Chapter Twelve
Burger Castle
Seth and I pulled into the parking lot of Burger Castle. I did not see Mommy's car yet. I followed Seth inside. Burger Castle is wonderful. From the outside it looks like a mini castle made of gray stone with four towers. It is surrounded by a moat and you walk over a drawbridge to enter through big double doors. I love it.
When we went inside we were in a waiting area with big wooden benches with plush red covers, wall lights that looked like torches and also tapestries hanging between the lights with medieval scenes of dragons and knights and ladies on them.
A teenage girl wearing a long pink gown and a silver tiara with pink jewels walked over, "Hi. Just two?"
Seth shook his head, "We have two more who will be joining us shortly so we will need a table for four."
"Great! I am Lady Strawberry Milkshake and I will be your hostess tonight. Right this way!" She went towards a nearby archway that led to the dining room.
"Your name is ridiculous!" I told her. I knew it was not her real name but I could not stop laughing.
She laughed, "You are a cute kid."
Seth glared at me, "Cool it, Karen."
She led us to our table which had wonderful chairs that looked like thrones and handed us our menus. The food all has royalty related names. I could not decide between the princess cheeseburger plate or the little knight chicken nuggets.
Seth set his menu down, "I think I want a royal deluxe angus burger and cheese fries. What about you, Karen?"
I lowered my shades to look at him. "I guess I will have a princess cheeseburger with fries and a raspberry shake."
"You could take off the sunglasses since we are inside." Seth said.
"I am not able do that," I told him.
Seth looked confused, "Why not?"
"This is my devil look. Now that I closed my church down I do not like religion anymore. Being evil is fun. You know how much I like dressing up as a witch on Halloween." I did not add that my plan was to try to make other people do bad things. Seth might spill the beans to Mommy.
"Karen," Seth said gently, "I think we need to find you a new hobby. How about ballet? Or maybe girl scouts?"
"Can I wear a devil outfit to those activities? If not I do not want to do them. I just want to be evil." I was not going to let Seth boss me around. He is not rich like my daddy. He is just a cheap imitation.
A new voice chimed in, "Karen Brewer do you even know who the devil is? Do you even really know about him?"
I looked to see who had spoken. I could not believe it. It was Pamela Harding. She and her mommy, daddy and big sister were sitting down at the table next to ours.
"Pamela, be nice." Mrs. Harding reprimanded her.
Pamela gave me a very mean look, "Mommy, that is Karen Brewer. You know she is not nice. I have told you about her many times. Plus you just heard her say she wants to be the devil. He is evil. Why would she want to be like him? He got kicked out of heaven and he likes people to do bad things."
"I have a lot in common with the devil. He got kicked out of heaven. I got kicked out of church by your daddy." I was not going to let Pamela and her family get the best of me.
"Pammy, sit down and leave them alone," Mr. Harding said sternly.
Pamela sat down and stuck her tongue out at me. I stuck mine back out at her. I was not happy. Pamela was being mean to me again and her daddy still had not apologized to me for ratting out my visit to his church to Mommy. Pamela owed me an apology too for destroying my church fliers and bribing Andrew to let her do it.
I decided to ask him about the church situation, "Um Mr. or Bishop Harding, whichever you prefer to be called, I have a question."
"Daddy! Do not talk to Karen Brewer. She is crazy!" Pamela pounded her fists on the table so hard that her mommy gave her a look and grabbed her hands. Pamela yanked them away.
He looked at Pamela then at me, "Um Mr. Harding is fine."
"I think it was very mean of you to kick me out of your church. I think you should say you are sorry." I hoped I had gotten my point across.
"Karen!" Seth did not sound happy.
"No it is ok." Mr. Harding put his hand up, "Karen, I am sorry you are not happy that I called your mommy but it is what grown ups have to do when we see a child by themselves without a grown up taking care of them knowing where they are at. If I had not been able to get a hold of your parents I might have had to call the police. It is not safe for you to be somewhere by yourself. You could get hurt or someone bad could take you. You need to let your parents know where you are at."
I frowned, "I understand." I did not really understand but Seth looked mad and Mr. Harding had that tone in his voice that grown ups get when they mean business and do not want me to argue with them.
Mrs. Harding added in, "Pammy, why not go with your friend down to the dungeon while we wait for the food?"
The dungeon is a big basement room under the restaurant. It has arcade games, prize machines, an indoor playground and some small rides. It is sort of like a medieval Chucky Cheese. I usually like to play in the Burger Castle dungeon but going down there with Pamela Harding did not sound like a picnic to me.
Apparently Pamela agreed, "I keep telling you that I am not friends with her. Plus I have not ordered my food yet."
Pamela's sister who had been quiet until now rolled her eyes at Pamela, "You sure could have fooled me. You talk about her all the time like she is your best friend. You bicker like an old married couple."
"Ugh I would never marry Karen Brewer or be her friend. She is too evil and mean." Pamela stormed off in the direction of the dungeon while her sister laughed. Mr. and Mrs. Harding started lecturing her about being nice but she laughed at them and they started arguing about other things. Mostly it sounded like they thought Pamela's sister was lazy for not getting a summer job, lazy for flunking out of summer school and they hated her new boyfriend. They did not seem to care that Pamela was upset or that she left. I felt a tiny bit sorry for Pamela. Maybe she was a meanie mo because her mommy and daddy are.
Seth looked at the still arguing Harding family then at me, "Uh Karen it would be nice of you to go see what is wrong with your friend."
Did Seth not hear what Pamela said about us not being friends? "I do not think I care to know what is wrong with her. I will stay here, thank you."
Seth pulled a wad of dollar bills out of his pocket, "Go have fun, Karen."
Well as my daddy, Watson Brewer likes to say, 'money talks'. I took Seth's money and went down to the dungeon. I was not really looking for Pamela. Now that I had the money, it was time to have fun. When you play games at Burger Castle, you win tickets and you can turn the tickets in for prizes. There are a lot of big prizes that you would have to save tickets up forever for which I think is not fair but there are a lot of things that are easy to win too.
I played castle bowling where you knock down pins that look like suits of armor with a cannon ball. I went a few rounds on the dragon pinball machine. I took a few pictures of myself in the photo booth. The photo booth is great because it dresses you up in computer generated medieval clothes. I rode on a ship ride that looked like a crusader ship.
I was thinking about heading back up to see if my food had arrived and to see if Mommy and Andrew were there when I heard the sound of someone crying from inside the indoor big toy that is shaped like a mini castle. The voice sounded familiar. I climbed up into one of the towers. There sitting on a platform with her head on her knees was Pamela Harding. Her face was red and her eyes were puffy from crying.
She looked up when I sat down on the platform, "What are you doing here, Karen Brewer?"
"My step dad told me to go and find you. Plus he gave me a lot of money for games." I informed her.
Pamela sniffled, "You probably only went down here because he gave you money. I do not even see my mommy and daddy looking for me."
This was true but I was not going to let her know that, "Well your sister was fighting with them so they were distracted but I am sure they are worried about you."
"Yeah right! They only care about her," Pamela had stopped crying and was starting to sound mad. "You know what Karen? As much as we do not like each other, sometimes I wish I was you. You have it so easy."
My jaw dropped and my mouth was wide open. I am not usually surprised by the idea that anyone would want to be me since I am so wonderful and smart but not Pamela Harding. We usually hate each other. I could not believe what I was hearing.
