Billionaire Boy (11 page)

Sapphire grimaced. “I’ll just have a bag of crisps.”

“Me too!” said Joe.

“And me!” said Mr Spud.

“Three packets of potato crisps coming right up, Sir,” sneered the butler.

“You look beautiful tonight, my angel!” said Mr Spud, before approaching Sapphire for a kiss.

“Don’t smudge me lip liner!” said Sapphire, as she repelled him forcefully with her hand.

Mr Spud was clearly a little hurt, but tried to hide it. “Please take a seat. I see you brought the new Dior handbag I sent you.”

“Yeah, but this bag comes in eight colours,” she complained. “One for each day of the week. I thought you were gonna buy me all eight.”

“I will, my sweet princess…” spluttered Mr Spud.

Joe stared at his dad. He couldn’t believe he had fallen for such a wrong’un.

“Dinner is served,” announced the butler.

“Here, my beautiful angel of love, take a seat,” said Mr Spud, as the butler pulled out a chair for her.

Three waiters entered the room carrying silver trays. They carefully placed the plates down on the table. The butler nodded and the waiters lifted the silver covers to reveal three packets of Salt n’ Vinegar crisps. The trio started eating. Mr Spud initially attempted to eat his crisps with his knife and fork to appear posh, but soon gave up.

“Now me birfday’s only eleven months away,” said Sapphire. “So I’ve made a little wish-list of presents you are going to buy me…”

Her fingernails were so long and fake she could barely fish the piece of paper from her pink handbag. It was like watching one of those grabber machines at the fair where you never win anything. Eventually she grasped it and passed it over to Mr Spud. Joe looked over his dad’s shoulder and read what she had scribbled.

There is video content at this location that is not currently supported for your device. Caption for this video is diplayed below.

Sapphire's Birfday Wish-list

Sapphire’s Birfday Wish-list

A solid gold Rolls Royce convertible

A million pounds in cash

500 pairs of Versace sunglasses

A holiday home in Marbella (large)

A bucket of diamonds

A unicorn

A box of Ferrero Rocher chocolates (large)

A great big massive like really big yacht

A large tank of topical fish*

‘Beverly Hills Chihuahua’ on DVD

*
I think she must mean tropical fish, rather than fish that are up on the news and current affairs.

5000 bottles of Chanel perfume

Another million pounds in cash

Some gold

Lifetime subscription to
OK
magazine

A private jet (new please, not second-hand)

A talking dog

General expensive stuff

100 designer dresses (I don’t mind which ones as long as they are expensive. Any ones I don’t like me mum can flog down the market)

A pint of semi-skimmed milk

Belgium

“Of course I will get all these things for you, my angel sent from heaven,” slobbered Mr Spud.

“Thanks, Ken,” said Sapphire, her mouth full of crisps.

“It’s Len,” corrected Dad.

“Oh, sorry, yeah! LOL! Len! Silly me!” she said.

“You can’t be serious!” said Joe. “You’re not really going to buy her all that stuff are you?”

Mr Spud gave Joe an angry look. “Why not, son?” he said, trying to control his temper.

“Yeah, why not, you little git?” said Sapphire. Definitely not controlling
her
temper.

Joe hesitated for a moment. “It’s plain to see you’re only with my dad for the money.”

“Don’t talk to your mother like that!” shouted Mr Spud.

Joe’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. “She’s not my
mother
, she’s your stupid girlfriend and she’s only seven years older than me!”

“How dare you!” fumed Mr Spud. “Say sorry.”

Joe defiantly remained silent.

“I said, ‘say sorry’!” shouted Mr Spud.

“No!” shouted Joe.

“Go to your rooms!”

Joe pushed back his chair, making as much of a clatter as possible, and stomped upstairs, as the staff pretended not to see.

He sat on the edge of his bed and cradled himself in his arms. It was a long, long time since anyone had hugged him, so he hugged himself. He squeezed his own sobbing plumpness. He was beginning to wish that Dad had never invented ‘Bumfresh’ and they were all still living in the council flat with Mum. After a few moments, there was a knock on the door. Joe sat in defiant silence.

“It’s your dad.”

“Go away!” shouted Joe.

Mr Spud opened the door and sat down next to his son on the bed. He nearly slid off the bedspread onto the floor. Silk sheets may look nice, but they aren’t very practical.

Mr Spud bumjumped a little nearer to his son.

“I don’t like to see my little Spud like this. I know you don’t like Sapphire, but she makes me happy. Can you understand that?”

“Not really,” said Joe.

“And I know you had a tough day at school too. With that teacher, The Witch, and with that ungrateful boy, Bob. I’m sorry. I know how much you wanted a friend, and I know I didn’t make it any easier. I will have a quiet word with the headmaster. Try and sort things out for you if I can.”

“Thanks, Dad.” Joe sniffed. “I’m sorry I was crying.” He hesitated for a moment. “I do love you, Dad.”

“Ditto, son, ditto,” replied Mr Spud.

Chapter 13
New Girl

The half-term holidays came and went, and when Joe returned to school on the Monday morning he found he wasn’t the centre of attention any more. There was a new girl at school, and because she was soooooooo pretty everyone was talking about her. When Joe walked into his classroom there she was, like a giant unexpected present.

“So what’s the first lesson today?” she asked as they walked across the playground.

“Sorry?” spluttered Joe.

“I said, ‘what’s the first lesson today?’” the new girl repeated.

“I know, it’s just… you’re really talking to me?” Joe couldn’t believe it.

“Yes, I am talking to you,” she laughed. “I’m Lauren.”

“I know.” Joe wasn’t sure if the fact that he had remembered her name made him sound suave or like a stalker.

“What’s your name?” she asked.

Joe smiled. At last there was someone at the school who knew nothing about him.

“My name is Joe,” he said to Lauren.

“Joe what?” asked Lauren.

Joe didn’t want her to know that he was the Bumfresh billionaire. “Erm, Joe Potato.”

“Joe Potato?” she asked, more than a little surprised.

“Yes…” stammered Joe. In the moment he had been too overwhelmed by her beauty to be able to come up with a better alternative to ‘Spud’.

“Unusual name, Potato,” said Lauren.

“Yes, I suppose it is. It is actually spelt with an ‘e’ at the end. Joe
Potatoe
. So it’s not quite the vegetable ‘potato’. That would be ridiculous! Ha ha!”

Lauren tried to laugh too, but she was looking at Joe a little oddly.
Oh no
, thought Joe.
I only met this girl one minute ago and she already thinks I’m nuts
. He quickly tried to change the subject. “We’ve got Maths next with Mr Crunch,” he said.

“OK.”

“And then we’ve got History with Miss Spite.”

“I hate History, it’s so boring.”

“You’ll hate it even more with Miss Spite. She’s a good teacher, I suppose, but all us kids hate her. We call her ‘The Witch’!”

“That’s so funny!” said Lauren, giggling.

Joe felt ten feet tall.

Bob bobbed into view. “Er… Hi Joe.”

“Oh, hi Bob,” Joe replied. The two former friends hadn’t seen each other over the half term. Joe had spent his days alone racing around and around his racetrack in a new Formula One car his dad had bought him. And Bob had spent most of the week in a bin. Wherever Bob was the Grubbs seemed to find him, lift him up by his ankles and deposit him in the nearest skip. Well, that
was
what Bob had said he wanted.

Joe had missed Bob, but this wasn’t good timing. Right now he was talking to the prettiest girl in the school, maybe even the prettiest girl in the whole of the local area!

“I know we haven’t seen each other in a while. But… well… I’ve been thinking about what we said when you were doing litter duty…” stammered Bob.

“Yeah?”

Bob seemed a little taken aback by Joe’s impatient tone, but pressed on. “Well, I am sorry we fell out, and I would like us to be friends again. You could move your desk back so that—”

“Do you mind if I talk to you later, Bob?” said Joe. “I am quite busy right now.”

“But—” began Bob, a wounded expression on his face.

Joe ignored it. “I’ll see you around,” he said.

Bob marched off ahead.

“Who was that? A friend of yours?” enquired Lauren.

“No no no, he’s not my friend,” replied Joe. “Bob’s his name, but he’s so fat everyone calls him ‘Blob’!”

Lauren laughed again. Joe felt a tiny bit sick, but he was so pleased to be making the pretty new girl laugh that he pushed the feeling all the way down inside him.

For the duration of the maths class Lauren kept on looking over at Joe. It put him right off his algebra. In History she was definitely gazing in his direction too. As Miss Spite droned on and on about the French Revolution, Joe started to daydream about kissing Lauren. She was so very pretty that Joe wanted to kiss her more than anything. However, being only twelve Joe had never kissed a girl before, and had no idea how to make it happen.