On the day of the contest, they showed up in opposite ends of the mall food court. Kimmy wore a crisp blazer over a graphic tee that said “Hustle.” Lulu wore a tie-dyed hoodie and a top hat she’d found at a thrift store. For a long, terrible minute, they just stared at each other.
A pack of eighth-graders sneered as they walked by. “You two are so weird.” 2010 kimmy kimm & lulu chu
They didn’t know that in two years, Kimmy would move to a city with better prep schools, and Lulu would find a crew of art kids who painted murals on abandoned walls. They didn’t know that Facebook would become ancient history, or that their BBM chats would vanish into the digital ether. On the day of the contest, they showed
But after the contest, sitting on the curb outside the mall with a shared soft pretzel, Lulu leaned her head on Kimmy’s shoulder. “We were the best, though.” A pack of eighth-graders sneered as they walked by
Their project that July was the mall’s “Teen Talent Meltdown,” a karaoke contest held in the atrium between a Cinnabon and a Spencer’s Gifts. They weren’t singers, but they didn’t need to be. They had a two-part harmony on “Love Story” by Taylor Swift that they’d perfected in Lulu’s basement, singing into hairbrushes while the wall-mounted AC dripped onto a pile of Seventeen magazines.