But this time Roma shrugged and flounced into the Hall of Primitive Mammals, her fire-red hair a beacon for the others. Wherever Roma went, the other girls of the Prince School quickly followed. The only one who didn’t was the senior girl acting as a chaperone, who seemed to prefer the long-dead animals on display to the pack of princesses she was supposed to be chaperoning.
Georgie tried to hide in the middle of the pack, tuning out Ms Storia’s talk about how the platypus had so many primitive features it was called a “living fossil” and wasn’t that just fascinating? Georgie wished she were back at home with her parents, discussing their plans for the day, the way they had all winter and into the spring. Some days, they went to one of the city’s many museums. Most days, they went to the library and picked out books for Georgie to read. Even though The Richest Girl in the Universe could have purchased every book in the city and still have enough left over to buy a few planets, Georgie thought it was lovely to be able to borrow any book you wanted, and then bring it back and exchange it for another.
Before you think Georgie a skull short of a full skeleton, you must understand that there were very good reasons for Georgie’s lack of interest in the truly mind-boggling amount of money she had. You see, Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington wasn’t always The Richest Girl in the Universe. As a matter of fact, she wasn’t always known as Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington. Just six months before, Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington was a girl named Gurl who lived in a miserable orphanage. There, she spent much of her time daydreaming about a happy life, a real life, without ever expecting to live one. But reality turned out to be more mind-boggling than any daydream. Half a year ago, she learned a lot of things about her life, among them:
That she had been kidnapped by the gangster Sweetcheeks Grabowski when she was just a baby.
That she was subsequently lost by the gangster Sweetcheeks Grabowski because of a special power she had, the power to turn herself invisible.
That she was found by a homeless woman and given to an orphanage called Hope House for the Homeless and Hopeless.
That Georgie escaped Hope House for the Homeless and Hopeless with the help of her good friend Bug, who turned out to be none other than the son of the gangster Sweetcheeks Grabowski.
That her real parents were The Richest Couple in the Universe.
And finally:
That this was an awful lot for a person to take in and still remain sane.
But Georgie was doing her best to adjust to her new life as well as she could, and that included trying to ignore the snotty second-, third-and fourth-richest girls in the universe and paying attention on school trips. Up ahead, Ms Storia was yammering enthusiastically about the development of marsupials. At least that was better than the teachers at Hope House for the Homeless and Hopeless. The only animals they ever wanted to talk about were the ones that could fly.
“Next up,” Ms Storia said, “is the Hall of Flight! We’ll see birds, of course, but also flying squirrels and insects! And we’ll see how scientists are studying the evolution of human flight! Isn’t that fascinating?”
Sigh.
“We are going to learn so many important things!”
Uh-huh, thought Georgie. The most important thing that Georgie had learned in the last six months was the fact that money does not buy happiness. Because as happy as Georgie was with her parents, there were many other things that made Georgie unhappy.
“Ow!” said Bethany Tiffany when Georgie accidentally crashed into her.
“Sorry,” Georgie muttered.
“That is the third time you’ve bumped into me!” Bethany said, rubbing her elbow as if Georgie had hit it with a hammer.
“I said sorry.”
“You’re always bumping into people and you’re always sorry.”
Georgie clenched her teeth to refrain from saying something rude about Bethany’s tiara. Georgie’d had a growth spurt that had happened overnight and her body wasn’t her own any more. The doctor said it was from good nutrition and seemed pleased by this turn of events. Georgie, whose joints ached and whose feet grew so fast that her parents couldn’t keep her in shoes, wasn’t as pleased. She felt like a marionette, all arms and legs jangling and none of them ever under her control.
This wouldn’t be so bad if she wasn’t a leadfoot – a person who couldn’t fly at all. Apparently, you can have more money than everyone in the universe put together, but if you can’t fly even a smidge, well, then you might as well be living in Hope House for the Homeless and Hopeless, eating lard on toast and getting pounded by a girl called Digger (who got her name because she picked her nose). And it didn’t matter that Georgie had a special power all her own. The fact that she could turn herself invisible – that she was the first person in more than a century who could – was the reason she had been kidnapped by Sweetcheeks Grabowski in the first place. Her parents didn’t want to take the risk ever again. They had made her promise that she wouldn’t use the power or even mention it. They had told her to trust no one with her secrets. And that meant that it was impossible to make a real friend.
“Fly, I mean, walk with us, Georgetta.”
The red-haired goddess herself, Roma Radisson, appeared next to Bethany Tiffany and London England. Georgie was immediately suspicious.
“Georgie,” Roma simpered. “We were just kidding before. We didn’t mean anything by it.”
Right, thought Georgie. Roma meant every spiteful word she said. But then, even with everything Georgie had been through, she was a deeply curious girl, the kind of girl who watches the world and misses nothing; she wanted to know why Roma was talking to her. And though she would never have admitted it, Georgie was also a hopeful girl. In the back of her mind, a little voice told her that maybe, maybe, if she were nice to Roma, if she could joke and laugh like the rest of the girls, Roma might be nice to her.
“Tell us,” Roma said. “Were you really kidnapped when you were a baby?”
Even though the story had been in the papers for months and months, everyone always asked the same questions over and over again, as if Georgie would suddenly answer them differently. “I was kidnapped by Sweetcheeks Grabowski. He’s in jail.”
“Amazing!” said London. “And is it true that no one could find you for years and years, and you lived in an orphanage practically your whole life?”
Georgie nodded. “I didn’t even know my real name.”
“Speaking of real,” London said, eyeing Georgie’s thick silver ponytail and fluffing her own blond curls with her fingers, “is that your real hair?”
“Whose hair would it be?” Georgie joked.
The other girls gave each other funny looks, and not the kind that indicated they thought Georgie’s joke was amusing. “Well, anyway,” said Roma, fanning the air. “I bet that orphanage was just so grimy and horrible. I did a TV special once where I had to meet some poor people. They sent me to a farm. I had to pick tomatoes. Awful! I had dirt under my fingernails and everything!”
“At least you could have eaten the tomatoes,” Georgie said. “At the orphanage, I was always hungry.” The girls gaped at her. So much for joking. Since Georgie was always trying not to reveal too much, she was prone to saying strange and unfunny things. (When you’ve spent years in an orphanage shunned by everyone but a cat, you’re prone to saying strange and unfunny things.) Georgie cleared her throat. “So, you were on TV? Was it, uh, cool?”
“She’s been on TV thousands of times,” Bethany said, eyes so green that Georgie wondered if Bethany had ordered them from a boutique. “You haven’t seen Roma’s advert for Cherry Bomb lip balm?”
“Or the video from her new CD, Don’t Get Up, Get Down?” said London.
“Or the ads for Jump Jeans?” said Roma.
“No,” said Georgie. “I don’t watch much TV.”
“What do you do?” Roma demanded.
“Well,” Georgie said. “I’ve been reading a lot.”
“Reading!” London said, her sky-blue
eyes wide. “Why would you do that?”
Roma admired her French manicure, glancing askance at London. “Have you ever thought, London, that she’s been reading my memoir, Fabulousity?”
“Oh!” said London. “Right. That’s a different story.”
Georgie didn’t believe that fabulousity was an actual word, but she decided not to say so. Instead, she said another wrong thing. “I’ve been reading From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs Basil E Frankweiler.”
“The mixed up what?” London said.
“That’s a kid’s book!” said Bethany in horror.
Georgie was tempted to point out that, technically, they were still considered kids, at least by adults too dim to know better, so a “kid” reading a kid’s book wasn’t so surprising, but somehow knew that wasn’t the right thing to say. She was also tempted to tell the girls how thrilling it was to pore over all the books she’d missed reading as a child, but then she knew that wasn’t the right thing to say either. Georgie lumbered along, trying to figure out something fabulous and witty to talk about. Mechanical monkeys stole my memory? No, too crazy. My cat Noodle is really unusual, even for a cat. She’s what they call a Riddle, see, and she can put you in a trance if she wants to… no, too childish. Um, there are giant rats with filed teeth living underground that call themselves The Sewer Rats of Satan. They’re obsessed with kittens. No, too bizarre.
“So tell us about Bug Grabowski,” Roma said, stopping to stare at yet another mounted skeleton of something or another. “Is he really Sweetcheeks’s son?”
“Yes.”
“Oooh! A gangster’s boy! How dangerous!” said London.
“Well,” said Georgie. “It was until they threw Sweetcheeks in jail. Now he’s just a regular boy.”
“Not such a regular boy,” said Bethany. “Is he your boyfriend?”
Georgie felt herself flush. “No, he’s not my boyfriend.”
“Did you see that advert he did for Rocket Boards?” Bethany said. “Those muscles!”
Ever since Bug was declared the youngest winner of the citywide Flyfest competition, he’d been spending hours and hours every day working out with his personal trainer. Like Georgie, Bug had also grown some centimetres… wider. His biceps bulged and his stomach now looked as if someone had carved furrows in it. Georgie still hadn’t decided whether she liked it or not, but it was clear that Roma, London and Bethany did.
“He’s got the most interesting face,” Roma said, which, to Georgie, was a polite way of saying that Bug looked a lot like a bug. “If he’s not your boyfriend,” said Roma, “you won’t mind setting me up.”
“Setting you up?” said Georgie. “But…” She trailed off. She wanted to say that she never saw Bug herself, now that he was so famous. And then she wanted to say that Bug was just another reason she knew money couldn’t buy happiness. That the last time she did see him, months ago, things hadn’t gone so well. He couldn’t seem to remember her real name and kept calling her Gurl, and she didn’t know what to say about his father being… well, his father. She asked him if he wanted to go flying and he bragged about a late-night photo shoot he’d been on and how that had made him too tired to do anything. He asked her if she wanted to turn them both invisible and wander around the city, but she told him that her parents didn’t want her to do that any more. They’d sat at the Bloomingtons’ huge dining room table and pushed the chef’s food around their plates in silence.
But Georgie wouldn’t talk about any of this with Roma, London, and Bethany. And even if Georgie wanted to talk to them, they wouldn’t have given her the chance.
“What?” said Roma. “You don’t think I’m good enough for him?”
You’re not, Georgie thought. “No!” Georgie said. “It’s just…”
“It’s just what?” Roma snapped.
“Nothing,” Georgie said. “I meant—”
“Just because you’re rich doesn’t mean that you’re all that, OK?” Roma said, her voice icy. “Anyway, you don’t have that much money.”
A hot flash of annoyance made Georgie blurt, “I’m The Richest Girl in the Universe.”
“Oh!” said Roma, lavender eyes blazing. “Well. You might have more money than most people, but you’ve never actually done anything.”
Georgie, who had rescued her cat from an army of giant rat men, unwillingly stolen for a matron with a plastic surgery obsession, endured a makeover by a magical Personal Assistant named Jules, defeated a cabal of Punks, escaped a narcissistic gangster (twice) who just happened to be a former child model, evaded a zipper-faced pterodactyl, and befriended a genius Professor with grass for hair, said, “I’ve done a lot of things!”
Roma put her hands on her hips. “Have you made your own CD? Written a book? Had your own line of deodorants?”
Georgie, who didn’t think that having your own line of deodorants was anything to boast about, said, “No, but—”
“You can’t even fly!” exclaimed Roma. “You’re a leadfoot! And I know you haven’t trademarked your own slogan. Have you ever heard anyone say: ‘That’s so fab’? Well, I own that.”
“Own what?”
“The words! I made up that phrase all by myself!”
“But anyone can say that!” Georgie protested. Oops. Roma got so red in the face that she resembled a Roma tomato.
“Fine,” she said, glaring at Georgie with her lavender eyes. “I only invited you to walk with us because I was trying to be nice. I won’t bother any more!” She and the three girls sped ahead of Georgie, Roma announcing: “Georgetta Bloomington in is love. With herself. So not fab™.” The three girls flew off as if Georgie was just another dead thing the museum had mounted on a stick.
Georgie looked down at the floor and resisted the urge to call them all a bunch of Dunkleosteuses. Of course, Roma and her friends had only wanted to grill her about Bug because Roma wanted a new boyfriend. Who knew that the Prince School would turn out to be so much like Hope House for the Homeless and Hopeless?
Georgie paused in front of the skeleton of a spiny anteater. Oh, get a grip, Gurl, she told herself. So the other girls at the Prince School didn’t like her. And so what that Bug was running around the city, starring in adverts for Foot Fetish foot powder and Cheeky Monkey shaving cream, even though he didn’t shave yet? So what that he hadn’t called her in weeks and that was only for five minutes to tell her about the film roles he’d been offered? So what that the only time she got to see him was in magazine pictures? He was busy, that’s all. That didn’t mean they weren’t friends any more.
Did it?
Georgie realised that she’d got pretty far behind the group and had to run quickly to catch up. And that, you see, was her biggest mistake. When one has experienced a serious and dramatic growth spurt that has caused one’s feet and limbs to lengthen far beyond one’s brain’s ability to compensate, doing anything quickly is unwise. Georgie tripped over someone’s outstretched leg and crashed into an unfinished exhibit entitled “Mega Marsupials”. Georgie’s own mega-sized limbs took out the partially-assembled bones of a giant wombat, which then landed in a painful, thunderous heap on top of her. Georgie was dazed, but not nearly dazed enough to block out the loud, mocking laughter of the Prince Girls, Roma Radisson’s loudest of all.
Yes, her name was Georgetta Rose Aster Bloomington, and she was, literally, The Richest Girl in the Universe.
But all she wanted to do was disappear.
Chapter 2
Eight Arms to Hold You
“Good, good,” said the photographer. “Now hold that pose. Hold it, hold it, hoooooold it, just another minute.” The camera whirred and clicked.
Bug had been holding his arms over his head in a V – for victory! – for what seemed like hours now. Every muscle in his body ached, the tip of his nose itched, his feet were killing him, and he had spots burned into his retinas from the camera flashes. He never knew standing still could be such hard work.
It was a gorgeous April day – the sky a rich,
robin’s-egg blue, the sea beyond the docks sparkling as if the surface were sprinkled with gems. A day perfect for flying. Bug was sure that Central Park was packed with people doing just that. The thought made him so wistful that he forgot to stand still; he looked up at the sky and sighed. Not because he wanted to fly, but because he didn’t want to. He didn’t know people could be this tired and live.
“That’s gorgeous,” said the photographer. “I love it! Now look towards the water; I need a profile shot. Come on, I need you to think regal, OK, Bug? You’re a duke! No, you’re a king! You’re the king of flyers!”
Bug rolled his over-large, buglike eyes, wondering how he could look like the king of flyers with both feet flat on the ground, but he turned his face to the sea anyway. He was being paid a lot of money to do this ad for Skreechers trainers, money that his agent, Harvey “Juju” Fink, said Bug could use. “What about all the money from all those other ads and posters and everything else?” Bug had asked. “What about the Cheeky Monkey campaign?” For that one, Bug had spent hours stuck in a hot bathroom with bitter-tasting shaving cream melting into his mouth. Ugh.
“What other adverts? Those little things? Pennies! Nickels! Dimes!” said Juju, who got his nickname because of his magical ability to promote athletes, and because all of his hair – including lashes and brows – had fallen out all at once on his twenty-fifth birthday. (There are two kinds of juju, superstitious people say. Good and bad. Juju seemed to have a little of both.)
“Skreechers trainer company is offering you your biggest contract yet,” Juju informed his youngest and most valuable client. “The biggest you could ever get, if you never win the Flyfest again.”
“What are you talking about?” Bug told him. “I’ll win Flyfest again. Wait and see. I’m going to win a whole bunch of Flyfests.”