‘I’ve decided that for this last week of filming you can be my assistant, Elly,’ says Mum as she pings off the walls of the Palace getting ready for work.
Now this is a strange thing, because last night I dreamed I was sitting down to eat a big slice of cake and drinking a glass of milk in Rosie’s catering van.
I looked it up immediately on the dream app and found two things:
Milk: ‘This is a very propitious dream for women. To dream of milk in large quantities signifies riches and health. It also denotes human kindness, wholesomeness and compassion. It can also represent a requirement for simplicity and a return to basic ideas and knowledge.’
Cake: ‘The dream may represent your accomplishments and achievements. Consider also the metaphor “piece of cake”, or some situation that is easy. To dream of cakes means that you will have good fortune in your undertakings.’
If Mum had asked me, even days ago, what I’d like most of all, I would have said that it was being her assistant.
Now, I want to keep working with Rosie. Not only because she makes me laugh and we have the best times pelting each other with potato peel and soggy sponges, but also because it feels like we are doing real, useful work.
We’re the ones who keep this whole movie going, I reckon. And without us . . . well, don’t even think about it!
And there are another couple of reasons I want to keep my job in the catering van.
The money’s really good, a LOT better than I thought it would be, and I know Mum will expect me to work for free, or she will just pay my phone bills with my wages and I’ll never get to see a single note. (I have earrings, handbags, candles and stuff to buy!!)
But more than that, the rest of this week will be a walk in the park compared to what I was doing before. From today I’m on late afternoon shift in the van because they’re filming at night. I don’t have to start until three o’clock; then we only have to get dinner ready and we finish at 8 p.m. Just five hours and I’m out of there.
SO that means I can go to the beach or to the mall and start enjoying my summer holiday. Carmelita’s not needed during the day either. At last! Me, Rosie and Carmelita. The three of us just hanging out together. Yahoo!
This is the last chance we will have for some fun because it’s the full moon on Friday night and that’s the night the filming is going to finish. There will be a massive afterparty too.
And the next morning Carmelita’s going home. I HATE the sound of that sentence.
I Just. Hate. It.
So, I tell my mother, no thank you very much, I’d like to keep perfecting my coleslaw skills. Maybe I’ll even sell my own range of dressings. The Pickering Collection: For an award-winning salad . . . that sounds pretty good.
‘Well, have a wonderful day, darling, and I’ll see you two girls later,’ says Mum, who seems to have a smile on her face for once, even though her phone is vibrating like a Mexican jumping bean. Ay Caramba!
And that reminds me, Tyler texted and asked me to go to the poetry slam tomorrow night and I better start working on something. Yep, I’m going to get up there and perform. Why not?
There are about a million reasons why not, but I try not to think about them. I’ve promised myself to start doing more daring things in my life, now Will and I are not together, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
Will and I are not together! How does that feel?
I do a mental check and listen to my heartbeat. Actually, it feels just about right.
Working in the catering van in the afternoon is hard work. It’s even hotter inside after the sun has been beating down on it all day long.
Still, I don’t mind so much, because we three had an amazing day together. We went to the mall and I bought some candles (one coconut and lime and the other vanilla) at Cathedral Candles and then I did a massive raid on Tiara with the money I’ve earned. Two new tops, three pairs of earrings and a new necklace and I have stacks left over for my phone bill.
The other thing that’s made it great is that people have been dropping by all afternoon to say they saw Rosie and me on How Was Your Weekend?
Remember when Rosie said we should make the catering van THE place to be? It sure is now. Everyone who walks past waves at us. It’s like we’re the celebrities around here instead of Jake Blake.
Although I catch a glimpse of myself in the side of the toaster and remember that I do look like a mushroom. Oh well, at least I’m a famous fungus. Hah!
Carmelita drops by to say hello.
‘Bianca is being totally ignored,’ she tells us. ‘Word got around that she took that picture of you and Jake down the oval and put it on FacePlace and everyone thinks that sucks.’
Then Rosie says: ‘I feel sorry for—’
‘DON’T,’ yells Carmelita. ‘It was only last night that she was being horrible to you. Let her suffer for a bit.’
I have to agree. Just a few more days and I won’t have to hear her name again until school starts.
School! Erk. I’m going to really make the rest of my summer holidays rock!
For the rest of the night while I’m serving and doing the dishes I have a poem starting to form in my head. Maybe I’ll write it down when I get home.