Beyblade Fan Fiction ❯ Evra's Big Mistake ❯ Chapter six ( Chapter 6 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Rei's Neko_gurl: Here we go peoples. Another chappy. I know it's taking so long to get into this, but it'll be worth it. I promise!

Dawn, flicking without much enthusiasm through a magazine in the doctor's waiting room at ten to nine on Monday morning, came across an article detailing the break-up of some minor celebrity's marriage.

In the accompanying photograph the woman -- an actress in her late thirties -- was looking suitably devastated in full make-up and a short clinging dress that showed off . . . well, practically everything.

The article was headlined: EVERY NIGHT I CRY MYSELF TO SLEEP.

Lucky you, thought Dawn, her shoulders sagging with exaustion. I cry every night but I still can't sleep.

How much could she seriously be expected to sympathise, anyway, with women who clearly didn't cry much at all? She was wearing mascara, wasn't she? Her eyes weren't permanently swollen like a frog's. Furthermore, she had a teeny-weeny waist.

Hating her, Dawn threw the magazine back on to the pile. She shifted on her uncomfortable moulded plastic chair -- moulded for someone with a far smaller bottom than hers, by the feel of it -- and eased a finger under the safety pin straining to hold together the waistband of her loosest skirt.

There was a poster blu-tacked up on the wall oppostie her. It said: Postnatal Depression?
I've got pre-natal depression, thought Dawn. Ha beat that.

'Dawn Kinomiya,' the tinny voice of the doctor announced over the intercom, 'to room six.'

In the space of the next five minutes, everything became astonishingly real. Armed with the date of Dawn's last period, the doctor twiddled a circular chart contraption, consulted a calendar, then pronounced, 'Your baby is due to arrive on Tuesday the third of December.'

Dawn gazed at him. He spoke with such absolute certainty.

Heavens. Move over, Mystic Meg.

'Call it an earlt Christmas present.' The doctor smiled at her stunned expression. 'So, everything okay? Husband happy about it?'

Uh oh, here we go.

'He left me five days ago,' said Dawn, and waited to bust into tears.

The doctor looked as if he were waiting for her to burst into tears too.

Dawn wondered why it wasn't happening.

Instead, the doctor's words, Your baby is due to arrive on Tuesday the third of December, kept dancing through her mind.

Somehow, miraculously, they seemed more important than the brutal ones Hiro had flung at her last week.

'He's never wanted children,' Dawn told the doctor, marvelling at the steadiness of her own voice. 'But it's okay, I'll cope.'

Well, cope might be putting it a bit strongly. Somehow muddle through was probably nearer the mark.

'In that case, let's pop you on the scales,' said the doctor.

Oh dear, how dainty. That was what you did in the supermarket with a bag of seedless grapes.

'I'm only seven weeks and I've put on laods of weight already.' Dawn kicked off her shoes, embarrassed, and shuffled over to the scales. 'I can't stop eating, I just feel so hungry all the time.'

'Don't worry about it. Just try and eat healthily.'

How healthy was pecan toffee ice cream? And bags of liquorice allsorts? Not to mention strawberry Angel Delight.

'Morning sickness, that's what I need.' Dawn sounded rueful. 'I keep waiting for it to happen and it just won't.'

Amused, the doctor tut-tutted.

'My wife's pregnant. If she could hear you now, she'd hit you over the head with her sick bag. You stay as you are,' he advised Dawn good-naturedly. 'You're a lucky girl.'

Was he a real doctor?

Or, Dawn, wondered, an escaped lunatic masquerading as one?

Me, a lucky girl?

'You're late,' said Fenn.

'I know, I'm sorry.' As she swung round to face him, Evra caught a glimpse of her frazzled reflection in one of the salon mirrors. Well, was it any wonder she was looking frazzled? 'Oh, but Fenn, you'll never guess what happened!'

Excuses? Fenn had heard them all.

'Don't tell me. You were seized by a gang of kidnappers and held hostage,' he guessed, 'untill they found out nobody was going to pay to get you back, so they let yo go.'

'Oh ha ha.' Evra was clearly miffed. 'I'm being serious.'

'The tube was held up. Body on the line.'

Always a trusty stand-by. It was a wonder London still had a population, the number of times Fenn had heard this one.

He got glared at.

'No.'

'Okay, a puppy ran out into the road and you had to rescue it.'

Fenn was grinning. Evra could have hit him. The puppy excuse was astanding joke at the salon. The really frustrating thing was, it had once actually happened. It was one of her few genuine excuses and nobody -- nobody -- nad ever believed her.

'If you must know, I've been looking for that beggar,' she announced. Fenn might be a pig, but she was bursting to tell someone. 'You know, the one who sits outside the shoe shop?'

'You mean the beggar you gave Alice Travistock's money to?' Entertained, Fenn raised an eyebrow. 'The one you keep insisting isn't a beggar because he never begs?'

'Okay, okay, don't rub it in.' Impatiently Evra waved the interruption aside. 'Anyway, it turns out he isn't a real beggar at all. He's not hungry and he isn't homeless -- he's a total fake. I saw him yesterday on Hampstead heath wearing normal clothes. He was with his son, flying a kite. And you'll never guess what kind of car he drives.' Her dark eyes flashed with renewed outrage as the words tumbled out. 'Only a BMW.'

Fenn tried not to smile. Poor Evra, she was positively fizzing with indignation. All her illousions, so brutally shattered.

'Well, it happens.' His tone was mild.

'I gave him a scarf and that pair of gl---' in the nick of time she stopped herself, 'er . . . glasses, an old pair of sunglasses.'

Nodding slowly, Fenn said, 'I see, sunglasses. Always useful.'

'I can't believe I was so stupid. The whole time he must have been laughing at me. Can you believe it?' Evra seethed. 'A bloody BMW.'

'So did you say anything to him yesterday?'

'Well, a bit, but his little boy was there. Anyway, I've thought of a whole load more things to yell at him today.' In fact she had lain awake half the night coming up with bigger an dbetter insults. In the end there were so many she'd had to write them down. 'Look, her's my list.'

It was a big list. Fenn could just imagine her standing over the poor fellow in the street, bawling, 'Wait, wait, I haven't nearly finished yet!'

'Well, good,' he told Evra mildly. 'But I'd prefer it if you confronted him in your own time, not mine.'


He wasn't there at lunchtime.

'Look on the bright side,' said Bex, whom Evra had dragged alog for moral -- and physical -- support. 'At least you won't have to share your lunch
any more.'

This didn't console Evra. There was a nasty feeling growing in the pit of her stomach. She was begining to suspect she'd blown the whole operation.

'I bet he's moved to another pitch.' Gloomily she shoved her hands into her pockets. 'Damn, I should have kept my mouth shut yesterday.'

There again, keeping quiet had never been her forte.

Bex was just relieved that she'd be getting back to the salon with her expensive false nails intact. She wrapped a consoling arm around Evra's
shoulders.

'Hey, cheer up. Maybe you've frightened him into going straight.'


By ten to six the last client had left. Evra was in the back room unloading the tumble dryer and folding a mountain of parma-violet towels -- the

Fenn Lomax signature colour -- into neat piles.

Well, neatish.

When Bex put her head around the door there was an odd expression on her face.

'Someone's here to see you.'

Evra looked at her. It was actually a really wierd expression; Bex seemed half enthralled, half perplexed.

'Who?'

'He didn' say. And he doesn't know your name either, he just asked to speak to the girl with the magpie hair.'

Hastily, because Fenn would only give her grief if she didn't, Evra semi-folded the last of the towels before bundling them up on to the shelf. She hadn't mentioned it to Fenn -- well, you don't do you? -- but one of his clients this morning had come into the salon with her son, who had shown definite signs of interest in her. He'd been good fun. Good-looking, too. And -- Evra had discovered -- he was a policeman!

She'd always had a bit of a weakness for men in uniform.

And now he's off duty, she thought with a rush of excitement, he's come to find me again.

Whisked away from your workplace, hmm, very Officer and a Gentleman, daydreamed Evra. And how apt, seeing as he actually was a police officer!

Although maybe not a terribly bright one, if he hadn't even remembered her name.

Hup, the last of the towels flew through the air, landing -- more or less -- on the top shelf.

'It's okay, I think I know who it is.' Eyes shining, Evra pushed her magpie hair behind her ears and presented herself to Bex for inspection. 'Do I look all right?'

'Fine,' bex was still bemused, 'but---'

'Don't be surprised if he picks me up and carries me out of here,' Evra fantisised happily. 'You can clap and cheer if you like. Oh, but don't say: Is that a truncheon in your pocket or are you just pleased to see her? because it might be a truncheon and that would be realy embarr---'

'Will you stop wittering on and get out there?' Exasperated, Bex gave her a hefty shove in the direction of the door. 'He can't wait for ever, he's parked outside on double yellows.'

Hang on, something not quite right here, thought Evra.

Policemen werehonest, law-abiding citizens, weren't they?

Surely they wouldn't park on yellow lines?

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Rei's Neko_gurl: Well, well, well. Who's came to see her eh? Find out in the next chappy. ^.^ Ja Ne