Page 114 of The Faking Game

“I’m done modeling,” she continues. “Thanks but no thanks.”

My lips curve. Always so polite, even when she’s drawing a boundary. “That’s it. And if they push even more, you know what you’ll do?”

“What?”

I lean in closer. “You’ll get angry.”

CHAPTER32

NORA

If I didn’t know better, I’d say West was jealous.

Standing in the corner and watching me with Henri and Pawel.

I’m used to lingerie shoots. They’re not my favorite, but I know what’s expected of me, and I’m used to the impersonal way I’m touched by the makeup and wardrobe department.Stand here. Lie like that. I have to moisturize that calf.

I carry those expectations like a cloak and turn performance into my armor.

It’s not me being photographed. Not really. It’s a projection of myself that can become what the viewer wants.

But I’ve never done it while West watched, and it washisgaze on my near-naked body. Not a photographer or a DP’s. And then he’d covered me in a jacket that still carried his warmth and his scent, like he was marking his territory.

Maybe it’s wrong, but I liked that. Someone coming to pick me up afterward, reminding me of whoIam.

Not who they want me to be.

Now he’s beside me, my arm threaded through his. He was the one to take my hand and put it in the crook of his arm. We’re standing at the base of the steps to the Fashion Institute fundraiser. This is what I’ve been looking forward to all day. Not the shoot.This.The pieces on display here tonight are legendary.

We walk the red carpet together, looking in the direction of every photographer. The cameras flash bright and dizzying, and he’s there every step of the way.

“Mask on?” he asks by my ear.

“Yeah. Yours looks good.”

“I’m not as smiley as you.”

“Doesn’t surprise me at all.”

When a photographer yells at me to look his way, West says in a half-amused drawl thatNora will look wherever she wants,to the laughter of the photographers.

I look up at him in surprise as another bright flash explodes.

Inside, the Fashion Institute is huge and storied. A legendary building. When I was a child and we spent summers at my grandparents’ in Maine, we’d occasionally spend a few days in the city. My mom and I always came here.

Beautiful, well-dressed people watch us enter the fundraiser. There are plenty of people I recognize. Designers I know, photographers I’ve worked with. West stays by my side as we mingle about.

More than a few people cast him speculative glances.

One designer winks at me openly and tells me that I’ve done well to catch myself the Calloway. Not a Calloway.TheCalloway. He has plenty of family—distant cousins, a sister, aunts and uncles—but West has become this generation’s main Calloway, the way his father was and the previous heirs before him.

When I spot the exhibit, I slide my hand down to grip his. “Come!”

He lets me drag him over to the items for sale. “Is this what we’re here for?”

“Yes. Look at this. Isn’t it incredible? These are archival pieces. This dress right here? It doesn’t look like much, but it revolutionized the industry. Grace Kelly wore it in 1972.”

He gives a lowhmmbeside me. “Are you planning on bidding on one?”

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