“I want a picture,” a childish voice interrupted, and I looked up to see that the little ballerina had reappeared at my side.
“Not right now, sweetie.”
“No. Now!”
I sighed. “I told you, I don’t work here.”
“But you’re the corpse bride,” she insisted, “and I wanna—”
“I’m not—”
“You’re the corpse bride and I want a picture! Mommy, make her give me a picture!”
“It—it’s just a picture,” the mother said, walking over while still staring at the commotion. It had gotten worse, with the Graeae piling their newly purloined clothes on top of Augustine. I wasn’t sure if that was because they were running out of room, or to shut him up, but if the latter, it wasn’t working.
“Look, lady—”
“Just pose for a picture, would you?”
“No,” I said, suddenly pissed. “I will not.”
“Why? It would only take a minute.”
“So does telling your child no.”
And, okay, I’d finally been irritating enough to get her full attention. She turned around. “What does that mean?”
“It means that maybe giving your kid everything she wants—”
“Don’t tell me how to raise my child.”
“—isn’t the best tactic for bringing up a well-adjusted—”
“Well-adjusted?” Her eyes took in my dusty, blue-lipped, shoeless form. “What would you know about well-adjusted?”
“More than you!”
“Just pose for the picture!”
“No! I am not the freaking corpse bride! My name is Cassie Palmer and I don’t—”
But I didn’t get a chance to say what I didn’t do. Because a booming voice suddenly broke out, loud enough to shake the walls. “CASSIE PALMER. CASSIE PALMER. CASSIE PALMER IS IN AUGUSTINE’S.”
What the hell?
Chapter Five
“What?” Augustine’s perfectly coifed head poked up out of a pile of clothes. “What is that?”
“No!” The irate mother stared around, and then abruptly became a lot more irate. “Goddamn it, no!”
She bolted for the counter with the cash register, which also contained the gift-wrap station. And started throwing fanc
y cards, spools of ribbon, and luxurious wrapping paper around, looking for something that I guess she didn’t find, because she kept doing it. And while that wouldn’t have been a great idea anywhere, it was especially bad here, because Augustine didn’t use normal paper.
Augustine didn’t use normal anything.
As was demonstrated when a roll of shiny blue and silver foil rolled across the worktop and fell off the edge.