Closer 2

130.

All the adults seemed to be so stressed out, but Elise didn't really care. She had gotten ice cream like she wanted, and was happily eating it while sitting on a chair behind the tall desk. The ice cream man had gone back to the ice cream shop, and a nice, but a bit scary lady was now keeping her company.

"What's your name, sweetie?" the lady asked her with a polite smile. Elise thought her lips were way too red, though, almost like she had an ouchie on them.

"Li-Li," Elise answered, taking another bite of her ice cream. Yummy chocolate ice cream.

"That's a very nice name. Did your mama give it to you?" the lady asked, and Elise had no clue what she was talking about. She had never heard of 'mama' or whatever she was saying.

"Nooo..." she said, looking mainly down at her ice cream cup on the table in front of her. It was really difficult to get bites of it without flinging ice cream all over, and she figured the nice lady wouldn't be so nice if she spilled ice cream on her stuff.

"No? Okay, sweetie," the lady said softly, stroking her back a little. It was a bit unpleasant because the lady was wearing so many rings. "Who did you come to the hospital with today, then?"

Elise thought about the question for a bit. Baba was with her of course, but everyone knew that, right?
"Sharkie," she finally decided on as a good answer before taking another bite of her ice cream. The lady looked confused.

"Sharkie? You came here with a shark, huh?"

"Yuh-uh," Elise responded, causing ice cream to run down the side of her mouth and drip on her shirt. "Sharkie."

"But where is the shark now, then?" the lady asked, and while Elise knew what the question meant, she didn't know how to answer it. She could picture where Sharkie was in her head, but she didn't know the words to tell the nice lady. Instead she just kept eating ice cream.

"Is it a secret?" the lady asked, smiling at her. Elise nodded, though she didn't really know what a secret was. It seemed like that's what the lady wanted her to say. She couldn't help but smile back, though, again with chocolate ice cream running down the side of her mouth.

"Oh, let me wipe your mouth for you, sweetie," the lady said, grabbing some napkins and doing just that. Elise whined a bit, not liking to get her face wiped by anyone. At least the lady was quick about it.

Elise jumped when the phone next to her rang loudly, but because the lady seemed busy answering it rather than checking if it had scared her she didn't bother crying about it. Instead, she decided to continue with her ice cream and watch the people walking past.

"No, no, all I know is that her name is Li-Li," the lady said into the phone, and Elise recognized her name in there. Why were they talking about her?

"I'll try and ask her some more. She said she had come to the hospital with a shark, so at least... Yeah, she's probably come to visit someone."

"Sharkie," Elise corrected her softly, but the lady didn't seem to hear. Oh well, more time for ice cream.