Indie Girl Read Free Page B

Aaralyn Taylor’s desk, and that she had drawn a gold star on it and stuck on a Post-it note to call me.
    I looked around for my best friend, Kim, whoseparents were Korean and, like my own, traditional but trying to keep up with the times. I finally caught sight of her down the long corridor, her blunt hair swinging from side to side as she waved and made her way toward me. She was the spitting image of her mother. Mrs. Cho was small and slender, her cheekbones high, her skin porcelain. She had always reminded me of a little doll. Kim had inherited her mother’s pretty if rather bland looks, but had elected to give herself a bit of an edge with some rather unusual fashion choices. One weekend she had dyed her bangs pink. Another, she had paid for an airbrush tattoo across her upper arm. Last week, she came to school wearing a vintage Hermès tie and baggy gray pants, looking for all the world like an Asian Annie Hall.
    “Wow, you look fab,” she said. “I skipped phys ed. Cramps. How was it?”
    “Look, we need to sit up front, okay?” I said, ignoring her question. “I want Aaralyn Taylor to be looking right at me.”
    “Shouldn’t be a problem,” she answered. “Nobody’s here yet. As soon as these guys finish setting up the room, we can go in and sit down. Nervous?”
    “Kind of,” I replied. “I know you think I’m crazy, but this is the moment I’ve been waiting for.”
    “Indie, you think I don’t know that you’ve saved every issue of that magazine? That you keep folders crammedwith pictures of each season’s must-haves? I love pretty clothes as much as the next girl. But you’re insane.”
    “Yeah, but you love me anyway,” I said, grabbing her by the hand and dragging her into the auditorium.
    I had told my mother to pick me up a little later than usual today. I had warned her that I would probably be deep in conversation with Aaralyn Taylor when she got there, and that I might need a few extra minutes to wrap things up. My mother, as she always did, rolled her eyes and proceeded to ladle out the homemade yogurt sweetened with wildflower honey she was serving for breakfast.
    She had asked me why I had skipped the NASA speaker the day before, and why I wasn’t scheduled to be in on the Silicon Valley insider the following afternoon. I wasn’t sure how to explain it to her. Somehow, between the heaping spoonfuls of cut papayas drizzled with lime juice and the jam-smeared croissants that followed, I didn’t find the opportunity to inform my mother that the main reason I wanted to attend Aaralyn Taylor’s talk was so I could meet her in person before I went to work for her. Summer break wasn’t too far off, and I wanted to have something lined up—something more enjoyable than taking appointments at the dentist’s office, like Kim was planning. I wanted to spend those glorious summer days going to interviews and fashion shoots andproduct launches all around town. It was going to be fabulous, and I was going to be part of it.
    “It’s nothing, Mom,” I said, responding to my mother’s concerns. “I just think she’ll be interesting, that’s all. And you know how I much I like fashion.”

three
    I could barely contain my excitement.
    Yet, at the moment that the talk should have been starting, there was still no sign of Aaralyn Taylor.
    In the corner of the podium, I spotted the school’s career counselor, Ms. Jennings, in deep discussion with Mr. Baker, the vice principal. They looked flushed and anxious. I glanced around the hall, and noticed that only about a quarter of the seats were filled. A sense of alarm started to rise in my belly. Maybe Aaralyn Taylor wasn’t coming. Maybe she was called away on some exotic photo shoot in Tahiti or had a last-minute interview with Chloë Sevigny or broke a heel on one of her Blahniks. Whatever the reason, I would be devastated if she didn’t show up.
    “Let me go find out what’s going on,” said Kim, rising from her seat, obviously in