Survival of the Fiercest Read Free Page A

worked for. I imagine selling my apartment and moving to Vermont, like in the movie Baby Boom , sans baby.
    Punching the keys on my computer, I pull up thefiercest.com and check the content feed. The recent piece we ran about interracial dating is getting good reviews. I click our news site and scroll through, trying to envision gossip posts. I can’t. I can’t put gossip in here . Gossip tears people down. It can ruin people’s lives.
    My head fills with all the slurs and slanders I’d endured growing up as a mixed kid. In high school, Tony Giuseppe started a rumor that my black father was in jail and my white mother gave me up, all because I wouldn’t let him go up my shirt after the sophomore dance. He was such a dick.
    The truth is my parents died in a car accident when I was eight. And they loved each other, despite the shit they got for being an interracial couple. My father’s mother raised me and peacefully passed away when I was thirty. Maybe that’s why I had gotten married then, to ease the loneliness, but now the marriage is gone too.
    I shake myself. Fierce is a forum for change, for positive reinforcement, not mean-girl rhetoric. But I can’t lose it either. It’s all I have left.
    A muffled ring fills the room. Skirting my still-packed bags, I fall onto the king-size bed and grab my phone.
    “’Sup, Tina?” After the meeting, I called Tina, but of course she already knew what happened. Now I find myself listening numbly as she fills me in on the club.
    “I spoke to Viper’s PR,” she says. “You are all set for tonight. It’s a two-story hip-hop club and street art gallery called Muse. Several actors, athletes, and musicians will be there. And I hear the owner is well connected.”
    “Connected? Mafia?”
    “No, former lawyer or something…whatever. Listen. You are on the list at the VIP entrance, and they worked out an exclusive interview with the owner, so call his marketing director when you get there.”
    “Yeah. No problem.”
    “Dolly, you’re good. I have faith, but there is one thing I’m concerned about.”
    I frown. I can’t handle another surprise. “What?” I ask cautiously.
    “What are you going to wear?”
    I sit up like a shot. “Did you just ask me that? My clothes are what you are concerned about? This isn’t a date, Tina. It’s work.”
    “You need to look sexy. Rumor has it the owner likes model types.”
    I sigh. “As opposed to the other club owners who just like us regular girls? Shocking.”
    “You know what I mean. You need celebrity attention. If you go there in your hipster flats—”
    “Uh, excuse me, they are Chanel.”
    “—and your tangerine work dress that you wear with that black suit jacket.”
    My jaw drops, and I stare at my unpacked bag. I love that dress.
    “You won’t keep anyone’s attention. You’re beautiful Lex, with a rack like Christina Hendricks and a booty like Serena. Show some cleavage, for Christ’s sake.”
    “Should you be saying ‘Christ’s sake’? You’re Jewish. And stop exaggerating. I’m not twenty-two anymore, but I keep it tight. I mean…I try.”
    I wander over to the mirrored wall of the dressing area. My white V-neck T-shirt shows just enough décolletage to be edgy, and my butt is squeezed into a pair of dark-wash skinny jeans accented by a thin black racing stripe down the side. The strappy heels I’m wearing tie it all together. She’s crazy. I look good.
    “I can dress myself, Tina.” I purse my lips, slap a hand on my bump, and give my reflection a few booty pops. My ponytail bounces along before I stop and roll my eyes at my reflection. I’m too old for this shit.
    “You’ve got great style, dolly. It’s hip, and it’s New York. But you’re in California; you have to look like a slut.”
    She’s insane. “I have to wear that tangerine dress. It’s the only one I have with me.” And just then I think to call Randy, my style editor who works out of Los Angeles. As a stylist to some of