70 Days Of Summer

Day 39

Beep beep beep
My alarm blares, sending me flying off the bed. I glance at the digital clock, and it blinks back,
8:01
Now I know, between flying off the bed, and attempting to soothe my aching ribcage while glaring at the clock; I spent 1 minute. I groan and brush my teeth, and my hair which could not be any more tangled! I run down the stairs, and into the kitchen, where.....my dad is cooking waffles in his navy blue, Ralph Lauren robe, exposing his grey and black chest hair; since he is only wearing boxers under.
" hey dad" I say awkwardly, because I'm not used to seeing him...home....in the kitchen.
" hey babe," he starts, calling me by his nickname for me,
" I'm making waffles."
" I see," I say obviously; pouring myself a glass of water.
" whoop!" He exclaims, flipping a waffle off the griddle and onto a plate. He pats the chipped kitchen chair, indicating for me to sit, so I do, and he slides the waffle on the plate towards me.
" thanks," I say; cutting into the waffle.
" baby! Baby," he sings, and starts shaking his large body around the kitchen. I laugh so hard that I almost choke on my orange juice, and I hear a stern voice,
" Clara! Eat properly!"
I look up to the hallway next to the staircase which leads to the guest room and back door; and my mum is standing there. She walks over to us; her faux, gold, silk, Givenchy gown, cascading around her slightly chubby ankles.
" what are you doing?" She asks, pulling out her cigarettes and lighting one.
" oh! Jillian, don't smoke. Ugh! No,no,no!" My dad says in a squeaky, funny voice, while scrunching up his face and furrowing his eyebrows, so he looks really funny. He always does that to my mum whenever she starts smoking. I fake laugh to make my dad happy, otherwise he pretends to be upset that we didn't laugh. My dad makes my mum a waffle, and she complain that it's terrible, but actually likes it. First, my dad leaves to get changed for work; and a normal couple would kiss each other quickly on the lips, but my parents are very.....distant. Not in the having an affair kind of way, but, in the, don't come near me, kind of way. I glance at my watch and its 9 am! I have to be at 'hat aquarium' at 10.
" I'm going to get ready," I tell my mum quickly; while running up the stairs. I take 10 minutes to decide what to wear, and finally, pick out; old, navy blue trousers; navy blue tank top; and my only lime green sneakers. I apply a thin layer of blush and pull my hair into a tight bun.
" bye," I call to my mum, as I race towards the door in order to avoid any conversation.
" wait," she calls from the kitchen, where she is covering leftover waffle mixture. I stand for 2 minutes until she finally saunters over. She has a very, very old navy blue backpack I used when I was 6, and hands it to me,
" just essentials."
I roll my eyes and complain,
" can I go now?"
" yes. Have fun. Be good, and home by 6. Now give me a kiss on the cheek," she instructs me. My mum is one of those mums who require you to give them a big hug and kiss on the cheek before going anywhere. I peck her on the cheek, and scream,
" bye!"
I run out the door, and straight to the bus stop. I board the bus to canton square, and call everyone to make sure they will be there on time. Most of them are there; so once I arrive at the square; I run straight to 'hat aquarium' and the clock strikes,
9:55
Mrs.Karen is pouring cups of tea for;
Mary-Beth, paige, Catalina, Libby, Berun, and....Larry?
Well, I did say he could bring a friend. Besides, him and Catalina seem to be getting very......intimate. Anyways, I'm so happy when I notice the large smile on mrs.karens face, and I'm pretty sure it's a real smile.
" hi, Mrs.karen," I say smiling and my cheeks are all flushed from running. Suddenly I hear the door barge open and 2 loud pants behind me. I whip around and Brenda and Ashley have just run through.
" hey guys," I smile, and wave.
Mrs. Karen insists we all have a cup of tea before we start; so we do; but she won't let us come into her so-called kitchen. We all start talking and laughing and before I know it, it's 11:00 am. I stand up and clap my hands to get everyone's attention.
" okay guys! Thank you for coming! Now, it's time to get to work. First, I must ask mrs.Karen; how much have you raised for the renovation?" I ask, and say 'you' with emphasis because a few days ago I gave her a real, amethyst necklace to sell; and that money is renovation money.
" $355" mrs.karen whoops, and everyone else starts cheering.
" oh, and I scrapped together some money to buy a bunch of wallpaper. It's a thank you present," Brenda says knowingly; pointing at large rolls of wallpaper. I give her a smile and let my eyes wander too the peach yellow, butterfly, wallpaper.
"Alright! Now, today is going to be a long day, and we have a lot of work to do. So, I have split us up in separate committees. Brenda, Libby and paige are in charge of wallpapering. Larry and Berun are in charge of dusting shelves and rearranging them to mrs.karens liking. Ashley and Mary-Beth are in charge of cleaning and organizing hats. Finally, Catalina and I are going to take mrs.ashley shopping for new furniture!" I explain. Everyone whoops but complains that I don't have to do any dirty work and I tell them I have to account the money, and they all go,
" eww math"
" math on holiday."
Once the girls have the hang of attaching wallpaper on the wall; and the other girls can tell their red from blues; and the guys figured out which way a broom works; Catalina, mrs.Karen and I leave. We allow miss Karen to choose the furniture shop since we are renovating her store.Big mistake! She leads us to a very very old and cramped furniture store that nobody knows about. Except her. The sad thing is; it reminds me of her store. Not anymore! We budge the cracked, tinted glass door open, and once we're in, we realize it was partially blocked by a brick. Partially because the extremely tall man who is the store clerk and has to crouch to get through the store; opens it for us. He is bald, has blue eyes, long nose, small circle glasses, and very thin. He is wearing a blue robe on top of plain white shorts and shirt. It's very much like mrs. Karens blue nightie- actually it is the man version of her nightie. Creepy! Even more creepy when mrs. Karen kisses him on the lips. A small, old people peck.
" Karen! I was waiting for you to drop by! It's been ages," the old man says, smiling, and exposing his 12, crooked and yellow teeth.
Catalina and I can't hide out very, very, shocked faces and they chuckle when they notice.
" we're married," mrs.Karen chuckles, her hand clasping that old dudes. We're even more surprised she says that and I accidentally blurt out,
" what?!"
" yes,yes. It's very odd. Peter polonkus, and Karen smidget are married. It's been 36 years, people should really have caught on by now," the old man named Peter says.
" wait! Your making us work our butts off to help bring business back when you could've just asked your husband," Catalina complains, and I agree whole-heartedly with her.
" no, no! It's not like that," mrs. Karen starts,
" Peter and I don't live together, or see each other. We're a very odd couple! We got married 36 years ago and decided we didn't want to be together; but we didn't have the desire to go through all the paperwork. So, we decided that we would live our own lives, separately, as a married couple. We would never speak, call, or ask for favors. The only contact we have is every year on our anniversary, we meet up at 8 pm, at our favorite cafe, the weasel. Now, we're seeing each other again, and our anniversary is not till next week."
" oh," Catalina and I mutter in unison; not knowing what to say. We walk away and leave mrs. Karen and Peter to talk about the good old days. The store is very small, and the farthest we can get from them is 10 feet and behind the shelves where we plonk ourselves on 2 dirty beanbags with slithering worms. After 2 minutes of silence, I finally collect the courage to ask,
" why have you and paige been hanging out so much lately?"
Catalina looks shocked and says quite rudely,
" is there a problem?"
" no. I'm just wondering. You guys used to hate each other....and now your BFF'S," I say calmly.
" well, we're just planning something," Catalina says gruffly.
" planning what?" I ask, trying to control my annoyance.
" why do you care?" She asks, looking at me like I'm a piece of trash.
" because we tell each other everything! I've told you everything about me! What could be so bad that you have to keep from me? I'm your best friend Catalina! Don't you remember me?!" I scream talk.
Catalina takes a deep breath and looks at me in the eye,
" the reason paige and I have been hanging out a lot, is because, I want to convert to Buddhism."
She turns away quickly and I start laughing like crazy. She looks back at me and starts laughing also.
" why were you keeping that from me?" I ask through my laughs.
" I just thought you would go all serious and religion is something you don't mess with on me," Catalina says shyly.
" oh my god! This is too funny! What made you suddenly want to become a Buddhist?" I ask, once I've restored my breath.
" honestly, it's just another way to piss my parents off since I haven't done that lately, but paige thinks I'm actually interested in it," Catalina whispers to me. I giggle and ask,
" how are you going to do it? Tell me your not going to pay hundreds of dollars for a cheap chant and spend even more hundreds of dollars on or age clothes, like Paige did."
" no way! Paige and I found a small temple which does it for free - illegally. The only thing is we have to bring a conch- or some sacred item and....yah! Basically were Buddhist," Catalina whispers.
" aaaah. So, what is your 'sacred item' and when are you going?" I ask seriously, but mock the 'sacred item.'
" I have no idea," Catalina says and starts laughing. We sit there for around 30 minutes just playing eye spy, and finally, mrs. Karen calls us to help find furniture.
2 hours pass, until we finally decide on 3 pieces of furniture we can afford, and mrs. Karen likes. The first is a shiny, mahogany desk, with faded gold, curved legs. The 2nd is a comfortable, black leather, rolling chair, for behind the desk. The third is a black, leather, back chair for guests. The total comes to $255, and Peter throws in a few lanterns for free. He says he will deliver them for us by the end of the day. We leave the store and stop by an unknown, french shop, and purchase 10 macaroons, one for each person. The total of macaroons is $50, which leaves us with...$50.
We take the long route back to 'hat aquarium' and as we walk, we notice a beautiful, hand carved, colored clay statue of a deep purple fascinator. Mrs. Karen stops dead in her tracks, and tears spill down her cheeks as she points to the statue.
" what's wrong mrs. Karen?" I ask with concern.
She just points to the statue and starts shaking.
" do you want it?" Catalina asks casually.
Mrs. Karen nods, and Catalina walks in the store.
" wait here,"
Are her last words for 30 minutes until she finally corns out, heaving the statue.
" t-t-thank you child. Both of you," mrs. Karen stutters. We smile and continue walking; Catalina and I behind mrs. Karen.
" why did it take you so long?" I whisper to Catalina.
" there was another buyer," she whispers.
" oh. How did you get it?" I ask quietly.
" the original price was $135, but I paid $200. It took a while for the clerk to agree," Catalina says.
" how is that possible? We only have $50 left to spend," I say confusingly.
" I used my credit card," Catalina says cooly.
" I'll pay you back," I say quickly.
" no need. Consider this my store-warming present for her," Catalina says. I start laughing in the word play and we continue our walk in silence. We reach the store at 3pm, and the place looks.....I'm speechless. The walls are plastered with wallpaper, and they look very professional. The racks are all spotless, and so are the hats, that are perched neatly on top. Color coded.
I can see my reflection in the sparkling windows, and the almost broken wood floors are completely fixed.
The crew is sitting on the floor where the old desk was, and they are Munching on subways.
I can feel my eyes swelling up, and I can only whisper,
" thank you."
They all laugh and say how easy it was and blah, blah, blah.
They hand us each a sub, and we sit down; mrs. Karen on her old desk chair; and we eat and talk. I thank them multiple times and tell them how amazing the store looks and they just laugh. Brenda and I are talking and and she says,
" I talked to Luke yesterday. He agreed that we should have more stability in our relationship."
" that's great," I say, looking at the floor and wondering how the wood got fixed. As if Brenda can read my mind she informs me,
" Larry did it. He brought a toolkit, and it turns out he knows how to fix floors."
I look up to thank Larry, but find him making out with Catalina on the now repaired floorboards. I can thank him later. We hear a knock on the door and we think it's the first customer, but it turns out to be Peter delivering the furniture in a van. Once we place all the furniture in their places, the room looks complete. No, it IS complete. We all decide to celebrate by heading to the french store and buying more macaroons, since we finished the previous ones. We squeeze into the tiny 6 seat table and start congratulating everyone on the amazing work. When we're all about to leave, Mrs. Karen stands up and says,
" thank you."
We all go,
" Awww," and scream,
" your welcome."
We leave and all the girls- and guys come to my house. We get home at 6 and my mum makes us hot cocoa, while we tell her bout out day. Everyone is exhausted and most of the girls are already asleep on my couch, with hot cocoa dribbling down their chins. My mum calls up their mums and they all end up sleeping over. The guys, paige and Catalina go home because they're full of energy. I wrap everyone with blankets and hop up the stairs to get ready for bed myself. I slide to my parents room where I hear a serious conversation going on but I interrupt by shoving the door open.
" goodnight," I say.
My parents exchange a look, and my mum says sternly,
" Clara. Come here, we need to talk to you."
I'm kind of scared but I shuffle over to sit next to my mom.
" what?" I ask.
" we have some devastating news," my mum says. My mind suddenly switches to Cassie in rehab and Cassie....dying.
" is it Cassie?" I ask, holding my breath.
" no, no. Your sisters fine," my dad says, and I breathe again.
" we wanted to tell you That the couples retreat offered us our spot back," my mum says cautiously.
" and your going to take it?" I ask casually. I don't really care if they leave. I'm pretty used to being without them. Not that I'm going to switch to Buddhism.
" yes. We wanted to get your permission first, since your going to be staying at Catalinas house," my mum says slowly as if I'm a 3 year old.
" yah. Sure,you have my permission. When are you leaving?" I ask.
" well, it took your father a long time to negotiate with the people for a refund, but they offered us a return instead. The only condition is we have to be there within 2 days. So, we are leaving tomorrow," my mum explains.
" tomorrow," I say surprised at how soon.
" yes. It's our only option," my mum says worryingly.
" that's cool," I say.
We sit there silently and awkwardly for 2 minutes until I finally get up and say,
" I'm going to go to bed now."
" yes, yes. Goodnight," my mum says, kissing me on the cheek. I stare at my dad who is snoring away and my mum and I exchange a silent laugh and then I leave their room. I walk to my room and plop down on the bed. I lie down and...............