Halfway Perfect

by Julie Cross

  I shake my head. “It’s not your fault. I should have been honest with you a long time ago. Besides, he’s completely civilized. It’s the two of us. We’re a mess together. A complete mess. And I didn’t tell you because I didn’t think I’d have to deal with that world again.”

  “Wait…” Her hand drops from her face, and her forehead scrunches up. “Did you say you saw him this morning?”

  My body is beginning to relax or else it’s turned to Jell-O from being tense all day long so I lie back on my bed and give her all the details of this morning’s photo shoot. Everything.

  • • •

  I groan and pull a pillow over my face. “Please don’t Google me. The stories will have you convinced I died of an overdose while in a drug rehab. And I got fat. I’m sure somebody has decided that I left and then got fat. For models, that would be worse than drugs.”

  “That’s fucked up,” Steph says. “You didn’t actually go to rehab, right?”

  I roll my eyes. “Of course not. I’m still an addict, can’t you tell?”

  “You don’t look like an addict,” she says, laughing. “And I still can’t believe you made it into Columbia with all the correspondence courses and working full time.”

  The truth is, I never stopped wanting to go to college. Modeling was fun at first. It was an escape from everything I hated about my life. But it also felt temporary, like a bridge I’d use to get where I really wanted to be. But there were long stretches of months with Wes when I lost sight of that and when I let myself think he was enough for me.

  I hate how weak I got. How stupid.

  “Okay, so let’s go back to the part where you gave a hot underwear model your email and phone number.” Steph is still on her laptop looking for my Seventeen cover debut, most likely. I’m not going to try and stop her. She’s been supportive enough already. Actually, she’s been supportive since the day I moved in. If it weren’t for her, I would be all study and no play.

  “I never called him an underwear model,” I correct. “And I didn’t give him my number. Okay, I did, but not the way you’re implying. I just thought he might like the running group, and I need someone else for my 5K team.” I lean over the bed and raise my eyebrows. “Maybe if you would have agreed to join, I wouldn’t need to give my number to strangers.”

  Her eyes stay focused on the computer. “I already told you, running makes me sweat and then I itch. So, is he hot?”

  “He’s a model, of course he’s hot.” I pull out my phone to glance at the text Alex sent me earlier and as I’m saving his number, I catch myself fighting off a smile. Good thing Steph isn’t watching me. “He seems nice. Like easy to talk to, you know?”

  Steph grins at me, sets her computer aside, and holds out a hand to pull me off the bed. “You just got really awesome news and we’re celebrating with ice cream. My treat.”

  I’m not sure I could eat right now. Too much emotional drama. But it feels good to talk to someone, to not have to hide the ugly parts of my life. “Okay, but I want to hear your pitch for that journalism midterm project thingy.”

  “Midterm project thingy,” Steph repeats, rolling her eyes. “You know, journalism is not that far off from photography. You could stand to take my passion a bit more seriously.”

  We both laugh. It’s an ongoing debate between us—photography versus journalism. Unlike a math or science career, both of our majors include a wide range of talent. You’d be surprised what can pass as a great photograph or a noteworthy story.

  I slide my flip-flops on and open the door for Steph. “Promise me you won’t work for any tabloids or gossip columns.”

  The smile drops from her face and a crease forms between her eyebrows. “Your animosity toward journalism is making a lot more sense now.”

  She’s right. I don’t think it was even a conscious choice, but I do have a certain level of annoyance with journalism majors. I’m also completely spent and can’t do any more talking on this subject today.

  “Don’t turn into a psych major on me.”

  Steph gets the message and leads us out of the building, saying, “All right, let’s stick with the underwear model topic. I’ve got so many more questions…”

  I try to imagine being behind the camera, in Janessa Fields's place, photographing Alex Evans in a pair of boxer briefs. My face flushes, and I smile down at the ground.

  Then I remember Janessa’s offer and the potential client for next week. Calvin Klein.

  Speaking of underwear models…

  Chapter 6: Alex

  October 6, 9:00 a.m.

  I walk into Wes’s office unannounced and plop down on the plush leather chairs, prop my feet up on the desk, and sip my venti cup of coffee. I’ve had an awesome week, so in my mind, I’m entitled to this luxury. In fact, my week was so amazing this meeting got postponed for three days while I took a trip out of the country, did a swimwear shoot, then rushed back for a Macy’s shoot. And now I’m totally beat, and I’ve forgotten what day it is.

  Wes is yakking away on the phone. He gives me a smile before swatting my feet off the desk and with the same motion hangs up.

  “Alex Evans! My favorite person without breasts, how have you been? How was Buenos Aires? The girls are out of control, I hear.”

  “Didn’t have much time for extracurricular activities.” I literally spent more time on the plane and in the airport than I did in that country.

  “Sorry, we had to rush you back for Macy’s, but I’m sure your bank account is happy and that will soothe your blue balls.” He laughs and moves to type on his computer, then looks over at me again. “Now on to the real business. Drumroll please…Next week you’re shooting for Calvin Klein again! And this time it’s even bigger. You’re doing catalog, billboards, PR, the whole nine. So congratulations. In other news, I’ve decided to elect myself agent of the year.”

  I sit bolt upright. Now I’m feeling that morning coffee. “Wes, you’re the man. That’s amazing. What’s something like that pay?”

  “Don’t get too bogged down with pay. It’s a stepping stone. The next stop is booking the fragrance campaign. Then you’ll be set for life.” He’s got his game face on, trying to keep things in perspective, but I can see the excitement clearly shining through his eyes. This must be a big deal. “The Klein shoot is a weeklong job, so we’re still discussing usage and all that. I’ll get back to you on the numbers, but I assure you, you’ll be pleased. The concept is a little out there, but the photographer you worked with on Tuesday will be doing the CK shoot. Some kind of urban safari theme.”

  “You mean Janessa Fields?”

  Wes lifts an eyebrow. “You’ve really got the name game mastered, don’t you? I almost never have to prep you like I do everyone else. That skill will come in handy at these upcoming jobs. It gets real political and who-is-in-with-what-photographer is at the top.”

  The shock is hitting me now. I don’t think even Jason or Landon, my agency-assigned roommates, have gotten jobs this big before and they’re both at least five years older than me. “I can’t believe this.”

  “Well, you better start believing it, Alex. I told you that you had something special. And not just the hair,” Wes says, grinning at me.

  I’m blond, and that’s not as common with male models. My old agency had no problem booking jobs for me when I was sixteen and seventeen—Abercrombie kids and gigs like that—but she told me I wasn’t buff enough and I didn’t have the “man look” to keep booking jobs after eighteen. But eighteen happened six months ago, and I’m still going. Not that I didn’t take her feedback to heart. I did. I hit the gym hard, and I haven’t missed a day since. I also started looking for a new agent. Someone who thought I still had a chance to keep going.

  “One more important detail…” Wes whips out a copy of US Weekly and spreads open a middle page. I nearly spit my coffee all over the magazine when I
read the story headline.

  “Fashion’s Newest Teen Couple: On camera, American model, Alex Evans and French native Elana, are headlining for Calvin Klein. Off camera, sources confirm a budding teen romance.”

  So, I guessed right. It is a couples thing. “Who made this shit up?”

  Wes lifts his eyebrows, leaning back against his seat. “I made it up, and you’re going to go along with it because it will make you very, very rich, understood?”

  No. Fucking. Way.

  “Seriously, man? She’s fourteen. People aren’t usually into that sort of thing.”

  Wes waves his hand as if I’m so behind on the information chain. “Oh, don’t worry about that. We changed Elana’s age to eighteen. The designers thought it would reflect poorly on them, promoting such a young model as a sex symbol.”

  And changing a model’s age makes them more ethical?

  “This has disaster written all over it,” I say.

  Wes rests a hand on my arm and gives me his serious, I-know-what-I’m-doing face. “Trust me. It’ll be just fine. All you need to do is show up at a few events together, no girls in your apartment for a while, not even the fake girlfriend. We want to keep it all clean and moral. Kara and I have heard that’s in right now.”

  So it’s not just his idea. He’s conspiring with Kara, Elana’s agent.

  I sink back into my seat, wishing I could crawl into bed again and give myself a few more hours of sleep before tackling this challenge. “She’s just a kid, Wes. What if she gets…attached or something?”

  He pauses for a second, contemplating his answer. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

  I know what he’s really saying; it’s not his problem if Elana gets emotionally attached. He knows I won’t. Still, I don’t really like this. Not at all. But Wes is the person who got me a permanent place in New York and full-time work for the most part. Before signing with him, I was only coming to New York a few times a year starting with sophomore year of high school. My parents thought it was something I was doing for fun, like going away to camp. I still don’t think my parents get it. But they let me leave and come here, so whatever.

  “Be on your best behavior,” Wes says. “A one-woman man.”

  I shake my head, too tired to argue further. “Great. Just great.”

  “I’ll email you the rest of the details for the shoot later today,” he says dismissively.

  The ringing of the phone is my signal for escape. I head back outside and plan my route to the gym. As tired as I am right now, I should go back to my apartment and fall into bed for at least sixteen hours, but of course, I’m not doing that at all. Instead, I’ve chosen to beat my body up a little more by rock climbing and possibly some cardio and weights. The second I let myself have a break or a day off, I’m going to wake up with a beer belly and man boobs, and no one will hire me.

  After I’m all changed and ready to climb, I see a skinny kid with wild black hair flying up the wall, Spider-Man style.

  “Elliot!” I shout from the ground below him. “Don’t you ever go to school?”

  Elliot’s grip slips on one of the holds, and he looks over his shoulder at me. “I’m homeschooled.”

  That explains why the kid is always here on weekdays around lunchtime. I guess it doesn’t make sense for a fifteen-year-old to cut school and hang out at a fancy health club at Chelsea Piers.

  Elliot is halfway to the ceiling when I finally hook myself up and start climbing. It takes me a few minutes to catch up, but I manage to without seeming too out of breath.

  “So what’s new in the world of fifteen-year-olds?” I ask him, reaching for some chalk from my bag.

  “How should I know?” Elliot grins at me. “I’m socially challenged, remember?”

  “Yeah, you are.” He and I came to this conclusion a few weeks ago when I noted that he never got a single pop culture reference I’d made in front of him.

  We work in silence for a few minutes and I can’t help but wonder what Elliot’s parents must be like if they wanted to homeschool their kid. I know my mother went nuts with four kids constantly trashing the house and breaking shit. She never said this, but I bet she was more than happy to see that school bus pull up every morning.

  “So what’s the deal with the homeschooling?” I ask Elliot when our paths have brought us close enough to talk. Sweat drips from my forehead and my hands shake from gripping the holds so tightly. “Are you, like, really religious or something? Avoiding exposure to the theory of evolution?”

  “All Jehovah’s Witnesses drop out of school at my age so we can help spread the word of God,” Elliot says.

  Shit. I nearly slip from the wall, then I swallow hard, digging for something redeeming to say.

  “That was way too easy.” Elliot snorts out a laugh. “My parents are professors. We move a lot. They’ve gotten grants and different research projects. I’ve only been in New York for about eight months. I was going to start school, but now my mom’s talking about spending a year in Nepal, so I figured I’d wait and see.”

  “Nepal? That sounds…”

  “Odd? Unconventional? Boring?” Elliot suggests.

  Maybe. Probably.

  “Hey, is that why you’re climbing all the time? Thinking of tackling Everest?”

  Elliot rolls his eyes. “Sure, why not? I’ll just wait until the angst of my teen years overwhelms me, and it’ll be an awesome suicide attempt.”

  If this kid wasn’t so geeky, he’d be incredibly cool. “I’m going to do it someday.”

  “What? Suicide?”

  “No, climb Everest.” My hand and foot both slip from their holds as I say this, and I end up with a big scrape down the front of my leg.

  Elliot cracks up. “Nice. You won’t last a day on a real mountain at this rate. What makes you want to take that plunge?”

  “My dad got me this book about Everest when I was eight, and I’ve kind of been obsessed with it ever since. At one point I had memorized the names of at least a hundred people who died climbing it.” I’ve never really admitted this to anyone, so I’m just waiting for Elliot to laugh at me again.

  Only he doesn’t.

  “I saw a Discovery Channel show about this group of people making the climb. Did you know Everest is taller than twenty-one Empire State Buildings stacked on top of each other?”

  “Yeah, it’s nuts.” I’m really straining now, looking for a blue hold within reach of my left foot. I would totally die on a real mountain right now.

  “There’s, like, more than a hundred dead bodies just lying around the peak,” Elliot says, hardly sounding as strained as me. Maybe it’s easier if you’re lighter. “I wonder why they just leave them there.”

  “Maybe someone thinks we’ll invent a way to revive frozen dead people in the future,” I say, totally joking, but of course Elliot takes it seriously.

  “No, the human freezing theories always revolve around being frozen alive, not dead.”

  “Well, they were alive before they froze to death, right?”

  “Huh.” Elliot’s forehead scrunches up. “Well, that’s true…”

  The frozen body conversation goes on for a while longer until I finally finish my route and return to the ground.

  “I’ve got to do my real workout now. See you tomorrow?”

  It’s already evening by the time I get back to my shared apartment in SoHo. I’m looking forward to doing nothing but eating my take-out sushi, showering, and going straight to bed. Jason has tacked two more 11x13 photos of himself on the refrigerator. I debate making some modifications to the photo with a green Sharpie lying on the counter, but I don’t have the energy, and some people don’t have a sense of humor, unfortunately.

  After eating, I flop on my bed and pick up my latest Everest book.

  Then I remember something minor mentioned in my mee
ting with Wes this morning. Janessa Fields is the photographer for the CK shoot.

  I snatch my phone from the nightstand and search for Eve Nowakowski’s number and send her a text.

  ME: Are you by any chance working for Calvin Klein next week?

  EVE: Why? Are you?

  I feel a tiny surge of something that resembles excitement. She didn’t even hesitate to reply. She must have saved my name in her phone. But maybe she saves everyone’s name?

  ME: Yes. And so is Janessa Fields, so I thought…

  EVE: Well, at least I’ll have someone with a brain to talk to.

  ME: That’s a compliment, right?

  EVE: Sure.

  ME: Remember Finley Belton from the Seventeen shoot?

  EVE: The girl with a fortress. I remember.

  ME: She’s booked CK for two days as well. Another nice person to talk to.

  EVE: That’s good to know. Do you think Wes will be around at all?

  I sit on that question for several seconds, wanting to know whether this is a good or bad thing. Finally I decide to ask.

  ME: Is it bad if he is there?

  EVE: If by bad you mean awkward, anxiety-filled tension? Then yes.

  ME: Ok. I guess things didn’t end on good terms with the two of you?

  EVE: To be expected when you walk away from a huge Gucci campaign and leave your agency to take the blame.

  I don’t really want to discuss Eve Castle’s last days, and I doubt she wants to hash it out.

  ME: Want to talk about running instead?

  EVE: Lol. I thought maybe I scared you off with that running group invite.

  ME: The Hot College Girls’ Running Club? Nope. Not scared at all. Quite the opposite. I had to go to South America the other day and then I did a shoot for Macy’s. But I’m ready for your sales pitch now.

  EVE: Where do I begin? The really cool route? Or the “really hot college girls"?

  ME: All of it. I need all the details. And photos if you have any…

  EVE: LOL

  This could be an interesting week. Eve texting me and me having fake dates with my fake underage girlfriend. Maybe Wes is right about superstardom being in my future. I’m already acting like a real celebrity.