Geek Chic (11 page)

“We have juices, breakfast tacos with guacamole, strawberries, and …” Jazz holds out a box. “Donuts.”

Howard starts the car (
I mean Hummer).

Venus looks at me and grins. It’s a very chic breakfast. We take one of everything.

The heated seat (
or maybe it’s the taco
) gets to Aunt Rootie, and she falls asleep before we get to the turnpike. Luckily she doesn’t snore, and she’s wearing her big sunglasses so none of us can see her eyes flutter. Which they always do when she sleeps.

Aunt Rootie misses seeing the Statue of Liberty. (
It’s sort of far away, but Venus has binoculars.
) She wakes up just as the car goes through the toll plaza and heads into the tunnel. It’s really quite unbelievable. We are underwater even though it doesn’t feel like we’re underwater.

Walter Colson should definitely do an extra-credit report on it. It is a totally major engineering phenomenon.

(
Walter is very good at building things. Last year he built a model of the Roman Coliseum out of sugar cubes.
)

We drive out of the tube, which is another name for the tunnel, and Howard makes a left turn at the traffic light. Aunt Rootie, who is now very awake, starts shouting.

“Howard. Howard! Turn right at this next light! You beat the traffic that way. I’ve been driving in this city for years. Trust me.”

Howard nods, but I don’t think he needs help from Aunt Rootie. He drives right between a bus and three taxis.
Molto
amazing. Venus and I look out the windows and count how many people Howard almost runs over before we get to Jazz’s office.

Howard zigs, zags, and then makes a right turn. Our people count is eighteen and a half.

Jazz reaches into her bag and pulls out her
phone. She flips it open. Howard turns the car closer to the curb.

“Hey, Hoyt. JD. We’re pulling up. Tell everyone to get ready.” (
“JD.” Jazz is so you-know-what.
)

“Ready for what?” I ask.

Jazz smiles. “You’ll see.”

Venus leans closer to me and whispers, “The incredible, cool makeover.”

I nod and smile as Howard gets out of the car and walks around to the sidewalk, where he opens the door.

“Okay. Everybody out,” says Jazz. “Thank you, Howard.” She glances at her watch. “We’ll see you again in about a little over an hour.”

(
An hour? Magazine people can do an incredible, cool makeover in only an hour? They are almost as fast as a real fairy godmother.
)

“Follow me, everyone,” Jazz says as she turns to go into the building.

I look up. This building is really, really, seriously really tall.

“Did I ever tell you girls about the time I was
almost a Rockette?” says Aunt Rootie, as she follows us through the revolving doors into the lobby.

“You were almost a Rockette?” we all say. Our voices echo. This lobby has acoustics way more
bene
than even the hallway at HST.

Aunt Rootie laughs as Jazz gathers the three of us by the long security counter.

(
It’s something like the one Mrs. Katterman has in the office, only this one is marble and Mrs. Katterman’s is plastic. The security guard looks like he’s even harder to get past than Mrs. Katterman.
)

“They’re with me,” Jazz says, showing him her identification badge. “Come with me, ladies.”

We snake through the red velvet ropes and head for a long double row of elevators.

One of the doors in the middle right row opens and we step inside. Jazz pushes a button that lights up with the number forty-two.

My ears pop.

Bing

The door opens. “Welcome to
U Grl
!
”

We step into the reception area and face the name of the magazine in big orange and purple letters on the back wall.

The walls are painted the same color as my wicked green stickies.

Venus whispers, ’Very cool.”

A girl gets up from behind a desk and takes our coats. (
Luckily my mother didn’t make me wear my poofy coat.
)

Jazz crooks her finger for us to follow. We go down a hall with lots of offices and turn left. Then right. Then left. Right. Left.

We finally reach a door at the end of a long hall that says Conference Room.

Jazz smiles at me. “Ready?”

“Ready!” (
Coolability meter, get ready to boing.
)

Jazz opens the door.

Aunt Rootie gasps.

Venus gasps.

I think I have to go to the bathroom.

If this is my makeover, it’s going to be very weird. Everyone is wearing fedoras, sneakers, and bowling shirts with names embroidered on their pockets.

…They all look like me!

(
Especially the one who looks like she hasn’t combed her hair.
)

Jazz puts her arm around me.

“This is our Zoey!”

Everyone applauds.

(Applause? Getting weirder.)

“Hello, Zoey. I’m Cindy Fowler, the executive editor of U
Grl.
So nice to meet you.

The lady with short, white hair shakes my hand. “We are so excited to have you here.”

“You are?”

Jazz laughs. “Can’t you tell?”

I look at everyone wearing fedoras that look just like mine (
or technically my great-grandpop’s).

Well, actually … no.

The Executive Editor Person picks up a magazine from the conference table and opens the pages to where the green sticky notes are stuck.

“Zoey, I’m sure by now you’ve seen all the photographs of you in the issue of
U Grl.”

“You mean, my hat … and bowling shirt … and …”

“sneakers!”

A girl named China comes forward and twirls in purple Chucks.

That taco isn’t feeling too good right about now. The orange juice is doing slosh-dancing in my digestive tract too.

The Following Is a Public Service Factoid: Complete digestion actually takes a while to occur in the human body. After swallowing, food goes down the esophagus in approximately five seconds, but it hangs around in your stomach for a couple of hours. Then travels on.

(
No need for further explanation
)

“Zoey, when we put our last issue together, we never thought we would get the kind of response that we did—but we did.”

I look at Jazz and hear my stomach grumble. “You didn’t? I mean, you did?”

“We did. And most of the responses were about you.”

Grumble. “Me?”

“In fact, we received so many emails, it crashed our server.”

Venus sucks in more air. “It did?”

“It did,” says Jazz. “We had questions about the hat, bowling shirt, frogs, crossword puzzles—we must have gotten hundreds of questions from girls wanting to know about Louisa May Alcott.”

“Well, she is a very good writer.”

“Yes, we know,” says EEP. “And now a whole lot of other girls, who perhaps didn’t know before, know that too.”

Jazz points. “Do you see that huge pile of letters at the end of the table?”

I nod and stomach-grumble. Stomach-grumble and nod.

“Well, those are only a sampling of the ones we received from girls all over the country. Go on, Zoey. Read a couple.”

I do.

She’s right.

They did.

This is now:

OFFICIALLY WEIRD.

“I’m not sure I understand any of this.”

The Executive Editor Person with short, white hair laughs. (
Weirder, because none of this is funny.
)

“Zoey,
U Grl
celebrates girls who are unique. Girls who are thoughtful. Curious. Girls who are inventive. Smart. Girls who
do.
Girls who
think.
And girls who have their own style and flair while doing it. Since the last issue came out, our readers have been telling us—that’s you.”

Backspace
. Did she say …
me
?

I look at Venus and Aunt Rootie. They look like they could make a bathroom trip too.

“But-but-but-but…uh …”

“Yes, Zoey?”

“Well … the thing is …I mean … you know … do you know? … I’m only not even eleven. And I don’t even know anything about accessorization either. Unless you count duct tape. Oh, yes, sure, maybe I’m good at making woven backpacks, but that’s it. Okay, one wallet too. But that’s it! And let me tell you, I don’t look good in pink. At all. I’m a green person.”

I take off the fedora. “Look, look! I don’t know how to use a round brush except to paint watercolors, and Venus is way better at that than I am. I tried gel, and it was a fiasco-disasco. Ask Venus. She’ll tell you.”

Venus nods. “It wasn’t good.”

Jazz laughs. “But Zoey, you do know lots of other things. And that’s what’s interesting to us at
U Grl.
And to our readers. They’re interested in
all sorts of different things.”

“Even the presidents of the United States?”

“Well, I don’t know if anyone is as interested in that particular subject as you are, but that’s fine.”

“It is?”

Jazz motions to a person with a bowling shirt that has “Bebe” embroidered on the pocket. She fans out big boards on the table.

“Here are some layout ideas for the spreads we want to feature in upcoming issues. Hoyt—you remember my assistant, don’t you?” Hoyt waves. “He remembered the books in your locker; and we had all the photos that Maya took during the photo shoot, so we got our inspiration from them.”

Jazz picks up one of the boards that has pictures of me all over it.

“We were thinking of taking a photo or two in front of President Theodore Roosevelt’s house.”

“He was the only president to be born in New York City,” I blurt. (
Can’t help it. I’m a natural blurter.
)
“I’m pretty sure the house is on Twentieth Street.”

All the magazine people laugh.

(
I really am missing the humor here.
)

“You’re right,” says Jazz.

Hoyt points back to the boards. “And we’re planning locations in places like perhaps the Guggenheim, the Met, the planetarium, the American Museum of Natural History …the Staten Island Ferry. …”

I look at Jazz. “I think I still don’t get it.”

“Zoey, we believe you are the perfect person to write a diary or column for the magazine representing our readers with your thoughts. Things you like to do. Places you visit.”

“Maybe even do a blog,” says EEP. “A blog on our website would be very cool indeed.”

Indeed? (
“Indeed” is like one of my most dollar-word choices.
)

Are my ears buzzing now too or is that Hoyt’s phone?

“How does all of this sound, Zoey?”

“Writing for your magazine?
Me?
Sounds yes,
you know … indeed … what you said. But are you really sure you want me? Because, really Jazz … I’mnotthatcoolI’mnotevenalittlecoolI’m souncoolIneedafairygodmothertomakemecoolbe foresixthgradereallytrulymyarrowiswaydownon TheBashleycoolabilitymeterVenusandIneversitat TheTableBashley. Wesitat … Table Ten.”

Jazz looks at me, then at Venus.

“The who? The what? When? Where?”

I take a deep breath.

“Everybody at my school thinks Zoey Zinevich is …well… a sort of …

geek.”

“Geek chic!” shouts Aunt Rootie.

Did she really just say that?
Geek Chic?
My own aunt is
so
not helping this situation.

“Geek chic? LOVE IT!” cries EEP, while Jazz’s people rush to find a pencil to write it down.

Can this get any worse?

Geek chic?

Something has gotten all mixed up here.

This is not the happening I exactly wanted to happen.

Jazz smiles. “So, Zoey? Ready to be
U Gel’s
very own … ‘
geekanista’?”

Okay—

(… wait-Wait-Wait!

Lightbulb Momento!

I know what this is.
This is one of those weird “other dimension” things
that Simon Malachek always talks about.
It’s when everything gets all weird and backward and sideways,
and nothing makes any sense. But then
you wake up or pinch yourself or whatever,
and everything is the way it’s supposed to be.
Yes. Uh-huh. Absolutely.
A weird other dimension.
That’s what this is.
)