Authors: Bethany Walkers
Chapter Fifty
Taking the children to no place like home
Sophie decided to pay the orphanage another visit.
On the way there, she saw twelve kids, lying on the street, clinging on to each other for dear life. They had barely any clothes on, just the rags of their old ones. Sophie walked over to them.
“What’s the matter?”
“We can’t find our mum and dad,” cried one of them. “There’s no-one to look after us. We have no family. And we have been living like this for weeks. Most of our possessions have been stolen.”
“You poor things,” Sophie said, really meaning it. “I know someone who will look after you, though. Come with me, you can trust me.”
“OK,” another nodded. They stood up in a line behind Sophie, as if they were soldiers marching.
Then they arrived at the orphanage. Sophie escorted them to the hospital department of the orphanage.
“I’m sorry, you can’t send them here. They may have been issued a place at the orphanage, but there isn’t enough space in the nursing wing. I’m sorry. You’ll have to go to the hospital downtown.”
“OK, madam,” Sophie smiled, and she called a cab to take them to the hospital. It was a tight fit.
Then they arrived. Sophie explained to the head receptionist at the hospital. He issued them a place in the children’s wing of the hospital. There were also some policemen on guard.
After taking them there, Sophie left.
After the children fell asleep, Petunia, the guardian and the head of the hospital, tiptoed down the stairs to curl up with a book and unwind until some more workers started to come into the hospital. The storm outside had intensified, and she secretly hoped the weather would bring them home earlier than anticipated. She first made herself comfortable on the couch of the staff room, but then a close flash of lightning, immediately followed by a loud clap of thunder, sent her scurrying for another seat across the room and away from the window. She wasn’t generally afraid of storms, but the big house with its shadowy corners and creaking floors had left her more than a little bit on edge. She switched on the TV to help drown out the thunder, although the windows still rattled—louder with each clash.
She read a few pages, trying to assuage her growing anxiety. Another loud clap sounded, followed by a distant boom, and suddenly the house was shrouded in darkness.
Ugh. The lightning must have hit a transformer
. She headed to the kitchen to find a flashlight or some matches. As she entered the hall, she heard a thud in a nearby room.
Must be one of the kids
, she thought.
I guess one of them snuck out of bed.
Then she realized that couldn’t be the case. She’d been in the den in view of the staircase ever since she tucked them in. They couldn’t have possibly slipped by without her noticing. She decided she must have imagined the sound.
She took another step towards the kitchen. There the sound was again! She froze, silent, to make sure she hadn’t mistaken it. The thud was replaced by a creak. Then another. Then, slowly, eerily, another. She couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. Yet she had to find out what was in there. Her life, and the lives of the children, could possibly be at stake if a stranger had found their way into the house.
With her heart pounding, she inched a little closer to the door. The creaking continued, rhythmically.
Creak, creak, creeeeaaaaakk.
Thunder crashed again outside. She took a few steps closer while the rumbling storm masked the sound of her movement. She was almost to the door where the sound was coming from, a room that she now remembered was the formal living room. She knew she had to bolt into the room and confront whatever it was. It was her only hope, to get to it…whatever was in there…before it could get her! She tiptoed a tiny step closer.
She closed her eyes and said a silent prayer. Her heart pounded so loudly now that she was sure anyone inside that room could certainly hear it. Opening her eyes, she took a deep breath and moved up to the doorway. Peering into the darkness, she slowly, quietly leeeeaaaaaaannnned inside. Suddenly a FLASH of lightning illuminated the room, startling her…as well as the family cat perched on the arm of a rickety, wooden rocking chair. “Blasted cat!” she screamed, before sighing with relief.
But was there really somebody there that night … ?
Chapter Fifty One
Shopping for a wedding dress
Sophie went home to the apartment she’d won. Adam had left for yet another job trip, and he said he’d return within three days.
Since she wasn’t with Adam, Sophie again decided to check up on the kids.
All twelve of them were there, being taken care of.
Sophie chatted to them, and then met the policewoman currently on guard. Her name was Petunia, and they became good friends.
Sophie couldn’t stop thinking about Adam and how they’d kissed. It felt amazing, and she always wanted more.
Damn
, she thought,
why didn’t we kiss each other earlier? If kissing’s that good I could do it all day.
She smiled to herself, thinking about how Adam had felt about it too.
Sophie Steele went down to the bus stop, alone. The street was deserted except from an old wrinkly man in a suit, smoking from a shisha pipe which was rammed with coal and pieces of wood. Sophie wrinkled her nose and then smiled as she saw that her bus had arrived; number thirty seven, as a matter of fact.
She boarded on the bus and sat down on a seat next to the window. As the bus started to move, she closed her eyes thinking of Adam (or Mitchell, in her eyes.) and their wedding day.
“Wow, you look so beautiful, honey! He won’t be able to keep his eyes off you!” Bessie smiled, as Sophie tried on her wedding dress, a white veil on her head. Every inch of the wedding dress was gorgeous. It had intricate design. There were flowers printed on the bodice, a silky ribbon at the waist, it exposed her amazing figure, and there were luscious pink roses embroidered on the transparent sleeves.
“You really think so?” Sophie grinned.
“I know so!” Bessie exclaimed, and they hugged each other tight.
It was time for Sophie to do her make-up. She went to a beauty parlour to get it done by a professional. The stylist was very pretty and chatted with Sophie as if they were best friends. She rolled Sophie’s hair around some rollers and then made them stay firm on her head with an extra measure of hairspray. Then she began with Sophie’s face. She plucked Sophie’s eyebrows until they were a perfect, thin slanted shape, and then gave her a facial threading. The next thing she did was brush Sophie’s face with creme-to-powder foundation. She then darkened Sophie’s eyebrows with an eyebrow pencil. Her lips were painted a dark, matte pink colour and then a coat of strawberry flavoured sheer glittery lipgloss was added for extra effect. False eyelashes were glued delicately to the rim of Sophie’s eyes, and then these were thickened with a party lashes mascara, giving her eyes even more volume and definition. Thick black eyeliner was applied to her eyelids. That was it, then. There were only a few more finishing touches and her make-up would be done. The stylist added blush to make Sophie’s cheeks glow rosy pink.
“You look stunning, my darling. That guy won’t be able to take his eyes off you!” She’d said exactly the same words as Bessie had said. “Or his hands, either,” she joked. Sophie laughed half-heartedly.
“Thank you so much,” she smiled. “Now … I’ve got to go and get my best man.” Sophie’s best man was Billy. Billy was going to give her away at the wedding.
Sophie was ready for the wedding; she’d completed her outfit and appearance. A car waited at her house door. It was just a ring on the doorbell and she raced to answer it. Billy linked his arm with hers, as they boarded on to the shiny white car in front of them. This was going to be the happiest day of Sophie’s life, the best, in fact, and she had never been more excited. It felt like heaven on Earth. “You’ve got to dance like there’s nobody watching, love like you’ll never be hurt, sing like there’s nobody listening, and dance like it’s heaven on Earth,” she found herself murmuring.
Before she knew it, Billy was walking her through the churchyard and into the church. All she could hear were bells ringing … and then she saw Adam standing at the front of it.
Billy nodded at her, as a signal of him to go, so letting go of her arm, he joined the guests in their seats. Adam stared at Sophie, positively love struck, dazed at how beautiful she really looked. He himself was looking very handsome too; with his black buttoned blazer, a black bow, a perfectly crisp white t-shirt with formal pants … Every part of him was perfect. He took Sophie’s hand in his and they faced the vicar, smiling.
The I do’s whizzed by for all Sophie and Adam were concerned.
“You may now kiss,” said the vicar.
Sophie opened her eyes. That was when Sophie realized that she wasn’t getting married, and this was just a dream, and when the vicar declared that the bride and groom could kiss, it was just her first kiss being played over and over again.
Sophie decided to keep her mind off things, playing with her hair and nails for the rest of the journey. Sophie sighed, bored. Then, she looked out of the window and saw a church. That gave her the idea of why she was going to go shopping. “I’m gonna shop for a wedding dress,” she whispered. “Yes, yes, yes! Perfect idea.”
Sophie walked into the shopping centre, and then looked for a boutique which sold wedding dresses. She went past countless shops, and sometimes stopped by to look at the posters, which were mainly Harry Potter ones.
Then she caught the sight of another poster:
Bend It Like Beckham.
Sophie laughed half-heartedly. She’d seen that film and loved it. Now though, she wished she had taken Bessie along with her to shopping, or even, Mr. Sandalwood, because she hated being alone. Then, she thought about Mitchell Anderson again, about their kiss, and about how their lives would be like together after they got married … even better, she thought about what it would be like to make love to him …
Her thoughts made her cheer up a bit, so when she finally found a wedding boutique, she walked in happily.
“Hi, what can I do for you today?” asked the person at the reception. Her name was Agatha.
Agatha had a narrow, oblong face with angular cheekbones and a pointed chin. Her slit-like eyes were a clouded hazel, and her thinly plucked eyebrows were shaped into a deceivingly perfect arch that followed the slight curve of her eye. A long nose hooked over continually pursed lips, which were painted a bright red in an unsuccessful effort to mask their natural thinness. Bleached blonde hair, made thin from too many years of hair dye, hung straight down into an angular cut at her jaw. The sharp features of Agatha's face were merely a reflection of her entire body structure, and everything—from her skeletal arms to her paper-thin waste—screamed of unnatural skinniness. She walked in long strides, her shoulders back and face held forward, wearing tall stiletto heels and a bold leopard-print mini-dress.
“I’m - I’m shopping for a wedding dress,” Sophie stammered, feeling herself getting worked up for some reason. She felt that she shouldn’t be doing this without Mitchell at her side.
“Come right this way,” Agatha smiled.
She led Sophie to a changing room and outside it hung all sorts of beautiful wedding dresses: dresses with a lace bodice and short sleeves, sexy laced short sleeved wedding dresses, sexy drop waist sweetheart chapel train white organza wedding dresses, ruffled sleeved puffy floor lengthed Alibaba bridal dresses, baby collar high neck wedding dresses, sweetheart pleating wedding dresses … the list of them was endless. And they weren’t just in the ordinary pink colour of wedding dresses too: there were a range of colours, even wedding dresses that gypsy’s wore.
Sophie came in and out of the changing room, fiddling with the different dresses. They were all beautiful, but they didn’t really appeal to her. She wanted a dress that would make her go
WOW, this one is perfect!
but hadn’t found one yet.
Soon later, after countless fitting, she found the perfect wedding dress. It was just like the one she’d been imagining on the bus:
Every inch of the wedding dress was gorgeous. It had intricate design. There were flowers printed on the bodice, a silky ribbon at the waist, it exposed her amazing figure, and there were luscious pink roses embroidered on the transparent sleeves.
This dress exactly matched the her dream dress!
“I’ll have this one, please,” Sophie smiled at Agatha.
“Wow … it sure does look good on you,” Agatha smiled. “Change back to your own clothes, and I’ll wrap this dress up for you.”
“Sure thing,” Sophie smiled, doing exactly what Agatha told her to do. When she went back to the till, she gasped in shock to see how really expensive the wedding dress was, and she couldn’t afford it in two lifetimes. Even though Adam was rich, Sophie didn’t know that, and she still thought that he was Mitchell Anderson, because Adam still hadn’t told her his real name.
“It’s ten thousand pounds, dear,” Agatha said, indicating the screen. “Of course, we do have a lot of, let me say, cheaper alternatives, if this one just doesn’t suit your wallet.” Her voice was dripping with sarcasm.
Sophie couldn’t believe Agatha’s change in her tone of voice. She wasn’t the nice woman she’d just been talking to about ten minutes ago, now she was icy. But this was a business, after all.
“Can you not give me any discount?” Sophie tried.
“I’m afraid not, dear. I could chop off a maximum of one hundred pounds, but that would be really pushing the limit.” Agatha sighed.
Yeah, some bloody help one hundred pound off is gonna be,
Sophie thought sarcastically. But then, she couldn’t believe the words were slipping out of her mouth: “That won’t be a problem then. I’ll buy it.” Sophie put her credit card in the kiosk and typed in her pin, thinking that she was out of her senses to go and buy such an expensive wedding dress. She hadn’t even bought one of the three embassy cars she was intending to buy, as part of her family tradition, yet now, she’d gone and splashed cash on something that wasn’t even the top priority.
“Thank you,” said Agatha, removing Sophie’s credit card from the machine. “The money has been withdrawn from your bank account.” She handed over Sophie the bag with the wedding dress in it, and before Sophie could say anything, she was being ushered out of the boutique door.
Oh well.
Sophie thought.
At least I’ll look good for Mitchell, and that’s all I want, really. I’m sure he won’t mind too much.