Golden Boys (Golden Boys, #1)(36)

And he does. He doesn’t have the best art ability, but you can tell he gets style pretty well. The model in his image is wearing a short mod dress in a burnt orange, with a matching handbag.

“Right, so at first look, it’s a pretty straightforward mod dress. I chose the color because it fits in a standard retro color palette, but it also reminds me of fire. And Sagittariuses are fire signs. I decided to break it up with color blocking, and you’ll see the thick white stripe down her front turns into an arrow, which represents Sagittarius as well.”

He continues his presentation, detailing little touches I hadn’t noticed before, showing his knowledge of early seventies fashion. It’s so hard to be a know-it-all and not sound like you’re bragging, but he does it in this humble way that makes me simply envious.

We all applaud when he’s finished.

“Well done, Philip,” Professor Watts says, then starts listing things she loves about the design.

“I would wear that dress,” she says with a laugh, “that is, if you made it in my size.”

We all chuckle, and I write my individual feedback on the Post-it. I’m writing all the things I like about it, but I can’t find anything negative to say. I write “Loved this!” and draw a little heart in the corner, then start to worry that this is way too familiar for me. But I can’t erase this. So as others start passing him their Post-its, I slide mine under the rest.

“You did so well,” I say.

He’s sweating, but he has a huge smile on his face. I can’t help but mirror it.

“Thanks. That was fun. Terrifying, but fun.”

A few others get called up and get mixed but mostly positive feedback. Another Taurus drew a smart houndstooth minidress with an oversized collar, but he turned the shoulders into full horns to match the prompt, seemingly as an afterthought. A Pisces goes with an even safer route, designing a cute, if not a little boring, retro swimsuit.

“Reese,” the professor says, “you’re up next!”

I pull out my presentation, and again I feel underprepared. Which is not something I’m used to. Being an A student all my life means I can really only find comfort when I fully understand something. But fashion will take me longer to understand.

“Right.” I snap into presentation mode. “I saw that halter tops were pretty popular back in the seventies, so I made this simple halter dress that’s patterned diagonally with the Taurus horns. It’s a print that I think looks visually appealing from afar, but as you get closer, you can see the horns.”

I go on to explain a few smaller details, the movement of the bottom of the dress, and so on. We open to feedback, and I flinch.

“Hi, yeah.” The Pisces girl looks at her notes, then back to me. “It’s a pretty dress, but it doesn’t really look mod to me. Maybe you could have done a halter top with high-waisted pants?”

“Oh, that would have been much better,” another student chimes in. “And you could have just done the pattern on the top, because right now it’s a lot of Taurus looking at me.”

“Exactly,” Pisces girl says in a knowing voice. “The print is a little obvious, so I would have gone for something more subtle.”

“Thank you for your feedback, Noelle,” Professor Watts says. “I just want to remind everyone that when we’re giving critique, it’s always nice to have some other ideas, but I find it a lot easier to highlight potential problem areas but not explain how they could fix it too much. I think we all end up finding ways to incorporate feedback that work for us, but what makes sense to you might not make sense to the original artist.”

Meanwhile, I just want to sink into a puddle in the front of the room. That shuts up Noelle, aka Pisces girl, for enough time to let the others start offering critiques. I don’t get a lot of positive notes that count—though Philip chimes in to compliment my use of color, which I appreciate.

I keep my head down as the others finish their presentations, and I pull on my shoulder bag as soon as we’re dismissed. I turn to leave, but Philip stops me.

“Hey, a few of us are going to go out tonight to celebrate completing our first week here. You in?”

He looks so hopeful, and a part of me wants to just say yes—I mean, we’ve already eaten dinner together three nights this week, and something about a new friendship with him really appeals to me. But right now, I just feel incompetent around him.

And I don’t want to be in a room with Noelle, even if her comments were warranted.

“I think I’m going to turn in early tonight,” I finally say, and I see disappointment crash across his face. “Maybe next time?”

“Yeah, of course. I’ll walk you back. I have to change anyway.”

The walk back is quiet and short. We get to my door, and he puts his arms around me in a quick hug, which is a first for us. When he lets go, I’m reminded of my friends back home. It shows me that I do have support here, even if it feels like I’m all on my own.

“Don’t worry about what happened back there,” he says. “I think when people start to negatively critique something, they fixate on that. Read the Post-its you got; I’m sure you got a ton of great feedback too. At least, I know you did from me.”

“Thanks,” I say, flashing him a smile. “I will.”