Picture Perfect (Geek Girl, Book 3)

  Then I clear my throat.

  I memorised that speech from my guidebook on the train on the way home, just in case anybody asked. It’s a good thing I know my family so well.

  “Give me your guidebook, Harriet.”

  Unfortunately, they appear to know me even better.

  I reach into my satchel and hand it over. Annabel flicks through it and then stops. I really wish I hadn’t underlined those exact sentences in green highlighter.

  “Right,” she says slowly. “Well, I’m glad you’ve taken the study of New York so seriously. That should come in handy over the next few days.”

  She hands me back the guidebook.

  “Why?” I frown. “What do you mean?”

  “You’re grounded, Harriet.”

  I stare at her, and then at Dad. “Do you mean well balanced and sensible?” I ask. “Or … prevented from flying, like an aeroplane?”

  “I mean you’re grounded. Verb, informal. You will stay in your room for the next five days.”

  OK: I’ve never been grounded. Ever.

  “But …” I can feel alarm creeping up my throat. The shoot’s tomorrow. I have to go. If I don’t, I’m going to let Wilbur and Nancy down. My fashion career will be over for the second time. I’ll be back to being nobody all over again.

  “No buts,” Annabel says, recrossing her arms. “Go to your room.”

  “Dad—”

  “Nope,” he says. “Beneath this deceptively charming and handsome exterior, I am genuinely quite angry.” He clears his throat. “So do what Annabel said. Go to your room, etcetera.”

  Then they both shuffle slightly and look at each other.

  I think they’re even more surprised about this than I am. It looks like they’re rehearsing a scene from a play called How to Deal With Naughty Children and they haven’t quite learnt their lines properly.

  “Do I get to leave my room to go to the toilet? Or do you want me to use a houseplant?”

  They glance at each other. “You can use the toilet,” they decide unanimously.

  “And the kitchen, or do you want me to starve?”

  Silence. “We’ll leave food outside your door.”

  “And the garden or do I have to take deep breaths through the floorboards?”

  “Harriet,” Annabel snaps. “Go to your bedroom. We will work out the oxygen requirements of this grounding later.”

  “FINE,” I shout, stomping up the stairs and slamming yet another door behind me. “WHATEVER.”

  Except nothing is fine at all.

  So I get up the next morning at 5am, when the entire house and everyone in it is still fast asleep.

  I turn off my phone.

  And I run away again.

  ew York is a different place this early in the morning.

  Gone are the tourists, the cameras, the breathable trainers and the waterproof backpacks. Gone are the giant maps and the confused conversations and the buzzy, impatient queues next to the information booths.

  At 7am, New Yorkers take their city back.

  I stand quietly in Grand Central station, watching their neat suits, tailored dresses and silk scarves: moving with the deliberate poise and grace of people who know exactly where they’re going.

  And even though I know my dad should still be in bed, every time I see a man with red hair, I have to duck behind one of them.

  Running away is a lot harder than it looks.

  Especially when everybody in the entire world suddenly seems to have morphed overnight into my dad.

  “My little Pease-blossom,” Wilbur says as yet another man in a suit and unnecessarily colourful tie walks down the stairs and I abruptly bolt behind a nearby column. “Are we playing hide-and-seek? Are you under some impression that you look exactly like an enormous piece of marble and therefore blend in perfectly?”

  I peek out from behind it and glance at the enormous, lit-up, multi-faceted clock hanging above us. 6.34am. According to their usual schedule, Dad and Annabel should just be waking up now.

  I shiver slightly.

  It’s starting to look like the clock isn’t the only thing in this building with more than one face.

  “Actually,” I say, patting the column, “I think this is Indiana limestone, which is sedimentary rock, while marble is metamorphic. They’re really quite different.”

  Wilbur rubs his eye tiredly with the sleeve of his gold lamé jacket. “Bunny-ears, they could both be made from the compressed souls of angels and kittens at this time of the morning and I wouldn’t give a squirrel’s bottom.”

  He starts wobbling off across the concourse so I quickly scan the room once more for angry redheads in their mid-forties and then follow him.

  “So, where’s the shoot?” I studied my guidebook on the train this morning for an hour and a half, trying to distract myself from the guilt by guessing where the location could be. “The Empire State Building? Central Park? The Rockefeller Center? Inside a diner, leaning against the metal counters and eating hamburgers?”

  “Chunky-monkey,” Wilbur laughs. “This is high art. We want subversive. Insightful. Explosive. We’re not shooting the front cover for New York for Tourists.”

  This is probably why models aren’t really asked for their creative input.

  Somebody shouts Harriet and I spin round with a dry mouth. “Hurry up,” a woman sighs again at a little girl, dragging her doll along the floor. “Why are you always so slow?”

  I swallow noisily as Wilbur starts pulling a huge suitcase towards the stairs that lead down to the subway.

  “Harriet?”

  I flinch and turn to the side. “Hawt,” a man says, flapping himself with his hand. “It’s so hawt, isn’t it?”

  And then the crowd dissolves into a hum of Harriet Harriet Harriet Harriet …

  Oh my God. I’m going mad.

  I ran away less than two hours ago and guilt is already turning me into Lady Macbeth. Any minute now I’ll be scrubbing imaginary blood off my hands, or – in this instance – the tears of my worried parents.

  I pause on the stairs and look into the darkness. The handrail is sticky, there’s a rush of hot, damp air, and it smells of sweat and oil and metal. A thundering sound starts rumbling and gets louder until the floor shakes.

  I want to go back to Greenway.

  “Umm,” I say, turning around. “Wilbur, I’ve made a horrible mistake.”

  “Mistake?” Wilbur looks at my striped trousers and green gym shirt with pursed lips, and then shakes his head. “No, Sugar-lump. This look is divine. Although maybe try pool sliders instead of flip-flops next time.”

  “I mean –” I cough – “today. The shoot. Can they replace me?”

  Wilbur starts laughing.

  “Can they replace you? Bless my baby cabbages, you’re not a salad with the wrong dressing, Munchkin. The shoot’s in an hour. I can’t magic models out of thin air like genies, as handy as that would be.” Then he pats my shoulder. “What’s up, Poppet? Don’t you want a day at the seaside?”

  And – just like that – my day splits down the middle.

  I can go back to Greenway: to the loneliest bedroom, the angriest parents and the longest extended grounding in the known history of man, ever. I can sit in my bedroom and wonder what page of my diary Alexa is currently laughing at and which amazing new cafés Jessica has taken Nat to. I can wonder whether my dog even remembers what I look like.

  Or I can go to the beach.

  Sunshine. Sand. Sea. Hot dogs. Deckchairs. Dolphins, jumping in perfectly timed sequence through sparkling water. Apparently there are 7.5 billion billion grains of sand in the world, and it’s been at least two years since I saw any of them.

  I’m in huge trouble anyway. I may as well earn my punishment properly. That’s just basic logic.

  “A seaside? In New York? Really?”

  “Absolutement. I’ll even buy you an ice cream, which I will then not allow you to eat because you’re a model and cold whipped fat is not one of the d
ietary requirements.”

  I think about it. The seaside sounds very far from Dad’s New York City office, which might mean I can stop hearing my name every couple of seconds.

  “Harriet?”

  A woman walks past. “I just hate having to get up this early,” she says into her phone. “Don’t you just hate it?”

  I don’t really have a choice. Plus I’m still wearing my favourite flip-flops this morning so at least I look marginally appropriate.

  I nod and wait until Wilbur’s plinking down the stairs again: one hand held loosely in the air, another dragging the suitcase in loud crashes behind him.

  And I pull out the box in my head: the box I haven’t touched in months. Tentatively, I open it. Then – gently, softly – I put in Annabel. I put in Dad. I put in Tabitha. I put in Nat and Toby and Hugo. I lob in Alexa, still clutching my purple diary.

  Finally, with a guilty wince, I put in Nick.

  And then I gently close it.

  It’s just for the morning, that’s all.

  Just one tiny morning while I have a bit of fun. And then, when I’ve had my morning of adventure, I’ll get everyone back out again and deal with the consequences.

  Whatever they may be.

  ere are some fascinating facts about the New York subway:

  And here are some things the guidebooks didn’t mention.

  They didn’t say, for instance, that the New York subway makes the London Underground look like an enormous toy constructed for children.

  They didn’t say that everything is gun-metal grey: the floors, the lights, the outsides of the trains, the insides of the trains, the handrails and the seats.

  They didn’t say that the map isn’t littered with chirpy names like Piccadilly Circus or Green Park, but has strict, angry-looking numbers and letters instead.

  They didn’t say how huge it is, or how busy, or how incredibly hot and bright.

  But probably the single most defining fact that none of the guidebooks mention is that the New York subway map makes no sense.

  Literally none.

  Wilbur and I stand by a large map for at least ten minutes, tilting our heads to the side in the hope that one way or another will make everything clearer.

  It doesn’t.

  “So …” I say after a long silence. “The red line is 1, 2 and 3?”

  “Apparently,” Wilbur sighs. “And the orange one is B, D, F and M.”

  I get a bit closer to it. “And this one is called 14th Street, and this one is called 14th Street? And all of these are called 34th Street?”

  “Apparently so.” Wilbur sighs as he starts scrolling through his iPhone. “Honey-puff, New York is the most magical place on earth, but the subway can kiss my cat’s pyjamas. Next time, we’re so getting a taxi.”

  I spend the rest of the journey tucked into a steel seat, staring surreptitiously at everyone getting on and off the train.

  There’s an old lady, dressed head to toe in fluorescent green with an enormous scarlet flower tied around her head. There’s a girl with dreadlocks and enormous high heels and a pair of fluffy headphones. There’s an old man, muttering to himself, and a woman in an expensive-looking suit, quietly crying into her handbag.

  Every age, every nationality, every dress sense clambers on and off the F train as we rush through the city; through Manhattan over the river into Brooklyn, popping in and out of the ground like a little mole coming up for air.

  And slowly the city starts to shrink: from enormous skyscrapers to smaller buildings with colourful graffiti and stars and words and paintings etched bravely across them.

  Sunshine begins to pour in, and the sky opens out again. From tiny, far-away patches it gets closer and brighter and bluer and lighter until it’s back to its normal size.

  “Are we there?” I say as Wilbur starts packing up his sketchbook. He’s been doodling in earnest ever since we left Manhattan, but every time I try to see what it is he bops me on the nose with the end of a pencil. “Are we at the seaside?”

  “Uh-huh, my petite grenouille. As close as we can get without driving straight into it, anyway.”

  As if to prove his point, my stomach does an excited little frog-like hop. The windows of the train are open, and I can smell saltiness and sweetness and candy floss and hot dogs.

  Maybe Wilbur will let me go for a quick swim with the dolphins. Ooh, maybe the shoot will be under water.

  I’ll just have to hope fervently that nobody ever finds out about the octopus in Tokyo or they will never let me near any kind of sea life.

  “Where are we meeting Nancy?” I ask as we both climb off the train on to a platform that’s much smaller, quieter and less cavernous than the last one.

  “Right here,” a clear-cut American voice says.

  And I turn around and immediately begin to flush.

  Nancy is standing behind us, glowing. She’s in a large white shirt and white trousers; she’s holding a bright white handbag and wearing bright white sunglasses. She looks like something out of The Lord of The Rings.

  But that’s not why I’m slowly changing colour.

  Standing next to her is a boy. He’s tall and deeply tanned. His hair is blond and swept in messy, sandy tufts across his forehead. There are little white strands around the front where the sun has bleached it, and his eyes are bright piercing blue.

  He looks like a wolf, except one with a little scar across his cheek that somehow makes him even more handsome.

  But none of this is why I’m blushing either.

  The reason I’m getting steadily hotter and redder and more uncomfortable is that I already know him.

  It’s the boy from the reception at LA MODE.

  Except he’s not studying his phone now.

  This time, he’s staring directly at me.

  ver the last year I have learnt quite a lot about boys.

  I’ve learnt that some of them are frightened of seagulls, particularly large ones. I’ve learnt that some had a hamster called Strategic when they were six, and it met an untimely end when a door blew shut during an impulsive bid for freedom.

  I have learnt that some enjoy playing retro Pac-man and hate passion fruit because they think it’s slimy like tiny eyeballs and that badgers are brilliant because they walk like old men. I’ve learnt some have a favourite beach on the south coast of Australia and like the smell of lime because it reminds them of a pancake recipe their mum used to make when they were little.

  I’ve learnt that some take stairs two at a time and throw their head back when they’re laughing so you can see the secret mole at the base of their throat.

  I’ve learnt that in the second before they lean down to kiss you, their bottom lip twitches slightly.

  In other words: I’ve learnt a lot about one boy.

  The rest are still a great, unsolved mystery to me.

  As the blond boy stares at me, I can feel myself getting more and more confused.

  I quickly wipe my face and look down, just in case I’ve got blueberry muffin all over my T-shirt or something.

  When I look up, he’s still staring.

  So I decide to confront the situation the only way I know how.

  “Hello again,” I say, holding out my hand as Nancy draws Wilbur aside and starts talking quietly. “My name is Harriet Manners. It’s nice to meet you properly.”

  He frowns as he takes my hand. “Have we met before?”

  I flush a bit harder.

  “I’m the skyscraper-facts girl,” I say, clearing my throat. “From the LA MODE sofa?”

  As if LA MODE Sofa is a distant country, like Spare Oom in Narnia, or Argentina.

  “Are you sure? Because I don’t think I’d forget a face like yours.”

  He must be gripping quite tightly, because it feels like every drop of blood is being squeezed into my cheeks. I suddenly wish I’d eschewed the traditional Western handshake in favour of a Nepalese head-butt.

  “You’d be surprised,” I say, trying to tug my hand ba
ck as politely as I can.

  He finally releases it with a devastating smile. His teeth are blindingly white.

  “Sorry,” he says. “Beautiful British girls always make me forget myself. I’m Caleb Davis, but everybody calls me Cal.”

  My stomach lurches. Beautiful?

  “I don’t think that’s what everybody calls you, Caleb,” a loud voice says from behind me.

  I turn around.

  The really tall, bald girl from the LA MODE reception kisses the air a metre from his ear with a loud mwah.

  “Be nice, K,” Cal says with a frown.

  “I’m never nice, babe,” she says, straightening her orange maxi dress. “It’s one of my striking characteristics. Kenderall,” she adds, turning back to me. “K-e-n-d-e-r-a-double-l. You’ve probably never met a Kenderall before, because I invented the name myself.”

  Wow. She must have been a really advanced baby.

  “Umm.” I blink in shock at the black and pink hairy thing grunting on the floor next to her. I don’t want to state the obvious, but: “Is that a—”

  “Pig? Yeah. He’s my pet miniature teacup pig, Sir Francis.”

  Without being rude, there is no way this pig could get into a teacup or a teapot. It’s enormous.

  “He’s another one of Kenderall’s striking characteristics,” Cal says as the pig stares into the distance with a glazed expression.

  “Nobody forgets the Girl with the Pig,” Kenderall says fiercely. “Although that wannabe Pilot has just gone and got a tiny pink one, and they say she makes it wear wellies. Next time I see her at a casting we’re having words.”

  “Sir Francis?” I say, bending down and patting him on the wiry top of his head. This is partly because I’ve never seen a pet pig before, and partly because Cal is studying me intensely and I need to avoid eye contact before my cheeks explode. “As in Sir Francis Bacon, famous philosopher and author?”

  Kenderall’s eyes widen. “There’s a man called Sir Francis Bacon?”

  “Well, not any more there isn’t. He died of pneumonia in 1626 while experimenting with keeping meat fresh by freezing it. Possibly pork.”