by Amanda Lees
Chico flashed her that grin and she felt her stomach go into spin cycle. Round and round and round, just like at the Laundromat. Come to think of it, she liked the Laundromat. It was kind of fun watching the clothes go round. Concentrate, Kumari. This guy is gorgeous.
‘So you want to grab a soda sometime?’
‘Uh, sure, that would be nice.’ Nice? For goodness’ sake. He asks you out and you say that would be ‘nice’? Does ‘grabbing a soda’ class as being asked out? Aarrgh – this is so complicated.
‘Hey there.’ It was Hannah, behind her a smirking Charley.
‘Room for us?’ asked Charley.
‘I was just going,’ said Chico.
A parting smile for Kumari.
‘Later.’
‘Uh, later.’
Don’t, she begged silently. Don’t you two start. Pleeeeease.
And they didn’t. At least, not for thirty whole seconds. By which time Chico was safely across the cafeteria and out of earshot.
‘So he said he’d see you later?’ giggled Hannah.
‘Like, how much later?’ snorted Charley.
‘I have no idea,’ said Kumari loftily. ‘Whenever. You know.’
‘No, we don’t know,’ sniggered Charley.
‘But we sure would like to,’ added Hannah. And with that they were off again, chortling as they munched their sandwiches.
Kumari could not help but join in. Their laughter was infectious. Every time one of them started, it set the other two off. It was true what she’d said to Chico. Despite everything, life was surprisingly good.
So good that sometimes she even forgot the clock ticking away in her head. Or the fact that she was so far from home.
KUMARI’S JOURNAL
(TOP SECRET. FOR MY EYES ONLY.
EVERYONE ELSE KEEP OUT!
THIS MEANS YOU!)
The World Beyond
April 1st – 243 days to go
It’s the first day of April today in the World Beyond and they have this really weird custom where everyone plays jokes on one another. At least, they say they’re jokes but some of them are not exactly amusing. Whoever put plastic wrap over the toilets was pretty lame and most people think it was Eddie. We got him back, though – me, Hannah and Charley – we super glued some coins to the ground near where he sneaks off to have his filthy cigarettes. Then we hid and watched as he tried to pick them up. He broke his fingernails trying – too funny!
Hannah has come up with a really great idea and at first the teachers thought this, too, was a joke. She suggested we all wear the same Yankees beanie hat in case the kidnappers suddenly reappear. That way, they won’t know which one is me, especially if we pull them low over our foreheads. It’s pretty hard to tell who someone is in a beanie, even harder if they wear a scarf. Anyway at first it was just me, Charley and Hannah but suddenly it caught on. Everyone assumed it was a fashion thing until Charley told Chico. Once Chico started wearing one, the whole school followed. Even those people who don’t support the Yankees, which is pretty cool.
I sort of wish Charley hadn’t told Chico in a way – it’s just one other reason for him to think I’m strange. But it’s a really nice thing for him to do and it shows he cares. On the other hand, maybe it’s not such a good thing. I don’t want him to think I’m some kind of sad case. Charley says guys like girls who are perky and smile a lot. I don’t really do perky. Anyway, it’s better he likes me for who I am. At least, that’s what I think.
LeeLee said the same thing this evening. Not that I told her about Chico specifically – we were talking about boys in general. And not because I started the conversation. It was because we’d been watching Dream Date on TV and I said I thought they were all really gross and it kind of went from there. CeeCee didn’t say much. I think it’s because she likes this guy at her high school but he doesn’t like her. If he doesn’t like CeeCee he must be an idiot and why would you want to go out with an idiot, anyway, is what I said. Then CeeCee went really, really quiet and LeeLee kicked me so I shut up. Still, I think it’s good advice: Always be yourself.
Anyway, all of this is what Ms Martin would call hypothetical. Good word. I like that. We have to produce a hypothesis about our science fair projects. Mine is that magic can defy the laws of physics. I’m still working on it. Ms Martin gave me that look she does, the one where she raises one eyebrow and stares right at you. Then she kind of smiled and said, ‘I can’t wait, Kumari.’ Me neither – I mean, my magic hit rate is not exactly high.
CHAPTER 14
The sidewalk was icy. Squealing, the girls clutched on to one another.
‘Heeeeeeeeeeeelp!’ shrieked Hannah.
Too late, she skidded, knocking the other two down. They landed in a heap, laughing, Kumari loudest of them all. She glimpsed the sky, blue despite the cold, and thought I’m happy. How weird.
Spring was late in coming. The big freeze showed no signs of letting up. Which suited Kumari perfectly as she was having the time of her life. Back home, snow sat on mountains, looking pretty. Here you goofed around in it. And there was nothing Kumari and her posse liked more than to goof around, except perhaps hang out and talk stuff.
Kumari sat up on the sidewalk. ‘Hey, isn’t that Daniel?’
‘Get up, get up!’ hissed Hannah, adjusting her beanie hat. She was already on her feet, cheeks pink.
Charley and Kumari looked at one another. ‘Hi, Daniel,’ they chorused.
‘Hey’ Daniel mumbled, sloping by. ‘How you doin’, Hannah?’
They waited a full ten seconds after he passed before collapsing in giggles. Hannah flapped her hands in mortification.
‘Stop it! Stop it, he’ll hear!’
‘Hey, Hannah, we’re sorry’ said Kumari. ‘We didn’t mean to upset you.’
‘She’s not upset.’ Charley grinned wickedly. ‘Daniel said hello. To Hannah.’
‘It was “hey,” actually’ said Hannah. ‘Not that I noticed.’
‘Uh, right.’ Kumari winked at Charley. It was fantabulizmous having friends.
Especially today. Today was an important day. The minute the bell sounded, the girls headed for the subway. Today they were going shopping Downtown. It was Charley’s idea. She could not believe Kumari had never so much as seen the big stores. And with Ma’s birthday coming up, it seemed the perfect excuse.
Kumari patted her purse one more time. In it, her earnings. Twenty dollars and fifty eight cents exactly. How impressive was that? It had taken weeks of sweeping up at the salon on Saturdays with a few shampoos thrown in. That was until she picked up the wrong bottle by mistake and turned Lola’s hair a fetching shade of green. Lola had still tipped her, insisting she liked it, but Ma had taken Kumari off shampoo duty that instant and given her back her broom.
She still had a couple of blisters on her hands as a souvenir. Actually, she was kind of proud of those blisters. She had worked hard for them, darn it. She paused to pick at them and a headline at the newsstand caught her eye:
Hollywood Star Adopts Orphan, it read.
So that was their latest victim. Kumari shook her head. The Manhattan Mystery Girl thing was forgotten and that was just the way she liked it. The papers moved on quickly. Being old news made her feel safer. She pulled down her Yankees beanie hat. It was like a sea of confusion bobbing in and out of the school gates and so far it had worked. Even so, she glanced around before descending into the subway. She had no idea if the kidnappers were still in custody. It was best to make sure.
‘You OK, Kumari?’ asked Hannah.
‘You bet,’ said Kumari, smiling at her friends.
‘Quick, the Badmash Bag,’ said Charley. They were nearly at the turnstiles. Kumari crammed Badmash into his special carrier, complete with chocolate treats. Now that he was getting bigger, Badmash was harder to conceal. Another problem with being in the World Beyond -Badmash was growing quicker. Back home he’d be a baby vulture for ages – out here it was different. It was Hannah again who had come up with the sol
ution: a Kate Spade tote stolen from her aunt.
‘I borrowed it,’ Hannah insisted. ‘Besides, she’ll never notice.’
Hannah’s aunt lived on the Upper East Side and wore more labels than a baggage carousel. She worked for some fancy magazine and considered Hannah’s mom ‘a failure.’ Only failure wasn’t the word she used; it was more like ‘disappointment.’ Kumari thought Hannah’s mom was lovely -she had wild hair and read a lot.
The bag was the perfect size. Badmash liked to snooze in its cosy confines. Kumari left its zipper open a little, afraid he would suffocate. It certainly got him past Ms LaMotta, who was no big fan of Badmash. Actually, Ms LaMotta was no big fan of anyone. She ruled the school with a rod of iron. At least, she tried to rule with a rod of iron. At Rita Moreno its effect was more that of a rusty nail. Only that morning she had stopped Kumari in the corridor.
‘Show me your hall pass, Kumari.’
‘My hall pass?’ Oh yes, those things. Kumari shrugged.
Ms LaMotta looked at her and sighed. ‘I’ll let it go this time, Kumari. Oh and Kumari . . . ’
‘Yes, Ms LaMotta?’
‘Good work on your science fair entry’
‘Uh, thanks, Ms LaMotta.’ She’d noticed! Oh my god.
A great big glow filled Kumari as she relived the moment.
‘What are you smiling at?’ asked Hannah and then she leapt up. ‘We’re here!’
As they emerged onto Fifth Avenue, Kumari craned her neck. Concrete citadels, stretching skywards. Suddenly she was back there, running through the crowd.
‘I can’t believe you’ve never been Downtown,’ said Hannah.
Actually, she had but that was another story she was keeping to herself. Her desperate race through the parade. That thing with Santa Claus.
‘Are you OK?’ asked Charley. ‘You’ve got, like, this funny look on your face.’
Kumari grinned at Charley. ‘Not as funny as your face, girlfriend.’
Laughing at one another, they linked arms and strode along. A few steps later, Kumari stopped dead.
‘Wow! What is this?’
‘That’s FAO Schwarz. It’s a toy store,’ said Hannah.
A toy store? It was more like a palace. The place glistened with expense. Inside, she could see the ceiling twinkling blue. There were even two soldiers guarding the entrance.
Nodding to them, Kumari swept through the gleaming glass doors, Hannah and Charley giggling behind. Once inside, she stared in amazement. This was no toy store. This was paradise. Mile upon mile of things arrayed enticingly all around. Enormous stuffed jungle animals looking on benignly from behind thick ropes. A life-size snow leopard stretched out, its eyes all too real. It reminded Kumari of home. She swallowed the thought. A delicious smell wafted towards her. Following it, she found an ice cream parlour to die for; alongside it, more candy than she had ever seen, acres of shiny wrappers.
Even Hannah and Charley were getting excited, now they had forgotten about acting cool. Stuffing candy into paper sacks, they gorged as they drifted round the shop.
‘Oh my god, moving stairs!’ said Kumari.
Hannah and Charley exchanged another look. ‘That’s an escalator,’ said Hannah kindly.
‘I knew that!’ said Kumari.
She could hear music from the top of the moving stairs. Stepping onto them gingerly, she held on tight. At the top, she gasped in astonishment. There was a piano so big that people were dancing across it! It looked so much fun she just had to join in. Leaping aboard, she started to twirl round on the keys. A dancer tapped up to her.
‘This is our show, sweetie,’ he spat as, deftly, he tripped her up.
A man in a blue jacket grabbed her and hauled her down. Hannah and Charley were doubled up, in fits.
‘You get to dance on the piano after the performance,’ growled the man.
‘Come on,’ said Charley. ‘Let’s split.’
Another wobbly ride on the escalator back through the wonderland of toys. On the way out, Kumari spotted something: a box with Magic Set written across it, a rabbit adorning the lid. What had rabbits got to do with magic? She’d never come across anything quite so stupid.
‘A magic set? Boring,’ said Charley.
‘My brother had one,’ offered Hannah.
‘Magic? That’s not magic,’ declared Kumari.
‘You some kind of expert?’ said Charley.
Actually, I am, thought Kumari. But I must not, cannot tell them that. Otherwise they won’t be my friends. They’ll think I’m totally weird.
Out loud, she said, ‘Nah! Just think it looks dumb, that’s all. Come to think of it, that rabbit looks a bit like Mr Johnson.’
She pulled a Jabba Johnson face and the other two collapsed. Still giggling, they burst out through the glass doors and skipped together down the street, skidding to an abrupt halt outside another fancy store as Charley shouted, ‘In here!’
She disappeared through the revolving door and Kumari attempted to follow suit. Somehow she ended up back on the street.
‘Whoops! Must have pushed too hard.’
‘You are a lunatic,’ grinned Hannah.
Phew, she’d got away with that one too. First the escalator, now the revolving door. The World Beyond was still full of obstacles, most of them designed to trip her up. Kumari looked for Charley. She was heading for the cosmetic counters, running the gauntlet of women with perfume sprays. They looked decidedly scary.
‘Try this,’ said a woman, dowsing Kumari in a smelly cloud.
‘Eugh!’ said Kumari. ‘That stinks.’
The woman glared.
‘It’s Divine,’ she said.
‘Whatever,’ said Kumari. The woman didn’t know the meaning of the word.
The woman stared at her blankly, her red-glossed lips slack.
Ahead, Charley was sticking her fingers into little pots, rubbing all sorts of colours on her face. As Kumari and Hannah approached, a saleswoman glided up and skewered Charley with a patronising stare.
‘Can I help you?’
To Kumari’s ears, it sounded like she meant the opposite. Behind her glacial smile was an icy tone that said, Beat it, teen scum.
Charley took it in her stride. ‘I’d like a makeover,’ she announced.
The saleswoman raised a perfectly plucked brow.
‘We’re not doing those today’
‘But it says here you are,’ said Charley, pointing to a placard on the counter.
‘Well we’re not,’ snapped the saleswoman. ‘Can I help you with anything else?’
‘Come on, Charley’ said Hannah. ‘Let’s just get out of here.’
Charley’s mouth took on the stubborn pout Kumari knew all too well.
‘I’d like a M.A.K.E.O.V.E.R. please,’ she said, very slowly and clearly. The saleswoman did not flinch.
‘Go away, little girl.’
Little girl?! Kumari could not believe her ears. She saw the flush rise up Charley’s cheeks. Worse, she saw her shoulders droop in defeat and her eyes fill with tears. How dare this person humiliate her friend? She’d show her humiliation. Without thinking, Kumari raised her arm, closed her eyes and began to chant. Power No 8, she could do that. Maybe it was a sugar rush from the candy but she forgot all about fitting in. All she knew was that Charley was hurt. And no one did that to her friends.
‘Oh. My. God,’ she heard Hannah gasp.
She could feel the whirlwind begin to rise, stirring the hairs on the back of her neck. Opening her eyes, Kumari saw cosmetics darting through the air, whizzing towards the saleswoman’s face. Mascara scored black lines down her cheeks, lipstick smeared scarlet streaks across her chin. A pot of cream dumped itself all over her hair. Green shadow applied itself to her ears. A fluffy brush inserted itself into the woman’s gaping mouth and stuck out like a squirrel’s tail. A huge can of hairspray whipped round and round then covered her in its contents like glue.
Excellent – it had worked. Almost too well, in fact. For a split s
econd Kumari felt a pang of guilt. But the woman had been really mean. And then, like a large, fluffy dart, Badmash came flying. Somehow he had worked his way out of the bag and was intent on adding the final touch. Snatching a tub of glitter from the counter, he hurled it into the air. It flew up and then drifted down, covering the saleswoman in a rainbow layer of sparkle. It might have looked pretty on its own but, with the rest, it was a disaster.
The saleswoman let out a muffled, ‘Gnnnh!’
All around, people were staring. With a sick feeling, Kumari realised what she’d done. All those months of acting normal, hoping to fit in, wasted for a few seconds of revenge. The chant died in her throat as she dropped her arm. Instantly, the cosmetics fell back down. One or two customers clapped and cheered. Grabbing Badmash, she shoved him back in his bag.
‘Come on,’ she said, ‘we’re leaving.’
They left the saleswoman looking like some kind of crazy clown and raced for the exit. All the way out, the other two said nothing. She could feel them darting her worried looks. Once on the sidewalk, she stopped.
‘Look, I’m a goddess,’ she announced.
‘A goddess?!’ Charley snorted.
‘Oh, come on,’ said Hannah.
She looked at them steadily. Charley’s face began to cloud.
‘You mean it, don’t you?’ she said. ‘You really think you’re a goddess.’
‘I am a goddess,’ said Kumari.
‘Sure you are,’ said Hannah. ‘Just like I’m a supermodel.’
They both looked at Hannah, all curvaceous five foot two of her.
‘See what I mean?’ Hannah shrugged.
‘You mean you’re, like, a sex goddess?’ said Charley. ‘Y’know, like in all the magazines. How to be a Sex Goddess. Let Your Inner Goddess Out.’
‘No,’ said Kumari. ‘I mean, like I’m a real goddess.’
‘Oh, come on,’ said Charley. ‘What are you, some kind of street magician?’
‘I told you,’ said Kumari, exasperated. Not even her best friends would believe her!
They trudged to the subway in silence. Neither of them would meet her eye. All the way uptown, they studiously stared at their hands. As they exited at their stop, Kumari tried one last time.
