‘Oh, it’s not for me,’ I assure him. I’d be high as a kite after a triple shot. I wouldn’t be able to sleep for days. I’d be tossing and turning . . .
Oh my God. I’m thinking about my bedroom, sort of, and that’s embarrassing, sort of. He’s staring at me oddly. But not at my face (luckily – it’s burning). At my outfit.
Oh no.
I pay him for the latte and head for the pick-up point without another word.
Apart from the one kimono incident, he knows me as the safely dressed, white-shirted girl from Keep your head down Friday. Today I’m in a skirt made out of an embroidered, fringed tablecloth of Mum’s, a tie-dyed top that Crow did for me a while ago, a bag I made out of old CDs of Harry’s and, to top it all off, a belt made from Harry’s bicycle chain.
I can almost hear the Belles laughing in the background. If ever Liam needed proof that I really am a mad, style-challenged freak, this is it. No wonder he was staring at me. I picture him telling the other boys from class about it when he sees them. It’ll probably make a great story.
At least I made myself a bracelet out of liquorice and Polo mints, for emergencies. This is an emergency, so as soon as I’m back I dismantle the bracelet and eat a Polo. It helps, but not as much as I’d like.
‘Is everything all right?’ the Senior Fashion Buyer asks me, when I hand over the latte.
‘Fine,’ I lie.
She clearly doesn’t believe me, but she’s too busy to do anything about it, which is good.
The next day, Starbucks announces a new chocolate and banana skinny milkshake combo that becomes an instant sensation in the office. Several times a day, interns are despatched for supplies. At least once a day, that intern is me.
Most times, Liam is there. He always gives me his half-amused smile and stares at my outfit. I wish, I really wish, that I could be a normal, sexy teenager, in a mini and layered vest tops, dripping with attitude. But I can’t. It’s not me and it’s too tiring to try and pretend every day.
Seeing him there, knowing he thinks I’m freakish and noticing the softness of his hair, the flecks of green in his blue eyes, and the way his mouth moves when he smiles, makes me realise how much I really like him. He is totally my most favourite unattainable boy right now.
I try and take my mind off him by thinking about Crow’s ideas for the new label. It doesn’t work. Edie manages to distract me a bit. Unfortunately, she does it by making me seriously worried about Jenny’s mum.
‘It’s the way she seems to avoid everyone.’
‘You know she drinks?’ I say.
Edie looks at me, horrified. ‘Really?’
‘That’s what Mum thinks.’
‘Gloria didn’t seem drunk. But . . .’
Edie plays with the straw of her smoothie. We’re in the V&A, because it’s my second home and Edie needs to get out of the library at least once in a while.
‘How did she seem?’
Edie pauses to consider. ‘Like she was sleepwalking. Like she wasn’t really there.’
‘What was she doing?’
‘She was in her bedroom, with the curtains closed. I asked her if she was OK and she said, “Yes, thank you,” but her voice was cracked, like she hardly used it.’
‘Do you think she was hungover?’
Edie shrugs and does her ‘creeped-out’ look again. ‘I don’t know what to think.’
There’s only one thing for it. We have to ask Jenny. We stay up really late so we can call her after she gets back from some trip to Brooklyn with Charlotte.
‘Why don’t you just Skype me?’ she says, airily. ‘Jackson’s got Skype. See you in a mo.’
So after five minutes of playing about with the camera on Mum’s computer (my semi-broken laptop doesn’t have one), we manage to get a grainy, slow-moving image of Jenny in some room with a grand piano in the background, and she gets one of us with our heads squashed together, looking worried.
‘It’s Gloria,’ Edie says.
‘Still creepy, is she?’
This isn’t getting us anywhere.
‘Does she have a medical problem?’ I ask. How do you ask someone if their mum’s an alcoholic? ‘Is there someone we should call?’
There’s a pause, while Jenny’s face flickers and we wait for an answer.
‘You can call her doctor, if you like. His number’s in the phone book. But he’ll just tell her to take her medication and she won’t take it. We’ve been there before.’
‘Medication for what?’
Jenny pauses a moment. ‘Depression.’
‘Oh!’ Edie and I say it together. Depression doesn’t seem so bad, somehow. Not as bad as drinking, anyway.
‘What – manic depression?’ Edie asks, sounding technical. ‘Is she bipolar?’
‘No!’ Jenny says. And it could be the grainy image, but I’d swear she looks almost wistful. ‘Not manic. Just depressed. Chronically depressed. But she’ll get through it. She always does. Look, I’ve got to go now. Just remind Mum to feed the kittens, will you? Bye.’
And that’s it. She reaches forward to switch off the camera. The picture goes fuzzy. She’s gone.
Edie gets up.
‘I’m going over,’ she says.
‘What? To New York?’
‘No, idiot. To Jenny’s flat. I’ve got the key. If I get the doctor’s number now, I can call him first thing tomorrow and get that medication Gloria needs. Hopefully we can get her better before Jenny gets home.’
Yeah. Edie would love to be able to tell Jenny she fixed her mum while she was away. Like she’s a broken clock or something.
‘I really don’t think you should . . .’ I stop myself before I finish the sentence. Trying to tell Edie not to get involved when she has world-saving to do is like trying to tell Stella’s kittens not to be cute. She can’t help it.
‘Tell me how it goes,’ I sigh.
‘Of course,’ she says, with an optimistic smile.
It doesn’t go well.
Edie’s waiting for me when I get home from work next day.
‘It was a nightmare!’ she says.
‘Tell me about it,’ I mutter. I’m thinking about unattainable boys and unapproachable mothers, but I know Edie isn’t. She tells me about it.
‘I went to the doctor’s and they said they couldn’t talk to me, because Gloria had to be there, but in the state she’s in now, she won’t go. That was bad enough, but then I had this idea. I went back to the flat and checked in the bathroom to see if she already had some medication – Prozac or something – that she was meant to be taking.’
‘And?’
‘I opened the bathroom cabinet and the stuff practically fell out. There were enough pills in there to knock out half of London. So I took some into Gloria and asked her which ones she was supposed to take and she wouldn’t touch them.’
‘Why?’
‘She said they make her brain go numb and she’s never, ever taking them again and if I go round and try and make her, she’s calling the police.’
‘Oh, great. Apart from that, it went really well, I’m guessing.’
‘Don’t make fun of this, Nonie. It was horrible.’
I apologise. I know I shouldn’t be teasing her at such a difficult time. And in fact, I really admire her for at least trying to do something. It’s just a shame it didn’t work.
‘So what can we do?’ I ask. I’m worried about Gloria, and also about the cats. If they don’t get fed, we will have dead, musical-themed kittens on our hands and that doesn’t bear thinking about.
Edie smiles slightly. ‘It’s sweet of you to offer to help, but you’re busy at Miss Teen. I’ll be fine. Gloria wouldn’t call the police on me. I think I’ll just keep popping round until I can work out what to do.’
‘That’s not your job, you know,’ I point out. I’m thinking of Mum. Mum doesn’t like interfering in other people’s lives if it can be avoided. It usually ends in trouble, she says. Plus Edie’s looking more stressed out than ev
er by this. It can’t be doing her any good.
‘I know,’ Edie says. ‘But it doesn’t seem to be anybody’s job.’
‘Tell you what,’ I offer. ‘You check on Gloria, and I’ll check on you.’
She grins. ‘Deal.’
Even so, she leaves with the air of a girl who has the weight of the world on her shoulders. A part of me badly wants to tell her to go on holiday, have fun with Hot Phil and chill out for a while in California, like she obviously needs to. But the rest of me is in awe of how she seems to absorb other people’s problems and make them her own, until she can fix them. She’s not the most fun person to be with right now, but she’s still amazing.
I know what Crow would do. She would make Edie a pom-pom necklace or something to show she was thinking of her. I haven’t got time for pom-poms, so I make do with another bag made out of Harry’s old CDs (which he has officially discarded, or I would be officially dead). It’s not exactly Edie’s style, but she’s always liked Harry and it might make her smile. At least, I hope so.
Edie has Project Gloria to worry about. I, meanwhile, have Project Flying Pig. It’s my plan for finding my perfect job in fashion . . . and for proving to my mother that she is totally wrong about me.
Every time I bump into someone at Miss Teen who looks vaguely busy and important, I quiz them on what they do. They look annoyed to start with, but eventually they tell me. I am the only person who really understands the coffee machine, so it pays to be nice to me.
It feels like no two people do the same thing. There are brand managers, merchandisers, forecasters and buyers. They don’t even make the clothes. Then there are pattern cutters, sample makers, garment technologists and production managers. Plus whole departments of PR, HR, and a bunch of other stuff that’s starting to make my head spin. I obviously couldn’t possibly do what they all do, so I try and work out who I most want to copy. And the awful thing is, so far Mum’s right. They’re all great, but I really don’t want to do any of their jobs. Not exactly. I want to be a part of their world, but I can’t find my niche. It has to be here. I just haven’t looked hard enough.
Andy Elat stops me in a corridor one day.
‘You’re getting a bit of a name for yourself, kid,’ he says.
‘As something good?’ I ask nervously.
‘As something persistent. What’s with all the interrogations?’
I explain about my need to find my perfect job in fashion. He nods wisely.
‘I’ve never known a kid so immersed in the world as you, Nonie. It’s not just what you do, it’s what you know. Plus how you dress.’ At this point he laughs. Not very politely. But at least he doesn’t tell me to go home and change.
‘So?’ I prompt.
‘You’ll find a job, or it’ll find you.’
Hah! I wish Mum had been here to hear this.
‘A job running a label?’ I ask.
He narrows his eyes. ‘I’m trying to picture it. You in a suit? I mean, maybe, but . . . You good at spreadsheets?’
I nod. I hate spreadsheets. I really loathe them. They always go wrong on me. I think they’re just traps waiting to spring on me and add up to the wrong number, but if I need to be good at them to get a job in fashion then . . . OK.
Andy frowns. He doesn’t look convinced.
I realise I’m frowning back. Was Vivienne Westwood good at spreadsheets? Was John Galliano? I bet not, but then, they were good at designing and making fabric into an art form. I can’t do that either. There must be something I can do. I just wish Andy had said, ‘Hey, you’ve already organised a catwalk show, haven’t you? And look at all that chutzpah you’ve got. You’ll be fine.’ But he didn’t. I’m back where I started.
Ever since the night at the Tate Modern, I’ve sort of assumed that my career in fashion was sorted. Apparently it’s not. That would be OK – I’m only seventeen and I don’t have to decide everything yet – except I’ve wanted to be a part of this world since I was tiny and nothing’s changed. In fact it’s worse. Since I met Crow, I’ve wanted it even more badly. I am both desperate and incompetent. This is not a great combination.
Andy wanders off down the corridor, wishing me luck over his shoulder. I don’t think I need luck. I think I need another life, another brain and a whole new personality. Project Flying Pig was perfectly named. Maybe I should get a job as a project namer. I’m so qualified. Yaaay.
When I get home, to my amazement, there’s an email from Crow waiting for me on my laptop.
Hi Nonie! Isn’t it cool? I know! I can email! There’s this great computer class and we all go every weakend. Joseph runs it he is realy cool. How is London? Victoria started seling school bags, Im helping the girls make them. Shes doing realy well. Ill give you one when I get home. Or you can buy one. Bye! Crow xxx
What? Victoria? Victoria! Who is seven, maybe eight, max. VICTORIA is already an entrepreneur, selling school bags, and I can’t even find a decent job at Miss Teen. This does not make me feel good. Although I’m pleased for her, obviously. I wonder why Crow wants me to buy a bag, though. Normally she just gives us stuff. Are we slightly less friends now that she’s at home with her family? Has she got a new set of friends, maybe?
I don’t want to think about it. I don’t want to tell her about what Andy Elat said, either. Instead, I email her back a few paragraphs about Jenny’s kittens. And about how there’s this boy from French class at the local Starbucks, and isn’t that a funny coincidence?
I’m interrupted by a knock on my bedroom door. A very tall man with a notebook pokes his head in and asks if he can have a look around. This is bizarre, but I say yes anyway. I assume Mum’s let him into the house. I hope so.
He has a good look at all my furniture, peers through my window and admires my view, then whips out a tape measure and does some quick measurements.
‘Impressive property,’ he says, pocketing the tape measure.
‘Yup,’ I agree.
And he, presumably, is the man Mum has called to try and help her sell it, which is why she stood over me for an hour while I tidied my room recently. Yaaay.
Things are going to be different, Crow said. This is what different feels like. It doesn’t feel good.
‘How would you describe me?’ Edie asks.
‘Hmmm?’
‘I’ve got to describe myself for this essay question for Harvard. What am I like?’
‘Grumpy? Stressed? Unnaturally intelligent?’
I’m lying on the floor of her bedroom, stroking the youngest of the kittens, who has finally been christened Starlight, after Starlight Express. Edie throws a scrumpled-up piece of paper at me, and misses. I roll it over towards Starlight.
‘Bad at ball sports?’
‘Look, Nonie! This is serious.’
‘Somewhat lacking in a sense of humour? What? What?’
I dodge the next flying ball of paper. How she ever made the netball team is a mystery to me. Persistence and sheer height, I assume.
‘Tall?’
She groans and turns to face me.
‘OK, I give up. I’ll do it later. What did you want to talk to me about?’
I sit up. This is more like it. I tell her all about Project Flying Pig and my disastrous discoveries. I’m not exactly expecting sympathy. Edie is Miss-I’ve-always-known-my-perfect-job. But at least she’s someone to talk to. Someone who isn’t Mum, or in New York, or Uganda.
‘Oh, poor you!’ she says, surprising me. ‘You’re like a fashion encyclopaedia, Nonie. There must be something you can do.’
‘Something that doesn’t involve spreadsheets?’ I ask hopefully.
‘Loads of people can’t use spreadsheets.’ As a girl who can, and regularly has to help people out who can’t, Edie would know this. ‘I always thought of you as a stylist or something.’
Hmm. Cool job. Working out what models should wear on shoots, or celebrities should wear on the red carpet. I could so do that. After I get my degree in fashion marketing or something – whi
ch is never going to happen, as Mum has so kindly pointed out. Stylist jobs are fought over like prize pieces in a sample sale, so you need a decent college degree to get a good one. This is one of the many things I know about the fashion industry. Unlike where I fit, of course.
Still, it’s a job I could almost see myself doing. Something I hadn’t really considered before.
‘Helpful,’ I say to Edie. ‘Insightful.’
‘What?’
‘Two other things you are. When you’re not being grumpy and stressed.’
‘Oh. Thanks.’
She turns back to her desk and pretends to doodle something in a margin, but I think she’s scribbling down ‘insightful’ before she forgets.
There’s a scrabbling noise in front of me and I look down to see Starlight pouncing like a tiger on one of the poor unsuspecting balls of paper. He gets it in a death grip and bites a piece out of it, before batting it in my direction. I bat it back. Starlight is adorable and I can quite see why Edie asked Jenny if she could adopt him. Jenny was thrilled. Now she knows she’s going to be out of the country for months, she’s been anxious to find different homes for all the kittens. Which would be easier if she hadn’t called the others Sondheim and Fosse. I mean, Fosse? It’s pronounced ‘Foss-ee’. I thought she said ‘Flossie’ at first, but no. Bob Fosse was a top choreographer, apparently. Beyoncé has used some of his moves for her videos. Even Bob would have been a better name.
Edie’s mother, who’s allergic to cats, is being very understanding about the whole thing and is dosed up to the eyeballs on antihistamines.
‘How’s Gloria, by the way?’ I ask, thinking of mothers and pills.
‘It’s hard to tell,’ she says. ‘She’s worried about climate change at the moment. She’s concerned that London will flood and the carpets in the flat will be ruined.’
‘But they’re on the fourth floor!’
‘I know.’
‘At least she’s talking to you, I guess,’ I add.
Edie nods. ‘It’s a good sign, isn’t it? That’s what Mum says. She says I shouldn’t be going round there so much, ’cause I’m so busy with all my other stuff. But Gloria won’t let anyone else into the flat, even Mum. So I just have to go.’
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