I was hailed as "The One Who Stopped Hannah" for the rest of the school year. It felt good! After school ended, we could go to the mall every day and work on Style Squad. Mr. Crimson and his team set up the iPad tech after the furniture arrived.
The iPads are specially programmed to only have one app that you can't close out of. That's the Style Squad Custom Clothing Creator app, as Sandra likes to call it, and it's what's used to make your custom clothes (obviously). First, you have a list of the plain white clothing items provided in the store. Let's say... you chose a pair of high-rise denim shorts, in a size 0 (I'm only saying that because I love high-rise denim shorts, and I'm a size 0!). Once you choose your clothing item, the program takes you to another page. This page shows you a 3D digital model of your clothing item (shorts, in this case) and lets you spin the item around with your finger. You can see the sides, top, bottom, etc.
In the high-rise denim shorts option, you can choose the color, any decals you want to add, button type, designs on the pockets, and whether you want ripped patches and/or frayed bottoms. In this case, there's also a little box at the bottom that you can click if you want the shorts to be acid-washed. I love acid-wash, so I would choose that option!
When you're done designing your clothing of choice, you click the "done" button. Then, it shows you the 3D model of your item one more time, and asks if you're done again, this time, with the options of "make changes" or "I'm done!"
Once you press the "I'm done!" option, you need to enter your first name and the first letter of your last name. You then turn around and go to the other side of the store, to the chute in the wall that's opposite to the iPad you were using. At the top of the chute, there's a screen that will show your name and a little progress bar that will track the progress of your clothing item. Once the bar is full, your clothing item will fall into the chute (kind of like a soda machine) and the glass door will slide open so you can retrieve your clothes. All of this is powered by an almost magical technology that Mr. Crimson says is "top-secret".
***
"That's so cute, Elisa!" Lexi exclaimed as my pair of shorts came out of the chute. They were super cute, with the light pink acid-wash denim and the little Style Squad logo near the bottom. I also chose to have frayed edges.
"My turn!" Vera giggled as she ran back to the iPad table.
"So, girls, we're set to open next week," Mr. Crimson said, looking down at his phone. "I see you've made progress with your posts on your website and social media pages. That's great! All we need to do here is set up the decor."
The decor was actually delivered yesterday, and Mr. Crimson's team was going to set it all up while we went to my house for a sleepover.
When Vera, Sandra, and Lexi were finished testing out the Style Squad software, we left Style Squad in the hands of Mr. Crimson and his team. My dad was going to be waiting outside with his car, ready to take us to lunch and then to our house.
However, as we were leaving, we heard our names shouted over the buzz of conversation. "Elisa! Lexi! Sandra! Vera! Style Squad girls! Over here!
We turned around to see Alice, Marissa, and a couple of other girls from the group of girls that were asking us questions. They were jumping up and down and waving to us.
"Is it true? You're opening next week?" Alice asked as we walked over to them. I nodded.
"SQUEEE! I just can't wait! So excited!" a girl named Sabrina said, flipping her fluffy, soft brown hair over her shoulder and typing on her phone. Me and my friends' phones buzzed in our purses. "I just followed you guys's social media profiles, and followed Style Squad as well!" Sabrina chirped.
My phone buzzed again, this time, with a text from my dad. I'm outside! Where are you?
Sorry, we're coming right now!! 😜 I responded.
"Sorry, guys! We gotta go, bye!" I said, walking back to the exit.
When we went outside, we see my dad's silver Nissan parked to the left. He honked and we walked over to him. "Hey, Mama!" Daddy said.
"Hi, Daddy," I responded, getting into the front seat. My friends squished themselves in the three back seats. "Do you know where we're going for lunch yet?"
"Wherever you guys want to go!" Daddy said, pulling out of the parking space. "Okay, let's see... we have Chipotle, Culver's, and Tropical Smoothie Café all within a mile of the house."
"Let's go to Chipotle!" Sandra said. We nodded in agreement.
"Chipotle it is!" Daddy responded. I turned on the radio to find one of my favorite songs playing, "Shout Out To My Ex" by Little Mix. I immediately started singing:
"Shout out to my ex! You're really quite the man!"
Lexi joined in:
"You made my heart break and that made me who I am!"
Then, Vera:
"Here's to my ex, hey, look at me now!"
And then, Sandra:
"Well I'm, I'm all the way up, I swear you'll never, you'll never bring me down!"
***
After we went to Chipotle, we went back to the house. My friends had dropped off their bags earlier, since we were having a sleepover later. We were about to get in the pool. I was braiding my hair to keep it from getting extremely tangled in the water. Lexi was putting her bathing suit on in my bathroom, Vera was putting on sunscreen, and
Sandra was going through her bag, looking for her sunglasses. "I swear, I put them in here..." she mumbled.
"You can borrow a pair of mine, if you want," I said, tying the end of one of my braids with a pink hair tie.
"Nah, I found them!" Sandra said, waving them in the air before putting them on her head. "They were under the towel."
Lexi comes out of the bathroom. "I need a new bathing suit. I've had this one for over a year!"
"Yeah, me too. It's so hard to find bathing suits nowadays!" Vera says. "They're all way too... revealing."
An idea hits me. "We can have bathing suits at Style Squad! You know, appropriate ones!"
"Yeah, that's great! We'll talk to Mr. Crimson about it tomorrow," Sandra says, getting her flip flops on. We walk down the stairs and outside, chatting the entire time. I turn on the jacuzzi and Spotify (Spotify FTW), and we get in the pool with our huge floaties.
***
Mami orders a couple of pizzas and we watch movies in my room. Clueless had just started when I got a text from an unknown number. Look out on your balcony 😉
"Huh?" I said.
"Who's that?" Lexi asked, flopping next to me on my bed.
"I have no idea... I'm gonna go on the balcony, though." I get up and open the door, stepping onto the balcony. Looking down, I see the marble that makes up the pool area of the backyard. We only have grass in the front yard, and a hedge separates the grass from the marble. The hedge surrounds the perimeter of the backyard pool area, and a small white gate separates the marble from the sand that leads down to the beach.
Looking out over the sand, I see that someone drew a humongous heart in the sand! It was so incredibly big!
I stood there, gawking, for a minute before Vera came out on the balcony. "Elisa, you're missing the mov— OH MY GOSH!" She said as she saw the heart. The sun was setting over the ocean, turning the sky an orangey-pink. The water reflected the colors of the sky, and the sugary sand transformed into a glittery pink. The sand heart glowed. Vera and I were mesmerized.
Another minute passes and Sandra and Lexi come out. Just like Vera, both girls stopped talking mid-sentence when they caught sight of the heart. After the sun set, we simultaneously let out a breath that we didn't remember taking. One by one, the stars glowed to life in the sky. It was so dark that I could just barely see the sand heart.
We went back inside. The TV is still on. We're thirty minutes into Clueless. Finally, Vera breaks the silence. "That was beautiful."
Lexi nods, pausing the movie. "I swear, how could a human draw something like that in the sand? That thing had to be the size of your house, Elisa!"
"One could almost say it was created by something... Supernatural!" Sandra giggled as she took a bite of cold veggie pizza. Supernatural is Sandra's favorite show. She's constantly making references. "Anyways, I think it means that someone has a crush on you, Elisa!"
I paused. Me? But why me? Why couldn't whoever this person is have a crush on someone prettier, like Lexi or Vera or Sandra? "No," I said, looking at my feet. I was sitting criss-cross on the bed. "Nobody has a crush on me. I'm sure of it."
"What? Why would you even think that nobody has a crush on you? You're gorgeous!" Vera exclaimed.
I shrug. "I'm just not the kind of person that anyone would like."
"Come on! Nobody would come over to my house and draw a huge heart in the sand! Someone's in love with you!" Sandra said, nearly shouting with joy.
Lexi nods again. "Seriously, though. We need to find out who did this."
All three girls stare at me for a minute, curiosity filling their eyes. The TV screen is still frozen. Finally, I take a breath. "Okay. We'll look into this. But first, we focus on Style Squad."
YOU ARE READING
Style Squad
General FictionBest friends Elisa, Vera, Lexi, and Sandra were assigned a group project at their Miami middle school: Create a business. What started out as a school project quickly turned into something far from fictional. The girls soon opened their own store...
