I was a little nervous about the whole thing. I knew there was no way I should be taking a $10,000 puppet shopping. But like I said—what could I do? I promised. There was another thing too. I’d never had many friends before. Real friends, I mean, who weren’t there just because my dad was a rich39 doctor. Or because they wanted to have a good seat if Bess got arrested again. Bitsie was annoying, childish and full of himself, but he was a real friend. The only reason he was there was me. He really liked me. I mean, why else would he get so jealous? And I liked him too. He was smart40 and funny.41 I hated hurting his feelings, and this seemed like a pretty easy way to fix things. I had the taxi vouchers to get there. I had my emergency money. I had a knapsack to hide him in (as long as he promised not to step on my Choc-o-rama). And Bitsie had keys to get in and out of the studio. One little trip to the mall. What could it hurt? Nothing, it turned out. Bitsie kept his mouth shut as we went past the security guard at the studio, and I only had to shush him once in the taxi.
