Chapter 180: Carlos First Birthday
Sarah grabbed Bell and said, “Let’s just leave her alone. Let’s grab something to eat first. I’m starving.”Contentt bel0ngs to N0ve/lDrâ/ma.O(r)g!
“Hey, you really don’t want to have lunch?” Bell asked again before she left.
“Just go without me! It’s fine.” Scarlett said.
After sitting there for more than ten minutes, Scarlett couldn’t control her mounting restlessness. She wanted to get out of there and go see her dear son. She grabbed her purse and hurried out. She did not want to miss Carlos’s first birthday– not even a second of it.
Scarlett walked around to look for a gift at the shopping mall. Everything she saw looked appealing to her, so she wished she could have just bought out the entire store!
“Are you looking for a gift for a toddler? Can I help you at all?” The store clerk asked.
“Yes, I am! A one-year-old boy.” Scarlett answered promptly.
“Excellent. And did you have anything in particular in mind?”
“I’m just going to browse for a while if that’s okay. Don’t mind me!”
“Okay, just tell me when you need help. I’ll be right here.”
Carlos had been born into a very wealthy family, and he wanted for nothing. That’s why Scarlett was having a hard time figuring out what she might be able to gift him. Besides, he was still too young to have developed any concrete hobbies. As a result, Scarlett was completely stumped.
As she perused the aisles, Scarlett’s eyes landed on a shiny yoyo. It was electric blue in color and glittered like a magnificent crystal. She picked it up and placed it in her palm, looking closely at its details.
Once the clerk noticed that Scarlett was looking at the yoyo, she bounded over from the other end of the store to talk to Scarlett about the item. It had been imported all the way from India and had been infused with minerals right from the Rajasthani desserts, where many of the world’s precious and semi-precious stones tend to come from.
“Would you mind if I gave it a try?” Scarlett asked tentatively.
“Of course, go ahead! No problem at all, go wild.” The clerk said happily.
Scarlett remembered her childhood. When she was a young child, she had a lovely little yoyo that she used to love playing with. She didn’t have many toys growing up, but the yoyo had been affordable enough for her to pay for it with money she had been saving up for months. Her mother had always implored her to share the toy with Skyler, but Scarlett had been very possessive about it and kept the toy to herself at all times. Whenever he wanted to play with it, he would throw a tantrum and inevitably end up in tears.
Scarlett played with the yoyo happily for a few moments and decided that she would pass on her love for yoyos to her son. “I’ll take it!” She declared jubilantly.
“Okay, let me wrap that up for you. Would you like to pick out some glossy wrapping paper? I take it for a special occasion, yes?”
“No, I’ll just take it as it is. Don’t worry about it.” Scarlett said as she messed around with the toy, even managing to do an “around the corner” trick with it. Years of practice had built up Scarlett’s muscle memory. It was like riding a bicycle– you never forgot.
“Wow, you’re quite good at that!” The clerk remarked.
Scarlett smiled and hoped that Carlos would like the toy as much as she had when she had been a child.
Scarlett paid the bill with her credit card and went to the second floor. While she was on the escalator, Scarlett suddenly caught a glimpse of a strange yet familiar figure. She overheard a curious conversation.
“I learned that he loves his son very much, so I really don’t know what gift I should buy for him.”
“Whatever we buy should be true to the identities of you and Mr. Sandler. I gotta choose the gift very carefully. The party is only hours away. I have to be quick and efficient about this.”
Scarlett couldn’t hear the rest because they had gone far away.
She stared at the yoyo in her hand and suddenly had the feeling that she had made a mistake. How could she be so stupid? Carlos would never take a liking to such a simple, even paltry present. He wasn’t an ordinary child, after all– he was the son of a business tycoon.
Scarlett sat unhappily in a coffee shop on the first floor while she pondered her next steps. She was completely lost in thought, her chin resting in her hands. Swimming in a sea of ruminations, her phone suddenly rang. Scarlett answered the phone, rudely ejected from her daydreams. It was Francis.
“Where are you now?” he barked.
Scarlett instantly sat up and said, “What? Oh, right. Um, I’m doing some shopping.”
“Tonight is Carlos’s birthday party, so you have to attend. Make sure to swing by,” he said.
Scarlett knocked on the table with her knuckles and asked, “Where is Carlos?”
“If you want to see your son, you have to get your ass here before three o’clock.” he hollered and then disconnected the line. Scarlett froze there for a few seconds, and then she rushed to stop a cab so she could get to the villa as soon as possible. She knew she had to make haste if she wanted an opportunity to spend time with her son on his first birthday.
Francis took the range of evening dresses that Shirley had picked out for Scarlett to wear. He frowned, his eyebrows furrowing.
Seeing the look on his face, Shirley knew that she had done a sub-optimal job. Francis was clearly dissatisfied with her selections, so she asked with utter politeness, “Sir, would you like to see some other dresses instead? I can pull out some more and start afresh.”
Francis nodded. A while later, one of the domestic help walked in a whole batch of dresses. Each and every dress was ornate and beautifully made. They were all the freshest designs, and in fact, some of them hadn’t even premiered on the runway yet.