Braless in Wonderland (5 page)

The lobby of Finesse Model and Talent Management had a red carpet, which was really perfect, because getting past the reception area was like trying to crash the Oscars. The receptionist was totally suspicious of my parents and me, to the point where I was thinking maybe we didn't really have an appointment. She told us to wait, so now we were sitting on black leather couches facing a window, listening to her chirp, “Finesse, please hold,” about nine hundred times into her headset and say things like, “
Guten Morgen
, Fritz, I'll get Dimitri. Dimitri, client on five.”

I'd brought a book to read, but I was really distracted. Outside, the pink sidewalk on Ocean Drive was full of South Beachers gliding by on Rollerblades, hanging out in cafés, and walking mini-dogs. Two men were strolling down the sidewalk holding hands and laughing, and a woman was zipping by on a scooter wearing nothing but a bikini and a backpack. If I shifted my gaze, I could see roof after roof of pastel-colored art deco hotels. They looked like they were made of candy. Hard to believe Cape Comet was only four hours away. An Alice in Wonderland feeling was coming over me, like this big window was the looking glass, and I was Alice about to step through it, into a different world on the other side.

Twenty minutes passed. Then thirty. It gave me time to check out the framed magazine covers lining the walls.
L'Uomo Vogue, Marie Claire, Petra, Elle, Dietra
. All I could think of was what my sister had said to me last night. That was harsh. And I did
not
think everything was about me. I completely agreed with her that she should be the one sitting here, not me. I wondered if my parents were thinking the same thing. Even my mother looked more like a model than I did in her red sweater dress.

The receptionist hadn't stopped fielding calls. What did she do if she had to go to the bathroom? After forty-five minutes, a Keira Knightley look-alike walked up to us and gave us each a quick handshake. “Hi, sorry about the wait. It gets crazy this time of year.” Her British accent could cut glass. Maybe it really was Keira. “You must be Allee.” She checked out the sunglasses on top of my head, which had tape on them thanks to Robby stepping on them this morning; my bitten-down nails; and my jeans, which had looked good on me last night in front of my full-length mirror but were, I was noticing now, a little too short. At least I had the dangling faux-pearl earrings The Fluff had given me for my birthday last year.

“Right, then, you're to meet Monique first, then Momma after. Follow me, Allee. Mum, Dad, you too.”

“Who's Monique?” my mother asked, getting up.

“Monique Fine,” she said in a tone that meant she totally expected us to know who that was. When none of us responded, she added, “The owner? She has to meet potential new faces.”

“Momma's not the owner?” my mother asked.

“No. Momma runs TV, film, and commercial print. I'm a booker in her division.”

Most of Monique's office was occupied by a desk, crowded with papers, Post-its, photo slides, cards with models' photos on them, and a computer. There was a petite Asian lady sitting behind it with a geometric haircut and short red nails. “Hello, hello, welcome,” she said, standing to shake our hands. “I'm Monique Fine. Sit down, sit down.” We sat on chairs in front of her desk. Now I could see that she wasn't Asian at all. She was just a victim of Joan Rivers Syndrome. Honestly, plastic surgeons should have an addendum to their Hippocratic oath making them promise they'll never pull a face-lift so tight it stretches people's eyes or gives them Skeletor cheekbones. Talk about do no harm. Yikes.

She carried on about how nice it was to meet us and asked how old I was and what my plans were for the future. Her accent was pure New York. My parents did all the talking while I sat listening to them discuss me as if I wasn't here. After a while she turned to me, winced her collagen-filled lips into something like a smile, and said, “Allee, you have such poe-tential. What we need to do is harness it and let it fly.” Wasn't harnessing something the opposite of letting it fly? But I nodded, and she seemed to like that.

“I definitely see what Jay saw in you. Mom, Dad, look at these.” She handed my parents some laser prints, and I recognized them as the pictures Jay had taken at the mall. My parents focused on them with the same intensity as Robby searching a page of his
Where's Waldo?
book. “Poe-tential, right? Right?”

These definitely didn't look like my yearbook photos. Waves of hair fanned out around my face. My smile was…well, my smile was big. And bright. It was like looking at someone else.

But it was me. It really was me. And I didn't look beige. I looked…pretty.

I handed the pictures back to Monique. Her arms were crossed and her eyes were flicking all over my face. “Yeah, the poe-tential is there, but I'm not sure you're right for this business.”

“Why not?” Mom asked, her back going straight.

“Well, she's a little stoic, isn't she? Not too smiley.”

“But she's smiling in the pictures,” Mom said.

“Yes, she photographs well, but I sense a general lack of energy. If her look were more editorial, more fashiony, I wouldn't be concerned. It's bizarre how some girls are as bland as white rice and yet somehow they come alive on film.” She leaned forward across her desk and looked me straight in the eye. “But, Allee, your look is commercial, and it's a whole different ballgame. You have to have some personality for clients to book you. You haven't said one word.”

“Sorry,” I said.

Mom cleared her throat and said, “I assure you she has personality.” Afterward, her eyeballs shot me hard laser beams carrying a clear message:
Lighten up, Wednesday Addams.

“We'll see,” said Monique. “But of course, it's up to Momma. My bookers are the best in the business. Here, take a look at our agency book.” She took out a black and red yearbook-looking book titled
Finesse Model and Talent Management.
“Touch it, Allee. G'head, open it.”

I opened to a page that said “Aisha” at the top. Under her name, there was a close-up of Aisha, biting her lip, with smeared lipstick and streaked mascara running down her cheeks. On the opposite page, Aisha was in an ad for Candie's shoes. It looked like she might be naked, but she was holding a big newspaper in front of her. Above that, there was another photo of her on all fours in a teddy and garter belt.
On all fours!
Disgusting. What if I had to exploit myself like that? Dad made a noise like “
Mmphh.
” I “
Mmphh-
ed” him right back so he knew there was no way I would let someone take a picture of me in my underwear.

Monique slammed the book shut, barely missing my hand. “I just wanted you to see the quality of girls we rep here, what an opportunity this is for you. But I don't know. I don't sense that you want all this. Do you? Want all this?”

Her question hung in the air. Of course I didn't. That book was a meat catalog. It depicted unrealistic images of beauty, reduced women to objects. And my sister was right. I definitely didn't know anything about fashion or posing. I could make a fool of myself trying this.

“Allee, do you want to model?” Monique asked again. It was code for a whole set of questions.
Allee, do you want to escape your ant bite of a town? Stop suffocating? Do you want to stop working with Abuela at Wal-Mart?
And most important, the Mac Daddy Numero Uno question:
Do you want to have all the money you need to pay for Yale, more money than you ever thought possible?

And so I said, “Yeah. I want it more than anything else in the world.”

 

Every wall in the booking room was hung with Lucite racks full of those model picture cards I'd seen in Monique's office. One wall was women, another was men, and another was children. About a dozen people, mostly women wearing jeans, were sitting around interconnected desks wearing headsets, talking and typing into their computers. It looked like a very casual version of NASA Mission Control. Mom was totally gaping at a pregnant lady in a tube top showing off a stretched-out butterfly tattoo across her belly. Everyone here looked like they were born with the supercool gene. Once again, I was aware of my short, farty jeans. I should have snuck a trendy skirt from The Fluff's closet.

We met with Momma in the conference room. I didn't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't this. Her sixty-something face was a cross between Ozzy Osbourne and a basset hound, jowly but sweet. I couldn't help but relax a little. “Oh, Allee,” she said in a manly cigarette voice, “you're just as adorable as Jay said.”

Somehow I had to fake that energy Monique was talking about. It was hitting me that this was for real. This model madness could really pay for my dream college. I had to convince Momma I had what it takes. I had to fake it. No more Wednesday Addams for me.
Think, Allee. Personality plus, mojo, cutesy-wootsy, think…The Fluff!
“Thank you, I'm like, so happy to finally meet you,” I said, my voice bursting with fruit flavor. “We've heard so much about you and I'm like, so excited to be here. Is Momma your real name?” Dad was looking at me like I'd sprouted facial hair. Mom was a different story. Her eyes were glistening with pukey joy.

“No, sweetie, it's Gabriella Diamond, but some actors started calling me Momma Gabby years ago, and then the name just stuck.” Momma sat at the head of the table and I sat on one side, my parents on the other. There was a computer, TV, electronic equipment, some cameras and a tripod in the corner. The wall behind me was glass, looking out into the booking room. There were a lot of glass doors and cutouts here, like this place was designed by a voyeur. Model cards and actors' head shots were hanging everywhere.

“You have actors here too, not just models?” I asked.

“Oh, sure,” Momma said. “This isn't strictly a model agency, it's a model and
talent
agency, which is one of the reasons we're so sought after. Our TV department is the best in town. We rep all kinds of talent—athletes, actors, you name it. Did you know South Florida is one of the top locations for commercials nationally?”

“Yes,” I said. I'd researched the Miami modeling industry on the Internet last night and it said that.

“Now, Allee, let's talk about you,” Momma said. “I've seen your pictures. Did you bring any more with you today?”

“I have some,” my mother said, whipping out a stack from her purse. I recognized them from the NASA beach picnic.

Momma shuffled through them quickly and went, “Well, you certainly look great in a bathing suit. And the camera loves you. I think you have a look we can use right now. You're dark, but you're not too edgy.”

“What's edgy?” I asked.

“An edgy look is one that's editorial, more hard-core. Not like you. Your look is girl next door, and that's very bookable these days. We could use you for the Latin market as well as the Anglo. The important thing is that you have the Latina look, but it's not
too
Latina, which is good. Do you speak Spanish?”

“No.”

“I do,” Mom said. What, did Mom think they were going to sign her? Her inner Abuela was showing.

“Oh, here's our Greek god,” Momma said. “Dimitri books fashion. Dimitri, meet Allee. Isn't she cute?”

Dimitri gave me the up and down eye sweep and said, “Hi, Gorge.” He was the one who was gorge. His brown shoulder-length hair had that tousled, just-got-out-of-bed look, but it looked carefully styled that way. My guess was he worked on his five o'clock shadow too. It was too perfect. “Allee, Jay said you're sixteen, yes?”

“Yeah, I skipped first grade, so—”

“You're not right for the high-fashion jobs, but I can still use you on my board. I think you will book the fresher teen editorial jobs, maybe some catalog, some junior work. You could book young adult too, like early twenties. I can already think of some clients I can send your comp to.”

“She's only sixteen!” Dad boomed out of nowhere, scaring the crap out of all of us. “She doesn't do anything adult!”

Momma said, “Howard—it is Howard, right? We'll only send her out for whatever castings are appropriate for her age and her look. Allee doesn't have to do anything she's not comfortable with.”

“What's a comp?” I asked.

Momma pointed to the model cards on the walls. “Those are composite cards. It's what you take to show clients, like your business card.”

A phone buzzed on the table, and the receptionist's voice said, “Dimitri, Odile on three. Says it's an emergency.”

What could possibly be an emergency in modeling? He rattled off what could only be Greek cursing, and then he stood up and kissed me on both cheeks! Then he walked out so fast that by the time I said “Bye,” he was already gone. My mother craned her neck to catch a glimpse of him before the door closed. Gross. She was old enough to be his mother.

“So how soon can this young lady move down here?” Momma asked my parents. “We have a casting for Roxy clothing next week and she'd be perfect for it. It's mid-January. We're hitting the peak of season now. We can't wait too much longer to try her out. The season starts winding down in late April. By late spring, it's dead around here.”