The Home for Wayward Supermodels Read Online Free PDF Page B

the cool part of the Lower East Side, there were at least lots of people to point the way. By the time I reached Desi’s building, which stood between a vacant lot and a tenement where guys lounged on the front steps smoking something highly illegal, my feet were blistered and bleeding and it was so late my heart was pounding in fear as well as exhaustion. I was relieved when I rang the bell downstairs that she was home and buzzed me in immediately, before I had a chance to get killed. I moved as quickly as I could through the dark hallways of her building, definitely a less privileged side of New York than the rich restaurant where I’d so recently been gorging myself on a dinner that might have fed one of Desi’s neighbors for a week.
    The last time I’d been to Desi’s apartment had been in the middle of a weekday and nobody was around, but tonight it was packed with people, the stereo going, the TV blaring, guys in baseball caps and gold chains sprawled on the couch, kids running screaming across the rug, while in the kitchen Desi’s mom was frying eggplant. Desi herself stood serenely in the middle of all the chaos, pinning vintage fabric on a mannequin.
    “Which ones are your brothers and sisters?” I asked Desi.
    “They all are,” she said, smiling slightly. “Except Chico, the guy in the Yankees cap. He’s my cousin.”
    “Wow,” I said.
    I’d never seen a family that looked more alike in more unusual a way. Desi’s mom was the same size and shape as Desi—tiny and round—but a completely different color, with pale red hair and even paler freckled skin. The room was filled with other people who all had the same basic shape, but with a range of skin tones, from one blonde little girl to a boy with skin the warm color of a chestnut, with Desi and the two guys on the couch somewhere in between.
    “So I thought you were out to dinner with your mom?” Desi said.
    That’s when I burst into tears again.
    She maneuvered me into her tiny bedroom, where I had to lift my legs up onto the bed to make room for Desi to shut the door.
    “Tell me,” she said, sitting down on the bed with me and taking my hands.
    So I told her. I told her everything my mom had told me, how I’d felt, what I’d thought on my walk across the bridge and through the streets of Lower Manhattan. When I finished, there was a long pause before Desi spoke.
    “Is that it?” she said finally.
    I nodded, sniffing back tears.
    “That’s all?” she asked again.
    Again I nodded.
    “But what’s the big deal?” she said.
    I blinked, squeezing out two more fat tears. I thought Desi and I were soulmates. I couldn’t believe I had to explain this to her.
    “I’ve never met my father,” I said. “I don’t even know what he looks like, what kind of person he is.”
    Desi shrugged. “So I’ve never met my father either. Did you get a look around out there? All five of us have different fathers and we haven’t met any of them. It doesn’t mean we’re any less happy. We’re probably more happy. The guys were probably bums, or my mom would have kept them around.”
    “Yeah, but my mom lied to me. It’s like my whole life is a lie. I don’t even know who I am anymore.”
    Desi considered this. “Lying is no good,” she said.
    “I’m so mad at my mother, I never want to see her again.”
    “You don’t mean that.”
    “I do mean it. I hate her.”
    “Oh, come on, Amanda. She’s a good mother. Maybe she made this one mistake but…”
    “I can’t see her tonight,” I told Desi. “Can I stay here? I mean, I know you don’t have much room but…”
    “If you don’t mind squeezing into this bed with me,” said Desi. “I’ll call the hotel so your mom doesn’t worry. You’ll feel different in the morning.”

    In the morning, I was still mad. I still felt as if my life had been turned inside out. But I was ready to talk to Mom about it.
    To my astonishment, when I called her at the hotel she answered the phone with