Wishing on a Star by Deborah Gregory

chillin’.” I smile. “You like house music?”
    “Some of it,” Do’ Re Mi says, shrugging. “Why?”
    “We can borrow some of my mom’s records to use as tracks for the show.” Now that we have memorized the lyrics to both of Kahlua’s songs (a small miracle), we can concentrate on my songs. And my songs need tracks. That’s where my mom’s house music comes in. All music, no words. Angie and Aqua still haven’t given in on singing my songs, so I expect another battle on this. But I figure if I have Do’ Re Mi on my side, that will make three against two.
    “Sometimes my mom cranks up the house music in the store and dances. She says it’s like going to church,” I tell her.
    “That’s funny.” Aqua laughs, hearing me. “She should come to our church. She’d have a good time, then. ’Cause we get down.”
    We are planning a trip to Aqua and Angie’s church, but not until after the show, because we are all mad hectic. I pray that Aqua and Angie don’t suggest we use gospel music tracks for the show. For now, it’s too noisy to talk about it. That’s the subway for you.
    We are going down to my mom’s store to see if she will make our costumes. Of course, I know my mom will make me sign an IOU—which really means, pay now
and
pay later. Pay later in duckets, and pay now by cleaning my room. Not every day, mind you, but every hour.
    I also want to give Do’, Aqua, and Angie a surprise. The question is, will my mom cough up three more cheetah backpacks so we can look like a real crew? (Stay tuned, Kats and Kittys, to find out….)
    My mom’s boutique is the brightest store on the block. You can see it all the way down West Broadway, which is a five-block-long strip of boutiques. A lot of famous divas come to my mother’s store to shop.
    We climb the five steps up to the big glass door entrance of Toto in New York. “If my mom offers you anything to eat, take it or she’ll think there’s something wrong with you,” I whisper to Do’ Re Mi.
    Chanel presses the buzzer so we can get buzzed in. All the dope boutiques in New York have buzzers because a lot of shoplifters, or boosters, try to come in and “mop” stuff. That means shopping for free. Boosters don’t usually come into my mother’s store because they are more scared of her than of the police.
    “Ooh, Toto in New York, that is so cute,” Angie says, looking up at the lime green and hot pink sign flapping in the wind.
    “Ooh, look at all the leopard clothes. They got clothes to fit us?” Aqua asks all excited when we get inside.
    “You keep eating like you do and they will,” I smirk as we plop down on the big leopard-print love seat and wait for my mom. We can’t interrupt her because she is doing her leg lifts against the counter. A house music song, “You Think You’re Fierce,” is playing on the sound system.
    “See, that’s house music,” I mumble to Aqua. Bet they’ve never met anyone like my mother in Texas. Aqua and Angie are watching my mother in awe. (Their mouths are open.)
    Mom weighs 250 pounds. That’s 120 pounds more than she did as a model—something “Madame” Simmons loves to make digs about—but she is as beautiful now as she was back then. And I’m not saying this because she is my mother. My mom was and is a real diva—not just “back in the day,” but today.
    “We can’t walk down the streets without some man goospitating and whistling at her,” I tell Do’ Re Mi proudly. “One guy stopped us right and asked my mom, “Girl, is it your birthday, ’cause you sure got a lot of cakes back there?” She hit that bumbling Bozo over the head with her leopard pocketbook. “I’m sure he’s still recovering, somewhere over the rainbow.” I smirk at Do’ Re Mi.
    Get me through this show, I pray silently to Mom’s Josephine Baker poster. (See, an old-school diva like Baker, who used to have a leopard for a pet, understands what I’m going through.)
    “Where’s Toto?” I