Page 27 of Guiding Little Gabi

Before anyone realized it, she pressed the button that activated all the jets in the hot tub. The multicolored foam surged. In fact, it was more like the foam detonated.

“No, no, no, no!” Pippi screamed.

“Kill the jets!” Sadie yelled.

“I’m trying,” Wren called out while frantically feeling her way around the walls of the tub. But by then, the thick foamwas flowing over the edges of the sunken tub in every direction. “Help me. I can’t find the button!”

As they all slid their hands over the sides of the hot tub, the different colors of the thick foam blended together, turning it a dark purple. Before they could find the button to stop the jets, the foam covered the entire concrete border around the hot tub and was creeping toward the pool.

Gabi jumped out of the hot tub and attempted to scoop the foam back into the water, but it was no use. Grabbing all the towels, she hurried to build a terry cloth barrier between the hot tub and the pool.

“Um, Gabi?” Pippi called from the hot tub. “Are you really, really cold?”

Was she crazy? As hard as they were all working, how could she be cold? Especially in July. “No.”

“Crap on a cracker!” Hayleigh yelled. “Is it me, or is Gabi purple?”

Gabi blinked. Were these girls all crazy?

“If the purple people eaters get here, you are going to be out of luck,” Wren said.

Sadie nodded, then a look of confusion crossed her face. “Wait. I thought the people eaters were purple, not that they ate purple people.”

“That has to be it,” Pippi chimed in, nodding. “I mean, they’d starve if all they could eat were purple people.”

Gabi stared at her body. Despite the gloves she still wore, the girls were right. Her arms and legs and chest had not been covered by plastic. If the people eaters love snacking on all things purple, she was in trouble. “Well, shi… shirtballs!”

She then took a good look at her friends. “I don’t believe I’ll be the solo item on the menu. You’re all purple, too.”

This was so not good. As she pushed the towel barrier toward the edge of the concrete, she groaned. “Do you think the Bigs would mind painting the concrete purple?”

“Don’t tell me,” Sadie said as she sank back into the hot tub.

“Crap on a cracker! The concrete is purple, too? Well, that’s just great.” Hayleigh flopped back into the still-foaming water beside Sadie.

“What should we do now?” Pippi inquired. “I enjoy a good prank, but this time it seems the joke is on us.”

At that point, telling everyone she wasn’t a lawyer flew right out the window. Instead, Problem Solver Gabi took center stage.

Caught up in the moment, Gabi shot to her feet. “That’s right! This wasn’t our fault. We all checked the warning labels on those bath bombs. It didn’t say anything about not using them in a hot tub. We are the victims of false advertising. It clearly states in Section… well, I’d have to look that up, but I’ll bet there’s a section somewhere that says you have to label bath bombs with warnings. How were we supposed to know the foam would go everywhere? We’ll call our Congressman… or… or the Federal Trade Commission. We shouldn’t get in trouble. We should sue!”

Filled with righteous indignation for her friends, Gabi paused to see if they were paying attention. If their gaping mouths and wide eyes were any indication, they had heard every word.

“How do you know all that?” Hayleigh asked. “More importantly, can we find a reason to blame the people who made the food coloring?”

Gabi had never researched food coloring before. Of course, she hadn’t looked into bath bombs either. This was probably one of those times Raleigh would have told her to keep quiet. Just as well he wasn’t there yet.

“Of course we can. Did the warning label say to keep the food coloring off the concrete? No. Did it say that the soap in bath bombs wouldn’t deactivate the coloring? No.”

“Do bath bombs have soap in them?” Wren asked.

“Let’s not get sidetracked with trivialities.” How was Gabi supposed to know? She’d never bombed a bath before in her life. “But if it goes in the tub and makes foam… which is practically bubbles… then I think the assumption of soap being involved would be a given. Does it say the bath bombs don’t contain soap?”

“I knew we were going to be best friends!” Sadie said. “Hayleigh, of course, she knows all things like this. Gabi is a lawyer, remember? Right Gabi? You’ll be able to fix everything. Right?”

Now’s your chance. Tell them the truth.

Sure, that was easy for Beetlebrenda to say.

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