Devious by Cecily von Ziegesar Read Free Book Online Page A

tall girl with a sleek platinum bob. She wore a pair of black leggings and a black-and-white striped off-the-shoulder T-shirt dress that hugged her slim, dancerlike body. She grinned at Brett. “Hey, Brett. Come on in!”
    “I really appreciate you letting me latch onto your project, Chrissy.” Brett stepped into the room, a tiny, brightly lit single with its bed pushed under the lowest part of the sloping attic ceiling. The floor was completely covered with pictures from magazines and art prints and random objects, like a jeweled ladybug brooch and a piece of paisley tablecloth. It looked like someone’s junk drawer had exploded all over the floor. “My project fell through unexpectedly,” she explained.
    “Don’t mention it. I could totally use the help.” Chrissy shrugged. She had an acorn-shaped beauty mark on her left shoulder. “I think I got overly ambitious. I somehow volunteered to design
and
make all the costumes for the spring musical.”
    “That sounds like a lot of work. But awesome, too,” Brett said, getting excited. Instead of writing copy about the same old designers who had been around forever, here was the opportunity to actually work on the designs. Who needed
Vogue
? “How did you manage that?”
    “Mr. Shepard’s my adviser—and he totally loves me.” Mr. Shepard was the long-haired, reportedly pot-smoking head of the theater department. He’d been a Vietnam War protester who’d dodged the draft by sneaking over the Canadian border and starting a hippie commune in British Columbia. “I was the costume designer for
1984
last year.”
    “Wait, wasn’t that the show where everyone wore Saran Wrap?” The whole cast had appeared before the DC for indecent exposure after some visiting parents had complained, but they’d decided to dismiss the charges. Brett hung her coat over the back of Chrissy’s chair and knelt on the floor to get a better look at the scraps.
    Chrissy nodded gleefully, casually flopping herself down on the floor and crossing her legs, Buddha-style. “You would
not
believe how many boxes of that stuff we had to go through, just so the actors wouldn’t be, you know. X-rated.”
    Brett giggled. “I hope you’re not looking to top that with this?”
    “No. Shep said I had to keep it PG this time.” Chrissy rubbed her hands together excitedly. “We’re doing
Les Mis
.”
    “Really?” Brett’s eyes lit up. She’d read
Les Misérables
last year in Madame Renault’s class, and it was wildly romantic—in that French, completely heart-shattering way. “Nineteenth-century French fashion? How fun.”
    “Yes, completely.” Chrissy clapped her hands, her blond hair falling across her forehead. It was refreshing to be in the presence of someone else whose hair color was a shade that did not appear in nature, Brett thought as she tucked her stop-sign-red hair behind her ears. Maybe she needed to hang out with theater girls more often. “It’s going to rock!”
    “So, that’s what all this stuff is for?” Brett asked, picking up a thick art history book covered with bright orange Post-it notes. Edith Piaf was playing softly on the stereo. When Chrissy did something, she really got into it. “Inspiration?”
    Chrissy nodded, snatching up a black-and-white photograph of a Parisian street crowded with horse-drawn carriages. “I’ve sort of grabbed everything I could get my hands on at the library. French art, French history.”
    Brett held up a copy of Julia Child’s
Mastering the Art of French Cooking
. “French food?”
    “Okay, I don’t know what I was thinking with that one.” Chrissy laughed, fumbling through the pictures on the floor. “I had this postcard of the
Venus de Milo
. Where’d it go?”
    Brett stood up, noticing some postcards thumbtacked onto the bulletin board above Chrissy’s desk. “She’s naked, isn’t she? I hope you’re not getting more ideas,” Brett giggled. She’d forgotten how nice it was to work on something creative.