The Fashion Committee by Susan Juby

Author:Susan Juby
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
Published: 2017-04-24T10:27:14+00:00

twenty-three

MARCH 18

Tesla sent me home from Green Pastures with a stack of books and DVDs and a list of websites. She also told me a story about how punk rock style was basically invented by Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood when they dressed the Sex Pistols up as a sort of ad campaign for their store, which was called Sex. Westwood wasn’t a trained designer, but she knew how to get people’s attention by cutting up clothes and putting graffiti all over them and using a lot of in-your-face color schemes. The story was incredibly depressing, from an anti-authoritarian/anti-capitalist/anti-kale perspective.

Tesla told me I’d be fine, that I had good aesthetic instincts and should trust my gut. Her eyelashes were extremely long, sort of like an alpaca’s. She told me that if I got stuck with my design, I should find a classic piece of clothing and adapt it, which sounded sort of like plagiarism to me. I wanted to touch her, but I didn’t.

I pedaled home in a daze of guilt and confusion. When I was halfway there, Barbra called.

My supposedly trustworthy gut twisted as I set my feet down and held the phone to my ear.

“How’d it go?” she asked. “Was it mostly moving doilies and ceramic milkmaids from side table to cabinet and back again?”

For a second I didn’t follow. Then I remembered the lie I told about helping my grandma’s friend. I remembered that I am a liar.

“There was more to it than that. But it wasn’t bad. Turns out, she sews. She’s going to help me with the design for the contest.”

“That’s good,” she said, possibly insincerely. “What are you up to now?”

“I’ve got a three-hour shift at the Stop. Then I’m going to see that kid who’s going to be my model.”

I tried not breathe in the blue smoke gusting out of an old furniture truck as it passed.

“Everything okay?” she said. “You seem kind of distant.”

“I’m good,” I said. “Little nervous, I guess.”

I thought of Tesla striding down the halls of Green Pastures, trailing a glittering wake of specialness dust. What must that be like?

“John?” said Barbra, and I realized she’d been speaking but I had tuned out.

“Sorry. Missed that.”

“Do you want me to come with you to meet the kid? I can provide moral support and snide commentary?”

I used to want calm, sardonic Barbra to go everywhere with me. I would have worn her around me like a life preserver. But at that moment all I wanted to do was to find a mirror so I could examine myself to figure out why a girl like Tesla would invite me to lunch. Why she would flirt with me and look at me with those wide aquatic eyes.

“You don’t have to,” I said. “It’s probably going to be a shit show. Kid or her foster mom will figure out that I don’t know anything about anything, and I’ll get the boot.”

“You’re giving me too much credit,” said Barbra. “I’d love to see that. I’ll drive us in my mom’s car.

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