Chapter 6 The Burglars

"It's O.K.,'' said Cloe.

"Thank you Caroline," said Caroline's dad. After Cloe had left, Caroline played with her dolls herself and then went to bed thinking about the events that had just happened. When she was finally drifting off she heard a noise from the first floor. Instinctively she got out of bed to investigate, or do whatever detectives did. When she went downstairs she turned on the lights to see who (or what) had caused the noise. Seeing four people dressed in weird striped suits with numbers on them unhooking the TV, she screamed. Dad, mom (carrying Simon), and Andrew all ran to the stairs.

"What is wrong Caroline?" said mom.

"Yeah. Why did you have to wake us up at 5 o'clock in the morning!" Andrew cried.

"Look," said Caroline .

"Oh my gosh!'' said mom when she saw the burglars. When the burglars saw the family with open mouths standing on the stairs staring at them they stared back. Then suddenly realizing that they were caught they grabbed the TV and started out the back door. Caroline's mom rushed to the phone, called 911, and screamed into the phone for help. About 5 minutes later the police, fire department, and ambulance came. While the police officer asked Caroline's mom and dad what the thieves looked like, the fire department and ambulance checked to make sure no one was hurt. After the police, fire department, and ambulance left, Caroline and her family locked the back door (which had been left open) and made sure nothing else was left open. Then exhausted they went back to bed and fell asleep. When Caroline woke up she decided to see what was stolen. So, she went downstairs. The TV was missing and one of the windows in the living room was broken. Her parents were cleaning up the mess the robbers made and Andrew was showing the crime scene to his new friends.

Suddenly Caroline's mom said "Where's Simon?"

"I don't know," said Andrew.

"Where's Simon? Where is my baby!" Caroline's mom cried, "What if the burglars took him?"

"Calm down, Katherine. I'm sure Simon's in our room," said Caroline's dad said.

"I'll go check," Caroline offered. She went upstairs to her parents room and looked for Simon. Not finding him and starting to panic, she looked everywhere for him. Still not seeing him she went downstairs.



"Is he up there?'' Carolines mom cried.



"No...." Caroline started in her smallest voice.



"He's not there!!" Caroline's mom yelled. "Not there! Not there!" Then a little cry came from the living room. Caroline's parents had left Simon on the couch.

"Phew!" Caroline's mom cried. Then she turned her attention on the little crying bundle of white cloth that kicked and screamed on the couch and picked him up. "My little baby," she cooed at him. "How could I leave you there? Hmm?" She kept talking and making faces at him while Andrew and Caroline shared a glance that said "I can't believe this is our mother." Caroline's dad looked at the mess for a second and said:

"Lets go to bed now." So they all went upstairs and soon Caroline heard her family sleeping peacefully. But it was about 3 hours before she could fall asleep.

Chapter 5 The little talk

Once they were out of the room Caroline's dad started talking to her.

"Caroline, what did you do?"

"Nothing."

"Then why is Cloe crying?"

"Um...she got hurt."

"Then why did she say it was your fault?"

"Because...I left something out and she tripped on it."

"Then why did she say that you insulted her and her dolls?"

"Because when she tripped on the toy I left out she broke one of her dolls and she was pretending that another one liked it."

"Oh. So that explains why she told me that you told her that her dolls were the ugliest dolls you had ever seen."

"Ha, ha. I think I'm going to go outside."

"And I think that you are going to apologize to Cloe."

Caroline and her dad went back into the room. "Sorry Cloe", mumbled Caroline.

Chapter 4 Neighbors

Caroline's heart sank. There was only one other room in the house that she could have. It was the ugliest room in the world. Then she remembered that there was the master bedroom too. Maybe she could ask her parents if she could have that room. So, she went up to her mom.

"Mom, can I have the big room?", she asked.

"The big room?",Caroline's mom replied, "Oh. No sorry. That room is for the adults."

"Please!", Caroline cried.

"No.", said mom.

"No fair!", Caroline pouted.

"Sorry. You know the other room? You can have that one."

"NO!!"

"Why don't you go outside? There are our new neighbors outside. Go meet them."

"Okay." Caroline went outside. There were two adult people talking to her dad. Then she saw three kids talking to Andrew. One looked his age, the other was older, and the last one was Caroline's age. The one that looked like her age said, "That is your sister? She is pretty ugly."

"I am not!", cried Caroline.

"Caroline! Be nice!", said dad, "Anyway where was I? Oh yeah. So..."


Caroline was not liking the new neighbors at all. She had tried to play with the older ones, Kate and Sofie, but they wanted to play alone. The younger girl, Cloe, was really mean. The adults only wanted to talk to each other. Caroline was playing with her dolls when Cloe came in. "Can I play too?", she asked.

"OK.",said Caroline, "Do you have any dolls?"

"Yes." Cloe took some dolls out of her bacpack. Do you want your girls to like my boys?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Because they're ugly."

"No they aren't!", Cloe yelled.

"Um...yeah they are."

"Um...no they aren't."

"YES. They are the ugliest dolls I have ever seen."

Cloe started crying. "I'm telling on you!" Pretty soon Caroline saw her dad looking into her bedroom.

"Caroline, I want to have a little talk with you."