Backstage, Mimah was staking out a corner of the dressing room so that she and Dylan could get their costumes on in private, away from prying eyes. She’d already dragged together three racks of costumes left over from old school plays, and was now positioning them against one wall to form a sort of cubicle. Around her, the dressing room was bustling. In front of the floor-length mirrors, six girls were crisscrossing pashminas over their bras as elegant halter tops, while Farah Assadi, wearing a bright orange pashmina wound round her body, was spraying herself with gold glitter.
Over the speaker system by the door, Mimah could hear The Kills’ song “Cheap and Cheerful” playing from the stage, which meant that Alice Rochester, Tally Abbott, Bella Scott, and Zanna Balfour were out there performing their bit. It was just over halfway through the show, and for the past forty minutes, the junior class had been parading along the catwalk in revealing pashmina getups, showing off the dance routines they’d practiced over the past three weeks.
Judging by the applause, the spectacle was going down a treat.
“We did it!” shrieked Bella Scott, bursting into the room hand in hand with Tally, seconds after the music stopped. “I can’t believe it.”
Alice and Zanna ran in after them. All four were wearing pashminas in various shades of blue and purple, tied as skimpy togas.
“I totally messed up.” Tally laughed. “Did you notice?”
“So did I!”
“Obviously! You bloody well nearly knocked me over.”
“Quick!” Alice cried. “Where’s my peach pashmina? I need to wear it in three songs’ time.”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Zanna giggled. “All I can concentrate on are those Hasted boys in the audience. It’s crawling with them.” She reached under their pile of clothes and dug up a bottle of Absolut that was by no means full. She screwed off the lid. “This is the only way I’m going out there again.”
“Oh yes, please, hand over some of that.” Tally swiped the vodka and took a glug. “Hey, Ali.” She spilled a bit down her chin. “I spotted your parents. They’re right near the front.”
“Fantastic, just what I need to hear. Not. What was the expression on Daddy’s face? Shit!” Alice stumbled over a Marc Jacobs bag that was lying on the floor and nearly fell flat on her face. “What muppet left this lying around? Is it yours, Zanna? It’s actually quite nice.”
“Umm, that’s mine,” Dylan spoke, above the clamor. Everyone fell silent as she looked up from the mirror where she’d been tarting herself up. One of her eyelids was covered in sparkly silver eyeshadow.
“Oh really? Yours?” Alice asked, clearly chagrined that she’d paid Dylan a compliment. “Are you trying to sabotage other people so you can be the star of the evening?”
Dylan glared at her. Are you trying to make up for your little “fake friends” show earlier on? she wanted to ask.
Instead, she smiled. “I can be the star of the evening without sabotaging anyone,” she remarked, “I think you’ll find.” She felt a small swell of triumph at her wit.
Alice said nothing. She looked surprised that Dylan had dared to talk back.
“Hey, Dill, come on,” Mimah called just in time, beckoning toward her lair. “We’ll get ready over here.” She dropped her voice to a whisper as Dylan squeezed inside. “No need to show those bitches our costumes in advance.”
“Damn right. So, did you bring them?”
Mimah winked. She slipped two tiny items of clothing from her gym bag, one red and one white. Dylan unfolded the red one.
“Oh my god! This is too perfect.” She held up a minuscule ruffle skirt—so minuscule it would barely cover her ass—and shook it between her fingers. Its layers bounced.
Next, Mimah took out a red pashmina, which she handed to Dylan, and a white one, which she kept for herself. “Let’s get ready!”
Dylan shook her head. “I literally can’t believe we’re doing this dance in front of everyone’s parents. And The Trap. Are we totally mental?”
“Yes, but in a good way,” Mimah proclaimed. “They’re going to adore it.”
Over the speaker, the opening hum of Massive Attack’s “Hymn of the Big Wheel” started up. Streams of girls pushed out of the dressing room. Clothes-wise, this was the creative climax of the show, with twenty people parading on stage in pashminas tied every conceivable way.
Mimah practically started jumping up and down. “Two songs! We’re on in two songs! And ‘Big Wheel’ doesn’t even have a dance in it. It’s like the quiet before the storm!”
Dylan grinned. She’d never seen her friend get this excited about anything.
“Okay, chill out and pin this for me.” She offered her back to Mimah. Dylan had wound her red pashmina round her boobs and, on the bottom, was wearing only the teeny skirt.
“Hang on,” Mimah pointed out. “You’ve still got your bra on.”
“I know.” Dylan folded her arms, turning pink. “I don’t feel like taking it off.”
“But you have to, it looks absurd. Our costume’s a boob tube. It’s not meant to have bloody straps.”
“But I hate not wearing a bra.” Dylan gestured at her breasts. “They fly around everywhere. It’s so embarrassing.”
“Don’t be a loser. I’ll pin it tight. They won’t even move.”
Dylan looked doubtful.
“The boys’ll love it,” Mimah prompted. “Tristan’s here, isn’t he? I thought I saw him.”
“I don’t care about Tristan anymore.”
Mimah dropped her arms at her sides in exasperation. “Look, either we do this properly or we don’t do it at all,” she snapped. “What was the point in practicing so much if you’re going to chicken out now?”
Dylan looked at her. Mimah was already wearing her costume, having somehow managed to pin it without Dylan’s help. No straps were sticking out of her tube top.
“Fine,” Dylan sighed. “Wait a sec.” She squeezed herself between one of the clothes racks and the wall so no one could see, and unhooked her bra. She clutched it in her hand for a second, feeling exposed. Once she dropped it, there was no going back.
The next second, Mimah saw Dylan’s Calvin Klein double-D cups hit the floor, and Dylan emerged with the pashmina wrapped round her again.
Good.
“Much better,” she said.
“I guess. Make sure you fasten it right.”
“Obviously, darling.” She felt Mimah messing about with the material. “There.”
Dylan reached back and tugged. The pin held firm.
Mimah took a deep breath and put her hands on Dylan’s shoulders. “Right, ready?”
“Ready.” Dylan’s teeth were chattering. She hadn’t realized she’d be this nervous.
“Wait a sec,” Mimah said, “I’ve fixed your pin a bit sloppily. Let me just hide it.” She fiddled behind Dylan’s back for a minute. “All done. Gorgeous.”
They walked into the wings, where crowds of juniors were peeping over one another to see onto the stage. “Milkshake” by Kelis was playing. The girls performing were wearing metallic-pink bikini tops from American Apparel, with hot-pink pashminas on the bottom, tied like sarongs. Mimah could hear the boys whooping.
The song was winding up. She and Dylan and Mimah were on next. They pushed their way through the crowd.
“Oh, hang on, sweetie,” Mimah said. “I forgot something.”
“What did you forget? Want me to come with you?”
“No, it’s nothing important. Be right back.”
Mimah took a few steps toward the dressing room. Then, as soon as she was out of Dylan’s sight, she stopped. She darted over to the group where Alice was standing and pulled a small, folded bit of paper out of her skirt.
“Here.” She slipped it into Alice’s hands.
“What on earth is this?”
“You’ll find it interesting, I promise.”
Alice cast a suspicious glance at the note, which had her initials on the front. She raised her eyebrows but said nothing.
“Look, I’m going on next,” Mimah told her. “Don’t open it till we’re on stage. Please.”
She ran back to Dylan just as the lights went dark.
The audience was roaring. The previous dancers scampered offstage and Mimah and Dylan ran on, assuming their positions. Mimah heard the first notes of their song, “Sexyback,” and the lights came up.
“Yeah! Hurrah!” the audience screamed when they saw the girls’ costumes. They’d been well warmed up by now, and besides, they knew that the show was almost over, that it was just the finale after this.
In time with each other and with the rapid beats, Dylan and Mimah started gyrating, their bodies fluid yet tense. They took a 360-degree jump in unison, then did a high scissor-kick and slithered all the way down to the floor. Impressed cheers and whistles flew up at them. Their dancing really was a cut above everything else in the show.
“Dylan! Dylan!” Jasper chanted. His friends laughed.
From the wings, Alice glared. She’d momentarily forgotten the note in her hands but now, in a rush, she unfolded it. Her eyes widened.
“From Mimah.” She nudged Tally. “Look.”
Tally started reading and quickly covered her mouth. “Oh fuck! No way. Do you really think…? Would she actually do that to Dylan?” They glued their eyes to the stage, in suspense.
Just then, the spotlight shone onto Dylan. She was obviously about to do a special move.
Preparing to turn three cartwheels down the runway toward the audience, Dylan ran, skipped up onto one foot, and raised her arms in the air. She cast her hands to the ground and kicked her legs above her head—but as she did so, the red pashmina around her boobs started to unravel. Its ends flew out. Dylan didn’t notice; the concentration and momentum of the cartwheels kept her going.
Landing at the tip of the catwalk after the third one, she threw her arms above her head in a gymnastic finish.
But something was wrong. The faces nearest to her were gasping and laughing. She flicked her eyes past them. So were all the other faces in the audience. Suddenly, Dylan felt something drop from her waist to the floor. Looking down, she saw what they saw: She was completely topless, her breasts ballooning out for every single person to see. “Fuck!” she screamed, covering her chest with her arms.
At that moment, a torrent of expletives flooded Dylan’s ears from backstage.
“Lights!” Sonia was wailing. “Lights, you fucking cretins, lights!”
The theater went black. There would be no finale.