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  CHAPTER 1

  My Big Break!

  All right, people! Hit the lockers!” called out Ms. Chen, our gym teacher.

  I jogged off the basketball court along with my friends Katie, Emma, and Alexis. We all have gym together, which is great. We all have pretty complicated feelings about gym, though.

  Emma is blonde, sweet, a little shy, and gorgeous—and, surprisingly, a competitive beast when she plays sports. I think it comes from having three brothers. She especially gets mad when the girls and boys play together and the boys don’t pass the ball to the girls.

  “What do they think? That we’re not as good as them?” she’d say.

  Alexis is competitive, too, but mostly about academic things. She likes gym—mainly because she’s really good at it—but she just loves to criticize it. “You need a healthy body to maintain a healthy mind,” she’d always say. “But gym class is just not an efficient way to get exercise. Half the time we’re standing around, waiting to play.”

  Then there’s my best friend, Katie. She used to hate gym more than I hate polyester, mostly because she used to get teased because she wasn’t good at sports. But she’s a lot more confident now.

  “Can you believe I made a basket today?” she was saying as we walked toward the locker room. She jumped up, pretending to make an imaginary layup. “An actual basket. In gym!”

  “You did great, Katie,” Emma said.

  “I almost wish gym wasn’t over yet,” Katie said, and I gave her a look.

  “Did you actually just say that?” I asked.

  “Well, I said ‘almost,’ ” Katie replied.

  “Well, I am definitely glad it’s over,” I said. “That means I can get out of this uniform.”

  I am at war with my Park Street Middle School gym uniform. For one thing, it’s half polyester, which is just itchy and gross. Polyester makes me sweat more, which is the exact opposite of what I need in a gym uniform. As Alexis would say, it’s not logical.

  Then there are the shorts, which balloon out on the sides like old-fashioned bloomers. And it’s a totally boring blue color, not a deep navy or a pretty powder blue, but just this really dull blue, a dirty grayish blue, like the color of the sky on a drizzly day. Blah.

  “Mia, you look great in the uniform,” Katie said. “You look great in everything.”

  “Thanks, but nobody looks good in this,” I said. I pulled at the fabric of the shorts. “I took these to my last class at Parsons, and Millicent, a design student, showed me how to alter the seam, so they don’t look so baggy. But they’re still hideous!”

  Parsons is a pretty famous design school in New York City. My mom signed me up for a class there, which is totally awesome.

  By now we had reached the locker room and quickly got changed for next period: lunch. We only get about three minutes to change, which is ridiculous. I never have time to redo my hair, which is always all over the place after gym.

  “How is that class going, anyway?” Alexis asked.

  “Really good,” I said. “I’m learning so much about sewing. Which I’m going to need to do if I’m serious about becoming a fashion designer.”

  “Oh, you’re definitely serious about it, all right,” Katie said with a grin. “It’s all you talk about.”

  “Not all,” I said, but then I remembered something. “Oh! I have something to show you guys at lunch. I found out about it yesterday, and I’m so excited!”

  “Yesterday? Why didn’t you tell me on the bus this morning?” Katie asked.

  “I wanted to save it and tell everybody at lunch,” I told her. “This could totally be my big break.”

  Katie raised her eyebrows. “Tell us now!”

  “Not in this smelly locker room,” I said, and then the bell rang. “Come on, let’s go to lunch!”

  The four of us pushed our way through a sea of middle schoolers as we headed to the cafeteria. Once we got there, Katie and I went to our usual table, and Alexis and Emma got on the food line.

  “Come on, just tell me now,” Katie said as she unwrapped her PB&J sandwich.

  I shook my head. “You are so impatient!” I told her, laughing.

  Katie put down her sandwich and closed her eyes. “Okay. I’ll just meditate until you’re ready then.”

  That’s when Alexis and Emma walked up, carrying trays of salad.

  “What’s with Katie?” Emma asked.

  “I’m meditating,” Katie said.

  “Not if you’re talking,” I pointed out.

  “Meditation can be very beneficial,” Alexis said. “In Business Club we learned that many successful executives practice it. It keeps them focused.”

  Katie opened her eyes. “Okay, I’m focused. Now tell us, Mia!”

  I opened my backpack and took out a magazine, Teen Runway. I flipped through the pages and stopped at a photo of a model gliding down a runway in a gorgeous chiffon evening gown. The headline above her read, “Design Your Fantasy Dress—Enter Our Contest!”

  “Teen Runway is having a contest,” I told my friends. “It’s open to anyone between the ages of twelve and sixteen. You have to create a dress that you would wear to a fashion event with all the top designers. The grand prize is a thousand bucks, but that’s not even the best part. The winner gets their dress photographed on a professional model for the magazine, plus a meeting with famous designers.”

  I put the magazine down on the table, so everyone could see. “I can totally do this,” I said. “Especially now that I’m taking that sewing class. You have to sew your dress yourself and send in a picture of it for the contest.”

  “You can totally win this,” Katie said, excited.

  “Totally,” Emma agreed, nodding.

  “It’s the perfect contest for you,” Alexis said. “Although I wonder how many people will be competing. Do you know how many subscribers the magazine has? Maybe we could estimate.”

  “I think maybe it’s better if you don’t think about the other competitors,” Emma suggested. “Just bring your amazing vision to life.”

  I nodded. “Exactly! On every fashion competition show I’ve watched, people get in trouble when they worry about what other people are doing.”

  “So, can you do the sewing at your class in the city?” Katie asked.

  “That’s my plan,” I said. “This week, I’m here with Mom. I can spend the time sketching and figuring out what material I need. Then next weekend I’m at Dad’s, so I can work on the pattern there.”

  My parents are divorced, so every other weekend I take the train to New York City, where I used to live, and hang out with my dad. The rest of the time I live here in Maple Grove with my mom; my stepdad, Eddie; and Dan, my stepbrother. It used to be much more confusing, but we all figured it out, and now it just seems normal.

  Katie scrunched up her face. “I almost forgot. Will you be around the weekend of George’s Halloween party?”

  “Yes. And even if I wasn’t, I would ask Dad if I could go. I definitely don’t want to miss that.”

  Suddenly, George Martinez appeared at our lunch table.

  “So are you guys all going to dress up like cupcakes for my party?” he asked.

  Katie almost jumped out of her chair. “George! We were just talking about you. That is so weird.”

&nb
sp; George waggled his eyebrows. “Really! Were you talking about how cute I am?”

  Katie blushed, because she does think George is cute. Which is okay because he thinks Katie is cute too. You can totally tell.

  “No,” she said. “We were talking about your party.”

  “And we are not going as cupcakes,” I said. “That would be ridiculous.” But I understood why George suggested it. My friends and I formed a cupcake club when we started middle school. We bake cupcakes for parties and other events. Everyone in school pretty much knows us as “the Cupcakers.”

  “Actually, it’s a pretty cool idea,” Katie said. “Although it might be kind of hard to go to the bathroom in a giant cupcake costume.”

  George laughed. “Yeah, right. But you’re all coming, right?”

  “Yes!” we all answered at once.

  “Good,” George said, and he headed back to his lunch table.

  “Everybody is going to that party,” Alexis said, leaning in toward us.

  “I know,” Emma said, her blue eyes shining. “The last time I went to a boy-girl party at somebody’s house, it was, like, first grade or something.”

  Katie nudged me. “Is Chris going?”

  Now it was my turn to blush. “I’m not sure,” I said. “He hasn’t texted me in a while.”

  Chris Howard is this boy in my grade who I’m pretty sure I like. He’s tall and cute, and he has braces like I do, only mine are the clear kind, and he has the shiny metal kind. But they don’t make him any less cute.

  Emma was frowning. “I haven’t thought about a costume yet. If we don’t go as cupcakes, what will we go as?”

  “If I didn’t have this contest, I would design fabulous costumes for all of us,” I said. “Sorry.”

  “No, the contest is way more important,” Katie said, and Emma and Alexis nodded in agreement.

  Then Alexis opened up her planner. “So, Cupcake Club meeting at your house, Mia? Saturday?”

  I nodded. “Mom and Eddie said fine. We could get pizza, or Eddie said he’d make spaghetti for us.”

  “Eddie’s spaghetti!” Katie sang out. “It’s delicious, and besides, it rhymes.”

  Alexis looked at the clock. “Ten minutes until the bell rings, and we haven’t eaten a bite.” She picked up her fork and dug into her salad.

  I picked up my turkey wrap in one hand and stared at the magazine page in my other hand.

  If I win this contest, it could change everything, I thought. I could go from middle schooler to fashion designer overnight!

  CHAPTER 2

  Spooky Sketches

  When I actually sat down to start sketching that night, creating my fantasy dress was way harder than I thought. What did it actually mean to make a “fantasy dress”? Should it be sophisticated, like something you’d wear to an art gallery opening, or runway-ready glamorous?

  And even though I had said that I didn’t want to worry about what other people might do, I was kind of worried. It was so hard to keep up with all the changing trends. Not that I wanted to follow them, but I knew I had to be ahead of them. My mom is a stylist, which means she helps pick out outfits and whole wardrobes for people. She helps magazines figure out which clothes to show, or she will help actresses with their wardrobes for a TV show or movie. She even styles “regular” people too. It’s pretty cool. Anyway, Mom was always talking about “being on trend,” so I know it’s important.

  I opened up my laptop and started searching for the fall runway shows. My head was pretty much in Paris when Mom stepped in through the open doorway.

  “Mia, did you finish your homework?” she asked.

  “I just have one worksheet to do,” I said, quickly closing the window on my screen so Mom wouldn’t see the model in the slinky sequined gown. But she already had me figured out.

  “Honey, I know you’re excited about the contest, but school first, okay?”

  I sighed. “Yes.” I shut the laptop. But inside I was thinking, If I win that contest, school won’t matter! Which, okay, to be honest, deep down I knew wasn’t true, but it was still fun to dream.

  I quickly finished my homework and then went back online. There were so many trends: hot pants with blazers, retro-looking dresses, lots of leather and fake fur. How was I supposed to come up with the next big thing?

  As I flopped down onto my bed, Mom came back in.

  “Bedtime, Mia. Laptop off, please.”

  “I know,” I said, but I didn’t move. I was too depressed. Mom sat down next to me.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “I don’t know how designers do it,” I said. “How do you create something that nobody’s ever done before and that everybody wants?”

  Mom thought for a moment. She knows a lot of designers. “As a stylist, I listen to what my clients want and then try to find a designer who shares that same kind of style. Most designers have a specific style. The most successful ones have a style that appeals to a lot of people and that is wearable for a lot of people. I love leopard-print jumpsuits, but that is not something everyone can pull off.”

  I shuddered, imagining some of my friends’ moms wearing leopard-print jumpsuits. “Yeah, not a good look for normal everyday wear.”

  “Talk to your friends,” Mom suggested. “Find out what they would want in a fantasy dress. It may spark some ideas.”

  “That’s a great idea!” I said, jumping up. I rooted under my bed and pulled out some fashion magazines from the stack that has piled up under there. Then I stuffed them into my backpack. “I can ask them at our Cupcake meeting on Saturday. Oh by the way, they want Eddie to make his spaghetti.”

  Mom smiled. “He’ll be thrilled.”

  Mom said good night, and I got ready for bed. That night I dreamed I was walking down a runway, wearing my gym uniform, leopard-print boots, and a fake-fur vest.

  I can’t believe I didn’t wake up screaming!

  Convincing my friends to help me out was easy. But it was almost as if Katie wanted to give me a hard time. When I handed her some magazines to look through at lunch the next day, she looked at me like I was handing her a dirty sock.

  “So you want us to do what?” she asked.

  I handed her a purple marker. “Just look through it and circle the stuff you like. Stuff you might wear. You don’t have to do it now—just bring it Saturday.”

  “Ooh, this is going to be fun!” Emma said.

  “Are you sure you want me to do this?” Katie asked. Her idea of dressing up is to wear a clean pair of jeans with her T-shirt and sneakers. But once in a while she lets me pick out clothes for her, and she looks totally adorable.

  “Yes, you,” I insisted.

  My friends didn’t disappoint me. Saturday at five o’clock, the house smelled like tomato sauce and garlic, and when the doorbell rang, my dogs, Tiki and Milkshake, started yapping like crazy. When I opened the door, Katie, Emma, and Alexis were standing there, carrying the magazines I had given them.

  They came inside, and Katie bent down to pet the dogs. They adore her.

  “Emma, how was your modeling thing?” I asked. She gets professional modeling gigs sometimes.

  “Another catalog,” Emma said. “Winter coats. And it felt like ninety degrees in the studio. Gross!”

  “Well, I got pretty sweaty during the race this morning,” Katie said.

  “Did your mom and Mr. Green run too?” I asked. Katie’s mom is dating a math teacher, Mr. Green, in our school. It’s really nice, but weird for Katie. Katie and her mom run, and Mr. Green does too, so now they all run together sometimes.

  “Yes, and Emily, too,” Katie said—Emily is Mr. Green’s daughter—and grinned. “But I beat them all.”

  “So how do you want to do this?” Alexis asked. “Fashion first or cupcakes first?”

  “Let’s do fashion, then spaghetti, and then talk about cupcakes for dessert,” Katie suggested. “It’s, you know, fitting.”

  “Okay, let’s go to my room,” I said.

&
nbsp; I had cleaned up my room (well, I shoved a few things under the bed), but I keep it pretty clean because I have loved it ever since Eddie helped me redo it. The walls are turquoise, and Eddie and I painted over the old furniture a glossy white, with black trim. Mom helped me with the colors but mostly it was my design.

  I tossed some turquoise and fuchsia throw pillows from my bed to the floor.

  “Okay, let’s see what you’ve got,” I told my friends.

  “Me first!” Emma said, handing me a magazine. “I found tons of beautiful dresses in here.”

  I flipped through the pages. The dresses she had circled with the pink marker I gave her were—what else?—pink and fluffy, or they had floral prints.

  “These are so you,” I told her. “So, do you think ‘romantic’ would be a good way to describe your style? Or ‘sweet and flirty’?”

  Emma nodded. “Definitely,” she said, looking down at the white peasant top and pink skirt she was wearing.

  “Well, I didn’t circle anything with flowers,” Alexis said. She handed me back the stack of magazines I had given her, with the pages neatly flagged. “The ones I liked best looked nice, but they were practical, too.”

  Katie frowned. “You mean like uniforms?”

  “No, I mean—well, turn to page thirty-seven of that one,” Alexis said, pointing, and I quickly obeyed. “See that black dress? You can wear it to work during the day, and then you can dress it up and wear it to a party at night. It says it right here: ‘One dress, two different looks, pretty and practical!’ ”

  I nodded. “My mom’s clients love stuff like that.”

  Then I looked at Katie. “Sooooo . . .”

  Katie sighed and handed me the magazines. “Well, I didn’t find my fantasy dress. I found some stuff I wouldn’t mind wearing, though.”

  Looking through the pages, I saw that Katie circled a lot of pictures of models wearing jeans and shirts, or shorts and shirts. No surprise there.

  “Well, what would your fantasy dress look like?” I asked.

  “I was thinking about that,” Katie said. “I guess if I had a really special thing to go to, I would want something completely different and amazing. Like a dress with a rainbow swirl all around it, or maybe a silver space-looking dress with a hat that had spirals coming out of it.”