All That Really Matters, Nicole Deese [best detective novels of all time .TXT] 📗

and nobody cared a lick about what I thought I could teach women in the beauty arena. My first few videos were only viewed by my friends and some family members. But little by little, I grew a following who shared those videos and commented with their encouragement for me to continue. My first sponsor—a protein bar catering to women’s health—found me ten months and a hundred and fifteen videos in. Their partnership provided me better camera and editing equipment, and about seventy-five percent of my daily sustenance, too. I now have a hundred and twenty-four companies who have partnered with my brand and my vision to bring a new level of honesty to the beauty industry worldwide, and with over half a million followers who engage in my weekly videos and livestreams, that number continues to grow daily, as do the products and retailers I endorse. So . . . what I have to offer your residents is a lesson in grit and determination.”

If Mr. Whittaker was impressed by any of that, he certainly did not show it. Instead, he leaned forward in his chair and released an exhale that had me itching to pull out my phone and tap into my Instagram account to prove I hadn’t exaggerated a single word of it.

But something told me it wouldn’t matter.

“You want to teach . . . grit?”

“Well, yes, and—”

He gave the tiniest shake of his head and sighed. “Miss McKenzie—Molly,” he corrected. “While I can appreciate your ambition and marketing abilities, I’m afraid that grit is not a quality our residents lack. Grit is how most of them survived their childhood. Grit is the common denominator for every child who’s ever lived through trauma. It’s kept them breathing in times most people would wish themselves dead. And it’s also kept many of them from experiencing deep and meaningful relationships, because the same instinct that tells them to push away potential failure and hurt has become the only instinct they know how to trust. The youth in our program don’t need more grit. They need more grace—to be seen, heard, known. To be real.”

It was suddenly difficult to swallow, much less speak. There was so much to digest in what he’d just said, so much to process and make sense of that—

“I want to thank you for your time, Miss McKenzie. Please give your brother my regards, and if we have a need for your services in the future, I’ll have Glo give you a call.”

He rolled his chair back and made to stand, but my legs refused to obey the signal my mind transmitted. He’d denied my application? I’d failed the interview process?

“Wait . . . does that mean you’re not approving my application? You’re rejecting me as a volunteer?” The very idea was ludicrous. Who rejected a volunteer?

“I don’t think you’re the right fit for our program.”

“Not the right fit?” Stunned, I shook my head. “I’m not a shoe, Mr. Whittaker. I’m a human being, one who filled out your entire fourteen-page application and answered every lengthy question to the best of my abilities. I’m willing to forgo paid work hours to volunteer at your establishment every week for an entire summer—for free. Am I missing something? Have you already filled the summer mentor slots? Because my brother seemed pretty convinced that you were in need of help.”

We were both standing now, nothing but a three-foot-wide desk between our egos. “As I’ve mentioned previously, we have a standard of professionalism to uphold—”

“Professionalism or perfectionism?” I didn’t know exactly where the words had come from, but there they were, like a slap across his face.

He reared back.

“Listen,” I continued, “regardless of how you might feel about my use of the term grit, I’ve proven that I know how to think—and thrive—outside the box I grew up in. Isn’t that what you want for all the residents in your program?”

“I won’t allow our young women to become brainwashed by some social media Cinderella fantasy they can’t possibly attain.”

“I’m not offering them a fantasy, I’m offering them relatability.”

“Relatability?” A huff of a laugh escaped him as he scanned the length of me. “Perhaps in all the confusion today with the Nerf darts, you didn’t get the best view of the young women in our program in need of a mentor. None of them own impressive clothing or shoes, and most of the possessions they do own have been passed down, bartered, stolen, or are worth less than the coins in your wallet.” He clamped his mouth closed and then restarted. “So, in short, no. I have a hard time believing that any of them will find you or your beauty brand the least bit relatable.”

“Every young woman wants to be beautiful. To feel beautiful. It’s one of our most basic core needs.”

He paused, as if unsure how to address such a statement. “Seventy percent and three percent.”

“Excuse me?”

“Those are just two statistics out of many that we fight against every day—the first being that seven out of ten aged-out foster girls become pregnant before their twenty-first birthdays, and the second that, despite government funding, only three percent of the twenty-three thousand teens who age out of the system each year will earn a college degree. Those are just two of the facts that determine how we focus our efforts within the program.” He flicked out the fingers on his right hand one by one. “How to budget, how to prioritize a weekly schedule, how to study for an exam, how to fill out a job application and interview for a position, how to cook a meal with more than three ingredients, how to trust another human being and be trusted in return. That’s just a sampling of the critical life skills we teach.”

“Being confident in your own skin is also a critical life skill,” I said passionately, recalling my Mimi’s favorite quote and arranging it to fit the context of this heated discussion. “‘When a person feels good in their own skin, they’re far more likely to