“Listen, you can send me one more recommendation or a thousand. Ain't gonna happen. Mr. Bollux just isn't a fit.”
Eight-year-old Gracie Trent was listening to her grandfather, billionaire Thomas Stepforth, just say no.
“Pop-Pop is just too old to be working with just anybody out here,” she said to her friend from next door, seven-year-old Amanda Ludlow. “Ain't nobody got time to be training grown folks: we are enough.”
“I think that is why Papa is selling the Ludlow Bubbly, because really, running our household is enough,” Amanda said. “We are never going to see Coca-Cola and Mentos again after George had time enough to try to invent a self-watering hose.”
“How did y'all get that stuff anyway?” Gracie said. “We all only drink the Ludlow Bubbly around here because we make ours fresh!”
“So, Cousin Harry is a man of good taste,” Amanda said, “but everybody that works at the police department isn't up to standard and they're in conservatorship so they don't want to afford us. They also do not know how to get real mint to freshen everybody's breath, so here we go with the Mentos. Cousin Harry orders in bulk but just drives it in himself, but there was a crushed box so Cousin Harry didn't take that in. He left it here and forget we are running in and out of his and Cousin Maggie's house, too, so since he was going to throw it away, George decided to help him recycle.”
“George is blessed that he didn't get recycled,” Gracie said. “When you are nine years old and just coming up with ideas every day to not make it to ten, life is hard.”
“I know – I pray so much for my brother George, that he just survive the year!” Amanda said.
“But then there are the grown ups that don't get it, and that's what Pop-Pop is not dealing with any more,” Gracie said. “How are you even applying for a position in finance when you are a hundred thousandaire in debt? I don't even know how folks don't know a billionaire is going to run a credit check!”
“Wait, what?” Amanda said. “How does this work?”
“So, go to school and get fifty-eleven credit cards on top of some student loans,” Gracie said. “Make good grades, graduate top of class, get a great job, and also get a taste for a whole bunch of fast cars. Wait ten years. Then, try to get a job that pays a million dollars a year with the local billionaire who's a whole billionaire, but still the one billionaire who you think doesn't know how to find out that when you finish getting your year's salary, you're going to have enough left to pay for one nice lunch.”
“I don't follow all that because my mind doesn't work that way,” Amanda said, “but I do know that student loans and fast cars are really expensive, and credit cards can be if you don't pay them off.”
“Ain't it the truth,” Gracie said. “Call it $999,980 worth of expensive – if he got his whole year's salary today, he'd be debt free with just $20 left.”
“Um,” Amanda said,“how do you live on $20 for a whole year?”
“That's not the problem,” Gracie said. “The problem is that when that runs out and you let a guy like that handle other people's money, he may shake out the other piggy banks for the rest.”
“Oh, that's not safe!” Amanda said. “That's not safe at all!”
“Which is why Pop-Pop is giving a hard no,” Gracie said. “They're blessed he's not laughing at them like he was this morning after pulling that report.”
“What I am learning as I get older is that you just can't rescue everybody,” Amanda said.
“Well, you're seven and I'm eight so we have time,” Gracie said. “Pop-Pop is on Route 66, and he is not even trying to get everybody in the car. If you don't have your life together, and you're grown, you're going to need to get a ride from someone else, especially if you're looking for a million-dollar job but you are $999,980 in debt.”
“Well, Mr. Bollux has all those fast cars – why would he need a ride?” Amanda said.
“He had all those fast cars,” Gracie said.”The repo man came through on him like that last time the repo man figured out Cousin Harvey was hiding his cars in Cousin Tremaine's backyard.”
“Now, wait a minute – how are you getting to work and being towed at the same time?” Amanda said.
“We will never know, because Pop-Pop is not about to go through the foolery to find out,” Gracie said.
“I'm glad because, really, people who do that kind of stuff are a little scary and y'all do not need that kind of not-safeness in your lives,” Amanda said.
“Ain't it the truth, Mandie, ain't it the truth.”