My actual first summer internship was in the design department of

Host:
The studio smelled of linen, paper, and morning coffee — a scent both gentle and restless, like the beginning of something waiting to be born. Through the large glass windows, the sunlight poured in with deliberate grace, falling across sketchboards, fabric samples, and the scattered echoes of creation.

Outside, the city was already awake, pulsing with rhythm, motion, and the quiet ambition of a thousand dreams being stitched into reality. Inside, however, the world slowed — as though the air itself wished to watch two souls in their private dialogue with beauty.

Jack leaned against a table, arms crossed, his grey eyes sweeping across the room filled with unfinished designs, color palettes, and half-empty coffee cups. Jeeny, seated nearby, was sketching softly — her long black hair spilling forward as her fingers danced across the page.

On the wall above them hung a small quote, written in faint gold ink:
"My actual first summer internship was in the design department of Clinique." — Aerin Lauder.

It was the spark that began their conversation — a single sentence, but one that seemed to hum with destiny, humility, and inheritance.

Jeeny: without looking up from her sketch It’s such a simple memory, isn’t it? An internship. But it’s how she says it — “actual first.” There’s innocence there, but also awareness. The beginning of someone stepping into her legacy.

Jack: half-smiling Or the beginning of someone proving she belonged there. You don’t start at Clinique by accident — not unless your last name is Lauder.

Jeeny: looks up sharply You make it sound like she didn’t earn it.

Jack: shrugs, his tone even Maybe she did. Maybe she didn’t have to. The point is, not everyone gets to intern where their family already built an empire. Some of us start with nothing but a résumé no one reads.

Jeeny: softly And yet, she started somewhere. Everyone has to. Even privilege doesn’t replace effort — it just gives you a stage. You still have to perform.

Host:
The light shifted, climbing higher through the windows, warming the space. The dust motes drifted in the glow, floating slowly, as if time itself had paused to listen. Jack’s posture softened — the edge in him giving way to something quieter, something almost nostalgic.

Jack: quietly I used to think beginnings mattered less than endings. That where you start is just geography — what matters is how you finish.

Jeeny: smiles faintly But we’re all shaped by our beginnings, Jack. You can’t escape the soil you grew from — only understand it.

Jack: sighs, looking out the window Maybe. But some people are born in gardens, and others in concrete. Understanding doesn’t change the weight of that.

Jeeny: gently No, but it changes how you grow in it. Aerin didn’t have to start at Clinique. But maybe she chose to — to learn, to earn, to not just inherit, but become.

Jack: grins, skeptical but intrigued You make it sound like she was rebelling against her own comfort.

Jeeny: nodding Exactly. Because comfort is the first enemy of creation.

Host:
A sudden breeze from the open window caught a loose sheet of tracing paper, sending it fluttering across the floor. Jeeny bent, caught it mid-air, and smiled as she placed it back on the table. The moment was small — but it carried meaning. The kind of attention that separates those who simply work from those who design.

Jack: You think that’s what “design” really means, don’t you? More than fashion, more than form — it’s a way of seeing.

Jeeny: softly It’s a way of living. Designing your days, your choices, your very existence — with intention.

Jack: smirks You’re turning an internship into a philosophy.

Jeeny: smiling back Maybe everything is a philosophy if you pay enough attention. Even a first summer in a design department.

Host:
The sunlight reached the sketchboards, making the colors on them glow — soft peaches, muted golds, powder blues. There was something almost holy in the arrangement, as though each shade carried its own breath.

For a brief moment, Jack stopped resisting the idea — the idea that design, like life, was an act of courage disguised as craft.

Jack: quietly, almost to himself Maybe she wasn’t learning how to design products at all. Maybe she was learning how to design herself.

Jeeny: looking at him with warmth That’s it, Jack. That’s what all beginnings are — apprenticeships to yourself.

Jack: nods slowly And yet, most of us never realize when we’ve started. We just stumble into it and call it luck or timing.

Jeeny: whispering Or grace.

Host:
The room grew still, the sound of the city now distant and muffled — as if the world outside had yielded to the quiet of their reflection. Jeeny’s eyes softened, and for the first time, Jack’s tone lost its skepticism, replaced by something earnest.

Jack: You know, I envy people like her. They start their lives already anchored to something — a name, a legacy, a direction. For the rest of us, it’s like trying to build a bridge with no shoreline in sight.

Jeeny: softly But maybe that’s your freedom, Jack. When you have no shore, the whole ocean belongs to you.

Jack: chuckles That’s poetic. But it’s also terrifying.

Jeeny: smiling All beginnings are. That’s how you know they’re real.

Host:
The clock ticked softly in the background, its rhythm like a heartbeat marking the passage of moments that matter. The light had shifted fully now — the gold of morning giving way to the silver clarity of noon.

On the table, Jeeny’s sketch was finished — a perfume bottle, elegant and minimal, its lines clean, its form timeless.

Jack stared at it, quietly impressed.

Jack: softly You know… if you hadn’t told me that was inspired by Aerin Lauder, I’d have thought it was your own design.

Jeeny: smiles faintly Maybe it is. Inspiration isn’t imitation — it’s continuation.

Jack: nodding slowly So the student becomes the designer, the inheritance becomes intention.

Jeeny: looking up at him Exactly. The point isn’t where we begin, Jack — it’s what we build from that beginning.

Host:
The camera would have lingered on the two of them — Jeeny, calm and luminous in the sunlight, Jack, shadowed but awakening to clarity.

Behind them, the walls of sketches and quotes seemed to whisper the same truth over and over: beginnings are never small, only unnoticed.

And as the scene faded, Aerin’s words remained — quiet, unassuming, yet profound — a reminder that every life of design, every dream, every act of becoming, must begin somewhere.

Sometimes in a studio,
sometimes in a summer,
sometimes in a single, ordinary moment that turns out to be the first design of who we are meant to become.

Fade out.