Part 4 (2/2)
”No gold medal,” Sarah adds.
Leah snaps the lid closed on the instrument case. ”No press conference.”
Sarah winks. ”No finale singing with the Amabile guys.”
Meadow's eyebrows tease up. ”We wouldn't want to jeopardize that.” She scrutinizes my face. ”Drop your bag. Try to stand straight.” She walks around me. ”Statuesque. Nice cheekbones. The jaw is a little heavy.” She grabs a chunk of my hair. ”At least there's lots of this to work with.” She pulls off my gla.s.ses. I can't see much, but I can tell Meadow is in her element now-way more than when she's singing. ”We can do a lot with your eyes. Have you ever tried contacts?”
”Whoa. Hold on. You think you can Glinda me? It won't work. I'm magic proof.”
”Oh, honey.” Meadow rubs her hands together. ”Glinda's got nothing on me.”
chapter 4.
REMAKE.
”What happened to your hair?” Scott flicks it with his finger and makes a section puff up as he sits down beside me in the caf.
”Being soloist has a price.” I feel naked. It's still frizzy. No way am I going to add hours to my morning routine straightening my hair with that nasty tool of torture they gave me. It's just school. But my hair is way layered and a good foot shorter. It looked fantastic at the salon. Today I'm the Beast on shock therapy.
”They made you cut your hair?” Scott shoves a forkful of spaghetti in his mouth. ”I liked your hair.”
Only Scott could like my hideous hair.
As soon as our official invite to the fourteenth annual Choral Olympics arrived, Meadow got started on me. She called it a makeover slumber party and invited Sarah and Leah and the rest of the prettiest girls in the choir-and me. No bones about who was getting made over.
I put down my sandwich. ”They ambushed me.”
”A bunch of skinny wimp choir girls ambushed you ?”
”Meadow sat me down in her glitzy bathroom.” She's got a Hollywood-type vanity mirror. ”And did my face-troweled it on.” All the girls gasped and said I looked beautiful. I put my gla.s.ses back on so I could see what they were talking about. Kind of ruined the effect. Then I had to tell them all about getting contacts when I was twelve, how excited I was, what a disaster it ended up being. I remember telling my mom that my fiery red hypersensitive eyes didn't hurt at all. She flushed them down the toilet.
”Jeez, Bethie, that's rough. Explains the new breakout.” He goes back to his spaghetti.
”So nice of you to notice.” Last month's fading crop of hormone-induced zits are being crowded out by a fresh load of fine red b.u.mps all over my face. Not just my usual zit zone.
He swallows. ”Stupid brats. Who do they think they are?”
”Beautiful. They don't understand ugly.” I tear my sandwich in two.
”You're not ugly, Beth.” He opens his milk.
”I just wanted to go home and scrub.” I take a bite and chew. ”They made me sleep over.”
Scott puts his milk carton back down. ”They waited until you fell asleep and then whacked your hair off?”
”Does it look that bad?”
”It's all uneven.”
”Layers. Supposed to be stylish. Meadow got us up early, and we went to a salon.”
”c.r.a.p, Beth.” He picks up my hand. ”You're wearing nail polish.”
”I know. I can't get it off. You should see my toes.” They waxed my bushy eyebrows to a thin line. I'm not telling where else they waxed. They tried to glue fake eyelashes on me, but after the waxing, I got a bit hysterical, put my foot down.
”You should get your money back from that haircut.” He guzzles down his carton of milk and eyes my apple.
”Meadow's mom paid.” I roll my apple over to him. ”She's the mastermind behind the madness. She got her stylist to fit me in.” He washed, conditioned, hot oiled, relaxed, and dumped an entire bottle of detangler on my hair-like I'm a bag lady who never brushed it. Then he ironed it flat, cut long layers, and a ”fringe” that I can't keep out of my eyes. ”Meadow's mom wanted him to dye it, but they ran out of time.”
”What color?” Scott takes a big bite of my apple.
”Maybe blonde.” I shove the bangs out of my eyes, but they fall right back into them. ”I stormed out of there in the middle of the debate. I don't want to be blonde. Can you imagine me blonde?”
”No.” He reaches over and slides my bangs out of my eyes for me. ”Your hair color is nice.”
”Mousy brown? Kiss it good-bye. How do you think I'll look with highlights?”
He puts the apple down, gets serious. ”Just like the rest of them.”
”That's the idea.”
”But it isn't you.” He stares hard right into my hyper-magnified eyeb.a.l.l.s. ”I thought they wanted you.”
”They want a star. Meadow's mom says my nose is okay. We don't have time to change that, anyway.”
Meadow gave me a bag of bra inserts. Since her surgery, she doesn't need them anymore. Gross. I'm not using her cast-off inserts. Next Sat.u.r.day we're all getting measured for our new performance wardrobe. Then Meadow's mom, Meadow and I-I begged Leah and Sarah to come along to keep it sane-are going shopping for the perfect push-up bra, designer jeans, and scoop-neck tops that show off my ”striking clavicle.”
Scott puts his hand on my arm. ”Will I recognize you when they're done?”
”Just look for the tall girl with highlights b.u.mping into things.”
”No plans to cut your legs off?” He glances down at my jeans.
”Shhh. She's got spies everywhere. We don't want to give her ideas.” My cell buzzes. I jump.
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