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On any other day, Ilistala would have found her mom's crappy car to be absolutely hilarious. Not only did it stall and turn off at red lights, but it made Ioyla go crazy, too, and that was always a blast. However, this was a very special day, and Stala absolutely had to get to the mall on time. Too bad the car didn't feel the same way.

Almost half an hour past the original meet-up time, Ioyla's shitty gray car puttered up to the main doors. "Well," she said, smiling but looking sheepish, "we're here. D'ya want me t'walk you in?"

"Nooo..." Stala replied, unbuckling and climbing out of the front seat. "I'm just gonna go to the mall with Elena, Momma. I don't need a chaperone."

"Are you sure? We can hold hands! We can skip!"

Ilistala stared at her mother with a mixed look of irritation and embarassment. Now that Stala was older and more "refined", she failed to find any humor in her mother's strange behavior. Sure, her car was funny, but not Ioyla herself. Ilistala was growing up. She slammed the car door shut and speed-walked into the mall.

"WE'LL SING SONGS!" Ioyla cried to the empty car, driving away.

Once inside, Stala adjusted her shirt and checked her watch. Great, I'm late. Stupid car... Twining a finger around her prized necklace, Stala began scoping the mall for her friend. She was sure Elena would be pleasently surprised to see that Stala had grown up to be a Big Girl, but the question was: would Elena be an even Bigger Girl? The idea that she would never catch up to her friends, age-wise, sent a bitter shiver down her spine.

After a few minutes of searching the main entrance, Ilistala spotted the back of a familiar head of hair: inky-black, punctured with what appeared to be glimmering stars. Sneakily, Stala crept up behind her friend, until she was just close enough to...

"LENA!" Ilistala yelped, wrapping her arms around Elena's shoulders to hug her.

"Why thank you, Lena~" Stala said to Elena's compliment, placing her palm beneath one of the barely-manageably curls and pumping upwards. She giggled, adjusted her shirt once more, and stood next to her friend. We're peers, she thought quietly, and allowed a smile of pride to split her face.

To Elena's question, Ilistala could only shrug. "I have nooo idea. I don't think I've ever been to a mall this big!" She cut herself off to gleefully form her arm into a hook for Elena to take. "Scratch that," Stala added, "I don't think I've ever been to a mall--period!"

Whether or not the Tale took her invition to loop arms was a moot point: Ilistala was far too excited to stand still for long. She hurried into the large open space, squealing with joy and all too aware of it. Her tween mind was fast at work, going over every scenario she had seen in the movies she had watched (Stala simply adored those funky twins, Cary-Jane and Annie) a few days prior to the mall invite. "Is there a clothes store around here? My Mom gave me some money to buy things with." Oh, just the very idea of shopping with a friend made Ilistala want to jump up and yell!

There was no way she could argue her and Elena's different tastes in clothes. "Got me there, Lena," Ilistala said soberly, nodding. She had a feeling this shopping trip would take longer than necessary...

At Elena's direction, Ilistala, hitching in a low giggle, promptly took off. Wings folded against her back to cut through the wind, she zigzagged through crowds and split up groups, earning plenty of agitated glares from those she disturbed. Stala finally stopped in front of a trendy-looking shop with hot pink flourescent lights and repetitive dance music pouring through the speakers. "This looks good!" Stala cried, waving her arms to make Elena hurry.

"Yes, here," Ilistala replied, and followed Elena into the store.

Inside, the shop was just as obnoxious as it let on: the hot pink lights from outside were accompanied by electric green and acid blue inside; the techno music was turned up to a volume that made Stala's heart thump against her ribs. The floors, linoleum and inky black, were painted in what appeared to be blood splatter. The clothes toed the line between racy and slutty.

Ilistala loved it in here.

"Ohhh!" Stala whispered, making a beeline for a rack of bubblegum pink shirts. She pawed through the sizes until she found a small--her size. Removing it from the rack, she held it up against her chest, looking to Elena for approval. "Whaddya think? Too much?" Too little was more like it. The shirt, if you wanted to call it that, ended a good deal above the navel and lacked any sort of sleeve. The legend YOU'RE ON THE TOP OF MY TO-DO LIST was written across the front in glittery silver letters.

Putting Elena's suggestion into good use, Ilistala nodded and placed the shirt/slutty dishtowel back on the rack. She perused the rack for a few more minutes, failed to find anything she liked in red, and moved on to the next one. There was a look of interested concentration on her face that would probably never be duplicated ever again.

"Oh!" Stala whispered again, pulling a cherry red cami from the rack. The material was imitation satin, deep red, and fringed with black lace. "This," she said, impressed, "this is the kinda shirt for me!" Probably not.

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Stala tapped a finger to her chin, mulling Elena's suggestion over. A black skirt would probably look cute... she placed the side of her rigid hand over her eyebrows as if she were a famed explorer and the Perfect Elusive Black Skirt were some rare animal.

"There," she murmured, sliding forward once she spotted a small inky black miniskirt that positively screamed of kinderwhore. She yanked the thing off its rack and modeled it against her legs, frowning slightly. "This doesn't look that great..." Stala muttered, more to herself than anyone else. Still, what did Elena think?

Ilistala nodded her head in agreement, already placing the skirt back on the rack before the new one was even picked out. Once finished with smoothing the skirt back into place, she turned to the other skirt Elena held out. She examined it with a shrewd eye, holding it up to the light, against her legs like the one before, and eventually with the red shirt.

Deeming it cute, Stala giggled airily. "It's awesome!" she said, making her way to the check-out counter; however, she soon stopped and turned back to her friend, puzzled. "Aren't you gonna get anything?"