I woke up late and missed the bus. I looked semi-okay in the bathroom mirror, but I almost puked when I flipped down the visor mirror in the car. My eyes looked squinty, my skin was blotchy, and my forehead was breaking out. I put some of Mom’s powder over the red mountain on my forehead. I had read in a magazine Talisa Milan used lipstick instead of blush, so I dabbed some on my cheeks. I think Talisa lied because I didn’t see her running around with bright red clown cheeks. I rubbed my face with a tissue, but it just made my face redder. Maybe the American Ingénue makeup people would have some tips on how to cover up huge forehead volcanoes.
“I can’t go to class like this,” I said.
“It’s school, not a beauty pageant. Just put more powder on.”
I slunk in late, and Ms. Ashcroft greeted me with a tight-lipped grimace. So I was five minutes late, it wasn’t like I ran over her dog. I went to the bathroom during second hour and washed my face with a rough paper towel. Ericka walked in and I pretended not to see her, even though we were the only people in the bathroom.
I went over to Devon’s house after school. She had pictures all around her dresser mirror, and there were photos of her with India and Peyton as well as magazines cutouts of Blake Alderson and Mason Fraser.
“This is from a picnic two summers ago. India made me climb to the top of this enormous playscape,” she said pointing to a photo. “I couldn’t figure out how to get back down, and I was stuck up there until Peyton’s dad said he’d catch me if I jumped.”
There were also pictures of her and Peyton on a roller coaster. I knew they were a tight-knit group, and India was her best friend. It seemed like everyone was already in a group, and I was just moving around trying to find my spot. I was so sick of being on the outside looking in. I just wanted to belong somewhere, and I wanted a best friend again. I wanted somebody who I could be myself around and talk to after school. Someone who I could just look at and she’d know exactly what I was thinking. Most of all, I wanted somebody who liked me more than anybody else — even if I acted like a total dork. Tori and I used to be able to exchange glances and talk about everything. I wondered if we’d ever start talking again. I missed her, but I also knew I’d never be able to trust her again.
When I got home there was a message on the answering machine from Tori asking me to call her. She and Ericka must want to make up. Finally. I called her back and she answered on the first ring.
“Hi Tori, it’s Landry. I just got your message.”
“Oh, Mrs. Dennis wanted me to call everyone to tell them tryouts for the play are on Tuesday,” she said.
How humiliating. Well, there went my hopes of making up and being friends again. I felt so stupid because I had gotten on the phone all cheerful and hopeful. She hung up, and I sat on the floor and started to cry. The phone rang again and I thought it was Tori calling back, but it was Grandma Albright.
“Hi, sweetheart. How’s school?” she asked.
“Fine.” I hit mute so I could blow my nose into a paper towel.
“How’s your mother?” she asked. I knew she was calling to find out about my dad’s visit because she thought it was horrible we weren’t all living together.
“She’s okay. She’s still at work,” I said.
“Have you cleaned up the house after your dad’s visit?” I started to answer when I got another call. It was Mom, and I told her Grandma was on the other line.
“Oh, great. What does she want?” she asked.
“She was wondering if our house was a mess for some reason.”
“The house? Oh my — did you tell her your father stayed in a hotel?” she asked.
“No, why?”
“It might upset her. Listen, I’m going to bring fish and chips home for dinner, so don’t fill up on junk,” she said.
I clicked back to Grandma, and she tried to find out what was going on with my mom and dad. Why didn’t she just call my dad, who lived two blocks away from her? Finally, she realized she wasn’t going to get anything interesting out of me so she let me go.
Since the next phase of the competition was coming up next week, I started worrying about what to wear. Mom suggested we go to the mall and look for a new outfit for me. I swear we had, like, fifty fights before we even left the first store. She wanted me to wear a dress which made me look about five years old. Then she found a dress Anne of Green Gables would have worn. I tried to explain to her I needed to look older, and I showed her a short leather skirt with a white off-the-shoulder sweater.
“Over my dead body,” was my mother’s understanding response.
“Moth-er, I can’t look like a kid. I’m supposed to be a model, not a baby,” I said. “You would not believe the outfits some of the girls wore to the auditions.”
Mom let up a little and let me try on a short skirt, but she would only let me get it if I wore it with a preppy sweater so I “wouldn’t look like trash.” I agreed, but I switched the sweater with a smaller one when she left the dressing room. The smaller sweater was a little tighter, and it showed off a bit of my stomach, too.
I also got my hair cut for the competition. The Ingénue people had already told us not to do anything drastic with our looks, but the form said a trim was okay. The hairstylist wanted to cut layers in my hair, but I wasn’t allowed to do anything other than “shaping” according to the forms I had signed. My hair looked a lot fuller after the woman styled it with rollers and sprayed it. It looked so good my mom even bought me some rollers from the drugstore and, shock of shocks, she even sprung for the volume spray and conditioner they used at the salon, which she never did. She always lectured me on how it was “a waste of money.”
On the day of the competition, I got out of school three hours early to get ready. Nobody wished me luck, other than the teachers, but at least I hadn’t woken up with a huge pimple or something. I washed my hair when I got home and put in the new rollers. However, I yanked out a ton of hair when I tried to get the rollers out. I guess they held a little too well. Mom had packed my outfit so it wouldn’t get wrinkled on the car ride. I barely spoke during the drive to Detroit. I was just so nervous. They were only choosing ten girls tonight to go on in the competition. But at least if I didn’t get picked, only people in the state would see it since it wasn’t being broadcast anywhere other than Michigan. We were recording the show at home, but I had made Mom promise not to show it to anyone if I didn’t get picked.
Dad called on the cell phone to wish me luck, and Grandma was at his apartment telling me I’d get chosen for sure. I hoped she was still taking her heart pills because I didn’t want to cause her a heart attack if I didn’t win. At least Grandma thought I had a chance, unlike any of my so-called “friends.” The phone rang again, and it was Ashanti calling to wish me luck.
“I’m recording it,” she said. “My dad said you should do something memorable on stage so you’ll stand out to the judges.” I could hear her dad yelling, “Good luck, Landry,” in the background. I felt better knowing at least two people, other than my family, cared.
We finally got to the hotel. Mom took a zillion pictures while I got ready so she could send them to all the relatives in Chicago. I felt nervous — like my skeleton was going to leap out of my body and run around the room. The American Ingénue people had put a little gift basket in our room with candy and sodas. Yeah, I’m sure real models ate candy all the time. I went to the bathroom five times and ended up throwing up ten minutes before I had to check in at the Ingénue table.
“Maybe a soda would settle your stomach,” Mom suggested as I curled up in a ball on the bed. “Or how about some of this banana taffy. You love banana—”
“Why would you offer banana flavored anything to a sick person? What’s wrong with you?” I said groaning.
Mom gave me a cough drop to cover the barf smell because I couldn’t handle the thought of putting minty toothpaste in my mouth. She walked me down to the check-in spot, although I noticed none of the other girls had their mommies with them.
“You were right,” she said looking around. “These girls look like they’re my age.”
To make matters worse, one of the competition organizers tried to give her a number as she was leaving. Everybody stared at me while she explained she was actually my mother. Fabulous. Not only did I look pathetic for bringing my mommy with me, it looked like my mom had me when she was thirteen or something. We lined up, and the organizers said we’d all take turns walking down the runway and then give our names and where we were from. Then the judges would narrow the group to ten girls. Those girls would go on to model different clothes the organizers picked from the racks backstage. I noticed Franciszka T had provided outfits for the girls who were chosen. They were gorgeous clothes, but I knew I’d probably puke again if I had to do a quick change. The organizers scrutinized all of us and gave us accessories to wear. I tried not to take it personally when they put a sailor hat on my head. I mean, the lady did say I had a “nautical” looking outfit on, but all I heard was “your hair sucks.” The volunteer, Georgia, also gave me a heavy gold chain belt to wear over my skirt. It looked like a belt Ashanti’s mom had.
We got back in line, and I stood behind a girl with dark blonde hair and amazing blue eyes. I asked her if she was nervous, and she told me she was used to doing pageants.
“It’s no big deal after a while,” she said as she told me all the different titles she had won. She pointed out a couple of other girls who had been in the pageants with her. Some of the girls weren’t what you’d call “pretty,” but there was something interesting looking about them. Others… well, maybe their mothers bribed the judges or something. Or maybe I had no idea what the judges were looking for in a model. I started to ask the pageant girl if my hair looked okay, but then Talisa Milan walked in the room.
All the girls crowded around her until the organizers made them back off. Everybody was going crazy over her outfit, but it looked like somebody wound a purple rag around her. An expensive rag. She had sleek, glossy dark hair which seemed to swing when she moved. She seemed laid back, and she told us to relax and have fun. One of the girls asked her if she was still dating Lorenzo from the band Puking Baby Dolls.
“Yeah, he’s a sweetheart,” she said, tilting her head and doing an annoying half smile you always see popular girls doing. “And he’s writing a song for my album. It should be coming out this summer so look for it, okay?”
“I heard she can’t sing,” the girl next to me whispered. “And she’s super phony.”
Talisa was acting like we were all best friends when this was the first time she had ever seen any of us. But she was sorta nice, and at least I could tell people I met someone famous.
“You guys all look so cute. I wish I could stay, but I have to go right after I do the intro,” Talisa said, pouting. “I have to do a TV appearance tomorrow at five, so I gotta fly to Chicago.”
Like we were supposed to believe she’d rather stay here with a bunch of people she didn’t know instead of being on TV?
“Ladies, line up. We go on in ten minutes.”
“Good luck you guys,” Talisa said. “I’m so excited for you.”
I didn’t think she meant it, but she looked over at me for a second and winked. Before she went on stage, she brushed lint off one of the girls and tilted my hat to the side. She smelled like gardenias when she leaned in to smooth my hair.
“Good luck,” she said. I never realized how pretty her mouth was. She had small Cupid ’s bow lips which looked like my Cadia doll. One of the other finalists from the show, Rae Ellen, was there, but I didn’t remember her as well. I think she was the one who got sent home for refusing to do the photo shoot with the cougar.
“Hi y’all,” she said. “I bet y’all thought I was going to wear red lipstick again. There’s a fan website keeping track of how often I wear it, but it’s my signature look. You were thinking I’d have it on, weren’t you? Y’all are funny.”
The rest of the girls seemed to be going along with it, but I wondered who in their right mind cared whether or not this weirdo wore red lipstick? And she just walked in the room, so how did she know what we were thinking or that we were funny? We were all strangers. People were acting so fake it made me feel sick… well the stress-induced diarrhea and vomiting wasn’t helping much either.
The stage manager came over and made sure we were lined up in the right order. From backstage we could hear the opening music playing. The girl behind me said she felt like throwing up.
“I already did before I came,” I said. “So at least I don’t have to worry about it anymore.”
“Unless you get the dry heaves,” she said.
Crap. What if I got the dry heaves on stage? And what if it got so bad one of my eyes bulged out or something? I should just go back up to the room… double crap. Mom had the room key. At least there was a bathroom for when I had to worry about… the other end.
While I was deciding whether or not to chicken out, the stage manager, Georgia, started having the girls go out on stage. I overheard somebody say one girl fell out of her shoe as she stepped on the runway.
“Is she okay?”
“Yeah, she’s fine. She just pretended to have two heels on and walked on her tip toes,” Georgia said.
I would have burst into tears and run off the stage — kind of like I did when I was four years old and in a dance recital. We were supposed to be little ballerinas and have scarves attached to our tutus, but my mom was still in school at the time and she came home late and forgot to give me my scarves. So all the other little girls pulled out their scarves, and there’s a video of me looking on either side of my tutu for my scarves and then bursting into tears crying “Mommy!” as I ran off the stage. My grandmother said I was adorable, but I don’t think it was any coincidence my grandfather died two weeks later.
At least I didn’t have to worry about missing scarves tonight. All I had to do was focus on not tripping. If I could just make it down the runway and back, I’d be fine. Unless, of course, I suddenly came down with Tourette’s Syndrome and started swearing live on the air… but I’d know if I had Tourette’s, right? It doesn’t just come on out of nowhere, does it?
“Okay, girls. Your group is next,” Georgia said.
I took a deep breath. All I had to do is say, “My name is Landry, and I’m from Grand Rapids.” Easy—as long as I didn’t get the dry heaves or puke into the microphone and electrocute myself…or get diarrhea on live TV. Why did I ever go to the audition in the first place? Everything was fine when I was just boring old Landry fading into the background. The girls at school were a lot nicer to me when I was nobody special. I mean, before this stupid competition I had friends, but now it seemed like there was no one I could trust. Maybe if I lost this stupid thing I could go home and everything would be back to normal.
“Okay, girls. You guys are next.” Georgia pushed me in the back. “Don’t forget to smile,” she said in my ear.
Then the girl in front of me morphed into a different person. She straightened her spine and walked with a little skip in her step. “I’m Desiree, and I’m from Sterling Heights,” she said in a low sexy voice. Great, I had to follow her.
“I’m Landry, and I’m from Chicago, Illinois,” I said. I moved away from the microphone and realized I said “Chicago” instead of “Grand Rapids,” so I went back to the microphone to correct myself and slammed into the next girl. She acted like she didn’t notice, but I had hit the microphone and it made a shrieking noise. I heard laughter. People were laughing at me. On television. I wanted to die.
I saw Georgia gesturing at me to get off the stage, and I walked off. I had been practicing my stupid runway walk for weeks and for what? A chance to humiliate myself on live TV? I’ve always been sorta accident prone. If anybody was going to do something stupid and embarrassing it was probably me, but I thought I could control myself for two seconds on live television. I’m such an idiot.
“Don’t worry about it, kid,” Georgia said.
“Um, excuse me,” a blond girl pushed her way in front of me. “Don’t you have to be from Michigan to participate in this? I thought we didn’t get to other states until the regionals?”
“She’s from Michigan, honey. She just got a little confused,” Georgia said.
The blonde girl looked at me like I was a complete moron. “Did you just move here or something?” she asked rolling her eyes.
“Yeah,” I said. So what if I’ve lived here for a while. It wasn’t any of her business. My face got hot, and I went to the bathroom to cry. I was blowing my nose when I heard a group of girls come in.
“Did you hear one girl forgot where she lived? What a loser,” somebody said.
“I know. Did you see the girl in the short red dress? Ew.”
I heard the girls walk out and was about to leave the stall when I heard the bathroom open.
“Landry? Honey, are you in here?”
Oh crap, it was my mom. I held my breath, but then she knocked on the stall door. “Sweets, I can see your shoes,” she said.
“Go away.”
“I just thought you might want to go out and get some ice cream,” she said.
I opened the door. “It’s not over, is it?” I asked.
She shook her head and said they were about to have everybody line up again while they narrowed the group down to ten.
“No, I’m staying and finishing this,” I said and went over to the sink to fix my makeup. I was not going back on TV with raccoon eyes. I couldn’t get all the mascara from under my eyes with the crappy bathroom soap, so I borrowed Mom’s concealer to cover it up. A couple girls came in to do last minute touchups on their makeup, and Georgia poked her head in the bathroom and told us to line up.
“Good luck,” my mom whispered as I went to line up. Like I had a chance. I got back in line behind Desiree. The room was silent. Everybody was wondering who’d get chosen and who would cry on stage. I didn’t have to worry either way — I wouldn’t get chosen, and I was all cried out. All I had to do is stand there and pretend to be excited for everybody else who was picked. I figured the camera wouldn’t be on me at all, but Desiree was the second name they called. She shrieked, and I gave her a hug just like all the pageant contestants always do. Nobody else hugged anyone, so I probably just made myself look even stupider. They called the rest of the names and then had the audience clap for us losers who were still standing on the platforms. We walked off stage, and Georgia put her hand on my shoulder.
“Nice job, kid,” she said. I thought she meant because I hadn’t crashed into anybody this time, but she said I showed a lot of “class” hugging Desiree when her name was called. She said there were free “promotional items” in the lobby. Mom and I walked to the lobby, and they gave me a big plastic bag filled with stuff. They assumed Mom was a contestant, so they gave her a bag, too.
We went back up to the room so we could check out all the free stuff. This time there were actual Little Rose makeup samples. Little tubes and jars with French words on them. And a makeup palette with shimmer powders, eye shadows, lipsticks, and blushes. There was even a tiny eyeliner and lip liner pencil with a teensy sharpener. Not worth making a fool out of myself on live television, but still cool. The lipsticks were too dark on me and so were the eye shadows, but I could wear the rest of the stuff. I tried using the lip liner, but it looked like I had a chocolate ice cream ring around my mouth.
“Your dad wanted you to call him when it was over,” Mom said as she cracked open a free soda. I wondered what to tell him. Did I tell him everything went okay and then destroy the tape of me crashing into the other girl on stage? I didn’t get a chance to get my lie straight because my dad called on the cell phone.
“How’d it go?” he asked.
“It went okay, but I didn’t get picked,” I said.
He said the judges must have been blind and said he was proud of me for going up there. He might not have been so proud had he seen me body slam another contestant and forget where I was from. Grandma got on the phone next and said modeling wasn’t a good career for young girls anyway. Then she went on about how she used to model for a department store when she was a teenager. Just what I needed to hear — how my grandmother could cut it as a model, but I couldn’t.
“I was proud of you for going back up on stage,” Mom said after I got off the phone.
I asked what she meant, and she said I could have just stayed backstage or left after I messed up my line. I hadn’t realized it was an option. I just thought it would have been worse not to go back out with the other girls. Everybody who watched would have assumed I didn’t come back because I was crying backstage.
I sat on the bed watching TV and ate a couple of free candy bars and drank some free sodas. Candy and pop were the only things sounding good to me after I had thrown up before. Besides, food tasted better when it was free. Someone knocked on the door, and I was afraid they were going to make us leave the hotel early… or maybe they realized we took an extra free bag and they wanted it back. I hid the extra bag in my suitcase while my mom answered the door. It was Mrs. Myeski.
“Landry, I just finished reading your comment sheets,” she said. I nodded as I wondered what comment sheets were. “You got a lot of positive remarks on how you handled yourself up there. There are five agencies interested in you.”
Even after I made a fool of myself? We sat on the bed, and Mrs. Myeski told my mom we should look into each agency to see if there was one which might work for me.
“And just because they’re expressing an interest today doesn’t mean they will necessarily take you on,” she said. She said my mom could call to set up an appointment, and I would need to bring a picture with me.
“This is an exciting opportunity for you, but only if you can handle it. A lot of girls get caught up in the glamour aspects of it, but it is a job and you have to look at it as a professional,” she said. She left us a sheet with the agency names on it and suggested we start researching them soon.
“Is this something you want to pursue?” Mom asked as I stared at the names. Three of them were located in Lansing, which was an hour away. One was in Detroit, which was too far, but there was one in Grand Rapids owned by two women named Delilah Rice and Anita Carter. Mom chewed the side of her mouth as she stared at the sheet.
“Let’s deal with this later. It’s too much to think about right now. Why don’t we do something fun? I heard there’s a great mall nearby. Wanna check it out?” she asked.
I must have looked pathetic onstage if Mom was offering to take me shopping. Still, I can’t say no to a mall. I changed into jeans and a hoodie, and we got directions to Somerset mall. I picked out a few things to try on, but everything looked like crap on me. I was too tall for Capri pants (they looked like I was expecting a Noah’s ark type flood), but too short for the new jeans they were showing. I found a couple of halter tops on the sale rack, and even though I wouldn’t be able to wear them for months, I wanted to see how I would look in one of those tops. I mean, the judges didn’t find me too hideous if I got through two rounds of the competition, right? However the halter tops made me look extra skinny and flat. Models were supposed to be able to make anything look good, and so far, everything looked blah on me. The only thing which looked halfway decent on me was a sweatshirt, and everyone looks good in a sweatshirt.
Mom could tell I was getting depressed clothes shopping so we went to the music store next. I hardly ever get CDs. I found a couple I wanted, and I was surprised mom was willing to buy them for me. Maybe I should humiliate myself in public more often. We went to dinner, and I had a hamburger and fries — my first real food all day. I was starting to have fun when I looked across the street and saw a sign advertising something on Friday. Just seeing the word “Friday,” reminded me of the word “Monday,” which reminded me I’d have to go back to school and face everyone who had seen me make a fool of myself on TV. My stomach rolled over. There was absolutely no way I was going back to school. Not on Monday. Not EVER.
“Do you want to head back after dinner?” Mom asked. I shook my head. “Well, I guess we don’t have to leave tonight. I could get the room for another night, and we could go see a movie or go back to the hotel and watch TV.”
I started to say I never wanted to watch TV again when I got a brilliant idea. Tomorrow when we were supposed to leave, I could pretend to be too sick to go in the car. Then there would be no way I could get back in time to go to school on Monday.
“Okay, can we stop at the bookstore on the corner?” I asked. “It’s huge. I didn’t realize Detroit had such great shopping.”
“Sure. Wanna order a sundae before we leave?” she asked. I must have made a real fool of myself on TV if she was letting us stay another night and offering me dessert.
While we were in the bookstore, I picked up a copy of Young and Fun magazine with Talisa on the cover. The article talked about how busy she was, and there was a breakdown of her day: yoga at four in the morning, then hair and makeup, publicity appearances, meet with the songwriters for her album, meet with her vocal coach, meet with the music video show’s producers, tape the show, more publicity stuff, and then work on the album some more. There’s no way Talisa and I were even the same species. I mean, I come home from school, flop on the coach, and try to cram in as much TV watching as possible, which was a full day for me. Maybe the whole celebrity thing wasn’t for me. I always thought Talisa’s career was just standing around looking pretty except for the one hour a day she introduced music videos.
****
Sunday morning, I heard Mom in the shower. I took out my new makeup case and dabbed a little of the deep plum lipstick on my eyelids. Last year when I got the flu my eyelids looked all red and weird, so I figured this would do the trick. However my mother just looked at me and said, “You’ve got something funky on your eyes.”
I pretended I couldn’t lift my head off the pillow. “I don’t feel so good,” I said fake coughing.
“I’m going to run down to get coffee,” she said. “I’ll bring you some tea, but you better be up and in the shower by the time I get back. Checkout time is at noon, and I’m not paying for another night.”
So much for sympathy. “My throat feels weird. Maybe I caught something from one of the other girls. Somebody at the competition said they thought they had a sinus infection,” I said.
She put her hand on my forehead. “You look fine to me other than the eye shadow you’ve got on. Didn’t you wash your makeup off last night? Seriously, we’ve got to be out by twelve. I’m not paying for another night.”
She gave me her “I-mean-business-move-your-butt-now” look. No wonder Dad wasn’t exactly killing himself to move in with us. Who’d want to live with her? I could have Ebola or the plague or something, and she was worried about having to pay for another night. It would serve her right if I got sick and died right on the elevator — no, wait, if I died in the room so she’d have to pay for another night and replace the sheets I died on. I dragged myself to the shower and Miss Speedy was back with the tea and coffee in, like, ten seconds.
“I brought you a blueberry muffin, but eat it while you pack,” she said, checking under my bed. “Landry, you’re not any neater on the road than you are at home. Your socks are everywhere.”
As she went on about “how many feet did I have to need five pairs of socks anyway on a short trip?” I threw my clothes in an overnight bag. I didn’t care if my stuff got wrinkled because I never got invited anywhere to wear my good clothes anyway.
We made it to the checkout counter with three minutes to spare so I don’t know why she was all freaking out. Of course, she ditched me in the elevator with all the bags and ran down the hallway to make it to the lobby in time. I had to drag all our stuff out front. A bellhop grabbed one of the bags to help me, and later my mom lectured me for letting him help because she had to tip him a dollar. All her sympathy for me had run out sometime last night after dessert. We got in the car, and she said I could put one of my new CDs in if I wanted. I said I didn’t feel like listening to music because I still felt sick.
“Do you want to stop for some soup or something on the way home?” she asked. I shrugged and asked if we could get some cough drops before we got on the expressway. I felt bad for lying, but I had to admit I didn’t feel good. Sure my throat didn’t hurt, but I did have a headache and I was kinda nauseous thinking about school tomorrow, so in a way, I did qualify as being sick.
“Here’s some money for cough drops and get some aspirin, too,” she said, smoothing back my bangs. “You’re probably just rundown from the excitement yesterday.”
Let’s not forget the extreme humiliation I faced where all of the state watched me not only make a fool of myself but fail. I had been rejected on live television. How much worse could it get? It’s one thing to feel like you’re not pretty, but it’s another to be told you’re not good enough with everyone watching.
When we got home, I had two messages on the answering machine from Ashanti and Devon. I called Devon back first because I figured she would understand what it’s like to get rejected by the American Ingénue people.
“You’re back,” she said. “How was it?”
“Well, at first it was cool. I was nervous, but I’m sure you saw how I made a fool of myself on stage. I blanked, and I almost died when I said the wrong city and then I ran into someone.”
“It wasn’t too noticeable,” she said.
Devon acted like it was nothing, so I started to feel better. She asked me what it was like backstage, and I told her about meeting Talisa and about how a lot of the girls had done pageants and stuff before.
“Probably why a lot of them got picked. They already knew what to do and what the judges wanted,” she said. “Did you get any free stuff?”
“I did get some candy and makeup and stuff. Oh, there are a couple of agents interested in me, too.”
“Even after you messed up on stage and all? Listen, I’ve gotta go. India and Peyton are coming over so I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She hung up so I called Ashanti, who said she had been waiting by the phone to hear from me. Her phone is right next to her bed anyway, but it was nice knowing somebody cared.
“You looked so cute,” she said. “I loved your hat. My mom said you looked ‘darling.’”
“Even though I messed up?”
“Please, you were great. Just a sec, Dad! Hold up. Landry, my dad’s bugging me. He wants to say something,” she said.
“Hi Landry. We enjoyed watching you last night. You did a great job,” Mr. Russell said.
“Thanks, I just wished I hadn’t screwed up.”
“You handled yourself well up there. You showed a lot of poise, and you should be proud of yourself. I’ll put Ashanti back on before she pulls my arm off.”
“Okay, so give me backstage dirt,” she said.
I told her about how nice Talisa was and how all the girls looked so much older than me. I told her the American Ingénue people thought my mom was the contestant instead of me. She wasn’t surprised because even her parents thought the girls looked way older than the age limit. I told her I got free makeup, and she could have some of my samples.
“And I have enough free soda to last me forever, so I’ll save some for you,” I said.
“Cool. Have you seen yourself on TV yet?” she asked.
I was dreading it, so I told her I’d watch later. Much later. I got off the phone with Ashanti so I could work on my sick act. I sat next to my mom on the couch and started adding symptoms to my fake illness.
“Mom, I feel like I could just fall asleep and, like, go into a coma. Wait, do you think I have mono?”
“No, I don’t. You’d be a lot sicker if you had mono. I had it once in college, and trust me, I’d know if you had it. What’s going on?” she asked.
“I told you. I don’t feel good,” I said, laying my head on the armrest.
Mom made me some tea and had me get into bed, which meant I couldn’t watch TV. I read until it was time for bed. My biggest fear is getting the stomach flu, but if I ever had to get it then I wished I could get it now.
****
Unfortunately I woke up healthy. Even my skin was glowing for the first time. It was going to take an Oscar winning performance to get my mother to let me stay home today.
“Mom, I think I’m going to throw up—”
“Landry, I know what you’re doing. You’ve been paving the way so you can stay home, but it isn’t going to happen,” she said.
She was smarter than she looked. “No, I’m sick.”
“Do you honestly think it’s going to be any easier going to school tomorrow? Or the next day? It’s always going to be there, honey, so you’re better off just going and getting it over with,” she said. “Trust me. Once you get there, it’ll be fine. The worst part is the anticipation.”
I said everyone was going to laugh at me, and she gave me the speech adults always give, but nobody ever believes about how, “Your true friends wouldn’t laugh at you.” Well, I obviously didn’t have any true friends besides Ashanti. Even Devon got all weird on me when I told her about the agents. After arguing for ten minutes, Mom promised to drive me to school all week and get me a subscription to Young and Fun magazine as long as I went to class. Little did my mother realize it was a weekly magazine so she would be paying more. Hah. But I still had to go to school.
I put on a navy sweater and pants and wished I could just fade into the background. I knew I couldn’t hide, so I put on more makeup than usual hoping everybody would focus on how good I looked instead of on the fact I didn’t make the cut. Mom didn’t say anything when she saw me, so I figured I looked okay. Then she told me to blot some of the lipstick.
“It’s a little dark,” she said.
Even my mother’s a critic. When we got to school I made my mom drive around the parking lot so I wouldn’t have to stand outside with everyone and talk about the show.
“Landry, I have to go to work. Just tell them it was fun and it’ll be the end of it,” said my mother, who I’m guessing had been homeschooled in a cabin outside of the limits of civilization.
“The first bell is going to ring in a minute, and I’ll go in then.”
The bell rang, but I didn’t budge. Mom sighed. “Am I going to have to push you out of this car? You’re going to be late, and then you’ll call attention to yourself.”
Crap. She was right. I got out of the car and walked in behind a group of seventh graders. I thought I was so smart, until they went around the corner leaving me exposed. Peyton waved to me and didn’t yell, “Hey loser,” so I figured it was safe to walk over to her.
“How was it?” she asked.
I shrugged as Hana walked over. “You should have gotten picked, Landry,” she said. “Did you get to meet any celebrities?”
I told her about Talisa and how none of the celebrity judges were celebrities you ever heard of before. The panel was mostly modeling people, but they threw in some local people who were semi-famous. One lady hosted a talk show in Detroit, one was a baseball player I had never heard of before, and there was some news anchor guy. I saw the talk show host for one second backstage when she wished us luck, but the news anchor guy and the basketball player never bothered to come back to see us.
I expected to get laughed at or to hear mean comments in the hall, but nobody brought it up. It was kind of weird. As far as I knew, nobody at our school had been on TV or won anything major. So how come when I got the chance to be on a popular show nobody even mentioned it? Maybe nobody cared or they were trying to spare my feelings since I made a fool of myself. No, no one at my school was nice, so they probably just didn’t care. Unless the principal had made some big announcement about how anyone making fun of the “poor reject from TV” would get suspended. Devon didn’t even bring it up, but we had talked about it on the phone. However, Tori waved to me in the hall, so I started to feel a little better. Then came lunch.
I got in the lunch line with Hana, and Tori came up behind me. I was telling Hana about how nervous I was before going onstage when Tori interrupted to ask if I got to keep the clothes I wore.
“No, it was my outfit, but I borrowed the hat and belt,” I said. She acted like it was normal for us to be hanging out, and I kinda felt like I wasn’t supposed to make a big deal out of it. I went on with my story and then said I had a couple of agents interested in me.
“Wow, so cool,” Hana said, but Tori didn’t say anything. Not, “Oh great,” or even a, “You suck.” Nothing at all. I asked her about her weekend, but she just shrugged. I started to say it would have been cool if we could have done the show together, but then she ignored me and ran off to talk to somebody in the back of the line. I grabbed a dish of macaroni and cheese and followed Hana to her usual table. Devon was already there, and I asked her if she was doing anything on Friday night.
“I think I have plans with Peyton and India,” she said. I was hurt she didn’t say, “Do you want to join us?”
When I got home, there was a message from Grandma telling me how pretty I looked on TV. I was surprised she had seen it.
“How did Grandma see it?” I asked. “Did you send her a link?”
“I don’t know, maybe Uncle Martin found a link,” Mom said. I gave her a look. “Okay, you know your grandmother. She has to be the first one to call and pretend to be in the know—”
“So she just said I looked pretty on TV without ever seeing me?” I asked. How depressing. Even my grandmother had to lie to me. I bet she’d freak if she saw the actual footage. Of course if I had anything to say about it, she never would. Grandma just figured out how to send an e-mail, so I was guessing finding a video online was a little beyond her abilities.
“How was school? Was it as bad as you thought?” she asked. I could tell she was getting ready to put on her smug “I told you so” face. I almost wanted to tell her I had gotten beaten up for being a reject. It was almost as bad to admit almost no one had even brought it up. Instead, I said Hana seemed interested.
“Have you decided about calling the agencies?”
I said I wanted to think about it a little more. I knew Mom didn’t want me to start modeling, but I kept thinking if the American Ingénue judges saw something in me then maybe I wasn’t as hideous as I thought. Or maybe I was picked just because I was tall and skinny. I decided not to think about it, but then I saw Talisa while I was watching a music video countdown show. She was wearing a white tank top with a short hot pink mini skirt. For some reason Talisa always looked weird when she dressed trendy. Like she was a doll somebody had dressed up. She was introducing the next video, and she mentioned one of her Ingénue costars was in it.
“You guys remember Bianca Laurel from the show?” she asked the studio audience. “Cause she’s in Lars Anderson’s new video, and she gets to play his girlfriend.” The girls in the audience started making “whoo” noises. Lars Anderson was only the hottest singer ever. I knew Bianca was only, like, seventeen, so it wasn’t like she was much older than me, and if Lars was interested in her then maybe I could meet a famous guy by modeling, too. Sure, Bianca had made it to the major American Ingénue competition, but it wouldn’t hurt to try modeling and see if I could get a part in a video or something. I told my mom after dinner I wanted to try modeling.
“Okay, I’ll check out the agencies tomorrow,” she said.
****
The next day I couldn’t wait to find out what the agencies said, but Mom came home in a bad mood.
“Landry, do you think I could get in the front door before you come charging at me?” she asked. I backed off, and she dumped her stuff on the kitchen table. I guess I was crowding her or something because she sighed and asked, “Don’t you have some homework or something to do?”
I went to my room and stayed out of her way until dinner. She made chicken pot pies, which I hate, but I ate the whole stupid thing (except for the soggy crust because it made me gag). She still hadn’t brought up the agents, so I asked.
“I went online and they all seem legit, but if you’re going to do this then it has to be the local one. I talked to one of the owners of the Grand Rapids agency, and I can set up an appointment for you to meet with them if you still want to,” she said.
Okay, so my chances of Lars Anderson (or any rock star) calling a Grand Rapids modeling agent weren’t good, but maybe I’d be so popular as a model I’d get to move to New York or something.
“I just want to make sure you have realistic expectations for this,” Mom said.
Like any one famous ever got anywhere from having realistic expectations. All I knew was I wanted to make enough money so I could leave school, get a private tutor, move to New York (or someplace cool), and do magazine covers and music videos. I didn’t even have to have a modeling career. I could just model until I got some sort of acting job. I’d rather be an actress than a model anyway. I just wanted to be famous, and I didn’t even care how it happened. I wanted to be like Talisa who was always in SuperTeen magazine and a Little Rose model. Plus, she was dating the lead singer of the Puking Baby Dolls. I just wanted to get out of this place and have everybody who was mean to me see I was special and they were all too stupid to notice me when they had the chance.
The next day, Mom called the Rice-Carter agency and made an appointment with me to meet Delilah Rice. I had no clue what to wear, and Mom told me to put my plaid kilt on.
“But I wore it to my first audition. What if she was there? Then it’ll look like I have one outfit.”
“Do you have another option?” Mom asked. “It’s your cutest outfit.”
I sighed. I needed to get some better clothes. Mom said I was supposed to come looking natural with no makeup on. I just used a little concealer on the pimple forming on my chin, put on a touch of mascara and brow pencil, and some tinted lip balm. We had to wait for Ms. Rice for twenty minutes, but when we went into her office she was nice and asked me if I wanted some tea.
“I have chamomile, jasmine, and Earl Grey,” she said.
Chamomile tasted like dandelions in dirty bath water to me, so I said jasmine would be fine. The jasmine tea was okay, and it kinda tasted like flowers. She asked if I had a portfolio, but all I had were the pictures the Ingénue people had taken of me. She set up a test shoot with a photographer for me on Wednesday and told me to bring two outfits.
“Bring some sort of accessory, a prop, an outfit for a close-up, and something for a full length shot — nothing baggy. We need to see your shape,” she said. I had to fill out some forms, which were confusing. I had no idea what my bust measurements were, but she told me to leave those blank and someone would measure me later. She had me stand up, and she walked around me the same way my dad walked around the last car he bought. I felt stupid standing there, but then Delilah nodded and said I could sit down.
“Your weight is perfect, but you could use some toning,” she said.
“Sure,” I said. And as soon as I figured out what she meant, I’d get right on it.
“Nothing over five pounds,” she said as I stared. “You know, for the free weights,” she said as she mimed lifting a dumbbell. Oh, muscle toning. Duh. I thought she meant, like, using astringent or something on my face.
I got home, and Devon texted me about going to the apple orchard for cider and donuts with Peyton and India after school on Wednesday. She said they’ve gone there every year since they were eight. I wanted to go, but I had my test shoot then. At first, I felt bad about missing out because it had been a long time since anyone had invited me anywhere. Then I started thinking about how Talisa had told Young and Fun magazine she had to “miss out on a lot of fun things with friends.” But I bet she thought it was all worth it since now she was famous.
I laid out my outfits for the test shoot. I was going to wear a black turtleneck for my close-up. I was also bringing a scarf, my black hat, and a huge white teddy bear (actually an old bear of my mom’s which I stripped of his little scarf and ski hat) for my props, and I was going to wear a peach and black sweatshirt and matching skirt I had gotten a year ago for Christmas. The skirt was too short for me on its own, so I was going to put black pants underneath.
****
Ms. Rice loved the stuff I brought when I showed up at the agency. They put the scarf in my hair for the close-up pictures. The photographer took shots of me standing, sitting on the floor with the bear, and posing with the hat. A week later Ms. Rice called and asked us to come to the agency.
We went to her office after school, and I was so nervous I could actually feel sweat drip under my arms. I thought she was going to say, “Sorry, I changed my mind,” but Mom said they would have just said it on the phone. Ms. Rice (she told me to call her Delilah) called us into her office just as I was getting up to go to the bathroom for, like, the hundredth time. I needed to pee, but I went in and hoped I didn’t have an accident in her office because those pink chairs looked expensive.
“I’d like to sign Landry to a six month contract,” Delilah said. I almost leapt across the table to kiss her. She pulled out my proofs to show me which pictures I should get for my portfolio. I was surprised to see how great they ended up. I didn’t look like Talisa Milan, but for me, they were great. Although you could kinda see my forehead breaking out in one. Delilah gave my mom some papers to sign, but my mother, being Miss Overprotective, asked to take them home to read. I bet Talisa’s mom didn’t take her contracts home to read back in the day.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Mom asked me for the millionth time in the car.
“Yeah, I can start making some money for college,” I said, thinking I would impress her with my responsible planning.
She laughed. “Right, you just wanted this to save up for college. Good one.”
I called my dad when I got home. While my mom was all weird about me doing this, my dad thought it was great.
“Of course they’d want to sign you honey, you’re gorgeous,” he said. “After all, you get your looks from my side of the family.”
In reality, I looked almost exactly like my mom except I have my dad’s eyes and chin. My mom is like a softer, prettier version of me. I was just glad to hear my dad say I was pretty enough to model. I knew it was my dad so of course he was going to say I was cute, but it was still nice to hear. I wondered if Mom kept asking me if I was sure I wanted to do this because she didn’t think I was pretty enough to model.
“Landry, come in here. I want to go over the contract with you,” she said.
We sat at the kitchen table as she read these boring forms. I put my head on the table while she was going over them.
“This is going to be expensive,” she said, poking me with her pen.
“Why? I thought Ms. Myeski said you should never have to pay to model.”
“But the pictures for your portfolio cost a lot. And you need something called a comp card,” she sighed. “They’re supposed to take it out of what you make, but… I dunno. Are you sure—”
“Yes. Why do you keep asking me? You know, Dad thinks I’m pretty enough to be a model, so how come you don’t?”
“It has nothing to do with — I know you’re pretty, but I just don’t want to see you get hurt—” I started to interrupt, but she put her hand up and gave me “the look.” “Of course your dad thinks you’re beautiful, but remember guys think it’s what a girl wants to hear. There are a lot more important things than just being pretty. Sometimes people put too much focus on a girl’s looks to distract her from other things.”
Mom went on a big thing about how people focus on the appearance of a woman running for President, while they focus on the guy candidate’s career. I made the mistake of yawning, which just made her mad and extended the stupid lecture. Mom went and got one of my teen magazines and started showing me how the articles on the guy singers focused on their songs, but the female singers’ articles focused on her clothes and makeup.
“But guys don’t wear makeup,” I said.
“Look at this cover. Tell me Drew Bernard doesn’t have eyeliner on,” she said holding Seventeen up.
Ew. Drew did have eyeliner on, and it looked like he had gloss on his lips — not like the super shiny kind or anything, but his lips were definitely glossier than most guys. Okay, so she had a point.
“And look at this,” she said turning to another page.” Salma Dagwood writes her own songs and plays the guitar, but the article focuses on how to get glowing skin like her, while this boy here doesn’t even know how to play the guitar he’s holding. And did you know Talisa Milan was an honor roll student? They don’t tell you the important stuff.”
It did seem unfair, but what did she want me to do about it? I asked her if I could still try modeling, and I promised I wouldn’t get all caught up in my looks and stuff.
“You have to promise to keep your grades up — even in math,” she said. “And absolutely no dieting. If I even suspect you’re eating less I will come down to your school and watch you eat your lunch.”
I rolled my eyes. Like I could give up food. Please. I promised I wouldn’t diet or do anything drastic to my looks without asking her first. It meant I couldn’t pluck my eyebrows or dye my hair, which was fine. I tried plucking my eyebrows once after seeing an article in a magazine, and it hurt so bad. And I had a huge fear of hair color after Grandma told me about some girl who went blind when hair dye dripped in her eye. She was probably just trying to freak me out so I wouldn’t dye my hair, but you know what? It worked.
“This is a big commitment to make, and you’re going to miss out on a lot with your friends,” she said. “I’m not going to let you take off from school, so you can only work on weekends, which will cut into your social life.”
Like I even had a social life. Ashanti was still sick and other than inviting me to the apple orchard, Devon hadn’t exactly been dying to hang out with me. People talked to me at school, but no one asked me to do anything outside of school. I hadn’t had a comment or a “like” on my social media page in weeks. I even considered setting up a phony account just so I could post fake comments on my real page and not look so pathetic. I could work every weekend from now until I was eighty and I wouldn’t miss a thing. Actually, working would give me a good excuse for not having any plans on the weekends.
Mom told me according to the contract, I wouldn’t be allowed to work much because of my age. I couldn’t do any of the perfume promotions where models stand in a department store and ask to spray you with perfume because I was too young. I would be limited to fashion shows, ads, and maybe commercials. I guessed music videos were out of the question, but it was still better than nothing. Plus, it was only for six months so I could quit if I hated it.
When I got to school it was pretty obvious nobody seemed to care I had an agent. Ashanti thought it was cool when I called her about it on the phone, but no one else said much. When I told my dad people at school didn’t seem to care, he said the other girls could be jealous. Maybe, but it was hard when the girls I went to school with were more impressed with winning basketball games, and I’m just not good at sports. Plus, during lunch, I overheard Arianna in the bathroom saying she was surprised I was chosen to model at all.
“She doesn’t look like a model,” she said. “But I guess they do have to be super skinny.”
I couldn’t see whom she was talking to through the crack in the stall, and the other girl didn’t say anything. I waited until she and the other girl left before I flushed the toilet. However, when I came out of the bathroom I saw Arianna walking back to the lunchroom with Ericka. I went back to my table and told Hana and Devon I wasn’t feeling well.
“Do you want us to walk you to the office?” Devon asked.
I was just going to sit in the library for a while, but I guess Devon wanted me gone. I shook my head and Hana told me to “feel better soon,” and then they went back to their food. I went to the office and said I didn’t feel well. The secretary asked if I felt like I was going to throw up, and I nodded. Then she stuck this gross looking barf-colored bowl in front of me. I’m surprised nobody puked just from looking at it.
“I’ll call your mother to pick you up,” Mrs. Beckham said. Just then a kid with a real stomachache came in. Now there was a guy who looked like he was going to puke. He needed the bowl way more than me. I decided I had enough of fake-sick land, so I told the nurse I felt better. She was busy with the sick guy, so she waved me off. I thought it was the end of it until I got called down to the office in math class.
“Landry, I tried calling your mom to pick you up, but she was out of the office all day,” Mrs. Beckham said. “So I called someone from your emergency contact card and Mrs. Robins said she could come pick you up if you still needed to go home.”
I forgot my mother had put Tori’s mom on my emergency contact card. There was no way I was having Mrs. Robins come pick me up. I told Mrs. Beckham I felt better, and I didn’t need to go home.
The next day Ericka made gagging and puking noises as I walked past her in the hall. I guess Tori’s mom had told them about my little illness yesterday. Way to keep it to yourself, Mrs. Robins. Meanwhile, my own mother never got the message. The secretary at her office didn’t think it was important enough to write down my mother’s only child was sick and dying. I loved the world. On the plus side, I did get a commercial lined up for Saturday. My first job was for a stain removal product.
Delilah had sent over a handbook which said models had to be prepared for anything. Most of the time there wouldn’t be hair and makeup people at the shoots, so you were expected to do your own. I also had to put together a “model bag” with hair rollers, makeup, pantyhose, a strapless bra, extra shoes, and anything else I might need while on a job. Plus, I needed to buy a thong, which I thought was super gross. I knew Yasmin wore them because I had seen one sticking out of the back of her pants before in gym.
I didn’t want to tell my mom I needed to buy a thong, so I just told her about the strapless bra. She was going to help me find one, but I told her I wanted to go in and try it on by myself. We went to the mall, and I grabbed a bunch of bras to try on. I must have tried fifty bras on and only two fit without sliding down. Mom was sitting outside the dressing room waiting, so I asked her if she could pick out some pantyhose for me.
“Can’t you just get those at the drugstore?” she asked.
“Mo-om, I’m supposed to be a professional.”
She sighed and went to pick some out. Meanwhile I went over to the underwear display and picked out a thong. It was in a box, so I hoped mom wouldn’t notice what it was. I went over to the counter and paid for the thong while mom was over in the pantyhose section. I couldn’t believe how much a tiny little string cost, but it was worth it if it kept my mom from freaking out. I tried the thong on when I got home and it was the most uncomfortable thing I had ever experienced. There was no way I was ever wearing it. I was also out fifteen bucks since underwear was non-refundable.
I showed up at the Averline agency for the shoot on Saturday morning. They had several pairs of white Capri pants waiting for me to wear — a clean pair for each take of the commercial. I sat down, and the hair stylist went to work on my hair. She yanked the comb through my hair and almost took my head off.
“How do you deal with this tangled mess every morning?” she sighed. She began spraying something all over my hair and then combed through it easier.
“What is this stuff?” I asked.
“Leave-in conditioner. You might want to pick up a bottle to use on your days off,” she said. “Your hair is fine, so I’m using the one for babies. It’ll get the tangles out without weighing your hair down like a lot of conditioners do.”
Once my hair looked shiny and smooth, I had to sit at this picnic table and smile until some loser ran up to me and dumped spaghetti sauce on me. I knew they were going to get the pants dirty, but I didn’t think the guy would dump half a bucket of sauce on me. Who would ever eat so much spaghetti sauce? The director loved the grossed out look on my face, so I only had to do a couple takes of it. He was thrilled, but I was covered in cold sauce — not even real spaghetti sauce. They had put some junk in it to make it thicker and so it would cling better to the material. It was all gooey, too. Gross. I’d never buy their crappy product. They gave me the tiniest little spray bottle of the stain removal spray. I’d be lucky if I got two squirts out of the container. Still, I made some money… which all went to the agency to pay for the photographs in my portfolio. Oh yay.
Hana asked me at lunch one day how modeling was going. I noticed Devon got weird whenever modeling was brought up. I just shrugged and said it was okay.
“Yeah, but she can never do anything because she’s always busy working,” Devon said. “You must hate it.”
I had only done one job, so I wasn’t exactly working my butt off.
“I can still do stuff,” I said, but she just shrugged.