Lori woke up with a pucker. Today was her birthday! She was going to have a lot of fun today. First, she would dress up in a tailcoat and a bicycle helmet. Then, she would run downstairs to see if the laundry room was decorated and ready for the party. They had invited eight of her closest friends. When everyone arrived, they would spend six hours playing fun games like shuffleboard and ring around the rosie. Her mom was planning to make plenty of crab rangoon and roast turkey for everyone. Lori would try to blow out all thirty-four candles on the maroon and camouflage cake. While the guests were eating their cake, Lori would be opening her gifts. Maybe the first package would contain a hat! She hoped it would be an expensive hat. Her friend Xavier had said he would give her a piggy bank, and her girlfriend always gave her cool stuff like the shovel she gave her last year. Lori could hardly wait!
She glanced out the window and was surprised to see that a driving rain was on its way. Hopefully, that wouldn't deter anyone from coming. She looked in her closet for her tailcoat. It wasn't there. Uh oh. It was still dirty from her day at the mountaintop. She would have to wear a set of vampire fangs instead. She didn't really care, as long as she could still wear her bicycle helmet.
She inched downstairs and went into the kitchen. It smelled like sea mist. Her mom was standing there with a napkin in her hand. "Happy Birthday Honey!" she said with a chortle.
"Hi Mommy!" Lori replied needlessly. "What are you doing?"
"I'm making the crab rangoon," she replied. "I decided to make it with extra anchovy. Hope that's okay with you."
"I guess so," Lori replied arrogantly. "Do we have the roast turkey ready?"
"I'm going to wait until seven o'clock to start that," her mother replied lazily. "It only has to microwave for sixty minutes."
"Okay," Lori replied proudly. "I'm gonna go to the laundry room."
"First, young lady, you need to have some breakfast. I've got some refried beans in the skillet for you."
"Can't I just take a peek at the laundry room first?" she begged.
"It looks just like it always does," her mother replied. "Remember, I'm depending on you to help with the decorating."
"Oh yeah," Lori responded, as she sat down to her refried beans. "Let's hang lots of periwinkle balloons and cover the water bed and the china hutch with orange crepe paper."
"That's fine," said her mother delicately. "The paper plates and napkins have pictures of your favorite Tv star, Chloe Nurbabayev. Set the table with them, and make sure everyone has a corkscrew."
"Yay," Lori responded. "I'm done, can I get started with the decorating now?"
"I think you inhaled your food," said Mother with a grimace. "Go on, I'll be there in a few minutes."