Chapter One ONE
I pose in the Washington Square Park fountain, a turquoise kiss on my cheek.

“Chin to the left,” Dani says from the bottom step of the basin.

Hooking my thumbs in the belt loops of my shorts, I tilt my turquoise kiss ever so slightly toward the camera while my girlfriend sets up the perfect shot. Dani slips out of white flatform sandals and takes a step down, submerging her hot-pink toes in fountain water that’s warm from concrete baked in summertime heat.

She squats. Raises my phone. Lowers it.

“Fitz. A smidge more stage left.”

Danica Martinez, an actress first and foremost, speaks in stage directions.

It’s adorable, but I can’t smidge.

Instead, my head snaps forward, my eyes meeting Dani’s mirrored sunglasses. “You know any farther left is borderline profile.”

Dani kicks a splash in my direction, the gold hoop in her left nostril sparkling in the sun. “Smidge left. Trust your photographer.”

Look. I don’t hate my face. I unpacked the trauma of internalized beauty standards in middle school. I’m my Grandma Dee, strong nose and all. I embrace it. My nose. The character it adds. That I can transform myself into the spitting image of Miranda Priestly from The Devil Wears Prada. Which I did. Halloween. Freshman year. My first post to get over 1K likes.

I just also embrace flattering angles to minimize the bridge bump.

So I turn my cheek as far left as I’m comfortable with. “This is max smidge.”

She rolls her eyes and her turquoise lips blow a raspberry, but she raises my phone again. “I suppose I can work with this.”

Dani might be able to work with this.

But I can’t.

I’m way too in my head about the bridge bump to focus on the rest of the shot. It’s only when she directs me to switch it up and look at the camera straight-on that I can relax back into the shoot.

Some artists express themselves with words on a page, with the composition of perfect harmony, with the swoosh of acrylic on canvas. Clothes are my medium. Photos are my channel. Today’s work of art is a patch-sewn crop top paired with high-waisted shorts, styled with oversize gold hoops by Lola Chung and loose pigtail braids that are long and blonde and pink at the ends. (Dani convinced me to let her oVertone them last weekend. Mom hates it—the pink—but I love the change.) A neutral no-makeup look emphasizes my turquoise kiss coordinated to match the crop top, which is the star of the photo. It’s a triumph in color blocking with cap sleeves that I lovingly hand-stitched from shades of blue scrap fabric. Behind me is water shooting toward the sky, the iconic arch, and the blurs of strangers all showcasing that I’m finally here.

In New York City.

And for the first time, my followers will see my designs out in the world, not staged in a suburban bedroom.

If the Shoe Fitz started as an Instagram account to show my three older sisters—Maya, Clara, and Tessa—that I’m a visionary with the clothes they abandoned when they left our childhood home. Clothes I refused to leave behind when I left that home. At thirteen, when my parents and I moved from Texas to Massachusetts, I schlepped their closets halfway across the country. In them, I discovered endless possibilities, mixing and matching patterns and contradictory color palettes to transform their hand-me-downs into something reminiscent of them, to keep us connected despite the physical distance between us.

It worked at first.

But lately, my sisters are too busy being adults to engage with my posts.

At least other people do.

Over the last four years, I’ve gained thousands of followers, all invested in the creative and innovative ways I reuse textiles and style outfits. It’s why I care so much about the angle of my face in a photo and agonize over every decision, from business opportunities like accepting my first brand partnership with a sustainable jewelry designer to editorial direction like choosing the fountain I’m standing in as the location for this shot.

With so many eyes on me, I won’t post anything less than my best.

Right now, my best is a top I made months ago, born from fabric left over from costumes I designed for the school musical. It’s the last thing I made that I’m truly proud of—and this city, this fountain, is the perfect place to show it off and announce my fashion-focused summer.

Some minutes later, I sit next to Dani on the stone steps and swipe through the shots, searching for the one that screams, I am thriving.

“Hot,” Dani whispers in my ear.

But I see the bridge bump. Ugh. I smidged too much.

Next.

“Hot,” Dani repeats at this one, and it is. I am.

If I wasn’t being photobombed by a shrieking toddler.

It’s a talent, my ability to find and fixate on the minute detail that renders an entire photo unusable. If it’s not my profile, it’s the wind wrinkling the top I’m trying to showcase, a weird reflection in the water, the arch of the background getting cut off at the top, my awkward hands.

I never know what to do with my hands.

“Can we take a few more?” I ask.

Dani sighs. “You really don’t have enough pictures?”

I shake my head. “None of these are The One.”

Am I being even more hypercritical than usual? Maybe. But it’s a huge deal, my passion taking me from my suburban home to one of the fashion capitals of the world. A step up meant to signal to brands, to designers, to college programs, to my parents that fashion is more than just a hobby. It’s my life.

“What about this one?”

She stops on a candid photo of me laughing, mouth open, full bridge bump on display. It’s cute, but in a behind-the-scenes-blooper-for-Stories way… not in a post-on-main way.

“It’s not perfect.”

“It’s real,” Dani says, nudging my shoulder. “But fine. Go ahead. I’ll stay in character until we lose the light.”

I raise my eyebrows. “In character?”

“As Hot Photographer.”

I almost blurt out I love you on the spot.

Instead, I let Dani wrap her hand around mine and pull me back into the fountain. Our toes submerged once more, she raises my phone and tap, tap, taps until we lose the light.

In the final moments of golden city glow, she lowers my phone and says, “You know, we can spend every day in this fountain now if we want.”

I grin. “I guess we do kind of live here now.”

Her turquoise smile is so wide it nearly knocks me over—as does the fact that I got so caught up in the moment that I forgot the qualifiers.

Dani lives here now.

I’m just visiting.

When her internship at the Public Theater ends, her freshman year at NYU begins.

When my summer at FIT ends… I go back to Massachusetts and my senior year of high school.

I already miss her so much.

But I shake off the feeling as soon as it snakes its way into my heart, replacing it with memories of laughter and musical theater references and the taste of bubblegum lip gloss that all started six months ago with rehearsing lines in her bedroom. I rewind back to our beginning, sitting on her bed and losing my mind over the furrowed brow that accompanied her request for notes, becoming obsessed with her talent and how seriously she took a student-run musical. Reading the lines of her love interest over and over.

Pausing at the kiss. Skipping it.

Until we didn’t.

You like girls, I said when we pulled apart.

I’m still figuring out my labels, she answered, biting her bottom lip. I like you.

We never skipped the kiss again.

And now we’re here, sitting in the Washington Square Park fountain, on the precipice of an entire summer together, pursuing our dreams and solidifying our happily-ever-after. Dani, interning at the theater that previewed Hamilton and taking improv classes. Me, learning new upcycling techniques and meeting people who love clothes as much as I do. Us, pretending we’re locals or playing tourists, depending on the day.

And before our programs begin, we have an entire week to start exploring the city hand in hand, her fingers pressed against mine, freezing despite the humidity that lingers even when the sun goes down. I’ve planned a whole week of adventures culminating in our six-month anniversary with the terrifying and exhilarating declaration:

I love you.

Dani hands my phone back to me. “What’re we thinking for Monday?”

“I made a reservation. It’s a surprise.”

She raises her eyebrows, golden-brown eyes meeting mine. “For six months? Fancy.”

Because I love you.

Damn my Irish lineage and the fierce blush I inherited from my dad. “I just thought…”

Dani sends another small splash my way. “Hey. I’m teasing.”

She reaches into her purse for her wireless earbuds and hands one to me. A second later, “Welcome to New York” blasts in our ears because we are Swifties to our core—but also because damn it, New York has been waiting for us. Dani sings along as she pulls her hair out of its messy bun, sending dark brown waves cascading over her shoulders in the shadows, her lamplight profile and perfect pitch killing me slowly.

“Don’t move.”

I pull out my phone and in one take snap a perfect photo of Danica Martinez at dusk.

Then I take her hand and pull her closer, closer, closer until her turquoise lips meet mine.