Dreaming of Cheers (Standing Up to Life Book 3)

Chapter 18:

THE NEXT MORNING Mom woke me up and prodded me out of bed. It was only about four in the morning, because we were going to try and hit some early bird sales that started at seven. "Sweetie you don't have a lot of time to get ready if we're going to get there early," she told me.

"Alright, alright, I'm moving." I told her. In the shower I wanted to skip my hair so I could move faster, but I needed it so much that I decided to do it anyway. I hurried quickly though so I might have a chance of blow drying it before we were going to leave.

As I jumped out of the shower, I pulled on my clothes quickly and tried to do more than one thing at once. Mom had been nice enough to leave a curling iron plugged in still, so I was able to begin curling the bottom of my hair right away. Curling and blow drying away I tried to hurry to get my hair dry. Just when it was about dry Mom knocked at the door, "Tiffany, are you about ready?" She asked me.

"Just a couple minutes more Mom," I said as I turned the blow dryer off and yanked the curling iron cord free of the wall.

"Well hurry up sweetie, we need to get going."

"I know I'm hurrying," I said. I quickly looked at myself in the mirror and decided my hair actually looked good – especially for the time of day – and brushed my teeth quickly before gathering a couple other things to do in the car. Since Mom had let up on the makeup yesterday, I'd decided I could put some on today too – though I wasn't going to push it. I was out of time in the bathroom, but I had a mirror in my purse that I was taking with me. I just grabbed some basics in my hands, along with some earrings and a necklace - the one Amy's Mom had bought us - and ran out to the hotel room to put my tennis shoes on.

Since we were tight for time, I shoved my feet into my shoes without bothering to untie the shoes. Mom gave me a bit of a shake of her head at that point, but I just continued. I'd tie them again later. I threw the stuff that was in my hands into my purse, and said, "Okay I'm ready Mommy," with a smile that wasn't forced. I had a feeling that shopping this morning was going to be a lot of fun.

"It's about time!" She said to me teasingly and handed me my coat, "You're going to want this today."

"Is it going to be really cold?" I asked.

"A lot colder than yesterday at least."

I groaned. Cold wasn't something I was a great fan of. Other than the fact it meant you could get snow, cold was really just a nuisance. The two of us headed for the car and drove off. "Where are we going first?" I asked her.

"Well, it sounded like there were some pretty good deals on some things at Penney's, so that's where we said we were all going to meet up at seven as the doors open."

"Okay, how long before that?" I asked as I was putting my earrings in my ears. "It's about twenty minutes to drive to the mall that we're going to, but we're going to be there plenty early still." She glanced over at me because we were at a stoplight, "Enough time to do a little bit of makeup – not much sweetie."

I just smiled at her and got to work. Of course, I wasn't going to put tons of makeup on, but I had to be presentable right? And since she'd let me wear makeup yesterday all day, I'd decided it meant it was okay now. I didn't put much on, just some foundation and powder, some mascara, and some lip gloss. Okay, so maybe that is quite a bit for my age, but all of my friends did it all the time at school – I didn't even put any eye shadow on! I finished up before we got to the mall and put everything back into my purse. I actually had a hundred dollars, leftover from the trip, to spend today on Christmas presents.

Mom pulled up to the parking lot of Penney's and I gasped, "Whoa..." I exclaimed. There was a line of people leading out of the store and around out of sight. It led to one of the main entrances to the mall, I wondered if we could even get directly into Penney's.