Free Famous by Todd Strasser Page A

kissed him back.
    It started to look like we might not get around to watching the movie. I tried to forget our discussion about my photography and lose myself in the moment, but I didn’t succeed completely. Then the alarm on my cell phone chimed. I gradually eased out of Nasim’s embrace and turned it off. “I can’t believe it’s time already,” I mumbled, straightening my clothes.
    â€œSorry?” Nasim’s brow furrowed.
    â€œShelby’s party.”
    His dark eyebrows dipped. I could tell that he’d forgotten about the party and had other ideas about how to spend the next few hours. “Are you sure?” he asked.
    I didn’t want to disappoint him, but I just had to go to that party. “You know how much this means to me.” I gave him a kiss on the cheek and stood up. Nasim stillhadn’t moved from the couch, so I grabbed his hand and gave him a tug. “Come on, we’ll have fun.”
    I knew Nasim wasn’t happy about going to the party, and on the way over I tried to explain to him that it wasn’t like I was choosing the party over him. It was just a matter of timing. He said he understood, but once again I got that feeling that deep down he wasn’t allowing me to see his true feelings. It was frustrating, but I’d learned from experience that there was nothing I could do about it.
    It turned out that the party wasn’t as much fun as I’d hoped. Shelby’s little get-together turned out to be a catered affair for 120 people in a rented loft in Soho. Most of the kids weren’t from Herrin, and Shelby was so busy introducing me to everyone as “the one from the
New York Weekly
article,” that we never actually got a chance to speak.
    Each time she mentioned the article, I had to bite my lip to keep myself from telling her about the
People
cover, but I was terrified that would jinx the whole thing. Nasim, who’d been a little grumpy ever since we’d left his place, tagged along for a while but finally wandered away after he’d heard me answer the same questions for the tenth time. At one point I saw him talking to Shelby and felt jealous that he was getting more face time with her than I was.
    My mother and Nasim were the only ones who knew about the
People
cover, and I made them swear not to tell a soul. I didn’t even tell Avy or my father. I was convinced that the more people who knew, the greater the chance that the whole thing would be jinxed—that an even bigger story would break and the editors at
People
would pick a different cover photo, or that Naomi would get a restraining order to stop the magazine from publishing my shot.
    After all, it really was too good to be true, wasn’t it? First the Tatiana Frazee shots, then the
New York Weekly
story, and now the
People
cover? That was
way
too much good fortune. Something
had
to go wrong, didn’t it?
    But nothing did. Five days later
People
hit the newsstands with my photo of the pregnant Naomi Fine. By third period, copies of the magazine were flying around school, along with the whispers and the stares.
    â€œThis is ab-so-lutely amazing!” Avy gushed at lunch, a copy of
People
lying on the table before us. “Now you’re going to be even more famous!”
    I wondered if he was right, and what exactly “more famous” would mean. But maybe it wouldn’t happen. “Not really,” I said. “Unless you know where to look and have a magnifying glass, most people aren’t going to notice my photo credit.”
    â€œBut you got paid a ton, right?” Avy said.
    I nodded.
    â€œAnd it is good for your reputation,” added the everinsightful Nasim with a tinge of irony in his voice.
    â€œTrue, all that,” I said, and glanced toward the table where Shelby Winston was sitting with her friends. Shelby gazed back at me with a smile and lifted a copy of the magazine. She pointed at the cover, made an OMG!