He might even kill you.
But right now Ty’s doing the goldfish face and chuckling as if we’re six years old.
We’re in the playground, in our spot under the tree. Sierra has just proposed that we have a sleepover on the weekend. All of us girls. It’s frothing up in my head like a shaken-up soft drink. I’ve only ever had one sleepover, and that was in primary school with this kid who tried to burn the school down. Not on that night, but still.
A slumber party!
Alex thinks we should put our PJs on under our clothes so we can just strip off the top layer. We’ll need to get PJs with puppies on them, or something.
We’re negotiating a venue, with my head going froth, froth, because there are probably all these rules and rituals that I don’t know about.
Then a teacher I haven’t seen before approaches us. Miss Angela, the school librarian. She wears stilettos and a magenta shift dress. She has a smooth Clinique face. She explains that she is organising a fashion show to raise money for the library.
I look out across the quad. Ty sits up near the hall with a group of about five other guys. Now he is standing a little bit away from his group. He has his hands in his pockets, and he’s watching me. He’s like a German shepherd.
There’s a permission slip, because Miss Angela is going to take us out of the school grounds to the boutique that is sponsoring the show. A real stylist is going to choose outfits for us to wear.
Her name is Lien, and she used to be a model. Miss Angela is obviously very impressed, because she goes allgushy when she talks about her.
There will be a dress rehearsal on the weekend before the show. We will get our hair and makeup done, and there will be a photo shoot for the catalogue. Then there’s the show itself, which will be held in the library. They want our parents to come along.
‘Cool!’ says Sierra, flushing slightly.
‘We can only have three from your year level,’ Miss Angela says, handing the permission forms to me, Julia and Amina. ‘It’s to do with the risk assessment.’
But what she means is that Sierra is too short to look good in clothes. Sierra knows it. I’ve been picked because I’m tall.
You’ve been picked because you could be a supermodel, Alex says.
Sierra glances at me sidelong, all slitty and hateful, as if it’s my fault. She could be a bigger person about it, and be happy that her friends have been chosen, but she’s jealous.
Amina bites her lip. She thinks this selection process is unjust. She thinks fashion is stupid and arbitrary. She should be fighting for it to be inclusive, but she is looking forward to dressing up.
‘Oh, and when you drop this form back at the front office, bring your birth certificate. You haven’t completed your enrolment,’ Miss Angela adds.
I nod. ‘Sorry, I forgot.’
I could nip it in the bud. I could say I’m not interestedin participating, and then Amina would say that too. Julia might do the fashion show by herself, but it wouldn’t be a schism. We could go to the show and support her. We would make up banners and cheer.
This fashion show thing is a schism, and it is my fault because if I said I didn’t want to do it, Amina would too. It is stupid and arbitrary.
Alex is looking at me and shaking his head.
What? I challenge him.
This is a bad idea.
I can see where this is going, too. Of course I can, because I am Alex as well. But I want to dress up in gorgeous clothes and strut up and down the runway like they do in the magazines, swishing my tail. I want to dress up with Amina and Julia and giggle and be girlfriends, arm in arm. I want to be beautiful. I want other people to think I am beautiful. I want them all to look at me the way that Ty does.
It makes me more real now that Sierra is jealous of me. Jealousy is a million times more potent than pity.
It’s just clothes, I shrug.
But it’s not, is it? Fashion makes the rules about what women should look like. If anyone should be
But right now Ty’s doing the goldfish face and chuckling as if we’re six years old.
We’re in the playground, in our spot under the tree. Sierra has just proposed that we have a sleepover on the weekend. All of us girls. It’s frothing up in my head like a shaken-up soft drink. I’ve only ever had one sleepover, and that was in primary school with this kid who tried to burn the school down. Not on that night, but still.
A slumber party!
Alex thinks we should put our PJs on under our clothes so we can just strip off the top layer. We’ll need to get PJs with puppies on them, or something.
We’re negotiating a venue, with my head going froth, froth, because there are probably all these rules and rituals that I don’t know about.
Then a teacher I haven’t seen before approaches us. Miss Angela, the school librarian. She wears stilettos and a magenta shift dress. She has a smooth Clinique face. She explains that she is organising a fashion show to raise money for the library.
I look out across the quad. Ty sits up near the hall with a group of about five other guys. Now he is standing a little bit away from his group. He has his hands in his pockets, and he’s watching me. He’s like a German shepherd.
There’s a permission slip, because Miss Angela is going to take us out of the school grounds to the boutique that is sponsoring the show. A real stylist is going to choose outfits for us to wear.
Her name is Lien, and she used to be a model. Miss Angela is obviously very impressed, because she goes allgushy when she talks about her.
There will be a dress rehearsal on the weekend before the show. We will get our hair and makeup done, and there will be a photo shoot for the catalogue. Then there’s the show itself, which will be held in the library. They want our parents to come along.
‘Cool!’ says Sierra, flushing slightly.
‘We can only have three from your year level,’ Miss Angela says, handing the permission forms to me, Julia and Amina. ‘It’s to do with the risk assessment.’
But what she means is that Sierra is too short to look good in clothes. Sierra knows it. I’ve been picked because I’m tall.
You’ve been picked because you could be a supermodel, Alex says.
Sierra glances at me sidelong, all slitty and hateful, as if it’s my fault. She could be a bigger person about it, and be happy that her friends have been chosen, but she’s jealous.
Amina bites her lip. She thinks this selection process is unjust. She thinks fashion is stupid and arbitrary. She should be fighting for it to be inclusive, but she is looking forward to dressing up.
‘Oh, and when you drop this form back at the front office, bring your birth certificate. You haven’t completed your enrolment,’ Miss Angela adds.
I nod. ‘Sorry, I forgot.’
I could nip it in the bud. I could say I’m not interestedin participating, and then Amina would say that too. Julia might do the fashion show by herself, but it wouldn’t be a schism. We could go to the show and support her. We would make up banners and cheer.
This fashion show thing is a schism, and it is my fault because if I said I didn’t want to do it, Amina would too. It is stupid and arbitrary.
Alex is looking at me and shaking his head.
What? I challenge him.
This is a bad idea.
I can see where this is going, too. Of course I can, because I am Alex as well. But I want to dress up in gorgeous clothes and strut up and down the runway like they do in the magazines, swishing my tail. I want to dress up with Amina and Julia and giggle and be girlfriends, arm in arm. I want to be beautiful. I want other people to think I am beautiful. I want them all to look at me the way that Ty does.
It makes me more real now that Sierra is jealous of me. Jealousy is a million times more potent than pity.
It’s just clothes, I shrug.
But it’s not, is it? Fashion makes the rules about what women should look like. If anyone should be
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