Free Model Misfit by Holly Smale Page A

up her own label. It’s huge, Peach-plum, and I need to make sure we’re all on the same page.”
    I suddenly feel a bit sick. You can look at it any way you like, but last time I attempted to model I ended up covered in gold paint and attached to a curtain rod. “She’s launching her new label with me?”
    Wilbur starts giggling. “Oh, bunny, you
do
crack me down the middle. Can you imagine?”
    I patiently wait for him to stop being so insulting.
    “No: the main” – he pretends to cough –
“
taller
models are being flown out today to China, Hong Kong, Macau, South Korea …”
    “Mongolia and Taiwan?”
    He abruptly stops laughing. “How do you know that?”
    “They’re the seven countries in East Asia, excluding North Korea.” Wilbur’s gone a strange, pale shade of mustard. “It was just a guess. Are you OK?”
    Wilbur breathes out hard. “This is all top secret, Moo-noo. We need to get the campaign done before Yuka tells Baylee she’s leaving. If I can just organise it” – he leans forward slightly and grabs my shoulders – “Poodle, it might be my way out of here.”
    “Yuka won’t let you out of the
airport?
”
    Wilbur starts giggling again. “Out of
agenting
, my little Nutmeg. She’s
finally
going to give me a position with her new label.”
    I don’t know why I’m so surprised. Adults almost never like doing their jobs from what I can tell.
    “I like being an agent, but I’m shockingly bad at it, Muffin-top. Anyway, I didn’t get a degree in fashion so I could sit at a desk, trying to talk to pretty women. If I wanted to do that, I’d have got a job in a normal office.”
    Wilbur straightens out the waistcoat. “This is our chance, Bunny. Yours, and mine.” He pauses. “Mostly mine, because let’s be honest: I’m an adult with a proper career and I’d imagine your shelf life as a teen model is almost over.”
    For the last twenty-four hours, I’ve thought about a lot of things. I’ve thought about how far away Japan is (5,937 miles), and how bad I am at eating with chopsticks (very) and my chances of dying in an air crash (1 in 10.46 million). I’ve thought about how many Hello Kittys I’m going to buy for Nat (zero: they creep her out) and how many vending machines there are for every person in Japan (23).
    But it hadn’t occurred to me that I might actually have to
model
when I got there. That it would be important to a lot of people. Or that I would be totally out of my depth.
Again.
    “OK,” I stammer nervously. “I’ll try my very hardest.”
    Wilbur sighs. “I know you will, Baby-baby Panda,” he says, pinching my cheek. “And that is
exactly
what I’m worried about.”

y the time we get through the security gates, I’m so excited and nervous, I feel like a shark. As if I can’t stop moving or I’ll die.
    Or talking, for that matter.
    Which is less like a shark, but does a similar job in making people try to get away from me as fast as possible.
    “I’m going to Japan,” I tell the man standing by the electric buggies. “I’m going to Japan,” I tell the lady behind the counter at Boots. “I’m going to Japan,” I tell the man who gives me a sandwich at Pret A Manger.
    “I’m going on my lunch break,” he replies, immediately entering into the spirit of things.
    Everything
is suddenly fascinating. The air-hostess uniforms. The scarily round bread rolls. The little packs with free socks and toothbrushes. The fact that you can pop the edges of the headrests out. Even the in-flight safety procedure brochure is – you guessed it – fascinating.
    I think I may be over-stimulated.
    “Haven’t you been on a plane before?” Bunty laughs when I finish breathlessly pointing at random landmarks below us so that I can click the cup holder in and out of the seat in front of me repeatedly.
    “I have, but never without—” I swallow.
My parents or Nat.
“Not long distance before. Did you know that the chances of being in a plane crash are less