A Surprise That Changed Her Life

Chapter 11: Shopping Spree

*****

Violet's POV

.

.

Michael dropped both Kate and me at the mall where my mom had promised to meet us. Both of us went straight to the Starbucks inside the mall because I knew mom would be there. She used to wait for me in the Starbucks inside the mall whenever the two of us went for shopping back in my hometown and I was late from school for one reason or another.

Just as we entered, I saw her sitting at the table in the right most corner, a muffin placed on the table in front of her. I sped walked to her and hugged her, "Hey, mom!"

She chuckled softly, "Hello, Violet! I'm seeing you after years! You've grown so much!"

Her voice was dripping with sarcasm. Now you know where I got my sarcasm from and the fact that dad could easily use sarcasm, combined made me a sarcastic bitch.

I let my hands drop from around her and folded them across my chest, "Now, now, mom. Please meet my friend, Kate Johnson. Kate, this is my mom, Natalie Steele!"

Mom looked up at Kate and extended her hand towards her, "Hello, Kate. It's very nice to meet you!"

Kate grasped her hand and shook it cheerfully, "Oh, the pleasure is all mine, Mrs. Steele!"

"What a nice girl! You can call me Natalie. I don't mind," mom said shaking her head a bit.

Kate smiled, "As you say, Natalie. So shall we head right in?'

Mom nodded, "Of course, let's go!"

Minutes later, we were standing inside a nice shop which had so many decoration options for a new house that my mind was whirling. I never thought decorating a house could be this hard. There were picture frames which were all beautiful by the way, vases of a dozen different colours and designs, dozens of rugs, fake flowers of many kinds, candles that you usually put on a coffee table but never actually light them, bean bags, wall clocks, and what not. If I started naming them all, we won't finish shopping by the next morning, mostly because I don't know the names of more than half the things.

Mom and Kate jumped right into it. I just stood there looking around and at the decorations. I was startled out of my thoughts and might have jumped two feet into the air when mom called me to look at the things in her hand. I took a deep breath and whined, "Mom! You scared me!"

She grinned, "Your fault for being distracted. What is bothering you, anyways?"

"Nothing at all, mom," I smiled, though it was a bit forceful because of what happened at lunch today, but I didn't want to worry her right now, "What was it that was worth giving me a heart attack for?"

"Oh, this," she held up a small dark brown vase which had flowers and butterflies engraved on it in golden colour, "We can put some fake flowers in it and put it on the mantle piece. What do you think?"

I nodded, "Good idea. This looks pretty enough."

"Excellent! Now come and help me decide on what to buy," saying this, she didn't gave me a chance to refuse and dragged me with her to where she and Kate were looking at the picture frames. Soon, I started enjoying myself. Needless to say, we bought a lot more decoration stuff than we were supposed to.

After putting all the delicate stuff into the boot of the car carefully, we went back in for dress shopping. Yes, the blasted dress for tomorrow's dinner. It sounds strange but whenever there was a ball, charity event, or even a dinner, mom would make me buy a new dress despite my protests. I mean why buy a new dress every time when it was going to end up in the bottomless pit of my walk-in closet after the event, never to be seen again. But as usual, my protests held no weight and mom dragged me to a shop where dozens of beautiful dresses were on display.