Read Online Gorgeous by Rachel Vail - Free Book Online Page B

she asked me.
    My heart was slamming against my ribs again. “Um, yeah,” I said. “You?”
    She let out a sigh/laugh. “I’ve had better weeks, actually.”
    She took a sip from the mug in her hand, and glanced at the papers in the other.
    I was scared to move a muscle, so I just stood there and said, “Mmm.”
    Then my phone rang and vibrated in my pocket. As I was grabbing it, she turned away, but then turned back and said, “Did you know everything you text on a cell phone is recoverable?”
    “Um,” I said. The call was coming from a number I didn’t recognize. I didn’t know whether to answer or not.
    “So be careful,” Mom said, and drifted away, sipping her coffee.
    “I will,” I said to her back, and flipped open my phone.
    “Allison Avery,” said an unfamiliar voice.
    “Yes?”
    “This is Natasha Mendel.”
    “Okay,” I said.
    “From zip .”
    My first thought was that I must have left my backpack there, but no, it was down in the bushes, which reminded me I should go get it after I hung up, despite the fact that, since I cut, I wouldn’t know what the homework was anyway. As I was thinking all that, I was walking across the hall to my own room but not saying anything.
    “Hello?” the voice said.
    “Yes,” I said, and sat down on my little beige couch, my favorite thing in my thankfully neat, clean room in shades of beige and white that Jade had helped me pick out. Jade’s mom had said neutrals are calming, and Jade pointed out the obvious, that I needed all the help with achieving calm I could get.
    My call waiting clicked. I looked and, weirdly, it was Jade. Had she sensed me thinking about her?
    I was about to ask the woman from zip to hold on, but then I remembered how freaky my cell phone had been acting and, out of fear I’d lose her, decided I’d call Jade back later, and realized the woman from the magazine was asking me in kind of a snotty, annoyed voice if she was calling at a bad time.
    “No,” I told her. “This is fine.”
    “You didn’t drop off a picture today,” said Ms. Natasha Mendel.
    “I didn’t know you had to,” I said.
    “You didn’t,” she said. “We were just wondering if you have management.”
    “Um,” I said, because I didn’t know what that meant.
    “Is there an agent or manager we need to speak with?”
    “About what?”
    “About you,” Natasha Mendel said.
    “What did I do?”
    “You photographed strikingly,” she said.
    I sank down onto the floor. “Strikingly?”
    “You are among our twenty semifinalists,” she said.
    “You’ve got to be kidding,” I said, and then realized what it must be. “Who is this? Roxie? Is that you?”
    “Who?”
    “Come on, Roxie, I know it’s you,” I said, pacing around my room. “You had me there for a second, I admit it, but I know your voice, you stinker!”
    “How old are you?” she asked.
    “Fifteen, same as you! Enough already, seriously, Roxie. Are you three-way calling me?” I was starting to sweat again. If there is one thing I hate, it’s getting punked on the phone.
    “I am far from fifteen,” the voice said. “We will be mailing you some parental consent forms to move forward with the next step, and I require your address, Allison. I have no time for adolescent behavior.”
    I didn’t say anything. I was too confused.
    “Your address?” the voice, which actually didn’t sound remotely like Roxie’s, repeated.
    Knowing I was never allowed to give out my address to a stranger over the phone or the computer, I listened with some surprise to myself reciting my address.
    “Return the forms promptly,” she said when I finished. “And meanwhile, I have you down as unrepresented. It will be best for you if you keep that status. We are looking to discover new talent in this competition.”
    “Okay,” I said, and hung up not knowing really what had just happened, or what to believe.

9
    I CALLED R OXIE FIRST . While her phone was ringing, I talked myself down. It was