The Selection (Is A Modelling Competition)✔️

Chapter 10: Flowers

As promised, when I arrived fifteen minutes early at Catwalk 3, Silvia was there - and very few girls. I guessed a lot of them didn't have the concept of punctuality (namely Celeste).

Marlee was there, dressed in a yellow skirt with a white peasant blouse, her shoes matching with yellow and white straps that crisscrossed over her ankles.

Elise was sitting off to the side in a wheelchair, her feet bare and bandaged. I had always thought the first foot-related injury would be due to too-high heels, and more specifically would be me tripping in those heels.

Just as I entered the long, spacious room, Kriss came in behind me, looking in awe of it. She also looked very dainty and cute in a flowy skirt and blouse ensemble that was light purple and cream. Was she lavender? A lilac? "Oh, wow!"

"I know, right? It almost feels like we're actually models." Well, almost. I didn't really like the flower I'd been assigned to - even though I knew nothing about fashion, I knew orange looked terrible with red hair. So, I'd managed to pick out a dress that was slightly more flattering than an all-orange dress would have been. It was pale orange, with black and white colour-blocking at the sides. The shoes I wore with it were white pointed flats. I guess it could have been worse - although I wasn't quite sure why I was disappointed with my flower assignment making me look bad. Maybe I didn't want to go home after all.

"America?" Kriss nudged me. I didn't know why I felt so annoyed by it - and her. She was nice, the complete opposite of Celeste. "I said, what flower would you rather be than the one you were assigned?"

She was deep in conversation with Marlee and Elise, who I now noticed was dressed in a pale pink dress that offset her dark hair. Its skirt unfurled around her like petals. I guessed she was a lotus - which actually seemed rather racist, since she was Asian. Quickly, I tried to answer Kriss's question. "Uh, probably something blue. Maybe a... Cornflower, or something?"

"That would look so pretty with your eyes," Kriss said, nodding excitedly. I knew she was being nice... But for some reason all I could think about was her touching Maxon's arm, flirting with him - Stop! I didn't like Maxon that way. I had no claim on him. I had a boyfriend, and I barely knew him. I just knew that he was nice, and made me laugh, and had an adorable bashfulness around girls -

"So, Marlee, what about you?" I asked her, more for the sake of cutting off the questions in my head than wanting to know the answer.

"Him... Maybe a rose? Like, a really bright red rose, not a dark red one - " she was interrupted by the presence of Celeste, who was three minutes late and actually dressed like a rose.

The dress made her look ridiculously seductive with its plunging neckline, short hem, and sequins. It looked like a dress for going clubbing in. I thought she would have done better as a Venus flytrap.

Silvia looked like she regretted letting us pick out our outfits. "All right, ladies, please line up in alphabetical order by last name next to the runway. This will be the order in which you will get to work with Maxon. After you have picked out a suitable pose, you will be walking the runway in the same order."

She clapped her hands together briskly. "Well? What are you waiting for?"

Quickly, everyone scrambled into position. I had Marlee on my right and an snotty-looking brunette named Leah on my left. She was wearing an orange dress as well, but pulled it off better with her hair. She was gossiping with Kayleigh, a girl who looked equally stuck-up. They both fell silent suddenly, and I looked up from  my shoes to see why.

Maxon had entered, and he was walking around, pacing the room. He looked nervous. I wanted to laugh. Why would he, a famed photographer, a rich man's son, be scared of a bunch of teenage girls?

For some reason, I thought the answer was one I'd like.

Keep up the commenting and voting guys! Thank you so much to @medievalrebel, @americally and @thenerdwriter28 for pushing me to update this, and also to everyone that voted on this story!