!" Fulton flings his arm around my shoulders. "Doin' anything right now?"

    I look at him and see Dean next to him. "No... why?"

    "She's coming with us." Fulton informs Portman. "You're going with us, let's go."

-

    We hit a bunch of shops and it was definitely after curfew when Dean wanted ice cream. "Ooo, ice cream!" He says.

    "Wait." I hear my dad talking. He walks out the ice cream with the trainer for Iceland. Dean pushes me back into Fulton and he put his arm infront of us.

    Once they walk away, Portman scoffs and drops his arm. "That's an Iceland chick. What's he doing with her?"

    "Some coach we have." Fulton shakes his head.

    I clench my teeth at the two people walking and chatting away. "At least he's not your dad."

    Portman walks across the street and we follow him. "Coach Bombay is your dad?"

    "Unfortunately." I spat and Portman softens his eyes. "He was more absent than anything. Left before my brother was born. Which was almost eight years ago."

Portman slows his pace to a stroll. "My father was never there either."

"Guess we all have daddy issues." Fulton tells us. "Mine weren't there."

I look to Portman. "Did you know your dad?" I knew Fultons whole story about his family, i was interested in Portman's.

"Barely." He gruffed. "He left when I was three for his mistress."

I felt sorry for him, even if he didn't remember it much. "Hope it's better now."

"My mom's an addict." He dropped a bombshell.

Fulton nods his head. "Same."

"Mine was." I awkwardly laugh. "Guess we're trauma buddies!"