The Daughters

by Joanna Philbin

  Ava turned around. “Oh, hey, Lizzie,” she said, with much less enthusiasm. “You going to Todd’s?” She sat down in Todd’s vacated seat. Across the aisle, Lizzie could feel the Icks watching them.

  “Yep,” she said, standing up and packing her bag. “Todd and I go way back, actually. We’ve been good friends since we were kids.”

  Ava was too busy logging on to her e-mail to get the dig. “Oh, right,” she said distractedly. “See you later.”

  As Lizzie walked to the door, she almost had to pinch herself. He’d invited her over to his house. Before everyone else. He’d confided in her about his parents. He’d taken her story to read. And he’d invited her over to his house. Before everyone else.

  Could this really be happening? Was this what she thought it might be? Could she and Todd really be, well… a thing?

  She couldn’t wait to tell Carina and Hudson. With just a few minutes left before the bell, she raced down the hall. They’d know what this meant.

  chapter 4

  Lizzie was still thinking about Todd the following night, as her town car inched its way down Forty-Second Street. Even in the gathering dusk, she could make out the edge of the massive white tent in the middle of Bryant Park, lined by tall skinny plane trees. While a million fourteen-year-old girls would probably kill to be going to see a show at Fashion Week—on a school night, no less—walking into the tents with her mom always made Lizzie a little nervous. And tonight would be even crazier than usual. This would be the fashion world’s first glimpse of Katia Coquette, and her mom had made sure to amass an especially high-profile crowd for the runway show.

  But for right now, she still had a few extra minutes to think about Todd’s party. It was still two nights away. Carina and Hudson were convinced that it was a date. “I called it!” Carina cried when she heard the news.

  Hudson immediately went online to check the astrological prediction for Saturday night. “Mars is in Cancer!” she gasped. “That means you’re totally gonna hook up!”

  Lizzie wasn’t sure about that, but her friends’ excitement only added to her own.

  “Okay, we’re pulling up right now,” her mother said beside her, into her slim black phone. “Wish me luck, honey. See you soon.” Katia slipped her phone back into her tiny silk clutch. “Your father said he’s going to try to make it to the after-party,” she said to Lizzie. “But he’s running late with his deadline.”

  Tonight her mother looked even more breathtaking than usual in a clingy purple halter dress that showed off her cleavage and toned shoulders. Her blond hair had been artfully piled into a messy, chic knot, and her expertly applied fake eyelashes looked like delicate black spiders clinging to her lids. How on earth am I related to this person? Lizzie thought.

  Katia patted Lizzie’s hand. “You look great, honey.”

  “Thanks,” Lizzie fibbed. She didn’t feel great. Her strapless Trina Turk dress pulled tightly across the hips, while the straps of her mom’s spike-heeled Manolos dug into the flesh of her toes. Plus, her updo felt more like a beehive. As the car traveled another few feet in traffic, she decided to finally ask the question she’d wanted to ask for weeks. “So, Mom… you’re not gonna make me pose with you, right?”

  Katia gave her a quizzical look as she pulled out a jeweled compact. “Well, you’re my date, aren’t you?” she asked, popping it open and checking her lipstick.

  “I just would rather that I was in the background for this. Maybe I can just meet you inside at the seats?”

  “But how’ll you find me?” Katia frowned slightly as she squeezed a pin-sized drop of Chanel lip gloss onto her finger and patted it on her lips. “You used to love Fashion Week.”

  “I know,” Lizzie said. “It’s just so intense.”

  The car came to a stop. “This is as far as I can go,” announced the driver.

  “Okay. We’ll get out here,” Katia said.

  “Mom? Is that cool?” Lizzie pressed.

  “Fine, Lizzie,” Katia said hastily as she opened the door.

  Katia got out of the car, and Lizzie followed her out into the steamy September twilight. It was so humid that her strapless dress stuck to her back. For a few minutes they walked unnoticed past the crowds lining the steps into the tent. Assistants wearing black SEVENTH ON SIXTH T-shirts and IDs around their necks scurried back and forth. Up ahead, just inside the doors, Lizzie could see flashes from the paparazzi’s cameras like lightning. Suddenly she wanted to be back in her room, lying on her bed and videochatting with Carina and Hudson.

  Suddenly a young blond guy wearing a black SEVENTH ON SIXTH T-shirt, an ID, and a hassled expression rushed up to them.

  “Katia? I’m Phil, I’ll be escorting you inside,” he said, waving them past the first round of security guards in front of the steps.

  They followed him up the steps and into the main lobby of the tent. A frigid blast of air-conditioning sent goose bumps along Lizzie’s skin. Ahead of her, she could see the snaking lines of people—noncelebrities—waiting to get into the two different runway rooms. Several leggy girls hawked free copies of Women’s Wear Daily and booths set up around the room advertised different sponsors—bottled water, sunglasses, watches. The noise inside was deafening. It reminded her of the time her dad took her to see a Giants game—the tangle of people all trying to squeeze into one line at their section of seats. At least she had finally gotten up the nerve to ask her mom to let her sit this all out.

  She was about to ask Phil to lead her to their seats when a flash of light popped in their faces.

  “Katia!” someone screamed. A moment later, they were surrounded. A fleet of paparazzi closed in around them, screaming at them, snapping their pictures. Clickety-clickety-click. Clickety-click-click. Clickety-click-click.

  “Katia! Who are you wearing?”

  “Katia! Why lingerie?”

  “Katia! Will you be modeling it?”

  “Katia! Over here, over here!”

  “KATIA!”

  The cameras were so close that Katia and Lizzie couldn’t move. Phil tried to clear a path through the cameras but it was impossible. Lizzie tried to remember to breathe.

  “Katia! Katia! Katia!” they yelled.

  Lizzie teetered on her heels while in front of her, Katia struck her favorite pose—shoulders thrown back, hand on hip, brilliant smile. The crush of cameras and the din of the screams could have sent anyone in their right mind running back out to Bryant Park, but Katia was used to this. This, in fact, was why they were here.

  Lizzie reached into her bag and let her fingers close around her phone. She had a desperate urge to text C and H, and have them take her mind off this ambush.

  And then her mother turned around. “Honey!” she called out with the same fake smile on her face. “Come here!”

  Lizzie watched, dumbfounded, as Katia held out her arm and waved to her, just like she had a few days ago. “Come up here! Take a picture with me!”

  Lizzie froze. Why was her mother doing this? Hadn’t she just said Lizzie could skip this?

  “Honey!” Katia yelled. “Come on!”

  Lizzie gulped. Had her mom already forgotten what they’d talked about in the car? She stepped forward as Katia reached for her and pulled her in closer, until she had her arm around her.

  The flashes were blinding. Lizzie tried to smile, but her jaw was locked so tight it felt like a grimace.

  “Smile,” Katia whispered. Lizzie wanted to shove her away, but she couldn’t. It was official, she thought. Her mother wasn’t oblivious. She was selfish. She’d decided to ignore everything Lizzie had said.

  “Thank you,” Katia said into the stream of flashes. “Thank you.” That was what you said when you wanted the paparazzi to stop taking your picture, as if they’d been doing you a favor.

  “Katia, we have some reporters waiting,” Phil yelled into Katia’s ear, taking her by the elbow. She nodded, and he led her over to the press area, where several television crews waited to interview her.<
br />
  “Congratulations on your new line!” said a reporter, aiming his tape recorder at Katia’s mouth. “What made you decide on lingerie?”

  Her mother pointed to her ample chest. “What do you think?” she asked in her sultriest voice.

  Lizzie grabbed a free bottle of Voss water from a nearby booth and tried to think past her anger. Why had her mom done that to her?

  She sipped some water and moved out of the way of another frigid stream of air from one of the vents. The pack of photographers at the doors had moved on to someone else now, a starlet known for losing a dress size every season. Lizzie watched her try to keep her cool as the paparazzi engulfed her tiny frame.

  At last they were on the move again. Phil began walking them toward the main exhibition space. “Katia incoming,” he said into his mouthpiece, in a deadly serious voice. “Katia incoming.”

  Then a small, muscular man with a platinum buzzcut and large, liquid brown eyes stepped out of the chaos. He wore torn black jeans and a T-shirt with an image of an American flag pocked with bullet marks, and his eyes had a wired and jittery look to them. “Katia darling!” he cried, flinging his arms around her mother as if she had just survived an earthquake.

  It was Martin Meloy. As he and Katia embraced, paparazzi shoved each other to capture the moment. A shot of the world’s most famous supermodel hugging the world’s most successful fashion designer was worth a lot of money.

  “Martin!” Katia said, kissing him on both cheeks. “Thank you for coming. I know you have your show tomorrow so I appreciate this.”

  “Not a word, darling,” he replied, grasping her hand in his. “I don’t sleep starting in July, so I’ve got it all under control, ” he said, winking.

  Lizzie stared at him, starstruck despite her anger. Martin Meloy wasn’t just a designer—he was THE designer. A Martin Meloy dress, or more importantly, a Martin Meloy quilted leather bag with real silver hardware and a special pocket for your iPhone, was the holy grail of fashion. His ad campaigns were deliberately edgy, with a simple photo of a girl sitting against a wall, wearing one of his items or accessories, hardly showing them off. But the girl was never just a girl. She was a mysterious combination of cool and beautiful and the Martin Meloy state of mind—which seemed to involve being effortlessly chic and rebellious at the same time. Martin Meloy supposedly handpicked her himself each year, and then designed his collection around her.

  Katia and Martin had worked together once or twice, but were mostly just good friends.

  “Darling, just go in there and kill,” Martin advised. “You’ll be divine.”

  “Thanks, love,” her mom said. “And you remember my daughter, Lizzie.”

  Martin’s restless eyes traveled over Lizzie’s face but only touched down for an instant. “Of course,” he said, leaning in to give Lizzie a perfunctory kiss on the cheek.

  “Hi,” she said, smiling politely. He never really remembered her.

  “Thanks for coming again,” Katia said.

  “Love love,” Martin said, the same way someone else might say “Bye bye.” And then he was gone.

  “Mom,” she started, wanting to ask her mom if she could wait to sit down, but there was a push of the crowd behind them, and before Lizzie knew it, they were both inside the main exhibition space. The plastic-covered runway seemed to stretch a mile down the center of the room. The air smelled spicy and sweet from all the perfumes. Hundreds of editors, writers, photographers, actresses, celebrities, and rock stars socialized from their seats, filling the usual half-hour of waiting time. As the assistant led the way toward the front row, Lizzie could see heads all across the room turn to gawk at them.

  “Um, Mom,” Lizzie began, but Katia was already chatting with a dreadlocked singer who’d written a song about her once. Lizzie had no choice but to shimmy sideways to the two empty gold chairs at the far end of the front row.

  She dropped into her seat. Now she was trapped. And she knew what was coming.

  “Couldn’t I have just skipped this?” she asked her mom when she finally sat down.

  Katia gazed at her questioningly, her greenish-blue eyes brilliant in the light. “Oh, honey. It won’t be too bad. I think it’s going well.” Even this close, her mother’s skin didn’t have a pore. She patted Lizzie’s knee. “Just don’t forget to smile.”

  And then, as if on cue, they were surrounded again. The photographers hovered like locusts, flashing and clicking, their lenses just inches away from them, screaming more questions at her mom.

  “How do you stay in such great shape?”

  “How do you juggle career with family?”

  “What was the inspiration for your design?”

  Calmly, Katia began to answer the questions. But Lizzie felt the onset of a full-blown anxiety attack. With her head bent, she fumbled in her bag for her phone. Now she really needed to text Carina and Hudson…

  “Hey!” a voice said.

  She looked up to see the foam-covered dome of a microphone in her face. On the other side of it was a man wearing pancake makeup and eyeliner. An entertainment reporter. Behind him another man stood with a video camera on his shoulder.

  “Are you the daughter?” the reporter asked.

  Lizzie nodded dumbly.

  “So what’s it like having the hottest woman in the world as your mom?” he asked breathlessly. He thrust the mic back at her face.

  Lizzie stared at it. She couldn’t think all of a sudden.

  “Is it fun having a mom who’s a supermodel?” he asked in the same hyper-enthusiastic tone. “And what do you think of her clothes?”

  Lizzie thought for a moment, staring at the microphone. She knew what she was supposed to say. It’s fun! It’s cool! Her clothes are great!

  But was this really fun? Fun was walking through the Village with Carina and Hudson. Fun was wearing her favorite pair of ripped-up corduroy shorts and Old Navy flip-flops, and lying on her back in the Meadow, watching the kites dance in the sky while she sipped a Frappuccino. Fun was writing in her journal, or sitting at her computer, lost in thought, writing a story. Fun was petting her white Persian cat, Sid Vicious, while lying on her bed.

  Fun was not squeezing into a dress that was a size too small and wearing heels that gave her blisters, and standing, frozen smile plastered on her face, next to the hottest woman in the world. Or having a gazillion cameras in her face for minutes on end.

  Or being ambushed by a man wearing more makeup than half the women in the room and his annoying questions.

  “Actually, it kind of sucks,” she blurted into the mic. “And I think her clothes are a little slutty.”

  The reporter’s mouth dropped open. Far back in his mouth, Lizzie could see a gold filling. Seconds ticked by.

  “I mean… it’s cool,” she corrected herself. “It’s great! I was just kidding.”

  He just gaped at her. Clearly, it was too late to correct herself. Finally he tipped the mic back to his face. “What’s your name again?” he asked.

  She swallowed. This wasn’t good. “Lizzie.”

  “Lizzie. Well, thanks for sharing.” He turned to the cameraman. “I think we’re done here,” he muttered.

  The camera. She had almost forgotten. This had all been recorded.

  “Wait a minute—” Lizzie said.

  Before she could finish, the reporter and the cameraman had stepped away, back into the swirling mass of people. A moment later, they were gone.

  Lizzie sat, paralyzed. Briefly, she thought of running after them, but she knew it was pointless. They were gone for good. And she had no idea who they were.

  “Thank you,” she heard Katia say on her left to the photographers. “Thank you very much.”

  Had her mother heard what she’d said? And had she really just said that?

  As the cameras finally stopped, Katia squeezed Lizzie’s arm. “Let’s get this show on the road, huh?” she asked, grinning.

  “Yeah,” Lizzie said faintly, trying to breathe. Miraculousl
y it looked like she hadn’t heard a thing.

  A pounding remix of one of her favorite songs suddenly filled the space and the lights dimmed. More assistants appeared and pulled off the plastic from the runway. Anticipation crackled in the air. The moments before a show began usually gave Lizzie chills, but this time she was too panicked to pay attention. All she could hear was what she’d said to the reporter.

  Katia squeezed Lizzie’s hand in anticipation. “Here we go,” she whispered.

  Lizzie tried to squeeze back. She had broken the golden rule, the First Commandment. Well, actually, it was rule number six of being a Daughter, but it was still a big rule. It should have been number one.

  She had put down her mother.

  In public.

  To a reporter.

  On video.

  Now Lizzie was really never coming to Fashion Week again.

  chapter 5

  “Fuzz? That you? Dinner’s here!” her father called from the kitchen.

  “Be right there!” she called back, as she walked into the apartment with her heart in her mouth.

  She was still in shock. After the show, she’d told her mom that she had homework to finish and run out of the tent, leaving her backstage surrounded by more reporters and a flock of fashionista friends. The twelve-minute show had passed by in a blur. Her answer to the reporter pounded inside her head, blocking out the DJ’s music. Instead of the models coming down the runway, all she could see was the reporter’s open mouth and his gold filling. Now her Trina Turk dress was soaked from sweat, and she wished she could just take a shower, go to bed, and pretend this had never happened.

  But she couldn’t. There was tape of her saying what she’d said. It was out there, loose in the world. Even though Katia hadn’t heard her, it was just a matter of time until she did, which meant she was going to have to tell her. Lizzie’s throat knotted up just at the thought of it.

  She opened the door to her room, and felt the knot relax slightly. Her room always calmed her. She called it the Cloud because every color was either blue or white. The walls were painted the color of the sky, and the carpet was a luxurious white shag. Her desk was white, her MacBook was white, and even Sid Vicious looked like a big fluffy snowball curled on her white and blue tufted bedspread.