Strike a Pose (Blame It on Fame #1)

11. Willow

Chapter 11

Willow

“ W

illow, darling, I need you to stop fidgeting, or I’ll take the liberty of pinning your hands to your sides myself,” one of the executive designers at Marc Jacobs tells me.

I’m at my final fitting in preparation for their runway this evening, my most anticipated show for New York Fashion Week. Since I’m closing the show, the entire team has been preening over me for the past few hours, making me cleanse, tone, exfoliate, fake tan, and moisturize every inch of my body with products of their choosing. Then, they painted my nails a metallic gold color to match my chain mail bodysuit and ten-foot cape, which connects to my body at the wrists and throat. And after this fitting, I still have to go through a couple of hours of hair and makeup before I’m ready to finally walk.

“Yes, sorry,” I mumble. They shouldn’t have had me stand in front of a mirror if they didn’t want me fidgeting.

“You look beautiful,” the designer says, seemingly reading my mind.

“My skin feels raw. ”

“It should feel raw. It’s remade every show, along with the rest of you.”

“You look great, Willow, really,” Heena reassures me from the next riser.

She’s opening the show in a beautiful long-sleeve golden wrap dress with a matching golden spiked tiara. We’re wearing the only two golden pieces in the show. The rest of the models are all wearing neutral colors.

“Thanks, Heena, you do too.” I smile at my beautiful best friend. Even with no makeup, she’s strikingly, stunningly, drop-dead gorgeous.

That beauty is what got her into modeling the old-fashioned way, by being scouted in a mall in her hometown of Seattle.

“Well, that’s to be expected,” she says with a wink.

“Stop moving,” the woman tailoring Heena’s dress snaps. Heena gives me a dramatic, wide-eyed ‘yikes’ expression. We both turn forward again.

“And,” I start, unable to get the sentence out, even though I’m not facing Heena anymore. “I mean, you…” I wring my hands in front of me, earning a dirty look from my kneeling designer.

“Anytime now, Willow, we have all day,” Heena jokes.

“You don’t think my walk is boring, do you?” I finally blurt out.

“ What? For fuck’s sake, Willow, you have the best walk in the industry! Who the fuck said that?”

“I just saw someone talking about it online…”

“It’s not true. It’s not even close to true. Jesus Christ, jealousy is a disease.” I can hear the exasperation in her tone. “Willow, look at—ah! She actually poked me with her pin!”

“You won’t stop moving,” Heena’s woman retorts as my woman laughs .

“Fine, don’t look at me,” Heena amends. “But listen carefully. You are the best model in the industry right now. And that’s coming from someone who thinks very highly of herself. I think you’re better than me. I think you’re better than every other girl out there. Your walk is textbook perfect, and it’s why you’re the highest paid, most famous one out of all of us?—”

“But my family?—”

“This has nothing to do with your family, Willow. You have the perfect combination of raw talent, good looks, and charisma that would have made you a world-famous supermodel with or without your family name.”

“You don’t know?—”

“I’m not done yet,” she scolds. “You are literally one of the kindest, most beautiful women in the world, and yet you let these fuckwads on the internet get into your head. Just because they’re miserable and unsatisfied with their pathetic lives doesn’t mean you need to be miserable too. They don’t deserve that power over you. No one does. The only person who has the ability to define your self-worth is yourself. And I know you’re smart enough to see that you’re an amazing, worthy person. So stop letting the incels on the internet get into your head!”

“Wow,” I breathe.

“Heena, if modeling doesn’t work out, you could become a motivational speaker,” her tailor says.

“Oh, shut up,” Heena replies, trying to hide her smile. “I didn’t say anything that isn’t true. So, Willow, start acting like the smart girl I know you are, and stop believing everything you read on the internet.”

“But doesn’t the internet say that you have a mathematically perfect face?” I tease.

She smirks. “Just because it’s not always right doesn’t mean it isn’t sometimes right. ”

“Mhm.”

“I’m serious, Willow. Don’t believe that shit, or I’ll have to hunt down the people posting it, and that would really inconvenience me, especially during fashion season. What would Donatella say if I showed up to her show with a broken nail?”

“Alright, fine. I’ll try to stay clear of the stuff people say about me on the internet.”

“And to not believe it when you happen to see it,” she adds.

“And to not believe it when I see it,” I echo.

I truly feel bad for anyone who has never walked the runway. It’s an electrifying feeling, second to none. I’m backstage now, watching the show with Heena at my side, as she’s already walked. Even stoic Heena can’t wipe the grin off her face resulting from the thrill of modeling some of the most innovative, detailed, and expensive fashions in the world.

“Close your eyes, breathe deeply, and repeat after me,” Heena commands, color high on her cheeks from her walk.

“Really? Again?”

“Yes, really, again,” she mocks. “Because I'll be damned if I let my best friend close the Marc Jacobs show feeling anything less than the goddess she is.”

“Fine.” I sigh, closing my eyes and taking a deep breath.

“There you go. Okay, ‘I am the most beautiful woman in the world.’”

I crack an eye open and give her a skeptical look.

“They’re positive affirmations. Humor me.”

“Fine.” I close my eyes again. “I am the most beautiful woman in the world.”

“Everyone is drawn to me for both my outer and inner beauty. I look amazing and confident because I feel amazing and confiden t. I am unique, I am radiant, I am a star. I am kind, I am happy, I am strong. I am a goddess on earth, a queen among peasants. And I’m going to close this show like nobody else could, rendering everyone, including Marc Jacobs himself, speechless, possibly even permanently mute.”

I echo every sentence as she says it and slowly open my eyes.

“You’re up in twenty seconds, Will,” Heena whispers, patting me on the arm to avoid messing up our looks. “Break a leg.”

I turn onto the stage and hear the familiar clicks of camera shutters. In the words of one of my old modeling coaches, I strut like I’m walking through hell in gasoline-soaked pajamas. I hate to admit it, but Heena’s weird affirmations have me feeling more confident than ever before. I stare down the camera at the end of the runway as I strut, hardly even registering the blossoming applause.

I pose at the end, popping out one hip and fanning my cape behind me before turning around dramatically enough to flip my hair as I strut toward Heena. She begins leading all the models back through the circuit in order, with me last. The audience’s applause is too loud to ignore now, and it’s a feat to keep my face blank as they give a standing ovation even before Marc’s appearance. They remain standing and applauding as Marc comes out, and I watch him gleefully walk through the crowd from where I’m perched.

“Wow,” Heena says once we’re backstage, finding me easily among the other models due to the gold. “You need to do affirmations before every show. That was incredible. I’ve literally never seen a standing ovation start before the designer comes out.”

I nod, smiling ear to ear. “It was a great collection.”

“Yes, but they were applauding for you . Not the collection. ”

“Well, maybe they just liked my outfit the best.”

“Not your outfit, you ,” she says, finally pulling me into a hug, throwing caution to the wind despite our extremely valuable and delicate outfits. She beams as she pulls back. “Willow, what a way to shut up the people who say you can’t walk.”