Forever

Chapter 36 _ Te Lo Has Ganado

The day of the competition had finally arrived. Juliana was nervous; as were most of the contestants. There were three hundred entires in total but only 50 made it into the actual show. The competition was broken up into two segments. The first was a secret session where the judges would get to view all the pieces as they looked on the mannequin. The second would be the runway show.

The night before the runway show the contestants were to deliver their pieces and set them up on mannequins to prevent them from getting wrinkled. What they didn't know was that they each had a judge helping them set up their piece.

The students were divided in groups of ten. The first group arrived and Penelope was among them. She was helped by the magazine editor who would be featuring the winning pieces. Josie arrived in the third group and was aided by Lucia who had been asked to be judge by Renata. Juliana arrived in the fifth and last group and had her favorite professor help her, Mr. Contreras.

Once the students had all come and gone, Valentina was summoned by Renata to photograph every piece. Valentina was to print ten copies of each piece for the judges for the following morning. Valentina didn't get much of a chance to spend time with Juliana on the eve of the competition or the morning of. She did a quick edit of all the images the night before and printed and filed every one with Hope's help. She and Hope were enamored by each piece.

The competition was to begin at noon. For this occasion Valentina had recommended her friend Jerome to Renata to photograph the event as she would be Juliana's model.

At 10:00am, Hope Valentina met up with Juliana and the rest of the girls at the loft as planned. Lizzie was to be Josie's model and Penelope had chosen one of her mothers to be her model. The girls had decided to all get ready together. Penelope's mothers were there as well since Penelope would be doing her mom's hair and makeup. Kim, Penelope's model had fallen in love with the loft and the view from the living room.

"Love of my soul, what do think Zach would say of the view?" Kim asked her wife in a joking yet curious manner.

Trini smiled at her wife adoringly and proceeded to say, "He would say that I'm the luckiest woman alive."

While all the girls awed, Penelope laughed as Kim blushed and told Trini she meant the view from the window.

Everything was laughter and joy until Valentina received a call from Renata. A call that would change the mood in the entire room. Renata called to inform the girls that there had been an incident with their pieces and they had to make their way to the auditorium as soon as possible to salvage what they could. They still had an hour before the show began.

Juliana's piece was the first in sight. It had been cut up and there was no way it could be salvaged. The second piece was Josie's, the white organza fabric had paint splatters in hues of blue. Penelope's piece was next and it had been cut in half vertically.

The girls dried their tears and got to work. They would save their pieces no matter what it took. The other three contestants affected were not as optimistic and decided to drop from the competition all together.

Valentina drove Juliana home in silence, simply holding her hand. Juliana had been working on three pieces for the show and that narrowed it down to the one that was now ruined. Once inside her apartment Juliana walked to her studio with Valentina in tow. She had been silent since the incident and Valentina knew she could burst any minute now.

"I know who did it." Was all Juliana said as she packed up the new piece leaving Valentina dumbfounded.

"What do you mean? Who did it? Why didn't you say anything to Renata?" Valentina asked in an urgent tone.