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then?”
    â€œSomethin’ about bein’ all freaked about goin’ someplace Saturday.” His voice went up into a high pitch. “‘What if they don’t want me?’” Shad gave a grunt of a laugh. “What’s goin’ on? Are your parents putting you up for adoption or something?”
    â€œNone of your business,” Lily said. But she was relieved. At least he hadn’t heard them talking about the modeling agency.
    â€œI can tell you exactly what’s gonna happen on Saturday,” Shad said. “Whoever ‘they’ are, they’re not gonna like you.”
    â€œYou just hush up your mouth, Shad,” Reni said. She stretched her neck up about as far as it would go. “You don’t even know anything.”
    â€œI know they’re not gonna like her,” Shad said again, “because nobody likes her. She’s too stuck-up.”
    â€œYou are such a liar,” Reni said.
    Shad looked at Lily like he was waiting for her to start yelling too. But her face was stinging, and she knew if she said anything, she’d start crying. Shad got even more evil when he managed to make somebody bawl.
    Lily hugged her arms in closer to her chest and turned on her heel and walked away, tossing her hair as hard as it would toss. Behind her, Shad grunted several times, his version of a laugh. Reni hurried to catch up with her.
    â€œDon’t pay any attention to him,” she whispered to Lily.
    â€œI won’t,” Lily said. Yeah. Like that was even possible.
    Finally the next day came, and Lily was ready hours before it was time to leave for the Rutledge Agency. She parked herself on the loveseat in the entranceway of their house, dressed in her newest flouncy skirt and the only tunic top that had escaped the day Art did the laundry and washed everything in hot water. Art stopped on his way past and asked her if she was waiting for a bus.
    She kind of hoped they would take Dad’s little Honda Accord instead of the van Mom always drove. Dad didn’t cart kids around. Mom did, which was why the van always had sticky yogurt spoons on the seats, sported really old Fruit Loops on the floor, and smelled like Joe’s dirty socks.
    I don’t want to go into the Rutledge Agency smelling like Joe , Lily wanted to protest. But as they climbed into the van, she heard Dad say, “Tell me again why we’re doing this?” So she decided to keep that to herself.
    When they got to the agency, it was obvious that other people were close to freaking out too. The meeting room was filled with mothers and fathers and girls who had apparently spent as much time in front of the mirror as Lily had. From the looks of the curls and outfits and even lipstick on a couple of the girls, some had even primped longer. Lily immediately wished she had some of that blush and lip gloss Kathleen had put on her.
    What really surprised Lily was that a few boys came too. One of them, who was wearing very cool jeans and had shiny nut-colored hair hanging down over his eyes like Justin Bieber, walked past her, looked back over his shoulder, and started to laugh.
    What’s so funny? Lily wanted to say to him. She felt her nostrils to be sure nothing was hanging out of them.
    Just then, Kathleen stepped up to a microphone at a podium and asked everybody to have a seat. Lily followed her parents to three seats in the second row. She stifled a groan when she saw that Cool Jeans was sitting right in front of them. His mother ran her hand over his head to smooth his hair, and he pulled away from her with a jerk.
    Evil child , Lily thought. Why did there always have to be boys? Life would be so much easier without them.
    â€œWelcome, all of you!” Kathleen said into the microphone. “I hope you’ll all take a moment to look around the room because the young people you see here are very special.”
    Lily glanced around, and her heart sank. They were better