Forever Geek

by Holly Smale

  Sugar cookies.

  When I look up, Bunty is still smiling at me. “But that doesn’t make it any less precious,” she says softly.

  “Actually,” I say with another glance up the hill, “it makes it more so, because without the Earth’s atmosphere the sky wouldn’t change colour either.”

  “Wouldn’t it?”

  “Even if some of that is unfortunately a result of pollution.”

  Bunty laughs. “Well, indeed.”

  I turn to go, then hesitate, lean down and give my grandmother a quick kiss on the cheek. She’s velvety and smells sweet: of something smoky, and herb-y.

  “I’ll see you soon,” I say affectionately. “Enjoy.”

  “Oh, my darling,” Bunty sighs, closing her eyes and turning her face towards the orange light. “I always, always do.”

  I look fondly at the glowing face of a grandmother I didn’t know that well until a year ago, when she turned up unexpectedly on our doorstep and never really left.

  And with a sudden pulse of love, I’m abruptly so glad she didn’t.

  Even if I wanted her to at the beginning.

  None of my stories would have been the same without her.

  Then I take a deep breath, pull my satchel on to both my shoulders and start walking to the top of the hill.

  bviously, I already know what the observatory looks like, thanks to last night’s research.

  This show is so important, I basically did everything I could to make sure there would be no surprises.

  That I couldn’t accidentally screw this up.

  And – as I finally reach the top of the hill (sticky and sweating behind my knees) – I’m relieved to see it looks exactly as I expected.

  It’s a large, sandstone building in the Italianate style: pale, blotchy shades of grey, with visible bricks and curved, narrow windows. There’s a taller, rectangular tower – four storeys high, with a little yellow pole on top – a few lower buildings and two octagonal domes with rounded, pale green roofs.

  There’s something kind of regal and austere and Brontë about it: it reminds me of Wuthering Heights or maybe the boarding school in Jane Eyre.

  So far, so exactly as dictated on the internet.

  With one – pretty major – exception.

  Because in none of the photos I looked at were a huddle of very tall girls collected outside a locked front door, crammed closely together like skinny Emperor penguins. In none of my research were these thin, pretty girls grumbling loudly.

  And at no point whatsoever did I expect to already know three of them.

  “I mean,” a furious British voice is sniping at full volume, “it says six-thirty on the invite. It’s six-fifty-five. Are we expected to just stand here forever? Does Yuka think we’ve got nothing better to do?”

  “I’m not going to just stand here,” a brittle Russian accent chimes in angrily. “I’m worth twenty grand an hour. That’s like nine hundred dollars a minute.”

  “It is,” another Russian voice agrees. “That’s so right.”

  “And I didn’t even bring SPF,” the first voice adds irritably. “The setting sun is damaging my delicate skin. I’m going to get freckles.”

  “You could sue if that happens.”

  “I might, you know. My new beauty contract is due any day now and they’ll take it away if I’m covered in ugly brown splodges.”

  Slowly, I approach the group.

  I can’t believe that I was so focused on ticking off everything on the invite that I forgot to focus on what else was written on there.

  As a previously employed model.

  I should have realised that there would be people I already knew on this job. I’d just assumed I’d never see these particular three girls again in my life.

  No, a better word is: hoped.

  “Three hundred and thirty-three dollars and thirty-three cents,” I say as I reach the back of the group. “Rounded down, obviously.”

  One by one, they turn to look at me.

  More than a dozen pretty girls I’ve never seen before, and three I unfortunately have. One, tall and angular with a glossy black bob and big eyebrows; one, smaller and honey-coloured.

  And a third: ridiculously beautiful, tall, curvy and blonde with long golden waves of hair, skin like peaches-and-cream and big blue eyes. Like a fairytale princess, except one that wise squirrels and bluebirds don’t want to go anywhere near.

  “That’s how much you should make per minute,” I clarify as Shola, Rose and Poppy stare at me blankly. “Although I think we’re doing this event for free. It says so on the invite.”

  “Oh, for the love of …” Poppy sighs, looking me up and down with obvious disgust. “You? Again?”

  I nod. “Me. Again.”

  “Look, it’s the little boy from Moscow,” Shola sneers, rolling her eyes. “Still trying to be a proper model. When she’s not rolling about on the floor like a little piggy. Ahahaha.”

  “Da, ona sovsem malaya dlya etoi raboty!” Rose laughs in Russian.

  “Eshe i zhirnaya!”

  Calmly, I look at the triumvirate of beautiful girls.

  One who befriended me in Tokyo, lied to me, sabotaged my modelling career repeatedly, tried to steal my boyfriend and then – just for kicks – intentionally got me fired. The other two who insulted me and then attempted to ruin my first-ever runway performance.

  And finally I have the perfect words for this occasion.

  I take a step forward with a bright smile.

  “Hello, Poppy,” I say, shaking her hand and then the others’ in turn. “You’re as beautiful and as eloquent as always. And hello, Shola and Rose. I can see you haven’t changed in the slightest either.”

  Because I have, and when in doubt you can always avenge yourself with kindness, compassion and forgiveness.

  And just a little bit of confidence.

  “Did she touch me?” Shola says, staring in horror at her hand. “Like, actually just reach out and touch me?”

  For a fraction of a second, I hear another voice in my head.

  A familiar voice on a bus, a long time ago.

  Ugh. Do you think I might have caught something? Noooooo! I’ve caught it! I’m … I’m … I’m a geeeeeeeeeeeek!

  And a bubble of laughter pops out of my mouth.

  “Yup,” I say happily. “I did touch you. You never know, maybe you can magically do maths accurately now too.”

  Shola blinks at me again. “Huh?”

  “Oh, thank God,” a fourth voice says from the back. “Harriet. I thought I was going to be stuck with these idiots for hours.”

  Blinking, I stare as a tall, curly-haired girl with light grey eyes pushes her way through the crowd.

  At exactly the same moment, the locked door in front of us clicks open.

  “Sorry for the delay,” a lady in black says from the doorway, looking at our murmuring group. “We’re running behind schedule. Please come in, we’re ready for you.”

  Apparently, on average, humans spend one hour a month hugging.

  And as I’m wrapped tightly in long, firm arms, it looks like I’m going to get my allocated ration in one go.

  Because grabbing me in the biggest bear hug of my life is the other model I assumed I’d never see again. The very girl I knocked on to the floor of the catwalk in Russia, seventeen months ago.

  Fleur.

  ’m going to correct my earlier statement.

  The average British person makes 396 friends in a lifetime, and so far I have made seven and lost just two of them.

  Because as Fleur and I walk into a large stone room filled with mirrors and lights and make-up and stylists, we can’t stop talking.

  About what’s been happening in the eight months since we saw each other last; about the party in Gotham Hall in New York; about monkeys and snakes and swimming pools and rabbit heads and catacombs and elephants and festivals; about exotic places and people and adventures.

  And Fleur has heaps to say. Because the
thin, sad, quiet girl I left in America – the girl Kenderall so unkindly called Blurgh – has disappeared.

  In her place is somebody happy.

  Somebody sparky and glowing and healthy; somebody quite possibly capable of out-talking me completely.

  According to statistics, girls use an average of 20,000 words a day, and Fleur’s about to hit her limit before we’ve even sat down at the make-up tables.

  “I wanted to get hold of you,” she continues as we’re plonked in front of bright lights and mirrors, “after the party in New York. But you ran off so abruptly and I couldn’t find you on any social media, so it was kind of impossible.”

  I’ve now just realised what the other purpose of social media is.

  “Are you still living in America?” I ask as a make-up artist holds a bottle of pale foundation up to my cheek and then tries with an obvious air of exasperation to find an even lighter one.

  “I’m back in London,” Fleur enthuses as the face-painting begins. “I managed to get a place through clearing at UCL and I’m studying Architecture. It’s the best decision I’ve ever made.”

  “Better than dumping Caleb?” I grin.

  “Even better than that,” Fleur laughs. “Although getting my heart broken by a model-chaser was an all-round low point for me.”

  “At least we got to hang out together at the bottom.”

  We both laugh and high-five knowingly.

  “Girls,” one of our make-up artists sighs. “As touching as it is that you’ve found each other after all this time and so on, can you please stop talking so we don’t get eyeshadow on your chins?”

  Oops.

  Yet again, I’ve momentarily forgotten why we’re here.

  “Focus, Harriet,” Fleur whispers. “We’re models, remember?”

  “From the 1600s French word mode,” I whisper back. “Which means fashion or style.”

  “Actually, it’s from the Latin modus, which means manners.”

  I blink at Fleur in amazement.

  Wait: did she just ace-card my etymological knowledge?

  Even more unbelievably, have I just spent the last year and a half of my life ironically living up to my name?

  How did I not realise this before now?

  “Do you want me to go and get Yuka?” the make-up artist snaps as we both start giggling again. “Because I will.”

  We both stop laughing, suitably cowed.

  But as our faces are slowly made unrecognisable with primer, heavy foundation, powder, blusher, contour, highlighter, sparkling eyeshadows, eyeliner, eyebrow pencil, lip-pencil and lipstick, I find myself glancing to the side.

  It’s surreal how different Fleur looks.

  Her cheeks have filled out, tiny dimples have appeared and her eyes are shiny and clear. The cheeky girl who winked at me behind the stage at the Baylee show in Russia is very much back.

  And I can already feel myself trying to work out where an F will go in JRNTH. I could squeeze it on at the end perhaps – JRNTHF – or I could rearrange it all into FRNTHJ and get new hats and badges made: it would be worth the investment.

  Oooh – maybe she’ll be the perfect girl for Jasp—

  No, Harriet.

  We learnt our lesson last time, remember? No more Emma-ing on your friends.

  I’ll just invite Fleur to the cafe and see what happens.

  Although a few bullet points and charts and maybe a scripted introduction wouldn’t go amiss. Just, you know, for luck.

  “OK,” one make-up artist says finally when we’re both transformed and our hair has been tied into tight little ballerina-knots. “If you go through to the door on the left, you’ll find your outfits. Nametags should be attached. Next?”

  Two beautiful girls take our places in the chairs.

  And together Fleur and I make our way towards a big wooden door at the side of the room: looking pretty ridiculous in full glitter stage make-up, jeans and T-shirts.

  Although Fleur’s tee is just a plain white V neck and doesn’t have a diplodocus on it or anything.

  Ooh: maybe I can get her a new one.

  “I was thinking,” I start as I push the heavy door with both hands. “Art and architecture are quite similar, aren’t they? I mean they both start with an A.” I push a bit harder. “They both involve pencils.” A bit harder. “They both, umm … have lines and … erasers … and …”

  The door finally swings open with a squeak.

  And my not-very-subtle attempts to force both the door and Jasper and Fleur together disappear with a pop.

  It feels like my prefrontal cortex has just opened like a trapdoor: as if my temporal lobe has been prodded with an enormous stick.

  As if the key to where I keep all my mental souvenirs has just slotted in with a loud click.

  Memories are tumbling everywhere.

  n front of us is a small, round stone room.

  And – hanging, perfectly spaced round it – are dresses: shimmering and glistening like large, very organised butterflies.

  Blinking, I walk into the middle of the room.

  To my left is a fragile, glittering gold column dress with thin straps, covered in tiny fish-type scales and ending in a flurry of gold feathers. That’s my girl, my dad shouts as I sit down in a velvet-lined theatre in Russia.

  Next to it is a resplendent ballet tutu.

  And, with a jolt, I’m suddenly covered in handwritten homework stickers: anxiously contorting myself into crazy shapes on the floor.

  Swallowing, I keep turning in a circle.

  There’s a candy-pink, heavily laced and ruffled beaded dress, and it suddenly feels like I’m crouched in a glass box, surrounded by tiny creepy dolls that look exactly like me.

  As if a huge cockroach is climbing slowly up my leg.

  Getitoffmegetitoffmegetitoffme –

  Turning again, I scan past a pretty yellow dress and a short, red glittery one until I reach a long, silky dark blue gown with holes cut into the bottom shaped like stars.

  And it abruptly feels as if I’m standing in the centre of a sumo stage in Tokyo: blinking at a crowd of thousands.

  Just copy me.

  With a lump in my throat, I turn once more.

  There’s a leopard-skin fake fur coat hanging over a black mini dress with vertiginous red heels dangling from a string, and I’m suddenly entering snowy Red Square: tackling my first-ever fashion shoot.

  Blow a raspberry. That’s not even a strawberry.

  I keep turning.

  Next to it is a bright orange, short puffed dress with delicate embroidered tentacles threaded all over it, and I’m covered in blue octopus ink and embarrassment again.

  Guess they managed to dry-clean that one after all.

  With a small smile, I keep spinning.

  Past delicate, incredible dresses I don’t recognise: black and lilac and turquoise and ivory; lace and sequinned and feathered and embroidered; starched and floaty, delicate and structured.

  Until, finally, at the end of the circumference, my eyes land on a long, white, delicate floor-length dress.

  And – just like that – I’m floating in a moonlit lake.

  Covered in light and stars.

  “Yesss,” Fleur says happily, running towards the exquisite green dress she wore in Moscow. “Thanks, Yuka! Score!”

  Nat says that fashion is history: that clothes aren’t just materials we wear, but they become a part of who we are, who we have been and who we will be.

  Which always seemed like an exaggeration to me.

  I mean, history is knowing that 750,000 people died in the American Civil War, the Cuban Missile Crisis happened in 1962 and Joseph Stalin was the dictator of Russia between the years of 1929 and 1953. Then getting an A grade for drawing a coherent timeline.

  But as I walk slowly towards my Lake Dress, I think maybe I’m starting to understand what my best friend meant after all.

  Because these aren’t just dresses.

  They’re portals: ways of time-t
ravelling without moving. A little bit of me went into each of them, and it’s as if I can see myself in each of them, standing there like a ghost. As if every emotion, every thought, every hope, every memory I had is still drifting visibly through them like smoke.

  These are all part of who I am and who I was, and they’re also part of who I will be.

  My very own historical timeline.

  Swallowing, I reach the white dress, hold my breath and close my eyes: please please please please. Then I open them and flick the little paper tag over.

  Harriet Manners

  I don’t know how Yuka knew that this was the piece of me I loved the most, but somehow she did. (Or maybe it’s the only Horcrux I haven’t successfully destroyed yet, like a fashion-world Harry Potter.)

  “OK, girls,” a lady says, entering the room with three models close behind her. “Get into your dresses carefully. This isn’t the changing room at Topshop.”

  Slightly possessively, I watch as a beautiful girl with dark skin and huge eyes takes the Octopus Dress off the wall and holds it against herself and as a girl with pretty blue hair grabs the Sumo Dress with a happy squeak.

  Then Poppy unhooks the pink Manga Girl dress and gives me a sharp look of triumph, and I try not to smirk.

  It’s the least comfortable one of the lot.

  Karma clearly works in strange and sometimes very itchy and rash-giving ways.

  Carefully, we climb into our outfits.

  Then focused, stern stylists wander round us: adjusting, re-pinning and sewing.

  “Whoops,” Fleur laughs as the stylist starts tugging her crossly into the now slightly-too-small green dress like the corset scene in Gone With The Wind. “I’m not modelling any more so I may have forgotten to update my measurements.”

  “Mmmm,” the stylist grunts. “I can see that.”

  “I’ve been eating a lot of Jaffa Cakes,” Fleur says proudly. “Like, a lot. Boxes and boxes.”

  “Yes,” the stylist snaps, pulling a third time. “I can see that too.”

  Fleur winks at me conspiratorially and I grin back.

  New Best Friend number five: tick.

  “You’ve got twenty minutes left, girls!” a woman shouts through the door. “Everybody needs to be ready, perfect and in the main room at eight on the dot! ON. THE. DOT.”