“Six. And it’s my final offer.”
The hint of a smile crossed Jane’s lips. “Four-fifty. And that’s my final offer.”
We were going to miss out on the material. We were going to be elephant-walking around the gigantic building forever.
“You buy the whole thing?” Mr. McSweaty asked. What? He was actually considering it?
“The whole thing and we’ll pay in cash.”
“Deal.” He held out an equally sweaty hand which Jane didn’t hesitate to shake. I could already tell she was thinking of the hand sanitizer in her handbag.
“He’s actually giving it to us for that?” I asked while the man handwrote a receipt.
“Yep.”
“But that’s almost half-price.”
Jane looked exceedingly happy with herself. “It’s called negotiation. None of the prices in here are fixed. You have to haggle.”
Words escaped me. I always thought a price was a price. I wondered if negotiating would work at Walmart? Probably not. Costco? I don’t think so.
After that first purchase, Jane was on a roll. She bargained down all the prices, some so low I actually felt sorry for the vendors. It felt like we were robbing them, but Jane was on a high.
She even got them to carry everything to the car.
Thank goodness we had agreed to split our business profits equally. If I had to negotiate those terms, I would have ended up owing Jane money.
“Our list is done,” Jane declared, ticking off the last item. We had fabric, zippers, and buttons coming out of our ears. I had never seen that much stuff outside of a fabric store before.
The little Mazda groaned under the weight of all the fabric. I was squished into the back of it, having to hold my breath just to be able to fit. Holly sat in the front passenger’s seat, hugging a trash bag full of off-cuts we got for free (Jane talked one vendor into throwing them into the deal).
No matter how uncomfortable we were, Jane still drove her usual slow, careful speed. We returned to her place and her staff helped us carry everything up to her room. It looked like a massive pile of material when we put it all together.
“That’s a lot of clothes to make,” Holly said, doubtful.
Jane shrugged, unfazed. “We’ve got a lot of orders to fill and new designs to make.”
Holly patted her on the shoulder. “I’m glad it’s you and not me, girl.”
CHAPTER 3
The six flights of stairs to get to my apartment seemed to be really long after walking around all day at the fabric wholesalers. I would have died for an elevator.
As we reached the third flight, Jane touched my arm and stopped me. I turned to face her but she nodded toward Holly. We waited for her to get out of earshot before speaking.
“We’re out of money,” she stated bluntly.
“I know, we just spent it all on material,” I replied. I wasn’t understanding her sudden panic. I needed a Jane translation machine sometimes.
“No, I mean completely out of money. Which means we can’t pay Holly what we owe her for the clothes we’ve sold. We promised her a cut.”
Ahhhh.
We were stuffed.
“I thought you budgeted for all that? You said all the numbers would work as long as we stuck to the list.” It was the only lecture I had ever really listened to. “We stuck to the list,” I added meekly. She hadn’t even let me buy a soda.
“I know, but we needed more than I thought. What are we going to do?” Her forehead was all wrinkled with worry. “I mean, I can take money from my trust fund and lend it to the business.”
I put up my hand, that wasn’t going to happen. Jane and I had already had one uncomfortable discussion about how I didn’t want her to use her money. It belonged to her and our business had to support itself. We had already used her money for the initial line and I had made sure she was first to be paid back.
I had a rule not to owe anything to anybody.
And I never broke it.
“No, Jane,” I started. “I’ll speak with Holly and see if she can wait for a few weeks. By then, we’ll have more sales so we can use that money.”
“Are you sure? I don’t-”
“I’m sure.” She gave me a nod before we started the endless climb again. We caught up with Holly at her door. “Uh, Hol, can I have a word before we go?”
“Sure.” She held the door open for me.
“Thanks for shopping with us today and signing all the business things. You did great,” I started. Because, really, if there was something I had learned it was to start asking for a favor by giving a compliment.
“It was no problem, I actually had fun.”
I glanced at Jane, she was standing at the door, staring at her feet. Clearly I was on my own here.
Thankfully, talking myself out of trouble was something I excelled at.
Most of the time.
“That’s great, we are so thankful for having you involved in the company. We can’t thank you enough.” Holly gave me a shy smile before I kept going. “Our business is really new so we’re still kind of figuring things out. It’s hard to fill orders when we have to buy supplies.”
“Everything is a learning experience. I’m sure you girls will figure it out,” Holly said. She was being too nice, it made the guilt all that much worse.
“I’m sure we’ll figure it out too. But, you see, the thing is, we can’t exactly afford to pay you the ten percent we owe you. I mean, we will, it’s just that we need some time to build up the cash.” The words fell out of my mouth in a cyclone, spinning around and making me dizzy.
Holly stepped closer, taking my hands in her own. Hopefully she wasn’t planning on squeezing them and inflicting some serious pain. She looked directly into my eyes. “It’s okay. I’ve seen Jane’s budget and business plan. I know you’re good for the money. Use everything you have to build the business. And, when you can afford it, start paying me my cut.”
“Really? You don’t mind?” Because, surely, I was hearing things? Nobody was this nice, especially to a pair of kids who spent half their time arguing with each other.
“The money would be nice.” Holly shrugged. “But it’s not really why I’m doing this. I’m here to help you out because you’re my friend. Money’s not going to get in the way of that.”
I gave her a hug, holding back the tears. People never did nice things for me, it wasn’t what I expected. I hoped it was a nice trend she was starting.
We left Holly in peace and quiet and went next door. Mom invited Jane to stay for dinner and she jumped at the chance. Poor thing, Jane was still under the illusion that having so many siblings was fun. Given enough time with the Winx family, she would eventually change her mind.
There were still a few minutes before dinner so I grabbed my laptop and we headed for my bedroom. We sat on the edge of the bed, seeking to cross off another thing on our to-do list.
“We need to get that ad online,” I explained.
“I guess we should. We have the fabric now so they can get started as soon as possible.”
Jane and I had already agreed that we needed other sewers to help her out. She literally could not sew that many outfits without letting our customers down and delivering their orders late.
Except, we couldn’t afford actual, legitimate staff. So we put an ad on the internet calling for people who could sew well enough and wanted to make some quick cash. Jane would inspect all their work to make sure our quality didn’t slip, but she wouldn’t have to do all the grunt work herself.
It had been my idea and I thought it was a brilliant solution. Jane had wanted to outsource to China.
We placed the ad just in time for my mother to call us to the dinner table. I braced myself, hoping tonight wasn’t the night for my brothers to start another food fight.
“You’re so adorable, Lily,” Jane cooed at my baby sister, sitting in the high chair beside her. “Aren’t you? Oh, yes you are.”
I exchanged an eye roll wit
h my brothers, Billy and Ethan. They actually liked Jane, which was weird considering she was a girl and all. They must have decided sometime over the last few weeks that she didn’t have cooties.
“So what did you girls get up to today?” Mom asked, feeding Lily with one hand and herself with the other. Talk about multi-tasking.
I hurried to reply before Jane could. “We went to the park and hung out. Nothing exciting, really.” I tried to sound bored, kicking Jane under the table.
Thank goodness she got the clue. “Yeah, it was really nice weather there… in the park.”
She was a terrible liar. Had she learned nothing from me?
I don’t think Mom’s lie-detector was working at full capacity as she smiled. “That’s nice that you got outdoors. I always worry that Truly spends too much time in the apartment.”
“Mom, can we have ice cream for dessert?” Billy asked.
“If you eat all your vegetables.”
Billy stabbed at his carrot. I could almost see him thinking about whether to throw it at Ethan or eat it. Finally, he shoved it into his mouth.
Good boy.
Mom turned her attention back to our guest. “Jane, do you need to call your parents and let them know you won’t be home for dinner?”
I cringed, knowing full well what Jane was going to say. Except she would do it much more politely than she wanted to. Her parents wouldn’t even miss her, odds were they weren’t home either. And wouldn’t be until much later.
“I texted them,” she replied.
She hadn’t texted them, I was with her the entire time. My heart went out to the poor thing. My mother wasn’t perfect but I never doubted she loved and cared for me. Jane sometimes went days without even seeing her parents.
And she had two of them. I only had one.
If anyone else noticed Jane’s lie, they chose to gloss over it. My brothers, baby sister, and my mother continued eating and keeping up a light conversation. They were on their best behavior, us having a guest and all.
After dinner, I offered to let Jane do the washing up so she could get the real family experience, but she declined. She thought I was joking. I wasn’t.
I walked her out so she could escape. Before she left, she stood in the doorway, turning to face me. “Thank you for letting me stay for dinner.”
“No problem. I guess I kinda like having you around.”
She nodded, flashing me a genuine smile. “You haven’t told your mom about Every Girl Inc, have you?”
“I will… eventually.” Mom was still under the impression that the company was all Holly’s. I wanted her to believe that for as long as possible.
I’d never told anyone why I wanted to keep it a secret from her. But I just couldn’t handle having her watch me fail at something else. Until I was certain the business was a success, she would stay in the dark.
Unless she busted me first, which I was trying really hard to avoid.
“Maybe you should tell her,” Jane said gently. “I’m sure she’d be excited about everything we are really doing. She wouldn’t mind that you lied.”
I mustered my best fake smile and hoped it looked genuine. It didn’t feel that way. “I’ll tell her soon. You know, I’ve got to pick my moment with her. She has a lot going on with my sister and brothers.”
She nodded like she understood, but I’m pretty certain she didn’t. When she told her parents, they had given her a ‘that’s nice’ response and said they were too busy to discuss it further.
I know I didn’t want a parent that was indifferent, but sometimes it might have come in handy.
CHAPTER 4
When I was little and dreamed of being a fashion designer, I imagined the life would be so glamorous. It would be parties and beautiful people, runway parades and diamonds.
I didn’t expect to be stuck in boring business meetings. Which was exactly what was happening around me.
Our website guru Beau, Jane, and I were seated in a circle in the school’s media room. I was desperately trying not to fall asleep.
And if I caught Beau gazing lovingly at Jane one more time, I was going to choke on my water.
“I’ve increased the bandwidth on the website so we can handle up to ten thousand clicks at any time without crashing again,” Beau said. “It won’t go down again, I’ve made sure of that.”
“Can the shopping cart keep up too?” Jane asked, completely oblivious to any of Beau’s glances.
“It sure can.”
“Great, can we move on?” I asked. Because, seriously, if I wanted to hear about geek stuff, I would actually pay attention in the computer lab classes.
Jane checked her agenda and put a tick next to the website update item. Thank goodness. “Okay, now we need to discuss advertising.”
I sat up straighter, I got this one. “I’ve been thinking and we need a spokes model, someone to represent our brand.”
“We’ve got Holly for that.”
“No, she’s the designer. Every fashion designer needs a muse, someone they design clothes for because they inspire them.”
Jane’s frown told me she didn’t believe me before her words did. “You’ve never needed anyone before to inspire you.”
Much to the credit of my self control, I didn’t roll my eyes. “I don’t actually need anyone to inspire me, but it would make us seem more professional. That model then talks about us to people and wears our clothes, she’s basically our biggest fan.”
“Like an avatar for the business?” Beau asked, pushing his glasses back up the bridge of his nose. He snuck a look at Jane, checking whether she caught a glimpse of his brilliance.
“Okay, we’ll go with an avatar,” I replied. Whatever. “We should hold an open competition online so everyone can enter. Then we choose the girl who best personifies Every Girl Inc.”
“If enough girls share the information, it will also spread the word about our clothes,” Jane added, finally getting the genius of my plans.
“I can set something up on the website,” Beau added. “Do you want just their pictures?”
I shook my head. Being merely a pretty face wasn’t enough to represent Every Girl Inc. We were about real girls. “No, they will have to explain why they are an every girl. I’ll give you a list of information they need to submit with their photo.”
Jane chewed on the end of her pencil, lost in thought. She jumped suddenly. “What about if we don’t even ask for their photo?”
Wait… what?
“Huh?” It wasn’t my best vocabulary moment.
“Well, we keep saying that our clothes are for every girl, right?” Jane paused until Beau and I nodded. “So what does it matter what they look like? We want a normal girl and if we choose them blindly, they will be any girl. We’ll be choosing them based on their personality.”
One of the main reasons why I wanted our clothes to be designed and available for everyone was because I didn’t want my sister growing up believing she had to be a certain way to be considered beautiful. I wanted every girl to feel gorgeous no matter what society deemed acceptable.
But I guess if we chose our representative based on looks, it would kind of be going against all those beliefs Jane and I had so wholeheartedly agreed upon.
Dammit, she was right.
“Okay, so we choose blind,” I said.
“There is another choice,” Beau interrupted. I had almost forgotten he was there for a moment.
“Which is?” I prompted when it was clear he was waiting for permission to keep going.
“Maybe one of you two should be the representative,” he said. “Nobody outside your circle of friends will know it’s actually your company. That way, you can still be the face of the business without being the official owner.”
Gee, I wonder which one of us Beau would choose to be the face of Every Girl Inc? He was practically licking Jane’s feet.
I exchanged a glance with my partner, she looked about as convinced as I was. Neither of us wanted to pret
end to represent the company, not when we really wanted to be the official owner.
And, in a few years’ time when the truth came out, it would just be weird having lied about the representative now. We couldn’t do it.
“That’s a good idea, Beau,” Jane started, speaking as the more tactful one of us. “But I don’t want to be the rep. Do you, Truly?”
“Nope.”
“So we’ll stick to the competition.” She consulted her agenda again. “So, advertising done. Good work, Truly, your idea doesn’t require any money and will spread word of our brand.”
Okay, I was kind of really proud of earning her praise. Call me shallow, but it was pretty rare. “Thanks,” I mumbled, hiding my smile behind my hand.
“I think that’s everything. Meeting over until next week,” she declared.
I stood quickly, not needing to be told twice. I hurried out so that Beau could have a few minutes alone with Jane while she packed away her stuff. He probably considered it a date.
I wished I could convince Jane that Beau was completely crushing on her. She seemed to think it was impossible for any guy to see her as attractive. But she was and guys did. So I was going to have to convince her somehow, otherwise she would end up alone with only sixty cats to keep her company.
I picked up my books from my locker and headed down the corridor. I had missed all the school buses for the day so I would have to walk a few blocks to pick up a regular bus. I could have asked Jane to drive me home but it was out of her way and I didn’t want to use her like that.
Halfway to the school gate, I saw Hayley and Kinsey walking along the same path. They hadn’t spotted me yet so I still had time to hide if I wanted to.
But, up until recently, they had been my best friends. Passing each other on the path shouldn’t be a big deal, right?
I kept going, getting ready to say something positive to them so they knew I was doing well with my decision to not be their friend anymore. It was them who had given me the ultimatum – I could either be friends with them or Jane. I chose the one person who was supporting me the best.
“Hey, guys,” I said happily as our paths crossed.
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