Cleo Edison Oliver, Playground Millionaire Read online

Cleo couldn’t afford to look back or worry about the knife now. She gripped her flip-flops with her toes and ran for her life. If Josh caught her, there was no telling what he’d do. He may only have been six to her ten, but he was strong. Much stronger when he was mad.

  Josh sprinted behind her, screaming, past Miss Jean’s house, past the Williamses’, almost to Caylee’s before she faked one way and went the other, barely escaping his grasp. She squealed at the thrill of almost getting caught, then giggled.

  “It’s not funny!” Josh howled.

  Cleo turned tail and sprinted for home. Her only hope was to throw the hat at the last second, like a steak to a lion, and make a dash for her bedroom.

  “You’re mean! I hate you!” Her brother was going berserk.

  Cleo’s conscience pricked her into glancing back. Suddenly, she was stumbling over the bin of DinoFormers. She yelped and threw the hat at Josh, barely avoiding a crash landing. The cap bounced off his body. He crushed it underfoot as he plowed into her, sending her into the fence. The chain links rattled as he pummeled her. Barkley was also going berserk.

  “Stop, Josh! I gave it back!” She covered her face with her hands. The best she could do now was to protect herself from his fists.

  The screen door slammed open. “Joshua Myron!” Mom called. In a moment, she was there, prying him off. She wrapped her arms around him and held him like a human straitjacket. “Shhhh. Calm down.”

  Her brother wheezed. Mom stuck his inhaler in his mouth. “Breathe, Josh.” He drew in a deep breath. His brown cheeks were tear-streaked. His upper lip was wet with snot. “You can’t do that, Josh. You can’t hit when you’re angry.” Mom stroked his arm.

  “She took my hat,” Josh said fiercely.

  The hat sat crumpled on the ground.

  “You took his hat?” Mom’s voice was as sharp as her Global Chef!® knife. Her blue eyes pierced Cleo.

  The horribleness of the trouble she was in crashed on her like a Zuma Beach wave. Josh’s hat was never to be taken from his head. It was practically the Eleventh Commandment in their house. She stood and picked up the dented cap. “Here, Josh.”

  He pulled the hat down on his head, shooting her a fiery look. Then he picked up his bin of toys and stomped toward the gate like a gigantic DinoFormer. Cleo held her breath, expecting him to say something about the knife.

  The knife. Barkley sniffed at it where it lay on the sidewalk. If he stayed right there, maybe Mom wouldn’t see it.

  “Why, Cleo? Why are you always pushing the limits? You know the hat is out of bounds.”

  “He started it.”

  “It doesn’t matter! You don’t take off his hat!” Mom stared at her disapprovingly. “I expect a serious apology from you.”

  “Sorry, Josh!” she called to his back.

  “No!” Mom’s hands flew up in frustration. “A genuine apology after thinking about what you’ve done for an hour in your room.”

  “What about my business?” She looked at the small pile of avocados still needing to be sold, at her signs hanging on the chain-link fence.

  “It can wait. Push everything against the fence and let’s go.”

  Cleo dragged the table toward the fence. She wished she had the power to make things disappear, thinking mostly about the knife, but a little about her brother. Why did he have to be such a baby? What did he think would happen if he didn’t wear that raggedy hat outside — the sky would fall on his head? At least he had a birth mom who sent him presents.

  Cleo picked up her money container. Maybe if she distracted her mom, she wouldn’t notice the knife. “Mom! Guess what? I made thirty-three dollars!”

  Mom’s eyes widened. “Wow!” For a moment, she looked genuinely impressed, but her Tough Mom face quickly returned. “Now, inside.”

  Cleo glanced to where the knife had been. Barkley lay on the ground with it between his teeth, gnawing on the handle! “No, Barkley! Drop it!” Fortunately, he obeyed.

  Mom stared, open-mouthed, at the knife. “What is that doing out here?” she said, fists on hips.

  Triple fudge and Frigidaire.

  Cleo rushed over and picked up the knife. “Mom, listen. I had a great idea! Samples!”

  Mom was waiting — wanting — to be persuaded. “People can’t resist samples, Mom. Did you know that samples increase sales by twenty-eight percent?” Cleo didn’t know that for sure, but it sounded about right.

  Mom crossed her arms. Blinked.

  Cleo held up the money container again. “I can make more. Lots more!”

  Mom shook her head, looking seriously disappointed in her one and only daughter. “Cleo, I don’t really care about the money. I care that you took what wasn’t yours without asking. Twice.”

  Cleo’s shoulders drooped. The container hung at her side. “I needed it to cut the avocados.”

  “You’re not allowed to cut with it. You know that too. It’s a very sharp knife, Cleo. The sharpest one I have. It’s also my best knife — not to be flung around outside or chewed on by the dog!” She held out her hand. Cleo gave her the knife.

  “But I’m almost eleven. I can handle it!”

  “You don’t decide that.”

  “I was careful. I didn’t hurt myself.”

  “I’m glad, but that’s not the point.” Mom sighed. “I’m sorry, Cleo, but you pushed too far this time. Business is over. You’re done for the day.”

  Cleo lay on her bed, fuming. Apple, Apple, Apple! (A great made-up swear because it was both a food item and a company.) She was so mad she could scream, but that would just get her even more time in her room. Solitary confinement. The worst punishment ever.

  Not only could she not leave her room for an hour, there would be no television for the rest of the day. She would miss Fortune! She pounded her mattress and stomped her feet, keeping her voice to a low growl.

  She thought about finding Mom and begging for another chance, but that definitely would get her more time. Once Mom announced a consequence, she never went back on it. Dad, Cleo could talk into a more reasonable position. But not Mom. She was as immovable as a corporate boss in a labor dispute.

  Fortune smiled down from the wall. Fortune — always beaming, always believing, always reminding her she could be the success she wanted to be. Fortune wouldn’t have punished her by taking away a whole day of doing business. She probably would agree that Josh needed to toughen up a little. And that Cleo was responsible enough to use a chef’s knife.

  She stood on her bed and looked into Fortune’s face, searching again for hints of herself. Brown eyes; long, straight nose; rich brown skin. Cleo had brown eyes, but they weren’t as round as Fortune’s. Cleo had a long, straight nose, but hers didn’t flare out as wide at the bottom. Cleo’s skin was brown too, but not nearly as shimmery. Fortune glowed.

  The biggest likeness was in their smiles. They both had giant, sparkling smiles that could win people over in an instant. Unless that person was Cleo’s mom. Why didn’t Mom believe in her like Fortune did? Well, like Fortune would if they ever actually met.

  She plopped back down on her bed and fell over, her head on her satin-covered pillow. If only she could talk to Fortune.

  She sat up straight. Of course! She could write Fortune a letter! A well-written letter would get her attention better than an email any day. And if anyone knew how to write a persuasive letter, Cleo did.

  She opened her desk drawer and pulled out a piece of the personalized stationery she’d made that weekend, after officially changing her middle name. She looked up Fortune’s office address in an issue of Fortune Women magazine, then sat down to write.

  It took her four drafts and a lot of personalized stationery, but finally it said exactly what she wanted it to say. Perfect.

  She’d come close to adding a P.P.P.S.: “Is there any possible way you had a daughter ten years and eight months ago and that I could be her?” But no. She didn’t want to sound desperate. Or pitiful. She w
as a Very Enterprising Young Lady™. She was on her way to the top! She was going to be a stunning success!!! And now Fortune would know it too.

  Thud! The floor shook.

  One of her brothers yelled.

  Thud!

  Josh and Julian were playing paratroopers off the top bunk again. Cleo looked out her window. Mom and Dad were talking in the driveway. Dad clasped his large hands on top of his head. Mom’s mouth moved quickly. Her eyebrows pinched together, whether in anger or worry, Cleo couldn’t say. Knowing her mom, probably both.

  Cleo pounded on the wall between her and her brothers’ rooms. “Knock it off, Josh and Jay! You know you’re not supposed to be doing that!” They screamed and jumped again.

  Thud! Thud!

  Cleo yanked open the window, ready to tell on her brothers.

  “It’s not enough,” she heard Mom say. “Our monthly payment is about to go up.”

  They were talking about it again. Money. Mom hadn’t worked for the past several years, since they’d gotten the boys.

  Dad said something, but his voice was too low to hear. They started walking toward the house. Cleo pulled back so they wouldn’t see her. Mom’s voice floated up from below. “I’m not being too harsh, Charlie. She has to learn that she can’t just take whatever she wants whenever she wants it. Do you want to raise a selfish kid?”

  Cleo’s chest squeezed. She felt hot all over. And something else . . . she didn’t know the word for it.

  Bad.

  She just felt bad. Full of badness. She was too selfish for them.

  She went to her closet and took down the small metal safe where she kept her money between trips to the bank. She turned the dial and pulled out ten of the dollars she’d made before screwing up and losing her business for the day.

  She took out another piece of stationery, wrote, “So you can buy your Nerf gun. I’m really sorry in her best handwriting. She stashed the money and note in an envelope, wrote “Josh” across the front, and quickly slipped it under her brothers’ door.

  A minute later, Josh bounded in and hugged her so hard he almost made her cry. Dumb kid.

  Cleo woke up Tuesday feeling bearish, which was what you were when things were not looking up. She was intrigued by the thought of getting to know her new teacher, since everyone said he was the opposite of his name — Mr. Boring — but she was not really looking forward to school.

  First of all, there was the school part. Cleo liked learning things. If only she didn’t have to do all those pesky assignments . . .

  And this year she had to face the awful-est of awful assignments. The one she’d been dreading since third grade.

  The Fifth-Grade FAMILY TREE PROJECT.

  Ugh.

  Every year, they hung in the fifth-grade hallway of New Heights Elementary — construction-paper trees with green leaves labeled with names. Names of kids’ parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, aunts, and uncles. Biological family. Learning about GENES. Finding out about WHERE YOU CAME FROM. All stuff she couldn’t do, because her birth parents — whoever they were — hadn’t wanted her to know who they were. She glanced at Fortune A. Davies on her wall.

  A knock came at the door. She sat up and put her feet on the floor. Dad poked his head in. “See you later, Sunshine.” He came over and kissed the sleep cap that covered her hair. “Have a great first day.”

  “You’re leaving?”

  “I told you last night — I’ve got zero period this year.”

  “What about chocolate chip pancakes?” They always had chocolate chip pancakes on the first day of school.

  “Rain check. Saturday. Promise.” He held out his hand for their special promise handshake: clasp, slide palms, fluttery fingertips. She did it, but not happily. Her day hadn’t needed any help getting worse.

  Shouting erupted on the other side of the wall. JayJay screamed, then started crying. Footsteps pounded down the hall. “Mo-om! Julian drew on my Nerf gun!”

  “Sounds like trouble in paradise. Better go help out.” Dad gave her a squeeze. “That was a really generous thing you did, giving your brother that money.” Dad had bought the Nerf gun with Josh the night before. They’d gotten a great Labor Day deal, of course.

  Cleo let herself be hugged. She inhaled Dad’s fresh, just-showered morning scent. Too quickly, he was leaving.

  Mom and Dad pecked lips as they crossed paths in the doorway. “See ya after soccer practice,” Dad said.

  “Cleo, you should be up and dressed by now. What’s the holdup?” Mom rushed back out. “Stop hitting your brother with that!”

  Cleo pulled herself out of bed and trudged to the closet, took off her purple satin cap, and shook out her braids. She had begged Mom to let her sport the twist-n-curl style Tasha had done for her a few weeks back, but Mom insisted it was too high-maintenance, and it would only last a few days instead of a few weeks. They were sticking with braids . . . for now.

  She deliberated for a long time over what to wear. Finally, she decided on her favorite purple-and-orange striped blouse with the ruffles on the cuffs and down the front, even though it was getting a little tight. On the bottom, she wore her black skirt with orange leggings. Her skin peeked through a small hole in one knee, but she didn’t think it was too noticeable.

  Wear bold. BE bold. It was one of Fortune’s favorite sayings. She looked back at the poster. Fortune looked straight ahead, her smile unflinching.

  Cleo stood on her bed. She basked in the gaze of the woman’s steady, sparkling eyes. Studied her brilliant, poster-perfect smile.

  Style. Self-assurance. Success. One day, Cleo would have these things too.

  She jumped from the bed and headed to the bathroom.

  “No! No! Don’t, Mom! Ow! Ow!” Josh jiggled on the bathroom step stool. Mom bent over him with a determined look on her face. She clenched his toothbrush in her fist.

  “Josh. Stop wiggling. We have to brush your teeth. All of them.”

  Cleo put toothpaste on her brush. “You should just yank it out, Mom. We could do it while he’s sleeping.”

  Josh narrowed his eyes at Cleo and held up his fist. “I’ll give you a knuckle sandwich!”

  Mom sighed in frustration. “I wish your uncle hadn’t taught you that.” She moved in with the brush again. Josh wailed.

  “It’s just a tooth, Josh. You don’t have to have a nuclear meltdown over it.” Cleo rolled her eyes and started brushing. You would’ve thought they were threatening to cut off his leg the way he screamed and carried on whenever the subject of pulling his tooth came up.

  Finally, they were done. Josh gave Cleo the Evil Eye on his way out the door. “Dear Lord,” Mom sighed. “I can’t go through this seventeen more times. And I’m definitely not doing what I did the first time. Ever. Again.”

  Josh had held out so long with his first loose tooth that, by the end, it was hanging by a mere thread of gum tissue. He had swallowed it in his sleep, which meant that if Mom wanted to have Josh’s first lost tooth in her special memories box she’d have to dig through the toilet for it.

  Which she did. Every time he pooped. Eventually, they found it.

  No keepsake, no matter how precious, was worth that.

  Cleo finished brushing her teeth, then grabbed her letter to Fortune and ran to the mailbox. She put the letter inside and raised the little red flag.

  In four to five days, according to Mom, it would be delivered to Fortune’s office. She would read it and see how determined Cleo was to succeed. She would write back and sign the letter with her very own hand.

  Cleo headed back to the house, pondering Fortune’s response. A letter from Fortune signed in ink from a pen she had held. It would practically be the same as being in the woman’s presence, having her signature like that. It would hold magic. It would be Cleo’s most prized possession ever.

  In fact, she probably would . . . yes, she’d even stick her hand in a toilet to save it.

  As th
e family minivan pulled up to school, Cleo searched the huddles of kids, looking for Caylee’s black hair and baby-blue suede jacket. Cleo hadn’t seen her best friend in ten whole days. She’d been visiting her dad at his new house in Palm Springs.

  Mom came around to the side door. She hugged Josh hard and kissed his face before he jumped down. “Have a great day, my big first-grader!”

  Cleo stepped out and Mom wrapped her arms around her. “Love you, kiddo.” She kissed her forehead. “You sure you don’t want me to hang around until the bell rings?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “You nervous?”

  “No-o.” Why would she be nervous?

  “You were clicking your wrist.”

  Cleo’s right wrist had a click in it. She had a habit of circling it until she heard seven clicks in a row, for good luck. Maybe she did it a bit more when she was nervous. “I’m okay.”

  “Come on!” Josh said urgently. “Benny is waiting for me!”

  Mom squeezed her again. “See you after school, love.”

  “Okay. Love you too.”

  They walked toward the building. Josh turned and waved as the van pulled away.

  “Remember, I’m in Room Fourteen if you need me,” Cleo said when Mom was gone.

  “Why would I need you?” He peered out from beneath his Dodgers hat.

  So much for trying to be a helpful big sister. “I don’t know. What if you get a bloody nose?”

  “I’ll pinch it and go see Nurse Bishara.” Between nosebleeds, tummy aches, and his asthma, Josh spent a fair amount of time in the nurse’s office. He and Nurse Bishara were practically best buds.

  She shrugged. “Okay.”

  Josh saw Benny and took off running.

  “See you later!” she called.

  “Bye!”

  She kept going, through the front doors and the short hallway that separated the multipurpose room and gym from the main office, and onto the playground. Caylee was walking up at the same time from the opposite direction. “Peanut butter!”

  “Jelly!”

  Their fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Nuesmeyer, had told them they were like peanut butter and jelly — impossible to separate.