The Brilliant Ideas of Lily Green

by Lisa Siberry

‘It’s …’ I blinked and remembered Bertie. ‘I think it’s colour-changing lip balm that’s like a mood ring for your face.’

  ‘Colour what?!’ Faye froze and I shrank back, waiting for a scream or a shove. Instead, Faye whipped out her phone and raced to the mirror, where she hit record and smiled.

  Her lips changed from angry-red to excited-magenta.

  Faye didn’t miss a beat. ‘Hey everyone!’ she shouted into the camera. ‘Major update from Kitty’s Beauty Parlour! We have a new product! And it’s called Lip Switch! Why?’ She did an expert pout. ‘Because we’ve just invented the world’s first MOOD LIP BALM!’

  You know that moment when you put a bunch of ingredients in a bottle and start shaking? When everything mixes together and you couldn’t un-mix it if you tried? That was my life. Right then. The moment Faye sent off that video and stormed downstairs to show Mum the lip balm, and everything started blurring together.

  I didn’t know exactly how Rosa’s berries had done it; all I knew was I’d made something beautiful. Something so beautiful that Mum, Faye and I sat around the salon desk until late that night, trying on the lip balm and laughing at each other’s crazy happy-gold lips. And later, as the moon shone through the faded lettering on the salon window, Mum wrapped her arms around me, and Faye read out a chapter from her Be the Boss book, and we all started dreaming of a new future.

  The plan? Package the lip balm into professional-looking pots and invite everyone we knew to the salon on Friday afternoon. Faye said this was called a ‘product launch’ and it would create ‘buzz’ – which was fancy business speak for showing Mum (and BeautyGlow) that Kitty’s was back in business. Oh, and hopefully everyone would book a haircut for the weekend.

  Faye said it was genius. Mum said it was worth a shot. On one condition – that the lip balm was all-natural and didn’t have anything ‘strange or dangerous’ in it. Those were her exact words. She even cupped my face in her hands and asked me to recite all the ingredients.

  I listed twelve.

  But I sort of left out the last one: the berries.

  I just couldn’t say it. And the weird thing is, my lips flashed an ugly shade of grey, which was probably the colour for big dirty liar, because only I knew the truth – my secret ingredients weren’t coconut oil or brilliant ideas or anything to do with me at all. My secret ingredients were growing in a dark corner of Rosa’s garden. And if Mum knew the truth, she’d throw the lip balm out, and our one chance to turn Kitty’s around would drip to the bottom of the garbage bin.

  No. No way. From now on, the garden had to be my little secret.

  So the next morning, I made extra sure to take my green notebook with me as I hurried downstairs to school. Mum was at the manicure table with Miss Sparrow, painting her nails with Fallen Angel Black. Miss Midnight Sparrow is really into black. Faye says she’s a goth. Mum says she’s unique. I just like her big black boots and handbag shaped like a spider.

  I waved at Miss Sparrow and went over to the tin of lip balm, which was sitting on the makeup shelf. Excitement pulsed through me as I scooped a bit into an empty jar. The clock ticked over to eight twenty-five. Violet would be walking past at any minute.

  ‘Kitty, you’re such an artist,’ sighed Miss Sparrow, admiring her nails. ‘No-one else in this city paints a black manicure with glitter spider webs.’

  ‘Thank you, Midnight,’ Mum smiled.

  ‘It’s all French manicure this and natural polish that. I dropped into BeautyGlow the other day – only because I was at the mall buying a top hat, Kitty, I promise – and the woman behind the desk was laughing at my black lipstick. Actually laughing.’

  ‘Forget about them.’ Mum shook her head. ‘You have a beauty that’s all your own, Midnight. And as we always say at Kitty’s, we put the you in be-you-tiful.’

  I rolled my eyes – so cheesy – but Mum and Miss Sparrow started laughing, and a second later Faye swished into the salon with her hair Glue-Gooed into a giant bow on top of her head.

  ‘Not so fast, frizzball,’ she said, spritzing some Glamour Girl Curl-Buster Spritz at my head. But I was too excited to fight it that morning. Even when Faye pulled my hair into something called a ‘twisted maiden braid’, I just grimaced and kept my eyes on the salon window.

  8.28

  8.29

  8.30

  Tap tap tap! Violet was at the window, waving her phone at me, and Faye’s lip balm video was on it! She’d seen it!

  ‘Bye, sweetie,’ Mum said as I dashed for the door. ‘Remember, today’s going to be a beautiful day!’

  And maybe Mum was right, because when I handed Violet that jar and she jumped around squealing, I realised I hadn’t just found the formula for a world-first lip balm. I’d found something even better – the secret formula for getting my best friend back.

  The day only got better from there.

  Violet didn’t care that I hadn’t made her any shampoo – she said the lip balm was way better. And as soon as we walked into science class, Bella and Saanvi practically fell over themselves to get a look at Violet’s rainbow lips. Within seconds, half the class was crowding around, begging for a sample of the green goop in Violet’s jar.

  My green goop.

  It seemed impossible that I’d once made pimple cream that only the cat would eat, and now Violet was handing my lip balm around to the whole class, and mouth after mouth was lighting up with a new colour. Excited magenta! Surprised silver! Grossed-out green! (That was Ewan.) The only person who didn’t try Lip Switch was Zoe. She sat in the corner of the lab with her arms crossed, sending me a toxic death stare.

  Jealous? I shot her a sweet smile.

  Zoe sniffed and glared at the green notebook in my hand. She was acting unimpressed, but we both knew I’d finally made something even she wanted. And it made my insides fizz with excitement.

  ‘Lily, sit next to me,’ Violet patted the seat beside her and I happily sat down, just as Ivy trailed into the classroom lugging her violin case.

  Ivy stared at everyone’s lips, then at the jar on Violet’s desk. I gave her a thumbs-up, while everyone started gathering around me like moths around a flame.

  ‘Lily, spill, when can we buy a pot of Lip Switch?’ Bella leaned on my desk and rubbed her greedy-pink lips together.

  ‘Pleeease tell me it’s going to be soon,’ said Saanvi, checking her impatient-orange mouth in my ruler. ‘Because I need this, like, now.’

  Everyone giggled. Except Ivy, who flopped down in the seat next to me. She was wearing glittery green avocado earrings and a look that said, ‘what’s going on?’ I tried to vibe back, ‘I’ll explain later.’

  ‘Um, so, I’m still packaging the lip balm,’ I said, turning back to Saanvi. ‘But we’re having a product launch at the salon this Friday if you want to come and buy it then?’

  ‘A product launch! That sounds so professional!’ Bella’s lips went from pink to gold. ‘Are you selling Glue Goo too?’

  ‘And anything else?’ piped up Saanvi.

  ‘No. But …’ I hesitated. But what? We only have the lip balm.

  ‘I know!’ someone shouted. ‘What about perfume that smells like baby rabbits and candyfloss?’

  ‘Or eye drops that make your eyelashes grow!’

  ‘Or a face mask that gives you freckles for a day,’ smiled Violet.

  ‘You could make that, right?’ asked Bella.

  Everyone waited for me to say something.

  ‘Oh. Sure. I can make anything.’ The words just slipped out of my mouth. ‘I’m working on something new right now.’

  Whoa. I had not meant to say that, but Zoe was watching me and the envy on her face made my dumb mouth start blabbing again. ‘Just come to Kitty’s this Friday,’ I said. ‘I’ll be unveiling my next invention, and it’s going to be even bigger and better than the shampoo or the lip balm.’

  What? Stop it!

  I bit down on my tongue, hard, just as Mr Lee walked in and everyone scampered back to their desks. For a
moment, Mr Lee looked confused by the sea of multi-coloured lips, but he just readjusted his glasses and wrote on the whiteboard in big letters: FIVE DAYS LEFT!

  Five days until the invention competition.

  Five days to save Kitty’s.

  ‘What happened to the lip balm?’ whispered Ivy in my right ear.

  To my left, Violet was spreading on more of it and checking her reflection in her phone.

  ‘The balm turned out better than expected,’ I whispered back at Ivy. ‘It changes colour with your mood.’

  Ivy’s huge brown eyes got even bigger. ‘How is that even possible? Can I see the ingredients?’ She reached for my notebook, but I slid it off the table just in time. I couldn’t let her see Rosa’s berries on that list.

  ‘It was probably the food colouring,’ I whispered. ‘Or maybe the hot chocolate powder?’

  Ivy looked doubtful and I felt a splash of guilt seep through me. Guilt, and a tiny bit of panic. Not only had I lied to Ivy, I’d lied to the whole class and told them I was making something else for Friday.

  Crud.

  Mr Lee tapped the whiteboard. ‘Don’t forget, just five days left to win a once-in-a-lifetime appearance ON TV with the LAB GIRLS. So get making, and remember – don’t be afraid of failing. Be afraid of not trying!’

  Failing? That so wasn’t happening to me, because I had my eyes on the prize, and a cake tin full of incredible, and I could already see myself on The Lab Girls with my pot of Lip Switch.

  Yep, I practically floated through the rest of the day, knowing Ivy and I had this competition nailed. I even told Ivy about the salon, and how we were planning on selling the lip balm, and was that all right?

  Ivy was fine about it. In return, I invited her to the salon after school to see if Faye had any ideas for her tangly hair. Then the best thing happened – Violet passed me a note in history, asking if she could film a Lip Switch makeup video. Without Zoe, of course.

  It really could have been the best day of my life.

  Except for one thing: Zoe.

  After the last bell, she was waiting for me and Ivy at the school gate, the sun bouncing off her glasses.

  ‘Where is it?’ demanded Zoe, stepping right in my way.

  ‘What?’ I shrugged.

  ‘The lip balm, you idiot.’

  ‘Like I said, Zoe, you can buy some on Friday. Only twelve dollars a pot.’ I went to push past her, but she blocked my way.

  ‘I don’t want to buy it, I want to know how you did it,’ she hissed. ‘What made it change colour like that?’

  ‘Food colouring,’ said Ivy matter-of-factly. ‘Or hot chocolate powder.’

  Zoe ignored her. ‘Tell me, Green.’

  ‘Nothing special,’ I lied. ‘It’s all natural.’ At least that part was true. But still, my palms were getting sweaty and I had to hold onto my notebook with both hands.

  ‘You’re lying.’

  ‘And you’re just jealous.’

  We stared at each other in a silent stand-off, then Zoe leaned in so close I could hear the silver chokers around her neck making an expensive tinkle. ‘I’ve always thought it’s funny that both our mothers run beauty salons.’

  ‘Hilarious.’ Must be such a laugh stealing all our customers.

  ‘But here’s the funniest part.’ Zoe narrowed her grey eyes. ‘The funniest part is that BeautyGlow has fourteen salons, over 100,000 customers, and twenty-five original beauty products developed in our very own lab. And what does your mum have? One pathetic little salon that no-one visits anymore.’ Zoe let out a sharp laugh that sounded like a dying magpie.

  I blinked once, twice, three times to make the prickling in my eyes go away, which only made Zoe laugh harder. She pointed a shiny silver nail at me and Ivy.

  ‘If you two think your ridiculous shampoo or lip balm is going to win the competition, you’re wrong,’ she snarled. ‘I’m going to find out what you’re up to, and then it’ll be me and Violet on TV.’

  You and Violet? My blood boiled. ‘You have a whole lab at your mum’s work, Zoe. Why don’t you just come up with your own ideas, instead of stealing other people’s?’

  Zoe’s eyelids quivered, and I saw the truth right then: Miss Fancy-Lab was out of ideas. She wanted to win this competition as much as I did, and the fact that I had something she didn’t was eating her up inside.

  ‘Zo Zo!’ Just then, a fancy black car crept up to the kerb and the window slowly lowered. It was Zoe’s mother, Elektra. Even with the window down, her perfect black bob looked like it had never been touched by the wind. ‘Chop chop, darling, we need to get back to the clinic, now,’ ordered Elektra, looking at herself in the rear-view mirror.

  Zoe headed towards the car, but not before swinging her bag painfully into my shoulder. I fell backwards, hitting the ground with a thud, and my green notebook flew out of my hands, skidding towards the gate. Zoe stooped over, and for a second I thought she might actually help me up.

  Instead, her hands closed over my notebook, and then she was running, and the black car door was slamming shut, and before I could blink, the car was speeding off with my lip balm formula and Dad’s last-ever notebook inside.

  I sat there in disbelief while white-hot panic bloomed inside me.

  ‘Ivy, we need to go to the mall. Now!’

  The mall was crowded, and as Ivy and I glided up the escalators to the second floor, I kept thinking about Zoe’s silver claws turning the pages of my precious notebook. I had to get it back.

  ‘This is bad,’ I said, when we finally stopped in front of BeautyGlow.

  ‘Super bad,’ agreed Ivy. ‘And way too bright. I need sunglasses to even look at this place.’

  It was true. BeautyGlow was so white and shiny I had to squint to see it properly: shiny white marble-tiled floors, glowing white chandeliers, and beauticians in white uniforms – all of them hovering around chairs full of customers. Zoe wasn’t kidding when she said they had customers.

  There were so many of them.

  I thought about Mum in our empty salon, waiting for things to get better. I thought about the blank appointment book, and Faye setting fire to the sale papers, and the tin of lip balm that was our last chance to save Kitty’s.

  And Zoe’s just going to steal my formula and take it all away from us?

  A computer pinged on BeautyGlow’s white marble front counter. Elektra was tapping away at a screen and handing a customer a receipt about as long as my arm. Beside her was Zoe, holding my notebook.

  ‘That dirty, dirty cheat,’ I hissed, pulling Ivy after me and crouching behind a bin. Zoe was now handing the notepad to her mother, and a red-lipstick smile spread across Elektra’s face as she flipped through the pages. I wanted to storm in there and snatch it back, but there was something about Elektra I didn’t trust. It looked like she wanted the formula as much as Zoe did.

  Still smiling to herself, Elektra placed the notepad on the dazzling white counter and patted Zoe on the head.

  I needed to get to that counter without being seen. ‘Ivy, can you play the violin?’

  Ivy looked at me as though I’d asked her to eat cockroaches.

  ‘I need a distraction,’ I said.

  ‘And you want me to busk?’

  ‘I have to get my notebook back before Zoe copies my lip balm formula.’

  ‘You mean our lip balm formula.’

  ‘Right.’

  Ivy fiddled with her violin case. ‘Why don’t we just make something else? Yesterday was so much fun. Ooo, we could try that vinegar hair detangler thing of yours. I bet it’ll be better than Lip Switch.’

  I rubbed my forehead, wishing I could tell Ivy that it was impossible to make anything good without her nan’s plants. But I guess lies are like leftover body scrub in a mixing bowl: the longer you leave them, the harder they stick.

  So instead I told Ivy the other part. The true part. ‘I need my notebook back because it was my dad’s. He wrote his last invention ideas in there before he got’ – I took a breat
h – ‘before he got sick, and that’s about all I have left of him.’

  Ivy’s face softened. The mall hummed around us.

  ‘“Mozart’s Concerto No. 4” or “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy”?’

  My heart pulled tight. ‘“Sugar Plum Fairy” please.’

  Ivy walked over to the BeautyGlow window and slipped off her graffitied sneakers, placing them neatly in front of her. She cupped her violin under her chin. She did a little bow.

  Then she started to play, filling Fern Hill Mall with a sound that was half ‘Sugar Plum Fairy’, half fingernails running down a chalkboard. It was perfect. And best of all, Elektra was storming out of BeautyGlow with Zoe trailing after her.

  This was my chance.

  I scurried straight for the counter. Elektra was shouting at Ivy, and I was only a metre away from Dad’s notebook. My fingers stretched out to grab it, but a golden business card on the counter twinkled in the lights. I hesitated, trying to place it, but it was too late – there was a flash of long blonde hair coming towards me.

  Zoe!

  I ducked down and crammed myself under the counter. Within seconds, Zoe’s silver boots walked into view and plonked down at the chair. My heart sank when I saw the notebook in her hand. Moments later, there was a sharp click-clack on the tiles, and Elektra’s white heels also appeared.

  ‘What a horrid girl, making that filthy racket.’ Elektra stamped her heel, and I shrank back into the furthest corner. ‘I should call security.’

  ‘Please don’t, Mother. She’s in my science class,’ said Zoe quietly.

  ‘Like I care. Give me that.’ Elektra snapped her fingers and Zoe handed over Dad’s notebook.

  ‘So, one of the girls at your school is making this Lip Switch lip balm, is she?’

  I held my breath.

  ‘Her name’s Lily Green,’ said Zoe. ‘Her mum owns Kitty’s Beauty Parlour.’

  ‘Well, isn’t that interesting.’ Elektra sounded like she was smiling, and I imagined her snake-eyes gliding over the recipe, taking in all of the ingredients. I thought of the berry vine clinging to the wall in Rosa’s shadowy garden. At least Zoe would never be able to find it.