Miss Polly had a Dolly (Emma Frost #2) (7 page)

"I love you Fanoe!"

Patrick was poking out from the car's sunroof
and stood with his arms stretched above his head, still wearing sunglasses,
while the car slowly moved from the ferry's deck onto the quay. He had been
angry with the producers for not renting a convertible for him to arrive in, so
everybody could see him, until he came up with the idea to open the sunroof of
the Toyota. A huge crowd had gathered in the parking lot where the ferry docked
and cameras were flashing as soon as he showed his face.

"We love you too, Patrick!" someone
from the crowd yelled.

The car moved slowly while fans were screaming
out his name and running next to it as it moved. Patrick leaned down and
touched hands with several of them. As soon as they were close enough, the
journalists started yelling.

"What are you hoping to find here on Fanoe,
Patrick?"

Patrick grinned and took off his sunglasses. The
girls in the crowd squealed with joy. Patrick winked at the female journalist.

"Love," he said with a deep voice.
"I hope to find faith, hope, and love…and some great talent of
course!" Then he winked again and put the sunglasses back on with a wide
smile. He put his arms up in the air and yelled into the crowd:

"What do you say, Fanoe? Do we have some
real Shooting Stars here on the island?"

The crowd went wild. The loud screaming drowned
out everything. Patrick laughed. It was like that everywhere he went—and
he loved it.

The car moved slowly through the crowd and
Patrick managed to touch hands, blow kisses, and even sign autographs on arms
and in books. His producer handed him a stack of signed pictures that he threw
out among the teenagers who grabbed them and held them to their chests like
prized possessions.

"Had enough yet?" Hanne asked from the
driver's seat.

Patrick bent down, sighed and looked at the huge
crowd through the front window of the car. "Not yet," he said.
"They really love me."

"Must be great," Hanne said
emotionless while looking at her fingers.

Patrick heard the crowd start to chant his name
to make him poke his head out of the car again.

"Patrick, Patrick,
Patrick."

He giggled inside the car while waiting for the
right moment. It was all about timing. Making them want more, keeping them
thirsty.

"Patrick, Patrick,
Patrick!"

Once the chanting reached a crescendo, he knew
they were almost ready. They were craving it now.

"Patrick, Patrick, Patrick!"

Almost there. They were almost at the point of
giving up, thinking he wasn't going to come back up.

"Patrick, Patrick,
Patrick!"
they chanted even louder.

Patrick waited just a second longer, then put
his arm up through the sunroof and gave them all the finger. The crowd went
wild. The screaming wouldn't stop. Patrick laughed. It worked every time. It
was his famous signature move. Originally from when the press was always
following him around in the beginning, when he had just started doing the show,
snooping in his private life, speculating that he might be gay (which they
still wrote, but Patrick had stopped caring about).

Running from the paparazzi didn't help—he
learned that lesson soon enough—but just standing there, giving them the
finger, gave them a picture they could sell and then they would leave him
alone. So in the beginning all the magazines and papers were filled with
Patrick giving the entire world the finger. His producers had told him it was a
bad idea, that the public wasn't going to like it, that he was destroying the
image of the show. But they were wrong. The people proved them wrong. Screaming
teenagers soon showed up to the auditions showing the finger to every camera.
It was the youths' rebellion against the boring lives their parents had created
for themselves. These kids wanted more. They wanted to make more of themselves.
They wanted to be stars. They all wanted what Patrick had. They wanted to be
famous enough to give the world the finger once and for all—
and get away with it
.

It was hard for
Nina
to keep her tears back as she followed Sergei to
the car parked outside the apartment building. It was daytime outside but the
clouds were heavy and grey. It was cold, too. Nina was freezing in her summer
dress.

The car was small and he put her in the
backseat. Sergei started the engine and they drove off. Nina stared out the
window and didn't say a word for hours. She looked at the strange houses that
looked nothing like they did on the island. That was when she realized that she
had to have been taken away from the island. Her mother had taught her many
things, and one of them was to read, so she could read most road signs at home,
but these seemed to be different. She didn't quite recognize the words. Was she
even in Denmark anymore? Nothing looked the way she was used to. Even the
houses were different. They were old and very dirty. Could her mother really
have wanted her to go to a dirty place like this? Her mother, the woman who
hated when she got dirty.

Nina looked down and realized her dress was no
longer pretty. It was dirty, too and had brown spots on it. Her mommy would be
really mad when she saw it.
If
she
ever saw it again
.
Nina looked up
and out the window again.

Mommy where are you? Why have
you sent me away like this? Was I really that bad? Please forgive me and let me
come home. I promise to never be bad again. I'll never complain about the
dresses again. I'll never talk to other kids on the playground again. I
promise, Mommy. I promise!

They drove for a long time more, then there was
suddenly a sign she could read. It said
Polish
Border 50 km.
Nina swallowed hard and felt a slight panic rise.
Polish border? She didn't know what it meant but it sounded really far away
from Denmark. Far away from her mother. Nina's mother had taught her about the
different countries and she had looked at maps before. She knew Poland wasn't a
place in Denmark. It was far away. Now the tears started rolling down her
cheeks. The uncertainty felt horrible. Was she ever going back? Was she ever
going to see her mommy again?

The car came to a sudden halt. It seemed to Nina
like they were in the middle of nowhere. She could see a pair of headlights
approach from the other direction. The car stopped across the road. Sergei told
her to sit still and then went outside. He talked to some other guy who had
come out of the other car, then walked back to the car and opened Nina's door.

"Come on," he said. "Get out of
the car. You're going with this guy now."

Nina started shivering. "But…I don't know
him…mommy always said don't go with strangers and…"

"Who cares about mommy? Get out,"
Sergei yelled, then grabbed her leg and pulled her out of the car.

Nina hit her head on the ground and scraped her
arms. It hurt and she started to cry. Sergei pulled her across the road by her
leg, while she was screaming and yelling. Then she heard him speak in a foreign
language to the other guy and she felt more hands on her legs, and now she was
lifted up and thrown into the other car where she landed on the back seat.

"Remember to be good," Sergei said as
the door closed.

The other man got in and started the engine.
Nina thought he looked just like Sergei, but fatter and even dirtier. He was
wearing a black leather jacket that squeaked when he turned in his seat to look
at Nina.

"I'm Stefan," he said and grinned. His
Danish was even worse than Sergei's. "I take good care of you now."

Then they drove off. As Nina peered out the back
window with a gasp, she saw Sergei standing back on the road with a big smile
and a roll of money in his hands.

Victor came
home from schoo
l an hour after Sophia had left me. I
couldn't quite let go of the uneasy feeling inside of me after hearing about
the missing girl.

"Hi sweetie," I said and greeted him
in the hallway.

Victor never cared much for being touched but I
really felt like hugging him and holding him tight. It took all my strength not
to.

"How was your day?"

Victor stormed past me without answering,
without even looking at me. That was just the way he was. I wouldn't say I was
getting used to it, because I don't think you ever get used to not having your
child respond to you, but I was beginning to accept the fact that it was part
of his personality. His lack of social skills was just a part of him. It made
me appreciate it even more when he did talk to me.

"I have baked buns," I said and
followed him into the kitchen where he sat down, still without looking at me.
Knowing he liked things to be like they always were I had already prepared a
plate for him that I now placed in front of him. He started eating without a
word. I grabbed my coffee and sat down in front of him. Since we moved to the
island his condition had gotten slightly better, but there were still days when
I wouldn't get a word out of him. I was working closely with his teachers and
they had been very helpful through it all. But I still got the sense that he
was only really happy when he was out in the yard playing with the trees. That
was all he ever wanted to do, so I let him.

"So, are the kids in school talking about
the TV show? I heard the host, that Patrick guy, is coming to the island today.
They said on the radio that he's down at the quay right now, causing a traffic
jam and the ferry to be late going back to Esbjerg."

Victor didn't answer but I knew he heard me. I
knew he hated small talk and he didn't feel obligated to answer if I didn't say
anything important. I continued anyway.

"Do you think they'll find this year's
winner here at Fanoe Island, huh?" I sipped my coffee while Victor ate.
"Maybe one of Sophia's kids will win, huh? Wouldn't that be great? Maybe
Ida?"

Victor stopped chewing. I couldn't help smiling.
I knew he had grown very fond of Ida. She was a year younger than him, only six
years old, but she was very pretty with her long blonde hair and extremely
sweet. "Would you like that, Victor? Would you like for her to win and
become famous?"

He didn't answer. I laughed on the inside. It
felt good to know that he was capable of that kind of emotion. I wanted him to
like her and was planning on asking Sophia to bring her over more often. It was
good for him to be with other children.

Victor finished his raspberry juice and
swallowed the last bite of his bun. Then it was like he froze.

"Victor, are you all right?" I asked
after a little while when he hadn't moved at all.

Suddenly he lifted his head and stared directly
into my eyes. I couldn't help but smile, since it was so seldom lately that I
got to see his eyes and feel the close connection between us that we used to
have. But then it happened, the thing I hated the most in the entire world.
Victor's eyes rolled back in his head and he started shaking. I jumped up from
my chair, knocking over my cup  and spilling hot coffee all over the
table. I grabbed Victor and held him in my arms, while his body was in spasms.

"Oh no, not that," I yelled.
"Please make it go away. Please make it stop."

It had been six months at least since his last
seizure and I had hoped it was over, that he had finally outgrown them like his
doctor used to say he would one day. I stroked his hair and kissed his forehead
while his body was shaking between my arms. The doctors had told me to always
hold him so he wouldn't hurt himself.

"It's okay, Victor. I have got you. Don't
worry," I said with an anxious heart. I hated these seizures. I hated
everything about them. Mostly I hated how helpless I was when they occurred.

Please don't let him swallow
his tongue. Please make this stop.

Victor said something. A mumbling emerged his
mouth. "What are you saying, Victor? Are you trying to tell me
something?" I bent down to better hear what it was. It was hard to make
anything out of it. It sounded like he'd said
baby
doll
.