Poseur #2: The Good, the Fab and the Ugly (25 page)

“It appears to be a pumpkin bucket.” Melissa frowned, hugging the grinning orange plastic jack-o-lantern to her chest. She bore into Charlotte with her sternest glare. “We do
not
have time for this.”

“But I have no idea where that
came
from!” Charlotte insisted in her defense, removing her trembling hand from her open mouth. On her palm, a gaping red lipstick print appeared to gasp in surprise. “I swear to
God,
” she warbled, glancing at the stricken Petra. “I just
showed
it to you. At your house!”

“I know,” Petra whispered, shaking her tangled head.

“So what are you saying?”
Melissa crossed to the wall and frantically cranked a paper towel. “The handbag we just spent a
month
working on went up and
shape
-shifted into a
pumpkin
bucket?!”

“I don’t know,” Charlotte whimpered, leaning up against the sink as Melissa continued to madly crank. At last, Janie intervened, ripping the brown paper towel from the dispenser, and calmly handing it to her.

“This isn’t happening.” Melissa crushed the eight-foot-long paper towel into a crumpled ball, squeezed it between her hands, and dropped it to the floor. “First our contest is sabotaged. Now
this
? It’s like we’re cursed!”

“Do you think that girl Nikki’s behind it?” Charlotte wrung her hands. She could just see Nikki skulking into the showroom and snatching the bag off of her trunk when Charlotte wasn’t looking. But then how to explain the pumpkin bucket?

“No way.” Janie shook her head. “She’d have to be some kind of diabolical mastermind. Which she’s
not,
” she insisted, reading Charlotte’s mind. “She may have macked on Jake, but she got
caught,
okay?”

“Not really a mastermind move,” Petra assisted her point. Nevertheless her mind continued to race. How the hell had this happened?

Melissa pushed her fingernails (appropriately manicured in Lancôme’s Code Red) to her eye sockets. “Do you even know how hard I hyped this thing? The whole damn school is waiting for this big-ass reveal . . . what are we going to do?” She blinked, her dark brown eyes glossy with dread. “Go up to the podium and be like,
yo.
Just kidding?”

“I hate to say this,” Janie whispered. “But TM’s in three minutes.”

“TM meaning
what
?” Charlotte buried her face in her hands. “Town Meeting? Or Total Mortification . . .”

“It’ll be okay,” Petra attempted a note of cheer, patting her tiny back. “We’ll just go in there and
rip
off the Band-Aid.”

“Yeah, I can never really do that,” Janie confessed, gray eyes agleam. “I always just leave it on until it gets really gross and, like, falls off in the bath.”

The four girls took her words to heart, staring at the floor in cowed silence. A moment later, the bell rang long loud and clear.

“Well,” Charlotte sang, pushing off from the edge of the sink. She brushed her voluminous petticoats, squared her ribbon-festooned shoulders, and smiled. “Total Mortification it is!”

From their conception, Town Meetings never started on time. According to one of their many nonspoken agreements, Winstonians devoted the first two minutes to trickling in late and another three to four minutes either a) shrieking at pterodactyl frequencies, or b) launching into super-complicated high-five routines. Invariably, Glen Morrison danced about the perimeter, squeezing his hands together, and pantingly lobbing instructions for them to “Simmer down and face forward” or “Put on our paying-attention masks” or “When the hands goes up, the mouth goes . . .”

Very occasionally, someone responded, “Butt.”

Jake weaved through the murmuring throng of seated Nomanlanders and beelined for his freshly re-earned and highly coveted West Wall spot, swinging his black canvas backpack from his shoulder. But before he could drop it to his feet, a streak of purple velvet swept across the floor, claiming his seat. Jake blinked in shock as Jules Maxwell-Whatever, imperious as ever in a powdered Louis XVI wig and royal blue satin sash, lay a bejeweled hand over the velvet garment.

“Um . . .” Jake lowered his backpack to the scuffed rubber edge of his black low-top Converse, scratching the back of his neck in mock confusion. “Sorry, but your
skirt
appears to be in my seat.”

Jules tightened his jaw, flexing the expertly applied beauty mark on his cheek. “It is a cape.”

“Are you protecting me from a mud puddle?” Jake grinned, pressing his hand to his heart. “What chivalry!”

“The chivalry is for Charlotte, not you,” the humorless amber-eyed king informed him. “This is her seat.”

“Ch’ello, stewdents!”
Miss Paletsky’s voice called from somewhere in the distance, striving to make itself heard. “Please take your seats so we can begin.”

“Bronwyn, Amanda, Joaquin, Christina,
Jake
. . .” Glen Morrison listed the names of the defiantly non-seated, and pointed. “That means
you.
”

“Jake!” A tiny voice cheeped behind him, and he turned to where an eager-eyed eighth-grade girl sat, her tiny moon-face shining up at him. She patted the patch of floor by her knee. “You can sit here.”

“Uh, no thanks,” Jake replied, his utter lack of enthusiasm inversely proportional to her twittering excitement. “Listen,” he said, extending his hand to Jules. “Charlotte told me to sit here. I’m Jake?”

“Oh yes, of course!” Jules swept aside the cape, gesturing for him to sit. “Charlotte tells me we are to be great friends.”

“Oh yeah?” Jake smiled, resisting the urge to flick the mole off Jules’s unsuspecting, Frenchie-boy face. “That’s cool.”

“Alright!” Glen clapped his hands together, ignoring a mysterious burst of snickering at the Back Wall. “We have a very special Town Meeting today. Instead of the usual round of announcements,
POSEUR
, the fashion label–slash–Winston special study, would like to treat us to a presentation of its first design! Let’s go, Community Expression!” he cheered, swiveling his turquoise and black Navajo belt-bound hips.

“Actually . . .” Miss Paletsky tapped the back of his elbow. “So sorry,” she murmured, tipping into a blushingly apologetic bow. “But . . .”

As she leaned into his ear, Joaquin Whitman crowed, “Way to go,
Glen
!” His Back Wall cronies tittered in amusement.

“Alright, that’s
enough.
” Glen returned his attention to the hundreds of students gathered on the floor. “Small correction!” He cleared his throat and gripped the podium. “Instead of Community Expression, the young women of
POSEUR
prefer the term . . .” He cleared his throat again, closing his eyes.

“Chic Preview.”
Miss Paletsky leaped to his assistance.

Everyone cheered — everyone, that is, except the clearly crushed Glen.
What in the name of Tofu was a “Chic Preview”?
He attempted an enthusiastic grin, achieving only a bewildered half-smile. “After the presentation,” he bravely pushed on, “we’ll be conducting our usual bagel sale, along with an exciting new option, the traditional Russian
bublik,
which are very similar to bagels except somewhat bigger, and with a wider hole.”

“But let us return to
POSEUR
!” Miss Paletsky stepped sympathetically forward, relieving Glen of his duties. “Are we ready to see what all the buzz is about?” she asked, testing her latest American idiom.

“Yeah!!!” the crowd blasted in unison. Miss Paletsky beamed, her mascara-hardened eyelashes fluttering behind her octagonal eyeglasses. She knew she was expected to follow her question with the standard “Are you
sure
?” or the variant “I can’t
hear
you,” but she refused. She had enough volume to deal with at home, thank you — in Yuri’s dismal apartment, with Yuri’s equally dismal family. Always the yelling, yelling,
yelling.
Why she should drum these students into a crazed froth and invite
more
screaming into her life was beyond her.

“Without further adieu,” she calmly announced, “we present the
POSEUR
Chic Preview.
”

Jumping into action, Venice shut the lights, cued the stereo to something Fergie, pumped the cool metal bar on the
EXIT
, and cracked the heavy glossy wood door open. A flood of semi-hysterical chanting pumped into the hallway —
PO-
ZEUR
! PO-
ZEUR
! PO-
ZEUR
! PO-
ZEUR
!
At last the door was all the way open, clicking to the wall with a hollow boom, and framed the four formally dressed girls like a prom picture. The crowd roared at the sight of them (literally,
roared
) like a sprawling six-hundred-eyed monster. Melissa was the first to break away, striding ahead, beaming, and waving, and one by one her three blushing colleagues followed in her wake. Underclassmen watched them with heart-wrenching awe. They were so beautiful. So
confident.
Who would have guessed how they
really
felt? Like pirate-ship captives walking the plank . . .

“Thank you so
much
!” Melissa cleared her throat as the monster calmed itself down, its six hundred eyes blinking in the dark. She cleared her throat again. “As you know, we’re here to present our work. Thank you for showing so much support. The energy here is . . . yeah.” She took a breath. “The thing is . . .
POSEUR
begins with
P.
Which stands for patience. And at this time . . .”

“Duuuudes!” a doofy-sounding backwaller wailed. “Let’s get this
shizzle
on the
rizzle
!”

“Yeah!” his comrade warbled in mock despair. “I want my friggin’
bublik
!”

Melissa swallowed, growing pale. Then with all the courage she could muster, she clasped her hands, took a breath, and:

Boom!

On the opposite end of the expansive Assembly Hall, the emergency door swung open, smacking the adjacent wall, and emerging from the flood of daylight, a small figure staggered forward, hauling what looked like a garbage-encrusted wooden plank. For Melissa, the scene was familiar, and after a moment’s bewilderment, her stomach heaved.
It was exactly like her dream.
The four Oscar dresses, the mysterious intruder . . .
Trick or Treat?

They were doomed.

But then the door clapped shut, blocked the glare of sunlight, and revealed the figure’s identity. “I didn’t do it!” Nikki Pellegrini gasped as the plank slipped from her weakened grasp, crashing loudly to the floor. Two blue bottlecaps dislodged from the plank’s jagged edge, briefly wheeled across the brushed concrete floor, and collapsed together with tiny clatters. She remained oblivious. She simply fixed her careworn cornflower gaze on Melissa. “Venice set me up!” she explained, sinking to her knees. “It’s not my handwriting. I’m free!” Melissa, Janie, Petra, and Charlotte abandoned the podium and quickly crept forward, and the student body had swelled to near hysteria, nearly drowning the puny cries of Glen, vainly attempting to restore control. The members of
POSEUR
gathered around, following Nikki’s pointed finger to a corner of the trash collage.

“I found it,” Nikki whimpered, squeezing out a little laugh. “
I found the tag.
”

“There’s only one word for this,” Melissa gazed admiringly at the Dumpster artwork propped above the Greenes’ fireplace, which blocked a good portion of their gargantuan, pastel painted family portrait. Turning to face the other three girls, she solemnly clasped her hands. “Providence.”

“Like Rhode Island?” Janie frowned, plopping into a corner of the white brocade sofa and sifting through a bowl of candy bars.

“No,” Melissa scoffed in a how-is-this-
not
-obvious way. “As in the divine and all-knowing.”

“Oh.” Janie tore into a mini Mounds bar. “Right.”

“Seriously!” She shook her head in disbelief. “If Nikki hadn’t burst into the gym today, do you even
know
what would have happened?”

“A nightmare?” Janie suggested.

“You have no idea.” Melissa blew some air between her lips, gazing into middle-distance. “We would have been the laughing- stock, of, like, the entire fashion world.”

“Oh, don’t be so
dramatique,
” Charlotte sighed, her customary confidence fully restored. She turned from the fireplace and smiled, extending her elegant ballet arms on either side of the mantel. “We would have been the laughingstock of
Winston Prep,
I admit. But that’s not the whole world.”

“You think ’cause something
starts
with Winston, it
stops
at Winston?” Melissa rasped. “I hate to break it to you, but laughter
spreads,
okay? It’s like herpes.”

“Well . . .” Charlotte bobbed her eyebrows. “Turns out Nikki’s the laughingstock, not us. I don’t see the point in brooding over
what might have been.
”

Janie chewed sadly on her chocolate cube and swallowed. “Poor Nikki.”