Forever Geek

by Holly Smale

  Quickly, I say goodbye to my parents.

  I blow Tabby a sympathetic kiss: after all, I’ve left her alone with them for the next two weeks, haven’t I?

  Then – with considerable effort – I spend twenty minutes carefully jabbing into the phone all my important numbers: Nat, Bunty, Rin, Toby, Jasper, Wilbur, home, the new agency and the nearest Australian bookshop.

  We use thirty-four muscles to move our fingers. By the time I’ve finished I think I’ve sprained at least fourteen of them.

  Finally, I send Jasper the shortest, most complicated-to-construct text ever written:

  SRY 4 CALL – RING U TMW AT 2. Hxx

  Seventy-one button presses: no photos, no attachments, no links, no smiley faces or tiny unicorns, no internet access, no dictionary, no predictive text (not that I ever had that switched on).

  Yup.

  This is going to be a nightmare.

  he rest of the night is spent working hard in my new position as Nat’s Social Media Chief Controller President™ (SMCCP).

  (I decided to combine all the titles and then – for luck – register the trademark.)

  This obviously includes:

  By morning, we’ve managed to lose the colonic irrigation company and gain a company that sells wigs for hamsters, and I’m not entirely sure that’s the Haute couture audience my best friend is looking for.

  “How’s it going?” Nat says over breakfast. “Is our venture taking off yet, Miss Internet Mogul?”

  She’s been buried in some new design ideas and I’m not entirely sure how to tell her that there are 2.3 billion active social media users in the world and so far we’ve only attracted three of them.

  One of whom is her mum.

  “Mmmmm,” I say, staring hard at my toasted soldiers. “It’s taking off like nobody’s business.”

  Literally, like a business belonging to nobody.

  In January 1986 the NASA Space Shuttle orbiter Challenger (OV-099) broke apart 73 seconds into its flight, disintegrating over the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Cape Canaveral in Florida.

  This venture is taking off very much like that one.

  “Harriet,” Nat says after a pause. “Look at me.”

  I stare at the ceiling above her head.

  “Harriet.”

  Swallowing, I gaze at the front door.

  “Harriet Manners,” Nat sighs. “You’ve got to work on making eye contact when you’re fibbing. Give me that laptop right now so I can see what you’re doing.”

  Reluctantly, I hand it over and wait while my best friend studies each page intently. Then I wait a bit longer as she slumps on to the table and starts gently smacking her head against a coaster.

  “Dude,” she says in exasperation, finally lifting her head. “Did you just spam the editor-in-chief of Australian Vogue five times? Did you use fifteen heart-eyed cat emojis?”

  “It’s not spam,” I say indignantly. “In 2013, emojis were officially named the fastest-growing language in the world: I am communicating internationally. What would you suggest?”

  “I don’t know,” Nat admits. “This isn’t really my area of expertise.”

  We stare at each other for a few seconds.

  “I could post a picture of a kitten in a jumper?” I offer tentatively. “They seem to be quite popular.”

  Nat puts her head back on the table again.

  “I give up,” she mumbles into her arms. “I mean, who needs a creatively satisfying career? I’ll just sit with you in the cafe after I finish college, drinking Jasper’s coffee and watching Toby wear a chocolate moustache every day for the rest of my life.”

  “Oh, we won’t be there,” I say without thinking. “Toby’s already got a place at Oxford, I’ll be at Cambridge and Jasper’s taking a gap year in Paris.”

  Nat groans loudly and begins head-butting the coaster again.

  “I mean,” I correct quickly, patting her shoulder and trying to lever her away from frontal lobe damage, “we will be there for you in spirit, and everything’s going to be dandy, you wait and see.”

  Also I don’t want to karmically jinx my spot at Cambridge University.

  I may have been working on my personal essay for the last six years, but you just never know what they’re looking for: there’s nothing to lose by trying to harness Bunty’s helpful cosmic spirits to my plan as well.

  “Maybe I’m crap,” Nat whispers miserably from under her armpit. “Maybe my designs are awful. Maybe I’ve been kidding myself all along. Maybe I can’t actually do this at all.”

  I can literally feel her natural confidence starting to evaporate, and the guilty stomach-spike starts again: slowly unscrewing my stomach from my abdomen.

  I’ve never seen Nat doubt herself about anything.

  This disaster is entirely because of me.

  Which means it’s up to me to fix it as well.

  “Right,” I say in a businesslike manner, standing up from the breakfast table abruptly. “We’re putting social media on the back burner while we wait for people to respond the way they’re supposed to. It’s time for Plan B.”

  “Plan B? We have a Plan B?”

  I stare at Nat in shocked silence. “Are you joking?”

  “Of course I am,” she laughs, pushing my arm. “Bet you’ve got the whole Plan Alphabet, and probably some Roman numerals too. Go on then, hit me with Plan B.”

  Relieved, I drag the Brick out of my satchel.

  It’s just past eight am, although I’m surprised there’s enough technological know-how in this thing to tell the time: I’d half expect it to come with a sundial dangling on a string.

  Luckily, it’s capable of receiving SMS text messages.

  Spangle-kitten! 11! B @TopModellz 4eva!

  Sparklification ON! Your gravy boat. FG

  One day I’m going to get a message from Wilbur that doesn’t look like it’s been written in abstract FBI code.

  That day is clearly not fast approaching.

  Also, I’m not sure how long the appointment at the new modelling agency is supposed to last but forever seems a little ambitious.

  “We’ve got three hours,” I say, dragging Nat over to the walk-in closet. “Which gives us just enough time to get ready.”

  With a flourish I open the door and gesture at the remaining clothes triumphantly.

  “Ready?” Nat frowns. “Ready for what?”

  I turn to her with a bright smile.

  “If the fashion world won’t come to us, Natalie Grey, then it’s time for us to go to them.”

  ow do I put this?

  Right at this precise moment in history, there are twenty-six sovereigns around the world: kings, queens, sultans, emperors, grand dukes and emirs who reign over forty-three countries, including Cambodia, Monaco, Swaziland, Britain and Tonga.

  There are, however, currently no empresses.

  At least, there weren’t until Nat and I walked into the biggest and most prestigious modelling agency in Australia wearing our very best and most fashionable outfits.

  That’s right.

  What I’m trying to emphatically say is: we rule.

  Literally everyone is staring.

  The receptionist, paused with a sandwich halfway to her mouth; two models, seated on chrome chairs in the corner; a cleaner, coming out of a bathroom with a mop; and an agent, passing by the internal window with a folder held close to his chest.

  At Nat, in a beautiful calf-length black silk slip with red flowers embroidered round the neckline: nipped in at the waist, then floating around the knees. And at me, in a long, yellow satin gown with scalloped neckline and a shiny white ribbon round my waist, now wound firmly round the door handle.

  It’s fine: I’m pretty sure nobody has noticed I’m tied to the fittings yet.

  They’re all too busy staring at my gold trainers.

  “Are you sure this was a good idea?” Nat whispers as she subtly disentangles my ribbon and we continue to swish our way regally towards the front
desk. “It doesn’t feel very … chilled.”

  “Really?” I whisper back. “The air conditioning is on full. Personally, I’m very glad I bought the faux fur coat.”

  Then I whip out a cropped, bright orange, fluffy number, pull it snugly on and immediately start to perspire.

  Nat opens her mouth, then shuts it again.

  She protested quite hard when I explained Plan B, but I knew evening gowns would be perfect for our first official Australian engagement. Not just because they’re gorgeous and Nat’s proud of them, and not even because they won her design prizes at college.

  Everybody knows that if you want to make a lasting impact, you’ve got to stand out. And nothing says look at me like wearing floor-length satin and a faux fur jacket in forty degrees of mid-morning heat.

  Plus our Australia badges, just for … you know.

  Luck.

  Lifting my chin, I approach the woman at the desk.

  The sandwich is still stranded three centimetres from her lips: that’s how much of an unexpectedly majestic vision we are.

  “Good morning. I am Harriet Manners and I’m here for an eleven o’clock appointment. And yes, I am wearing an original Natalie Grey design. Please, do take a professional business card that I definitely did not print out of my computer at home.”

  Carefully, I do a spin on the spot, curtsy and place an NGrey Designs business card on the reception desk: shiny silver side up.

  Then I turn to Nat, who’s hiding behind a large stone pillar.

  “Show her your dress again,” I whisper encouragingly. “They work much better as a duo.”

  “Harriet,” she whimpers, retreating further. “Jeez.”

  “You’re the who what where now?” The receptionist blinks at the card, then takes a nonchalant bite out of her sandwich. “Wait, are you guys British? Yeah, that makes loads more sense.”

  OK: why do people keep saying that?

  I’m about to ask when the door opens and three more models saunter in: tall, thin, tanned and possessing the kind of healthy, netball-playing beauty I could never hope to achieve in a trillion years.

  I may know that the game was invented in England around 1890 and is a derivation of early basketball, but that’s as far as my netball prowess goes.

  “Strewth,” the brunette in tiny white jean shorts blurts, stopping short in front of us. “Did we miss Cinderella’s ball?”

  “Nu-uh,” a blonde in a miniskirt and halter-neck giggles. “It’s the Annual Disney Princess convention, remember?”

  “That yellow one is Belle, right? If only there was a beast around hahaha.”

  From the corner of my eye I can see Nat’s face getting redder and my stomach churns guiltily again.

  Do something, Harriet.

  “Actually,” I snap, spinning round. “I think you’ll find that your most dangerous indigenous creature is the Tasmanian devil and it has been absent from the Australian mainland for 3,000 years.”

  Nope: that wasn’t the scathing retort I was looking for.

  “And,” I keep going desperately, “you should know that the Tasmanian tiger was—”

  “Calm down, chook,” the third girl interrupts, looking up from her nails. “They’re only mucking with you. They’re just not very funny.”

  The other two models promptly stop laughing. “Harsh,” one of them says in a hurt voice.

  The girl who interrupted me narrows her eyes, dyed silver crop glistening in the sunshine. “These dresses are cute,” she decides after a beat. “Totes inappropriate for mid-morning, but they’ve got kind of something.”

  Confused, I glance to the side and see Nat’s face abruptly changing colour again.

  “Yes!” I shout enthusiastically, quickly putting my SMCCP metaphorical hat back on. “Exactly! They’re made by a brand-new designer from England and she’s won awards and—”

  “I made them,” Nat says calmly, walking out from behind the pillar. “They’re mine.”

  “Yeah? Because I’ve got a big show next week, front row, and I need to wear something fresh. Do you make to order?”

  If you didn’t know Nat, you’d think she was taking this 180-degree turn of events completely in her stride: coolly and professionally.

  But I do, and she’s not.

  One of her earlobes has gone pink and her left nostril is twitching. She starts fumbling in her handbag and haphazardly pulls out a lipstick, an eyeshadow and our apartment keys, so I triumphantly slam four business cards into the girl’s hand.

  “Always at the Cutting Edge of fashion!” I yell. “That’s our famous strapline!”

  Also ha: Dad was clearly wrong: business cards are not “outdated and redundant”.

  (“You’re outdated and redundant,” I told him.

  “Touché,” said Dad.)

  “I could probably sort something out.” Nat shrugs casually as her right nostril begins twitching too. “I mean, I could try to fit you in.”

  “Brill,” the girl nods, slipping the cards straight in her pocket and heading past the receptionist’s desk into the agency. “I’ll call you this arvo, yeah?”

  “How does she do it?” the blonde model says as she picks up a sheet of paper from the reception desk and turns towards a side door. “She always spots the up-and-coming designers.”

  “And this one’s British,” the other one adds. “That’s so cool.”

  “Also explains a lot,” the blonde concurs as they disappear too.

  The second they’ve gone, Nat’s nonchalance breaks.

  “Oh my God,” she squeaks under her breath, grabbing my arm. “OhmyGodohmyGodohmyGod—”

  “Told you so.” I grin smugly, wriggling out of the faux fur jacket. “Told. You. So. I am a veritable marketing genius.”

  I’ll make up the song and dance for this triumph later.

  “Harriet Manners?” a voice calls from the back. “Eva’s available now. Would you like to come through? We’re ready for you.”

  4Eva.

  Ah. Wilbur wasn’t asking me to sit in a modelling agency for the rest of time after all.

  Carefully, I assess my best friend: shining with hope and confidence and – I’ll be honest – the gloss of slightly damp-under-the-armpit silk.

  “So much to do,” Nat murmurs, pulling her sketchpad out. “Material to research, patterns. A-line skirt, or circle bias cut. Silver, to match the hair, or maybe pink …”

  Grinning, I watch my best friend submerge herself in the world she loves: motivated and content.

  Plan B: tick.

  Then – still grinning – I head towards my next great adventure.

  The Australian modelling world is ready for me, is it?

  Perfect.

  I think I’m ready for it now too.

  ust north of Melbourne is a mountain.

  It’s 800 metres high, and covered in plants and trees: mountain ashes, grey gums, red stringybarks, narrow-leaved peppermints and candlebark. In fact, it has so many trees that when British explorers Hume and Hovell climbed it in 1824 they realised the view was rubbish, decided it wasn’t really worth the climb and named their discovery Mount Disappointment.

  Which is officially the best mountain name of all time.

  I kind of understand how they felt.

  To get to this modelling agency, I’ve travelled 10,650 miles, used two planes, three taxis, one suitcase and precisely forty muscles just to move my legs. I’ve missed two study groups, one Saturday crossword and maybe even a potential first date with my nearly-boyfriend.

  And I have to be completely honest: now I’m actually here, I don’t totally understand why.

  “Harriet …” Eva says for the fifth time, leaning back in her chair and flipping through my modelling portfolio with one tanned finger. “Harriet, Harriet, Harriet.”

  I’ve been in here six minutes, and that’s basically all she’s said. There are 14,221 people called Harriet registered as living or having once lived in Australia, and I’m becoming slowly convince
d she’s going to name all of us one by one.

  “Yes,” I confirm, smoothing out my gown. “Harriet.”

  “Harriet,” she murmurs again, then more hopefully: “Harriet …?”

  “Manners, from England.”

  “That’s the one,” she says, pausing on the photo of me in the Hatfield House maze. “Got it. Wilbur’s protégée from London. Wonderful.”

  Then she closes the book and smiles at me.

  We’re tucked away in a tiny side-office with glass walls, which means I can see the hub of the agency very clearly. It’s mainly open-plan with private rooms shooting off to the sides and five enormous round desks: each with eight agents and dozens of phones, computers, huge piles of paper and files.

  On every wall are boards covered in glossy, glamorous images or headshots and there’s a lot of activity: phones ringing and beeping, printers whirring, agents chatting, models and clients walking in and out of side rooms.

  It’s just that none of that action is in here.

  Literally none of it.

  Apart from a fly, hovering by the window, nothing is even moving. Eva continues smiling at me with the benevolent, disinterested expression of a lion who has already eaten in a David Attenborough documentary.

  “So …” I prompt, clearing my throat.

  “So,” she agrees, nodding.

  “So?”

  “So.”

  So is the 41st most commonly used word in the English language: I think we’re about to push it up a few places.

  “So … what can I do for you, Harriet?” Eva leans back in her chair once more. “How can I help?”

  I blink and straighten my dress out. What do modelling agents normally do for models in a modelling agency? Is this a trick question?

  Maybe it’s a test to check how intelligent I am.

  “I thought maybe I could print out the casting itinerary?” I suggest, immediately rising to the challenge. “So I can study it properly and get it all scheduled in. Or you could put it on my USB-stick, if you like.”

  Proudly, I place a memory stick shaped like an ice lolly on the desk.

  I thought it was very summery and Australian and also cute in an 8GB-of-storage kind of way.