The Collection (Contemporary Reverse Harem 5)

Chapter 2

RAND

“Dude, what’s up with these trousers?” my buddy Marlon whispered to me.

I looked at what he was wearing and then back at my ensemble.

“I have no fucking idea, but this is some ugly shit,” I whispered back.

The trousers we wore had some kind of weird diagonal fly that buttoned across the crotch instead of the standard vertical opening, presumably for great aesthetic fashion effect.

Marlon lowered his voice to make sure no one could hear us. “Did Forest really design this crap? Because if he did, he should have his head examined.”

I looked around at the other male models in our small makeshift dressing room. Everyone looked a bit confused about the strange garments, but they were trying to just suck it up.

Yeah, when you modeled in fashion shows, you never knew what the hell they were going to ask you to wear. But they paid us well, so we kept our mouths shut. Unless they wanted us to wear assless chaps.

That’s when we would say, thanks but no thanks. And that had never happened, anyway.

So pants with weird openings were not the worst things in the world, but it did mean I had to have some ‘dresser’ help me into them when I would have preferred to dress myself. Luckily, there was only one more change of outfit for this particular show—only one more weird-ass garment I’d have to wear down the runway for all the fashionistas in the audience who’d trip over each other just eating it up. Then, I could get back into my street clothes of tattered jeans, a faded rock ‘n roll T-shirt, and a beanie pulled down almost to my eyes. I blended in just like any New York slob once I washed off the nasty makeup they put on my face to cover a couple zits and red spots.

What could I say? Nobody’s perfect…right?

And no one passing me on the street would ever guess I’d just made a shitload of money for wearing ugly clothes and walking on a catwalk for five minutes. I almost felt guilty about it.

Almost.

And given where I started in life, it was a freaking miracle I even had a roof over my head, much less a nicely-growing bank account.

“C’mon,” Marlon said, nudging me in the back. “We gotta get lined up.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said, falling into line with the other guys who’d be walking the runway with us.

Forest, whose ugly clothes we were wearing, was running around like a maniac making sure we were prepped to perfection and that we had every hair in place. The funny thing was, he was going for a bit of a ‘grunge’ look, so our hair was actually pretty messy. They’d spend hours making it just right, which I found to be pretty ironic.

“Rand,” Forest said, tapping my shoulder and turning me so he would give me a once-over. “Handsome as ever, honey,” he said and moved on to check over the next model.

I leaned toward Marlon, who was queued up just in front of me. Our other buddies, Shane and Cross, were toward the back of the line looking bored out of their minds.

“Yo, Mar, you got any other shows lined up for this week?” I asked.

He nodded without fully turning around. Right before we went on, they liked us to be quiet.

“I do. I got a busy week. You?” he asked.

“Ugh. My agent is such a dick. He got in a fight with half the designers in town, and now, they don’t want to work with him.”

At that, Marlon turned fully to face me.

“How long have I been telling you to get rid of that douchebag?” he asked.

A loud shhhhh! came out of nowhere.

He was right. I’d only hesitated to dump my agent because he’d gotten me into the business when I needed some money. But lately, he was on to fresher meat, and if he was burning bridges, that meant I was going to pay the price.

A little sprite of a guy wearing a headset and holding a clipboard was speaking quietly into his mic and doing a countdown with the fingers on one of his hands.

“Dude, after this show, I’m taking you right over to meet with my agent. He’s gonna love you,” Marlon said.

With that, Marlon was tapped on the shoulder by the sprite. He walked past the curtain separating the back stage area, made a sharp right, and was gone from my view. After a ten-second interval, a hand on the shoulder let me know I was up. I turned the corner, walking into the blinding lights.

I stomped down the runway in the strange, militaristic-walk they’d asked of us, in time to the blasting music. I passed Marlon on his way off the catwalk, and then, I was on my own. Camera flashes went off, but I pretended not to notice them. I just kept my disinterested scowl on and stomped left, right, left right, until I was at the end of the runway, where I pivoted to head back and give everyone one last look at Forest’s latest creation. From the applause, he must have done something right. They were eating it up.

Just before I passed the next guy coming out, I caught sight of a woman in the audience, sitting against the wall, watching the show. While I had only a split-second to register, she was the cute blonde I’d seen running around backstage with the female models before they’d gone on.

She was beautiful, sure, but what had got my attention, I suppose, was the graceful way she handled the pre-show chaos.

Before I knew it, I was off the stage and rushing back to my next outfit change. Marlon, just steps ahead of me, was already dressed and ready to go. A dresser unbuttoned my clothes, which I stepped out of as quickly as I could—he had the next shirt over my head and in moments, I was re-dressed and once again in line behind Marlon. Shane and Cross were still being fussed over when a hairdresser checked me and a makeup artist dabbed something across my forehead, presumably to absorb the sheen of sweat I always got from the goddamn boiling lights.

“Whatcha doing tonight?” Marlon mumbled out of the corner of his mouth.

“Eh, I gotta get some studying in. I got a history exam coming up.”

“Cool. You liking your classes?” he asked.

Did I like my classes? Did a bear shit in the woods? I freaking loved everything about City College, from its dumpy campus to its brilliant teachers, and everything in between.

No one ever expected me to go to college, especially me. It hadn’t crossed my mind, nor the minds of anyone in the family I grew up in. It just wasn’t done. I’d never even known anyone who’d even been to college aside from the teachers I had in grade school. But modeling, which I fell into in a completely accidental way, broadened my horizons and made me believe the key to upward mobility—at least mine, anyway—would be to get a degree under my belt. It was great for paying the bills and even building a nest egg, but it wasn’t a long-term thing. Not for me, nor for anybody, really.

I passed Marlon again as I entered the runway and he stomped off. The blonde was gone, probably to get back to work, and I was backstage again before I knew it. We had to wait around for a few minutes while Forest walked out on the stage and bowed, making his little speech, thanking everyone for contributing to his latest collection. We’d run out and surround him with even more applause while he took several deep bows to the audience.

It was an odd ritual, but then, fashion was a strange game, anyway.

For example, the model who’d been loudly bitching out the pretty blonde earlier? I watched as she popped a pill into her mouth and chased it down with a bottle of water.

Guess she wouldn’t be eating the rest of the day.