Filomina Noir and the Case of the Posted Diary

March 17, 2008

Dear Diary,

I awoke in my bed with a Kool-Aid hangover you wouldn’t believe.

The glow-in-the-dark hearts on the ceiling were spinning about the pink room, and my head was swimming with the events of the previous night. I tried to make sense of them, but they were as fuzzy as the plush bear-princess wedged by my bedpost.

I sat up and brushed the powdered sugar from my face. The room was quiet, too quiet. With the amount of light shining through my Barbie-print curtains, I could scarcely see a trail of glitter leading underneath my rose colored sheets. Rummaging through the empty juice boxes, and Pixy Stix wrappers, I tossed the covers aside. There lay Bubble Cup, My Little Pony, at least the top half of her. Some one was trying to send me a message.

I got rid of the pony head, and cleaned up the glitter. I didn’t waste any time mourning. Bubble Cup had been a good friend of mine for many years, and I would never have wished any harm on her, but what can I say? She had it coming. Besides, I had bigger pom-poms to fluff. I had to figure out who was behind this before they struck again.

“Girl Guides!” I thought. The Girl Guides had been especially ornery lately, ever since the Brownie gang had taken hold of the West Mount territory. I had recently crossed the Guides after accidentally stumbling on to their cream-filled cookie racket. It had been a lean year for me and cookies don’t grow on trees, so what was a girl to do? I spied an opening, took a handful of goods and headed for the door. Now the guides were out for revenge.

But this wasn’t the work of the Guides. It’s not their style. Guides are many things, but ambiguous isn’t one of them. They don’t leave you guessing. No, this was someone else’s doing. But who’s was as big a mystery as Dora the Explorer’s sexual orientation.

My thoughts were hijacked by the rumbling of a bus engine. The mystery was going to have to wait. I downed some Fruit Loops, and headed out.

Ms. Phillips' elementary classroom was unusually gray and disorderly. My desk was in it’s usual place, nestled in the back between the hamster cage and Suzie Whitmore. I went straight to my chair, and settled in.

“Hi!” Suzie addressed me, her pig-tails jiggling.

I ignored her and turned towards the cage to my left. The hamster wasn’t much of a conversationalist, but it beat the sparkles out of talking with Suzie Whitmore. Suzie had been diagnosed with a kootie growth on her psyche as a young child, and her Doctors were forced to surgically remove her personality. That’s the only explanation for her that I could come up with.

Just then, the door swung open, and in stepped a curvy blond. She was a tall drink of water; her gams were three feet if they were an inch. Writing her name on the board, she introduced herself as “The Substitute”. She seemed harmless enough, but there was something about this dame I didn’t trust. Not wasting any time, she cut straight to the chase.

“I need your help.” She said to me. “I need you to tell me the answer to four plus three.”

“Sorry, Doll.” I muttered. “ But I know your type. Broads like you ain’t nothin’ but trouble.”

Unfazed, the hussy kept at it. She used every trick in the book to try and get her way, but I wouldn’t budge. I was one tough Dunkaroo. Finally she changed her tone, and caught me by surprise. I was blindsided by a detention and a trip to the office. The next thing I knew I was in front of the big man himself, Principal Peterson.

The office was hot, like an easy-bake oven, and the timer was just about to ding. Peterson interrogated me for hours, but I kept my cupcake hole shut. Eventually he let me off with a warning, and I was tossed onto the playground so hard that I almost lost a scrunchie.

The rest of the day was no picnic either, but by the time I got home, I managed to get a lead on Bubble Cup’s assassin. Popping a juice box, I read a note one of my sources had left in my lunch bag. He’d spied a blue pony hoof in the locker of a Jr. High kid. It was Donnie, my jackass brother. I should have known.

Finally it’s all starting to making sense. But bed time is coming, and it’s too late for me to do anything about it now. I will have to deal with Donnie, and his G.I. Joes tomorrow. Until then, all I can do is wait for morning, and hope that Polly Pocket and her friends will be safe.

What can I tell ya, Diary? Life ain't fair, especially around here. This is a tough town for a six year old.