party committee | Alo
Mini had somehow managed to convinced her mother to watch Grace for the day so that her and Alo could finish up the planning of the little one’s third birthday party. Mini, wanting to have control over every detail of the birthday, had a binder set up full of all her ideas and plans. She had texted the red-headed boy earlier in the day to tell him he would be meeting her at her house before they went on to get everything ready. She had been sitting on the stairs outside the McGuinness household as she waited for the boy. Once he finally arrived, she stood up and crossed her arms over her chest. “It’s about time you made it here, farm boy. We’re losing daylight here, you know,” she yelled over to him, just loud enough for him to hear, as she motioned up to the sky. “We have a lot to get done.”
Alo laid in bed, having received the texts from the ex and the only reason he didn’t just ignore it was because it was about their daughter. She was going to be three soon and they had a party to plan for his little ginger snap. He looked over to the bedside table in his cottage to see a picture of his daughter. They had gotten some professionally done after Alo’s parents had gotten some money from a now dead aunt who gave them a good chuck of change that allowed the cottage to be built. With a room for his daughter and a good sized bedroom. But then Mini and he broke up, it was the closest he ever came to dealing with a blood bath. After a few months of not seeing either her or his daughter Mini returned. They worked out an agreement to share custody, odd weeks and such. This was Mini’s week and the thought that he could spend the day with the both of them was awful and exciting. He would get to see his daughter on his off week, so he got ready and left the farm with big blue fighting him the whole way into Bristol. He let out some choice swears as his van bucked it’s way downtown and he pulled up to her place only to be yelled at instantly and she had no nappie bag so Grace was with Granny McGuiness. That thought always made him smirk because he knew how much she wanted to be a young woman and not a grandmother. “Sorry Mins, blue just needs to be gassed and we’ll be on our way,” he said. Normally he would climb out and help her in but he just opened the door and waited for her to climb in.
Mini rolled her eyes as she climbed herself up into the big blue van, closing the door behind her. She situated herself in the seat, binder and handbag sat comfortably in her lap. “You know, maybe you should invest in another vehicle. One not so big or blue? Maybe one that you don’t have to gas up every time you take it out?” To say that Mini wasn’t a fan of the vehicle, would have been an understatement. It wasn’t that there was anything wrong with it, per say, it just wasn’t her style. “I mean, don’t get rid of this…thing, if you don’t want to,” She said, looking over at her ex-boyfriend. The two had been broken up for a bit now and this birthday planning day was the first day they had spent with just the two of them since before their break up. Of course the freckle-faced girl was slightly excited to spend time with just the boy. But, they had a mission to accomplish by the end of the day. A mission to create the most perfect third birthday that they could.
“But anyways,” she let out a sigh as she opened up the party binder ever so slightly, “I think first we need to get decorations. I’m thinking a princess themed party. Complete with all the pink and sparkles that we can find. Every girl needs a princess party, you know.”
“You never complained about the van when we were playing hide the sausage,” he said as he pulled away from her place. Alo drove through the streets of Bristol, he had made sure to turn the music down so he could hear her. He at least hadn’t gotten to a point in his life that he hated her. But things were broken and at this point he didn’t think they would be fixed. They had created a perfectly good system of barely talking and handing their daughter over without any scenes. She was backtracking about the van and it was weird to see her this way. She was normally feisty but maybe she was holding back for their daughter. “Does she want a princess theme? When she is over at the farm, she is jumping in muddle puddles, playing fetch with Rags and begging me to teach her to ride the horses and some days the cows,” he said. Alo pulled into the petrol station, “I’ll be back in a few,” he said as he hopped out of the van. Alo got the nozzle after opening up the van and began to fill it up. He set the switch down so he didn’t have to hold it. This would take some time and he could hear her going through the binder like the sound was amplified so he knew she was prepared. If Mini was good at one thing it was making him feel like a tit. He had no idea what to get his daughter for a gift, and he knew this was going to be a long hard day. The click was loud and the tank was full he closed everything up and climbed back into the van. “We goin’ to Tesco to get the decorations or we going to some fancy foo foo place?” he asked.
“Oh god, Alo. Can you not?” she said, rolling her eyes again as she shook her head. “I just think it’s time you get something new to drive around in, you know? The van maybe good for playing ‘hide the sausage’ as you so elegantly put it. And you can keep it around for the girlies you may want to bring around to play it with but, maybe you need another one. Something you can drive Gracie around in that’s not so big...or blue.”
She made a face at the boy as if to say ‘Of course, the girl wants a princess theme’ without saying any words. “Every. Girl. Needs. A. Princess. Party.” her eyes shooting daggers at the boy as she spoke. “Besides, she loves pink, sparkly princess things just as much as she enjoys muddle puddles and playing with that dog. And horses. Actually a good idea, let me write down,” she pulled a pen out of her hand bag and jotted down the word horses to a blank page in the back of the binder.
While Alo was filling the the van up, Mini flipped through her birthday binder, trying to organize up a shopping list to make their trip a bit easier. She looked up at Alo, her pen settled gently between her teeth. “Umm...just Tesco. Don’t think what I have saved up is enough for some fancy foo foo place.”
