"All the Money in the World"

Now Granny Pearl is telling Meeka a job means buying all the sweeties her mouth can handle. She looks at me and says that pinning our happiness on boys is a recipe for tears. It is a great but scary thing to know that Pearl can see the inside of me, see the trapeze act of hope I’ve clung to for any boy who’s happened to land near my feet. Only now there is this seed Granny’s planted in our heads and I am already imagining buying real Doc Marteens with my own money. And there’s Meeka, suddenly sitting up in Granny’s bed, playing with her bottom lip, playing with the idea of earning her independence.



“Mother would be so angry,” Meeka says—fear and delight contorting her face.


“Eh eh! Even more reason to do it, child!”


Pearl laughs and it is a contagious sound. We are all three giggling—little girls making bunny ears behind someone’s head. Except Pearl isn’t a kid but an old woman who needs a kidney transplant ASAP. Except there is fear behind our laughter because we all know that Pearl will not always be around to get Meeka sweeties.


But we keep laughing, trying to drown out the fact that all the money in the world can’t make Granny Pearl better. It doesn’t matter that Meeka’s father is a brain surgeon and can afford the best doctors for Granny Pearl. Money can’t buy what she needs the most: a new kidney. So we laugh while we wait.


When Julie reminds Pearl that it’s time for her bath, none of us can look the other in the face. The laughter has left us with shiny eyes we are too scared to share.