The Heartbreak Factor - Part Four

Chapter Forty-Two.

Looking out of the window as we drove down the infamous World Drive that would lead us to the Disney parks, I began to realise how happy I actually was. Ever since I’d met George I had been happy but today was different. Today I was really happy. I was spending my second day as his wife in one of my favourite places in the whole, entire world. Katy was sat in her car seat behind me and kept singing along to the Disney songs that had been on repeat since we got in the car half an hour earlier. She was so adorable when she was lost in a song - she would be looking out the window at the cars rushing past us, holding onto her teddy with both her hands and singing along to the words, albeit getting a few wrong but that made it even more adorable. 

“What ride do you wanna go on first, Mrs. Shelley?” George beamed as we clambered out of the car and walked around to meet at the back of the car to get Katy’s pushchair out. 

“You know what I want to do,” I giggled as I watched George open up the boot - or ‘trunk’ as the Americans say - and pull out Katy’s neatly folded Finding Nemo pushchair. 

“Do we have to?” George groaned. “I’ll feel ridiculous.”

“You promised..” I paused. “And you know if we ask Katy, she’ll want to do it too so just face it, George - you’re out voted.”

George reluctantly nodded in agreement as I walked back around to the car door and reached into the back to unclip Katy, who looked like she was about to burst with excitement at any moment. Carrying her around to the pushchair that George had put together, I smiled at George, still in disbelief that he was now my husband. 

“So Katy, do you want to dress up as a Disney princess?” George asked, kneeling down beside the pushchair to clip her in properly as other cars were driving past our car to get to their parking spots. 

Katy shook her head violently, looking unamused at the idea. I was pretty shocked since Katy had been going through a phase of dressing up back at home and her love of Disney was just as much as my love of Disney. 

“Nemo!” Katy beamed. 

“You want to dress up as Nemo from Finding Nemo?” George asked, looking confused. 

Katy nodded. “Yeah! Nemo!”

I couldn’t help but giggle to myself. My love of Finding Nemo had definitely rubbed off on her too. 

“Katy-May Shelley,” George paused as he looked at me and Katy in turn. “The only girl in the entire world that would rather dress up as a fish than a Disney princess.”

I coughed. “I’d rather dress up as a fish than a Disney princess.”

“But I made an honest woman out of you, so you’re not a girl anymore,” George joked. 

“But ‘woman’ makes me sound old,” I groaned. 

“Sammy, you are 23..”

“That is not old,” I stated. 

“Fine. Katy-May Shelley, the second girl in the entire world that would rather dress up as a fish than a Disney princess,” George repeated, correcting himself. 

“Thank-you,” I giggled, satisfied by George’s correction. 

*

Walking down Main Street USA of Magic Kingdom, I held onto Katy’s hand as she toddled beside me as George pushed her pushchair. We weren’t planning on letting Katy walk for the first few hours as she’d only just recently learnt to master walking properly and it’d tire her out, but after a huge commotion on the ferry to the ticket entrance which involved Katy screaming to be out of her pushchair, we decided to just let her walk. 

“Katy, what’s that?” I grinned, crouching down to her level and pointing up at the castle that stood proudly in the centre of the park. “Is that Cinderella’s castle?”

“No,” Katy replied, looking at me like I was stupid. “Katy’s castle.”

I chuckled as I picked her up and carried her into the nearby shop in search of costumes. 

“Are we still being..”

I interrupted George before he had any chance to complete her sentence. Luckily for him, I already knew the rest of his sentence. “Yeah.”

George nodded and parked Katy’s pushchair up at the side of the shop as we walked into the front entrance. Inside it was like my idea of heaven. There was rows and rows of Disney teddies stacked up against the wall - every single character from every single Disney movie, book, show, etc. that you could think of. Even Katy was looking at all the teddies in admiration. We continued to browse the store, completely forgetting why we went in there in the first place. There was everything imaginable that could possibly be made so it was related to Disney. There was plates in the shape of Mickey Mouse’s head and ears. There were glasses that were decorated so that when you drank it looked like your drink was the ocean to the Finding Nemo scene. There were mugs of Simba from the Lion King where his tail was the handle. There was a set of cutlery - each place setting dedicated to one of the Disney princesses. We finally tore ourselves away from looking at everything and went in search of the costumes. 

“Mummy,” Katy beamed, pointing at the Sleeping Beauty costume that was hung up on one of the rails at the back of the store.

“Katy, what about Nemo?” George asked, holding up a child’s Nemo outfit that was ridiculously cute.

Katy shook her head and remained pointing at the Sleeping Beauty costume. 

“Are you sure?” I asked her, picking the costume off the shelf. “If we get it, you can’t change your mind.”

“Mummy, please,” she smiled. 

I nodded, giving her a smile back as I held onto the costume with my free hand. Now it was time for George and I to find our costumes. We had already decided what we were going to be - well, I decided and George just went along with it - on the flight to America. We were going to go back down Memory Lane and dress up like we dressed up on the trip to Disneyland Paris during the X Factor live shows. Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse.

*

“Well, don’t you look beautiful?” I beamed at Katy as she stood in the middle of the baby changing room at the end of Main Street USA. 

She gave me a little grin as she swirled around in her Aurora dress, looking as pretty as a princess. 

“Mummy Mouse!” she giggled as I lifted her up once I’d folded up all our clothes and put them in the basket beneath the pushchair. 

“Shall we go see what Daddy Mouse is up to?” I asked her. 

She nodded, looking around the changing room as I unlocked the door and struggled to push the pushchair out of the door. We walked around the swirling pathway to meet George, who was dressed up as Mickey Mouse beside an iron fence - well, wearing a pair of the Mickey Mouse ears which had a groom’s top hat in between them. We were getting quite a few funny looks from passersby but it was amusing. As I carried Katy, George took over from me with pushing the pushchair as we made our way towards our first ride of the day - Dumbo. 

*

With a sleeping Katy wrapped around my shoulders, we began to walk back to the car after what had been a long but enjoyable first day. Katy had been flat out in her pushchair since we were in the queue waiting for the Winnie the Pooh ride but we decided to go on it nevertheless. As soon as we got to the car, I clipped Katy into her car seat, trying ever so hard not to wake her but she was too tired to notice she wasn’t in my arms anymore so it didn’t really matter how gently I put her into the car seat - waking her was an impossibility. Before getting into the car myself, I put Katy’s teddy in her arms and kissed her forehead. 

“I love you, princess.”