“Who wants to do the interview?” I asked, running through a mental list of the columns that were usually published in the paper.
My mom got up and walked over to the pad of paper we kept near the phone, so that we could write down messages for each other. My mom of course, was the only one of us who ever remembered it was there. It was like I had this strange mental blank spot when it came to passing things along. Somehow my mom’s obsessive Compulsive side hadn’t extended to me. Thank God.
“It’s a woman named Sylvia longood,” Mom read off the scrap of paper. “She writes a column called…”
“Sylvia’s secrets?” I asked, surprised. Sylvia’s column was basically our town’s equivalent of “Sex & the City.” only with a lot less sex and even less city. McCartney and I had been reading the column since we’d discovered it back in middle school.
“Yeah. She says she’s doing a piece centered around dating and wants to talk to you about your fundraiser,” Mom said, handing the slip of paper over to me.
“It could be cool to at least meet with her, I guess,” I answered, trying not to sound as excited as I felt. “I mean, it would be rude not to.”
“You know I’ll back up any decision you make, honey,” my mom began, “but I don’t want you to feel at all pressured to bend to the will of the media. And if you do choose to meet with her, I need to know you understand what you’re getting into.”
“I appreciate that Mom, but my privacy was sort of taken away the day I decided to put my first kiss up for auction on the internet,” I answered. “People at school already know what’s going on, and I was mentioned on the radio the other day, so I’d say the word is already out. Maybe it’s time I told my side of the story.”
My mom was silent for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, she smiled and resumed eating.
“Then I’m behind you one hundred percent,” she said, with a firm nod. “Would you like me to come with you? I have had a bit of experience in this arena myself.”
“I think I can handle Sylvia on my own,” I answered. Seeing my mom’s slightly hurt expression, I added, “But if anything comes up, you’re my first call.”
Happy to hear this, Mom began to clear the remnants of our dinner from the table. As soon as she was distracted, I took the note with Sylvia’s phone number on it and snuck up to my room to give the reporter a call.
I agreed to meet Sylvia longood for coffee at The Roast the following morning before school. It was 6:30 am and I was running late. It was hard enough for me to get up on time for the ungodly hour that school required of us, but to have to be coherent before the sun had barely begun to shine, was practically torture.
Wishing I was more awake, I stumbled into the coffee house and looked around for my interviewer. I’d studied her picture in the paper the night before, but as I searched the place, I didn’t find anyone that resembled the journalist.
Finally, I noticed a woman wearing black-rimmed glasses, her hair pulled back into a tight ponytail, waving at me enthusiastically from the corner. Turning around and finding no one else behind me, I realized the enthusiastic greeting was, indeed, intended for me.
I smiled nervously before shuffling over to the table where the woman had set up shop.
“Arielle, right?” she asked. “Hi. I’m Sylvia longood. Well, aren’t you just the cutest thing!”
She looked me up and down, nodding her head in approval, but it just made me feel self-conscious. So I hurried to sit down, landing awkwardly on my butt before settling into my seat.
Great first impression, Arielle. Really stellar.
As Sylvia flipped through the pages of her little notebook, I snuck a glance at her. Take away the glasses, shake out the hair, apply some serious makeup, and she’d almost look like the woman I’d seen in the newspaper. My guess was that photoshop was her friend.
I was still studying her when a waitress came by to ask if I wanted to order. Sylvia insisted that our breakfast was “On the newspaper,” so I ordered a chocolate chip muffin and a coffee.
I’d never actually had coffee before, but I didn’t want this big-time journalist to think of me as a kid. Even if I technically was. I wanted Sylvia to see me as a young lady on the verge of womanhood. Someone worthy of the attention of her readers. Not that drinking coffee would do all that, but hey, it didn’t hurt. When the steaming mug arrived in front of me, I took a small sip and instantly resisted the urge to spit it back into the cup.
Who would drink this foul-tasting stuff willingly?
All too aware of Sylvia’s eyes on me, I forced myself to gulp down another mouthful, thus proving my adult-ness. Then, as nonchalantly as I could, I reached across the table and began dumping bag after bag of sugar into my cup in an attempt to make it taste better. As I did this, Sylvia gave me a Cheshire Cat grin.
“So?” I fished, trying to take the focus away from my coffee-flavored sugar water.
“Soooo,” Sylvia purred. When neither of us said anything else, Sylviaand then letting it trail off at the end cleared her throat and fiddled with her pad of paper. “Well, I guess you know why I asked you here, right, Arielle?”
She pronounced my name oddly, putting a lot of emphasis on the “L,” and then letting it trail off at the end. I hadn’t even been there for five minutes and the woman was already irking me.
“I’m guessing you want to ask me about the whole eBay thing, right?” I asked, stirring my coffee methodically. I figured if I was stirring it, I wouldn’t be expected to drink it.
“Exactly,” Sylvia said, pen poised above her paper.
There was another uncomfortable silence.
“Well, what do you want to know?” I asked finally.
Geez. Was I supposed to do her job for her or what?
“Why don’t we start off at the beginning,” Sylvia said, her smile practically taking up her whole face. “How did you get the idea to sell your first kiss on eBay?”
“Um, well, I’m a freshman this year, and haven’t, you know, kissed anyone yet, or anything,” I said, staring into my mug and feeling my cheeks turn red despite myself. I wasn’t sure why I was still embarrassed to talk about it—it wasn’t like everyone didn’t already know the deal. Pressing forward, I told Sylvia about how McCartney and Phin had gotten the idea to solve my “problem,” and how things had developed since then.
“I think the bid’s up to two hundred bucks or something,” I finished, shrugging.
Sylvia nodded as I spoke. “That’s fascinating. People sell stuff on eBay all the time—why not a kiss?” she said almost to herself as she scribbled something furiously on her paper. I picked up my mug of coffee to give myself something to do while I waited for her to finish.
“Is there someone you hope wins?” Sylvia asked finally.
No one had bothered to ask me that before, and to be honest, I hadn’t given it too much thought. Until right now. Was there someone at ronald Henry that I wanted to kiss? Had I already met him or would my first kiss be from the person I least expected? I had no idea how to answer Sylvia’s question. Eventually I spit out the first thing that came to my mind.
“Really, at this point, I just want to get it over with,” I answered.
Sylvia grinned as if I’d just said exactly what she’d been hoping I’d say. This, of course, made me nervous. Had I done something wrong? Should I have not answered at all? Before I could ask to take it back and start all over again, Sylvia reached across the table to shake my hand and then placed a few bills on the table and stood up.
“That’s it?” I asked, surprised. We’d been talking for less than twenty minutes.
“I think I’ve used up enough of your time, Arielle,” Sylvia said, letting the “L” linger even after she’d started walking away. “The piece will probably be in tomorrow’s paper, so be sure to keep your eyes peeled. Ta, ta.”
Then she left me to sit at the table by myself, staring after her and wondering exactly what the heck had just happened.
“IT�
�S OUT! IT’S out!” McCartney screamed at the top of her lungs.
I turned to see her running after me as I navigated my way through the school parking lot, and cringed as everyone near us shifted their focuses our way. It was way too early for this kind of enthusiasm. Especially from McCartney, who was typically the morning crank. But when I saw how excited she was about Sylvia’s article, I couldn’t exactly burst her bubble.
The only problem was: I didn’t know how I felt about it. In fact, I still wasn’t sure whether the feature even portrayed me in a positive light. Until I figured that out, I didn’t exactly want to publicize it to everyone I knew.
Clearly, McCartney had found no problem with it though. So, I put a smile on my face and joined in my friends’ enthusiasm. “Do you really think it’s good?” I asked her.
“Duh! you’re mentioned in our favorite column ever!” she exclaimed. “How much better can things get?”
“What’s going on, ladies?” Phin asked as he slipped in beside us.
“Sylvia longood wrote her whole article about Arielle!” McCartney practically screamed and then waved the paper around for Phin to see.
“Awesome!” Phin said, and paused. “Who’s Sylvia longood?”
“You’re dead to me, you know that?” McCartney said, her face serious.
“She’s this reporter at The Kennedy Daily,” I explained to Phin. “She’s got her own column about people living in Kennedy and stuff.”
“Sounds fascinating,” Phin answered sarcastically. “So, why did she write about you?
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” I snapped, before explaining, “She wanted to know about the whole eBay thing.”
“Here, listen to this,” McCartney said, opening up the paper to Sylvia’s article as dramatically as one could.
“Dating isn’t just tough for single adults in Kennedy—teenagers are even feeling the stress of finding a partner. More than a few times, I’ve vented about how difficult it is to meet people in this town, let alone find someone that you want to see past the first date.
But after talking to Arielle Sawyer, a freshman at Ronald Henry HS, I realized that we’re all in the same boat—no matter what age we are. This 14-year-old is so bothered at the fact that she hasn’t kissed a boy yet, that she’s resorted to putting her first kiss up for sale on eBay! “I really just want to get it over with,” Sawyer said about the posting.
With bids well over $200, it’s starting to look like this young lady had the right idea. Which leads me to wonder—Are we so starved for love that our only choice to find it is to sell it online?”
McCartney shut the paper and turned to hug me tightly around the neck, cutting off my air supply in the process. “Girl, you have officially arrived!” she squealed.
“Whoa, calm down, Cart,” I said, dislodging myself from my friend’s embrace. “Being mentioned in a local newspaper is definitely not a sign that I’ve arrived.”
I felt my cell vibrate in my pocket just as McCartney began to argue with me. Looking down at the screen, I saw that it was my mom. Uh-oh. She rarely called me at school, so of course my imagination immediately went to worst-case scenerios. There’d been an accident and she was lying in a ditch somewhere. She’d been kidnapped and was being held by a crazed lunatic in some out-of-the-way cabin in the woods. Gramps had died. All these thoughts flashed through my head as I flipped the phone open.
“Hey, Mom. Everything okay?” I asked, plugging my other ear with my finger so I could hear.
after a few minutes of just listening to her, I closed the phone, and gently placed it back in my pocket. The silence grew around us, but I barely noticed it.
“Hello?! Who was that?” McCartney asked finally, searching my face for some kind of answer.
“My mom just got a phone call,” I said, slowly. “A news station in new york wants me to be on their morning show. Tomorrow.”
“Shut up!” McCartney screamed, and started dancing around in a circle.
Phin whistled loudly and patted me on the back.
“Now,” Phin said. “I think it’s officially safe to say that you have arrived.”
I could barely concentrate throughout the rest of the day, settling for walking around, my head in a fog, oblivious to the hustle and bustle that was happening around me. And classes? Forget about it. I know I went, but I have no idea what we learned.
When my miserable math teacher, Mr. Haan made a comment on my paper, calling my handwriting, “worse than chicken scratches,” I muttered, “Thank you,” and slunk back to my seat without putting up a fight. It was only later when my classmates began snickering, that I even looked up and acknowledged that he was there.
“Huh?” I asked, forcing my attention back to the subject I was supposed to be working on.
“If you spent as much time studying as you do daydreaming, Miss sawyer, you might be passing my class,” Mr. Haan said, clucking his tongue as he walked back up to the front of the classroom.
If I weren’t already so freaked out about the phone call with my mom, I might’ve been embarrassed. or annoyed. Possibly both. But even Mr. Haan’s usual bullying tactics couldn’t take my mind off the fact that in less than 24 hours, I was going to be on live TV.
And yeah, it may only be local news, but it was still TV.
Suddenly, I felt a headache coming on, and lay my head in my hands, allowing my forehead to touch my desk. A few moments later, I heard a noise. More specifically, a coughing sound, like someone clearing his throat.
I looked up, to see Mr. Haan standing over me again.
What now? I grimaced as I looked at the frown on his face.
“Hi, Mr. Haan…”
“Miss sawyer, if it’s not too much of an inconvenience for you,” He started, “You may want to wake up long enough to go home.”
I looked around and noticed that everyone had already left the room. The bell must’ve sounded and I hadn’t even heard it.
“Let me try this again: the period’s over, Miss sawyer,” He said, sighing. “Do us all a favor and try to get more sleep before class tomorrow, or don’t bother coming at all.”
“But,” I started and then let my voice trail off. There was no point in arguing with the guy, when he was already halfway out the door.
I pulled my bag from the floor and packed up my stuff slowly. All I wanted to do was go home and take a nap.
Maybe if I was asleep I wouldn’t stress about being seen by hundreds of strangers on TV. I placed my bag over my shoulder headed home.
I WAS HOPING that my after-school plans would consist solely of sleeping and dreaming of anything other than embarrassing myself on live TV, but I realized too late that I was mistaken. Instead, my mom ambushed me as I walked in the door. And from the look on her face, it was clear I wasn’t getting out of whatever she had planned.
“I thought we could go through your closet and find an outfit that would be appropriate for your television debut,” Mom said. She already had her “Serious therapist” glasses on, and was using the soft tone she usually reserved for her patients.
I groaned and tried to make my way toward the stairs, hoping that if I acted like I hadn’t heard her, I could make it to the safety of my bed. Or maybe if I stalled long enough, she’d forget about it completely.
No such luck. As I passed by, she grabbed the bag from my shoulder and set it down near the stairs, steering me toward the couch. Gently pushing me down onto its comfy cushions, Mom squinted her eyes and studied me. I began to squirm as she stared, wishing, for once, that I wasn’t an only child.
“Now, given the topic of the segment, you should dress nicely, but still look your age,” Mom said, putting her fingers to her mouth thoughtfully. “A nice pair of slacks and a cardigan should do nicely.”
I made a face. No kid my age wore slacks and a cardigan. Outside of private school at least. And that look certainly wasn’t going to earn me any bidders, despite whatever my mom thought.
I opened my mouth to say as
much, but was interrupted as the front door burst open, and McCartney and Phin charged inside. Our living room was a descent size, yet almost immediately I began to feel claustrophobic. Like the walls were closing in on me. My heart started to race, and my breath caught in my throat, causing what I could only describe as sheer panic.
Looking around at everyone, I realized that it wasn’t the walls that were closing in on me—it was them.
“She’s gonna be talking about kissing, Mrs. Sawyer,” McCartney argued with my mom as respectfully as she could. “We can’t have her dressing like a nun. She needs to wear something that’s gonna make the guys want to bid on her. Like a jean skirt and a halter.”
“What’s a halter?” Phin asked, confused.
“A top that goes like this,” McCartney said, gesturing in a V-motion around her neck and chest.
“Oh, yeah, we like those,” Phin said, nodding enthusiastically.
I scrunched up my face as he agreed. I so didn’t need Phin looking at me that way. It was just too…weird. And kind of gross. The halter was officially out.
“Any other ideas?” I asked, crossing my arms and sighing.
“The important thing is to feel confident in whatever you wear,” McCartney said, pushing forward. “Confidence is sexy.”
“Kids, I’m not sure if ‘sexy’ is the vibe I want my daughter to put out there on national television, given the slightly scandalous topic,” Mom said, frowning.
“My mom just said ‘vibe’ and ‘scandalous’ in the same sentence,” I said, shaking my head in disbelief. “Do you even know what those words mean?”
“You know what guys really like to see girls wearing?” Phin interrupted and moved over to my side. He placed his hands in the air with a flourish. “Sweats and a T-shirt.”
Phin smiled as he pictured whatever girl he was currently crushing on, lounging around in bummy housewear.
“You know, I’ve never really understood that,” McCartney said, curiously.
Kiss & Sell Page 7