Model Misfit
Authors: Holly Smale
Tags: #Juvenile Fiction, #Humorous Stories, #Girls & Women
For my sister, Tara.
In calm or stormy weather.
fit
adjective
1
Appropriate or suiting
2
Proper
3
Qualified and competent
4
Prepared
5
In good physical condition
NOUN
1
Fashionable clothing
2
An onset or period of emotion
COLLOQUIAL SLANG
1
To be really, really good looking
ORIGIN
from the Old English
fitt
: ‘conflict or struggle’.
Table of Contents
y name is Harriet Manners, and I am a model.
I know I’m a model because:
1. It’s Monday morning, and I’m wearing a gold tutu, a gold jacket, gold ballet pumps and gold earrings. My face is painted gold, and a long piece of gold wire has been wrapped around my head. This is not how I normally dress on Mondays.
2. I have a bodyguard. The earrings cost so much I’m not allowed to go to the toilet without a large man checking my earlobes afterwards to make sure I haven’t accidentally flushed them.
3. I haven’t been allowed to smile for two hours.
4. Every time I take a bite of doughnut to keep my strength up everybody breathes in sharply as if I’ve just bent down and given the floor a quick lick.
5. There’s a large camera pointing at my face, and the man behind it keeps saying, “Oi, model,” and clicking his fingers at me.
There are other clues – I’m pouting slightly, and making tiny movements every couple of seconds like a robot – but they’re not necessarily conclusive. That’s exactly how my father dances when a car advert comes on TV.
Anyway, the final reason I know I’m a model is:
6. I have become a creature of grace, elegance and style.
In fact, you could say I’ve really grown up since you last saw me.
Developed.
Blossomed.
Not literally. I’m exactly the same size and shape as I was six months ago, and six months before that. As far as womanly curves go, much like the netball captain at school, puberty is making no bones about picking me last.
No, I’m talking metaphorically. I simply woke up one day, and
BAM
: fashion and I were at one with each other. Working together, helping each other. Just like the crocodile and the little Egyptian plover bird that climbs into its mouth to pick bits of meat out of its teeth. Except obviously in a much more glamorous and less unhygienic way.
And I’m going to be totally honest with you: it’s changed me. The geek is gone, and in her place is somebody glamorous. Popular. Cool.
A brand-new Harriet Manners.
nyway. The really great thing about being totally
synergised
with the fashion world is that it makes shoots very smooth and focused.
“Right,” Aiden the photographer says, “what are we thinking, model?”
(You see what I mean? What are
we
thinking: fashion and I are basically sharing a brain.)
“We’re thinking mysterious,” I tell him. “We’re thinking enigmatic. We’re thinking unfathomable.”
“And why are we thinking that?”
“Because it says so on the side of the perfume box.”
“Exactly. I’m thinking Garbo and Grable, Hepburn and Hayworth, Bacall and Bardot, but it might be best if you think reality TV show contestant and do the opposite.”
“Got it,” I say, shifting slightly in my position on the floor and moving my foot so that the sole is pointing towards me. Then I lean towards it gracefully.
Mysterious
. I grab the corner of my jacket and lift it slightly, like a butterfly wing, angling my face downwards.
Enigmatic
. Finally, I arch my back and poke out an arm so I’m staring at the crease of my inner elbow.
Unfathomable
.
“Got it.” Aiden looks up from the camera. “Model, Yuka Ito was right. These are some very strange shapes you’re pulling, but it works. Very edgy. Very high fashion.”
What did I tell you? Me and fashion: I walk in and out of its mouth and it doesn’t even
try
to eat me any more.
“Now point your elbow in the other direction for me.” The photographer crouches down, adjusts the camera shutter and then looks back up again. “Towards the camera.”
Sugar cookies
.
“You know,” I say without moving, “enigmatic, mysterious, unfathomable. They’re tautological. Yuka could save a lot of room on the box by just picking one.”
“Just move your arm.”
“Umm, has she considered ‘baffling’? It’s from an old word used to describe a wind that buffeted sailors from all directions. It’s sort of appropriate for a perfume, don’t you think?”
Aiden pinches the bridge of his nose with his fingers. “Right. How about you show me the bottom of the shoe? We should try to get the contrasting sole in the shot.”
I clear my throat, mind starting to race. “Erm … but what about Saudi Arabia, China and Thailand? It’s considered culturally impolite to show the bottom of your feet there …” I look around the room in a blind panic. “We don’t want to risk alienating them, do we?” I sweep my arm out in a wide, persuasive gesture.
And something on my sleeve catches Aiden’s eye.
Oh no. No no no.
“What’s that?” he says, standing up and walking over to where I’m now scrabbling to get off the floor but my feet are caught in the enormous tutu. The photographer grabs my arm and peels a tiny gold sticker from the inside of my jacket elbow. “What’s
this
?”
“Hmm?” I say, swallowing and straining to make my eyes as round as I physically can.
Aiden peers at the sticker. “F = M × A?” he reads slowly. Then he pulls three more from inside the lining of the jacket. “V = I × R? Ek = ½ × M × V2? W = M × G?”