ESCAPE

Chapter 34

VALENTINA

The second I set foot in the stadium, Lux was dragging me along with her and introducing me to everyone.

'This is Valentina, she can't talk. Her throat hurts', she says and I would awkwardly smile at whoever I was meeting.

'What do we have here?', asked a voice and a man with sandy hair picked her up. Lux squealed in his arms and I stood there not knowing what to do.

'Hi, I'm Josh. You must Valentina, I've heard about you', he said with a warm smile and I smiled back at him.

'You should go play somewhere else Lux, we're about to start working', he said and she pouted.

'Sound check starts in a few minutes', he said looking at me, hoping that I would take her away.

Sound check?

Josh understood that I didn't know what that meant.

'Right, Niall did mention about you didn't know a lot of things. Well a sound check is basically a warm up session before the real thing, we check if everything is perfect', he said and I nodded.

'Hello', said a voice and I turned to find Harry coming up to us.

Harry and Josh greeted each other and then he looked at us.

'What are you both up to?', he asked with a quizzing expression.

'Josh doesn't want us here', pouted Lux.

'I did not say that', he said quickly and I giggled.

'We have to do sound check Lux, why don't you go play in the dressing rooms?', suggested Harry and she sighed dramatically.

'I have no idea how she became a drama queen', chuckled Harry.

'She learns from the best mate', said Josh.

'Hey', objected Harry and I shook my head at their silliness.

'Go on', he said looking at me and I nodded as I lead Lux towards the dressing rooms.

The rooms were all temporary as the stadium didn't have ones of its own. There were long passages connecting each tent and you could easily get lost in them which was why I kept a close eye on Lux in case she decided to suddenly opt for hide and seek.

'Mummy!', called Lux as we entered the room.

'Hey sweetie, are you having fun?', she asked as she picked her up.

'The boys are being mean', she pouted.

'Well they're busy right now, they are not being mean', she explained and Lux rolled her eyes.

'I really have to stop her from taking drama lessons by those idiots', mumbled Lou and I laughed.

'There's a box of things over there which you can play with, go on, take Val with you', she said as she put her down.

Lux took my hand and showed me a giant box that was as tall as her.

'Mummy keeps costumes in here', she said excitedly and took out a pair of fairy wings.

'You can have Nova's costume', she piped and tried to drag out a pink dress.

Nova?

Nova had a costume too?

I shook my head and helped the little girl take out a pink costume that looked like an oversized Barbie dress.

I couldn't help but laugh as I saw it and Lux laughed with me.