Ladies. Mr. Greer sounded snide. So sorry to interrupt. But some of you might recall that its the last week of the semester, and were finishing up our final three-minute oral presentations, which will count as a quarter of your grade, before winter break.
I couldnt help groaning inwardly. I was completely unprepared for this. And it was going to be my turn to give my presentation sometime soon, and I hadnt had a second to work on it. When Id got home from Christophers last night, Id been astonished to find Lulu there instead of out partying with her friends, and in the kitchen making, of all things, coq au vin.
Since Id never seen her cook anything more complicated than microwave popcorn, Id been sure she was suffering some kind of stroke and had almost called for an ambulance.
But it hadnt been a breakdown. Lulu had been cooking for Nikkis brother, Steven, whom shed sent out in search of a really crunchy baguette of French bread to go with the meal she was preparing.
I want your brother to think I can cook, Lulu had informed me when I asked her what the heck was going on. No, wait, maybe I dont. Wait, which do you think hed think is cuter, a girl who lied and tried to cook just for him, or a girl who really knows how to cook?
Id given her a weary look and said, Lulu, Ill tell you whats not cute. You, right now. This is pathetic. If you want Steven to like you, why dont you try being yourself? Thats what youve always told me, remember? To just be myself? Not that itd ever worked. Well, it had, of course. Just not with Christopher.
I could have worked on my homework after dinner, I suppose, but somehow Id ended up on the couch between Steven and Lulu, while he told her (after shed prompted him) about his job as radioman on the sub on which he served.
And then when Id tried to sneak off to work, Lulu had followed me, clearly aching for a little girl talk, asking over and over again, Butdo you really think he likes me?
Lulu, Id said to her. You just met him. Why do you like him so much already?
Lulu sighed and snuggled down into the pillows beside me. Because hes just soamazing.
So far, the most amazing thing Id seen about Nikkis brother, Steven, was that hed volunteered to wash all the really big pots Lulu had used making the coq au vin, the ones that wouldnt fit into the dishwasher and that Lulu was going to leave for Katerina to wash when she got to the loft in the morning.
But I had to admitfor a guy, that was pretty amazing.
Still, if Id used our girl chat time to do my homework instead of listening to how amazing Steven Howard was, Id probably have felt a lot less like throwing up than I did the next morning, when I saw Mr. Greer flipping through his roster.
So if we could get straight to business, Mr. Greer said. Id like to call on Not me, I prayed. Not me, not me, not me, and I swear Ill stay home and study till midnight every night this week Christopher Maloney.
Christopher got up and went to the front of the room. I noticed with some chagrin that I wasnt the only girl in cla.s.s whose head turned as he walked by. Christophers look in the past few weeks had gone from preppy Polo shirts, which used to cause him to blend right in with the Jason Kleins of the school"Whitneys boyfriend and reigning king of the Walking Dead"to wearing his newly acquired black leather jacket indoors. McKayla Donofrio (I swear I was going to rip that tortoisesh.e.l.l hair band right off her head, and not even care how much hair I took with it) stared as he went past her, and both Whitneys and Lindseys eyebrows shot up as welland not, as in the past, because they were making fun of him, but because his form-fitting jeans didnt leave much to the imagination.
And, Mr. Greer said from his desk, when Christopher reached the front of the room and indicated he was ready to begin. Mr. Greer timed all our speeches with an oven timer. Things were nothing at Tribeca Alternative, considered one of Manhattans finest prep schools, if not high tech. GO!
Stark Enterprises, Christopher began, is now the worlds largest corporation, surpa.s.sing even the oil companies, pulling in almost three hundred billion dollars a year.
Wait. What? Christophers three-minute final oral presentation was on Stark Enterprises?
I felt myself begin to sink down in my seat.
From the sound of it, he wasnt about to say anything good, either. Not that I had anything good to say about Stark. But it was just slightly embarra.s.sing that I, the Face of Stark, was sitting here in the cla.s.sroom while a fellow student went on a rant about my employer. I could feel everyones gaze nervously sliding toward me.
Stark Enterprises, Christopher went on, declares a profit of over seven billion dollars a year, and yet, with more than one million employees"this countrys largest business"the average employee makes only fifteen thousand dollars a year before taxes for full-time work"hardly enough to sustain the average household in America. But Stark employees receive medical benefits only after two years of work, and then at such high premiums they often have to supplement them with government-subsidized health care programs. Essentially, many full-time Stark employees, who arent allowed to unionize, find themselves depending on Medicaid to pay for their health care. Meanwhile, Robert Stark, Stark CEO and chairman, routinely appears on the Forbes List of Wealthiest People in the World, generally in the top ten, with a personal worth of somewhere around forty billion.
Hearing this, several people began mutteringand not just Lindsey and Whitney, who whispered that Brandon Stark was worth a lot more than they thought. I knew what was coming next (from them): They were going to want to know if I could get them Brandons cell number.
During the past twenty years, Christopher went on, its been ill.u.s.trated again and again that while on the surface, Stark Megastores seem to provide convenience and low prices to the consumer"and Stark Enterprises receives tax incentives for building their stores in many towns"that convenience comes with a costand that cost to the communities in which these megastores appear may prove irreparable, since they wipe out locally owned businesses that didnt get tax breaks, dont sell cheap, knockoff products made exclusively in China, and so cant compete with Starks rock-bottom prices. These megastores turn whole communities into ghost towns as locally owned businesses are forced to close. And who suffers because of this? We do, the taxpayers, when states and cities then have to finance downtown revitalization programs, which usually fail, since its easier for everyone to shop at Stark, where the parking is more convenient.
I looked around to see how people were reacting to all this. Normally, this early in the morning, most of the cla.s.s would have been asleep"including Mr. Greer, who had a bad habit of dozing through his students oral presentations.
But weirdly, everyone was wide-awake, and paying total attention to Christopher. This, of course, only fed into his rant.
Stark keeps costs down by outsourcing every step of the way, paying nothing to the American worker, he continued. And Stark Quark, this computer Stark is launching after the new year, is no exception. Not a single person involved in the manufacture of it was employed in this country. And to guarantee every kid in every American household will be clamoring for one this Christmas, Stark has arranged for the new Quarks to come with the only available copies of Realm, the new version of the Journeyquest RPG, and has been doing an aggressive ad campaign for the PCs for weeks now"
I sank even lower in my chair. No one here could have missed the commercial, which had gone viral on YouTube, showing Nikki Howard plinking around on a Quark keyboard resting on her bare stomach while floating on a raft in a Stark brand bikini in a laptop-shaped pool. The Quarks are waterproof (well, splashproof. You couldnt actually drop them in water, as I discovered when I accidentally did just that) and come in a variety of colors. The ad shows Nikki in a different-colored bikini to match each of the colors the computers come in, while a boppy rock tune plays in the background. Theres no mention, of course, of how technically useful the laptops arejust that theyre pretty.
Kind of like Nikki Howard, now that I thought of it.
If we want to keep America from going the way of ancient Rome, Christopher continued, seemingly unaware of the uncomfortable silence as I caught Lindsey humming the Quark jingle, which in the fifth century found itself in a similar situation, with a collapsing economy and a society dependent on imported goods, we have to become producers again, and stop consuming so much. Otherwise, people like Robert Stark are going to continue getting insanely rich off our laziness, our refusal even to go buy our music at a music store, books at a bookstore, food at grocery stores, and clothes at clothing stores, because its more convenient to buy all of these things in one place. Some of us are so lazy, wed rather waste fossil fuels driving a few miles to get all of them in one store, made overseas at a discount price"even if the quality is substandard"than buy them in a few local stores, made in the good old USA. Lets take a moment to think about what this is doing to the communities we live in, not to mention to the American spirit"murdering them. Because that, not progress, is the true legacy of Stark: murder.
There was a moment of silence as what Christopher had said sunk in, during which he simply looked out at us with his ocean blue eyes. Not just out at us in general, I realized after a few seconds, but out at meyes, me, directly at me, like I was there in the room as some kind of representative of Stark.
Which might technically have been correct. But, h.e.l.lo, I was the last person who needed convincing of Starks evilness. Look what they had done to me.
I mean, sure, they had saved my life.
But they had also forced me to completely give it up, too, in most of the ways that matter. I couldnt even spend the holidays with my family. Give me a break.
And okay, I completely agreed with every point Christopher brought up about Stark in his speech. But what did he expect me to do about it? Quit because my boss was the devil? Yeah, well, I couldnt quit.
Not that I could mention this in front of everyone.
I had no choice but to sit up straighter in my seat, fold my arms, and stare right back at him. Even though, of course, doing so caused me to have to look at those lips againthose lips that yesterday Id so foolishly thought might be close to finally brushing mine. I still wanted them to. Desperately.
I was smiling bitterly to myself about this when the oven timer on Mr. Greers desk went off, and I jumped, as did a few other people in the room. Everyone except Christopher, who just kept staring at me, cool as an iced mocha latte.
Then someone"McKayla Donofrio. Of course. That suck-up. Was there nothing shed stoop to in order to get Christophers attention?"started to clap. A few seconds later, more than half the cla.s.s was applauding. Like they really meant it, too, not sarcastically like they sometimes did when someone did something spastic like drop their tray in the cafeteria.
And Mr. Greer was going, Excellent work, Christopher. Really excellent work. Strong, persuasive argument. I think you went a little under three minutes, but I wont take off any points for that because it was such an improvement over your past piece. You can take your seat now.
Christopher went back toward his seat. I didnt miss the swift glances both Whitney and Lindsey, who were among the people applauding, gave him as he pa.s.sed them. I couldnt believe how quickly Christopher went from being a social pariah to almost revered by them. It was as if they could sense how dead he was insidejust like they were.
And yet a part of me refused to believe Christopher really was one of them, a member of the Walking Dead. I knew he couldnt really be dead inside. Not the Christopher I loved. He was, after all, only doing what he was doing for revengerevenge for what had happened to me. That thirst for revenge had made him blind to everything else, like the fact that I wasnt really dead"that I was sitting right in front of himturned in my seat to face him, as a matter of fact, and saying, Nice speech.
Well, what else was I going to say? Everyone was watching to see how I was going to react. I had to play the game.
Christopher nodded. Thanks. Do you have that information we talked about yesterday?
Part of it, I said, and fished from the depths of my tote bag the Social Security number Id cadged from Steven that morning. I slid it across his desk toward him. Ill try to get the rest of it soon.
I wasnt entirely sure this was true"or how I was going to get it for him if I did decide thats what I was going to do. But I wasnt ready to say I wouldnt help him when there was still a chance he was my only hope of finding Mrs. Howard.
And when there was a chance that, by helping him, maybejust maybehe might stop hating me.
He took the slip of paper and put it in his jacket pocket, just as Mr. Greer was calling the name of his next victim"fortunately not mine.
Everything I said up there, Christopher said, is true, you know.
His words burned. And he knew it.
Yeah, I said. Im aware of that.
And yet youre still loyal to Robert Stark. He was smiling a little. I didnt get what the smile was about. It was like he knew something"something about me.
But how could he, when the most fundamental thing of all continued to escape him completely?
I dont have what you want, I said.
But youre going to get it for me, Christopher said. He was so confident. He had never been this confident when we were friends. About anything. It was s.e.xybut also a little frightening. Right?
Um, I said, just as Nikkis cell phone, deep in my tote, began to chime Barracuda. Ill let you know.
McKayla Donofrio, whod been about to begin her three-minute oral presentation on whatever incredibly boring topic shed chosen, no doubt about the dairy industry and its unfairness to the lactose intolerant, glared in my direction.
Okay, she said. Whats with Fergie? Thats not cool, whoever didnt turn off their cell. She said whoever, but from the direction of her gaze, she clearly meant me. You could extend some common courtesy, you know.
Sorry, I said, digging through my tote. Sorry, sorry. I found and turned off my cell.
But not before I saw the text from my agent, Rebecca.
Rehearsal going on for Stark Angel show right now, shed written. Where are you????
TWELVE.
THREE MONTHS AGO, IF YOUD ASKED me what I thought Id be doing during finals week, hanging out in my underwear at a fashion show with a bunch of the worlds top supermodels would not have been high on my list.
In fact, it wouldnt have been anywhere on my list.
And by hanging out at a fashion show in my underwear, I mean, About to go out onstage wearing nothing but.
Except that they didnt call it underwear. They called it lingerie.
And it wasnt a stage: It was a runway.
Yeah. I was about to publicly humiliate myself wearing fewer clothes than I had ever worn in public in my life, including in the locker room at school, where Id always made sure to have on something that covered me from armpits to midthigh at all times, even if it was only a towel. Forget about showering with my fellow students in Tribeca Alternatives prison-style showers"one nozzle for four to six girls at a time"in the locker room. It was impossible to work up a sweat during what pa.s.sed for physical education cla.s.s at TAHS, so there was no need to shower, anyway.
Well, impossible for me, considering that, in the past, whenever a volleyball or whatever came near me, Id always make sure to step calmly away to avoid it.
See? No sweat. No need for a shower. Problem solved.
Only now it appeared as if karma was sending me a great big power serve for all my slacking off in PE. I not only got to parade around in my underwear at the real deal on New Years (an event where Id be humiliating myself in front of a live audience of four hundred photographers, journalists, cameramen, fashionistas, designers, stylists, art directors, and your everyday run-of-the-mill celebrities such as Sting and John Mayer, and various celebutantes whod have gathered at the Stark Enterprises Sound Studios in Midtown for the occasion), but Id have to endure several dress rehearsals, where Id be half naked in front of a.s.sorted sound and camera people, light and technical crew, stylists, and dont let me forget my fellow models.
One of whom"I think her name was Kelley"was peering at me right now as we sat amid the craziness backstage, wardrobe a.s.sistants running around, trying to get us all sorted out and fitted with our wings and various a.s.signed bras and panties and thongs so theyd know if theyd ordered the right amount for the Big Night.
Are you worried, Nikki? Kelley leaned over to ask me, in a Southern accent. Cause you look worried.
Uh I was totally shocked that she was speaking to me. No one had spoken to me all day, except for the stylists, one of whom warned me about my chi. In his opinion, it could have used some realigning. Maybe a little.
I smiled queasily at her. I really did think I was going to heave the chocolate-covered strawberries Id just scarfed from the catering table. Why couldnt I follow the advice on the list of forbidden foods on the refrigerator back in the loft? Chocolate was definitely on it.
Youll be fine! Kelley said. She had huge brown eyes, made to look even larger by the liquid liner around them. If the lights get to be too much and you cant see, just feel for the stage with your feet. If all you touch is air, dont put your foot down. That means youre at the end of the runway. You dont want to step off into thin air. You know what happens then. She made a splatting noise.
This didnt rea.s.sure me. If anything, I felt more like throwing up than ever. I was going to be so blinded by the studio lights, I was going to walk off the end of the runway? No one had mentioned this to me before. I was already completely unsteady on the six-inch platform Louboutins theyd handed me. My sa.s.sy catwalk strut? It wasnt all that sa.s.sy, it turned out.
But I said, Great, thanks, anyway, to be nice.
Gosh, Nikki, Kelley said, looking a little surprised. Youre the one who told me that about the lights when I was just starting out. Remember?
I blinked. Id screwed up. As usual.
Of course, I said, with what I hoped was a fierce laugh. Nikki was nothing if not fierce. Right?
Kelley didnt fall for my alleged fierceness. Well, why should she have?
You really did bang your head and get amnesia, like everyone is saying. Kelley looked at me pityingly.
Whats it feel like? another girl"this one as fair as Kelley was dark"wanted to know as we waited for someone to come over and tell us the director was finally ready for us.
I was surprised"surprised Kelley and the other girl were even talking to me. Wed been in the studio for hours for our fitting and rehearsal, but none of them had said a word to me, even though Id figured, you know, being in the same business, some of the girls had to have known Nikki, and maybe even been friendly with her.
But either these girls were just too shy (doubtful, given their outgoing personalities) to say h.e.l.lo, or Nikki had done something to p.i.s.s them off"which, knowing Nikki, was the most likely explanation.
Hows what feel? I asked, starting to freak. Not that this girl was speaking to me. But that she knew. Only how could this gorgeous girl, sitting there so coolly in a water bra and thong, have found out about my surgery?
Or maybe she didnt know. Maybe she was a plant, sent by Stark, to try to screw me up. See if Id talk.
Yeah. Thats how paranoid Ive gotten. Its amazing what happens when you start thinking youre being spied on all the time, the tricks your mind starts playing on you The diamond bra, the blond girl said, when I didnt say anything for a minute. Youre wearing ten million bucks on your chest, Nik. Whats that feel like?
I looked down. Oh, yeah. I was completely cracking up, that was obvious.
Oh, I said. Its really uncomfortable. Diamonds, being the hardest substance on earth, arent the best material with which to make a bra. Well, technically, thats aggregated diamond nanorods. But you know what I mean.
Oh, wow. I sounded like the biggest nerd. And nothing like Nikki Howard The blond girl"whose name, I seemed to recall from the stylist, was Veronica"just stared at me. But thankfully, Kelley seemed to get a kick out of my reply"as did a couple of the other models nearby"and giggled.
Diamond nanawhatevers, she echoed. What have you been doing since I last saw you? Kelley wanted to know. Taking science cla.s.ses at night school?
Well, I replied. Not night school, exactly, but high school"
It was at that moment my non-Stark brand cell phone rang. I checked it to find a text from Frida.
Im sorry, Frida had written. Plz dont b mad! I luv u! U should c me, I cant stop crying! Plz call back!
Honestly. I would give anything to have the biggest crisis in my life be that my big sister said I couldnt go to her holiday loft party. I mean, suppose Mom could see me now, in a ten-milliondollar diamond bra and sheer, black lace-trimmed panties? Oh, and did I mention the angel wings?