Chapter One

One
Seventh-grade choir is a time to sing for most people, but not for me. I sit in the very back, with my music binder up in front of my face. And when it’s not time for me to sing, I draw.

When I put pencil to paper, everything around me fades away except the lines and curves I mark on the page. Even the loud banging of Mr. Martin’s piano became muffled as I worked on my latest comic book panel about Meteor Girl, one of my newest characters.

When you live in a quiet and boring suburban town like I do, and your family isn’t rich enough to go to cool places like Europe or Colorado like your friends do during breaks, there isn’t much else to do to entertain yourself. Drawing is how I have adventures without having to pay a single cent. I may not be able to fly super fast across the night sky as Gigi Shin, but as Meteor Girl, I could fly over the pyramids of Giza and the Eiffel Tower.

“Gigi?” said Mr. Martin, the choir director. “What did I say about drawing in choir?”

I looked up to find myself staring right into the teacher’s eyes. Thankfully, he was still behind the piano with both hands on the keyboard—sometimes, when he feels “inspired,” he walks up and down the rows—but he looked so mad that I could picture laser beams shooting out of his eyes.

That’s when I realized that everyone else in the class was standing up except me. No wonder Mr. Martin could tell I was drawing again.

Oops! I quickly stood and held my choir binder higher up so it was covering my face. A few people behind me snickered, but I didn’t look. I was scared of Mr. Martin but not of the other kids in my grade. They already laughed at me plenty last year, when I tried giving myself a chic bob like the ladies in the fashion magazines but gave myself an asymmetrical, crooked haircut that only went to my ears instead. Compared to that, this was nothing.

My hair hadn’t fully recovered from that disaster, so I was still wearing a headband now. But it was okay. Headbands were coming back into style. And my red headband with white polka dots was especially cute. It went well with my white silk scarf and red overalls. I managed to get all sorts of cool clothes from the thrift stores in our neighborhood. I loved making my own style!

“Sorry, Mr. Martin,” I said. “I’ll make sure to pay extra attention for the rest of class.”

I snuck a glance at the binder of the girl next to me and saw that we were singing “Do-Re-Mi” from The Sound of Music. I flipped to the song. It was easy enough to find since Mr. Martin always printed our sheet music in different colors so we could instantly tell which song was in which packet.

Mr. Martin sighed and shook his head before finally looking away from me. “Okay, class, let’s start again from the top of the chorus. Doe, a deer…”

Like I promised Mr. Martin, I put all my effort into singing, and class went by fast after that. Choir is sort of pointless when you are tone-deaf like me, but it was the only class I could take to fill our school’s music requirement. After all, it wasn’t like I could draw while holding a violin or a trumpet. So, even though I hate it, I try to do my best in choir when I’m not drawing.

While I was singing—or trying to sing—I happened to accidentally make eye contact with Paul Kim Wiley, one of the most popular boys in our grade. It was hard not to since the choir chairs formed a U, and as a bass, he was on the exact opposite side of me. When our eyes met, he smiled, and I hid my face with my binder so he couldn’t see me blush.

Paul was half white, but he had a Korean mom like me. We had been friends when we were kids since we used to go to the same Korean school, but he stopped going in sixth grade. So we barely talked anymore. He was kinda annoying when we were little, but as a seventh grader, he was cute and nice. All the girls in choir whispered about how he was like a kid K-pop star: great at singing and super polite. He was also on the seventh-grade football team, which made him the closest possible thing to a prince in a Texan school like ours.

When the bell rang, I gathered my things. Next period was art, my all-time favorite. I was so excited that I rushed to the door, not looking where I was going until it was too late.

“Oof!”

I glanced up to see that I’d run smack-dab into Paul. Paul was now a head taller than me, so he had to look down to meet my gaze.

“Oh, sorry, Gigi,” he said, even though I’d run into him.

“It’s okay,” my mouth replied. I was so nervous that my brain was taking a while to catch up. It was weird how back in Korean school, Paul and I used to mess around and chat effortlessly every week. Now things were so awkward between us, I could barely say two—or three, depending on how you count it—words to him!

“Where are you headed off to?” Paul asked, and it took me a couple of seconds to process what he’d asked.

“Oh, art,” I said, almost robotically. “It’s my favorite class.”

“Oh yeah, I always see you drawing during choir,” Paul replied with a smile. “You’re really good! I’ve seen your art on display in the hallway by the art class all the time.”

My jaw almost dropped to the floor. “You’ve looked at my art?”

A funny look crossed over Paul’s face, and his cheeks reddened just a bit. “Yeah, one of my friends is also in art, so we meet up together in that area sometimes.”

I had seen Paul meet up with Caleb, a boy in my class, a couple of times. But I had no idea Paul had even been remotely interested in our artwork.

“Cool,” I replied, because that was the only thing I could think of saying. “Well, see you around!”

“See you!” Paul turned and walked away, sounding like he was as glad as I was that our awkward conversation was over.

If I had any other class next, I would have been too mortified by what had just happened between Paul and me to focus. But sixth period was art, so I pretty much forgot about everything else by the time I stepped into the hallway. Art was the class I share with my best friends, Zeina Hassan and Carolina Garcia. This was the first time the three of us had a class together since fourth grade, so it was awesome.

On my way to the art room, I met up with Zeina, who was coming from English class. Zeina is the first friend I made when I moved to Bluebonnet in kindergarten. We’re next-door neighbors, so we grew up making mud pies when we were little and riding our bikes to the library to read manga in fifth grade. She likes to draw, like me, but her main love is reading. She brings a book everywhere, even to art class. Since she also likes to write, she says she wants to make her own picture books one day.

Today Zeina was wearing a sky-blue hijab and had on pretty, robin’s-egg-blue flats to match. She usually wasn’t as adventurous as I am—which was probably a good thing—but she was still very stylish.

“Your outfit today is so cute!” I said. “I meant to tell you at lunch today but didn’t get a chance to comment on it earlier.”

Zeina beamed. “Thanks!”

When we walked into the art classroom, there was a big poster on the whiteboard at the front. It had the words “Starscape Young Artists’ Program” written in fancy cursive letters and had a picture of a big, fancy brick campus that looked like an Ivy League school. In front of the building were smiling kids painting at easels beneath a grove of willow trees. They looked so happy, like they were having the best time in the world.

Everyone was gathered in front of the poster, chatting excitedly about it. Ms. Williams, the art teacher, was nowhere to be seen. She must have been in the bathroom or something.

Zeina and I walked around the crowd of kids to sit down at the table with our other best friend, Carolina. Carolina had her head down, and I knew she was playing her Nintendo Switch since Ms. Williams wasn’t here yet. Carolina loves playing video games and draws cool fan art of her favorite characters. She said she’s still deciding on whether she wants to be an astronaut or a video game designer… or both! She moved to Bluebonnet at the beginning of fourth grade, and since then the three of us have been as thick as thieves.

“What’s that about?” I asked, pointing at the poster.

Without looking up, Carolina replied, “Starscape! It’s a prestigious summer art camp on the East Coast. Apparently, they have world-renowned teachers. An artist for one of my favorite video games is teaching this year! And so are famous graphic novelists and other artists.”

Zeina and I both perked up. I took my phone out of my pocket and looked up more information about Starscape. Carolina was right. There were a bunch of cool people on the instructor list. I even spotted Christiana Moon, my favorite graphic novelist. I didn’t know what I would do if I met Christiana in person, but this was my chance to get advice from the very best. She was Korean American too. Maybe she could help me figure out how to convince my parents to let me pursue art!

The bell rang then, and Ms. Williams rushed into class. Her curly brown hair looked even more frazzled than usual, and her warm dark eyes softened behind her bright red glasses when she saw us all staring at the poster.

“Okay, my artists!” she exclaimed, clapping her hands. “I’m happy to see so many of you excited about this camp, but please get into your seats so we can get started!”

When we all settled down, she continued. “Before we begin today’s class, I want to tell everyone about Starscape. It’s a summer camp that lasts for a month in one of the most prestigious arts schools in the country. The location changes every year, and this year it’ll be hosted by NYU! This will be our seventh year sending kids to this camp. Previous participants later got into many great art colleges, like RISD and Tisch!”

Tisch was my dream school, since that’s the college Christiana went to. Starscape was also in NYC—and even hosted by NYU this year!—so it seemed like the perfect first step to reach my goal. I really hoped I could get into the camp.

In class later, we were working on our still-life paintings when Ms. Williams came over to inspect our work. She looked at all our artwork with an impressed smile on her face.

“Good job, ladies,” she said. “I can always rely on you three to produce amazing work. Are any of you considering applying to Starscape?”

I nodded quickly. “Definitely! I want to go.”

Zeina frowned. “I want to go too, but I don’t know. I read the poster, and it’s super expensive. My parents already pay for my oldest sister’s college tuition, and my other sister is going to start next fall.”

Ms. Williams winced. “That is quite the predicament. Especially since the cost of college is rising so much every year.”

Carolina sighed. “My parents probably won’t let me go, either. Especially not with the baby on the way. Apparently, babies are expensive. And a lot of work.”

Carolina’s mom was pregnant with her baby sibling. We didn’t know its gender yet, but we did know they were due sometime next year.

“Congratulations to your mother!” Ms. Williams said. “But, oh dear, yes, this seems like very rough timing all around.”

Everyone looked at me, and I stared at the ground.

“My parents don’t even know I want to be an artist,” I said. “I doubt they’d let me go, even if we could somehow afford it.”

Ms. Williams frowned. “Well, that’s too bad. On the off chance any of you girls do end up being able to go, be sure to ask me for a teacher recommendation. I’d be more than happy to write glowing letters for all three of you girls!”

“When do we have to apply by?” asked Carolina, scrutinizing the poster at the front of the room.

“Great question, Carolina,” Ms. Williams replied. “All the materials are due by December, but it’s a rolling admission process, which means that the sooner you apply, the sooner you’ll know if you got in or not. You’re allowed to submit the artwork you made in class or by yourselves in the last couple of years. If you do decide to create new art to supplement what you’ve already made, we still have two months until the final deadline.”

“And when do we need to have the money by?” Zeina asked.

“Well, aside from the application fee, you don’t have to pay anything unless you get into the program,” explained Ms. Williams. “After that, all other fees aren’t due until March of next year.”

After the teacher left, I turned to my friends. “We have to at least try asking our parents. There’s no harm in just asking, right? This could really help us in the future if we get in! Even though things may not be ideal now, they might get better by March!”

My friends shrugged. Neither of them looked very hopeful.

“I guess,” Zeina replied. “I’ll keep you guys updated.”

“Same here,” Carolina said. “Let’s all report back at lunch tomorrow.”

“Sounds good.” I nodded, clenching my fists in excitement.

My parents probably wouldn’t let me go either, but I wanted to remain hopeful. This could be the opportunity of a lifetime!