Diary of an Ugly Duckling (8 page)

nize Ma? Because I really don’t see it that way—not

at all.

Besides, I don’t want to talk about her, or her

secrets or any of that stuff right now—not on the day

of my big night out!

You’ll be happy to know that after the embarrass-

ment in Marciella’s, I pulled some kind of outfit to-

gether. It’s not as glamorous as I would have liked, but

it’s nice, I think. Of course, I’ll still be the fat chick, but

I’m going to try hard to look as good as I can. Fortu-

nately, I also have my sparkling personality to rely on—

along with a fantastic repertoire of scenes from

Hollywood’s greatest!

Still . . . I’m nervous, P. Really nervous. I think he

DIARY OF AN UGLY DUCKLING

59

may really like me. God, I hope so. But the things Ma

says get under my skin sometimes and make me

doubt myself. And it doesn’t help that I have that trou-

ble brewing at work, either. Sometimes it feels like

everything’s always against me and it will take a mon-

umental change to turn it around . . .

Or maybe I just need to eat a few more Oreos!

Wish you were here,

Ugly Sister

Too trendy for words.

That’s what the place was, considering it was

in a basement, sandwiched between an Indian

restaurant and an art gallery in a “transitional”

neighborhood in Brooklyn.

It’s at least aptly named
, Audra thought, studying

the bright neon script spelling out the word: Caverna.

A cinnamon-skinned teenager with long, black

hair, wearing a tiny beaded halter, stood just outside

the entrance dragging determinedly on a cigarette

and pretending not to shiver while a not-quite-

spring breeze caught the smoke and bore it away. A

short, older-looking white kid stood near her, talk-

ing excitedly, but the chick barely seemed to be listen-

ing. As Audra descended the five steps toward the

bar’s entrance, the odd couple fixed their collective

gaze on Audra, making her feel self-conscious all

over again: Her nicest black pants were tighter than

she would have liked, and the yellow-shawl-like top

from the plus-size store that had been her second

choice flapped in the breeze like a tent. The pointy

toes of her new shoes pinched her feet. Audra

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Karyn Langhorne

wished there were time for one last check of the

makeup slathered on her face like a mask by a deter-

mined beauty consultant a few hours ago, but there

wasn’t. She was here now . . . and acne or no acne,

running mascara or lipsticked teeth, her look would

have to be good enough.

Still, if she weren’t mistaken, the kids were giving

her that same folded-lip look her mother had given

her just before she’d walked out the door . . . and to

make matters worse, she thought she heard the

smoking girl burst into a twitter of sudden laughter

in the space between the time Audra’s foot crossed

the threshold of the club and the second after, when

the door thudded closed behind her.

She shook off the sound with difficulty and

looked around her.

The owners of Caverna had taken the cave thing

literally. It was dark except for a few torch-shaped

sconces set strategically around the room. The ceil-

ing dripped with stalactites and the tables and

chairs were designed so they looked like stalagmites

growing up from the cave floor. Audra thought she

heard the sound of dripping water under the pump-

ing rhythm of hip-hop music, but could not locate

its source among the crowd of youthful bodies jam-

ming every square inch of the place.

Sleek girls in slim, short skirts and high heels,

showing brown midriffs from tiny halters danced

with boys in low-slung pants and slick-patterned

shirts. Other girls were more conservative in their

strapless, gauzy chiffon and flouncy, asymmetrical

hems, but all of them were so attractive and ener-

getic that Audra hesitated, the worst memories of

DIARY OF AN UGLY DUCKLING

61

herself as an uncool high schooler returning with a

vengeance.

This was a mistake
, a voice from deep inside her an-

nounced, flashing back to many a high-school

dance, when Audra’s only companion had been her

own isolation, her own loneliness.
There’s nothing for

you here
. Audra’s feet seemed inclined to agree. They

were already shuffling her backward away from the

dancing and the music and the whole party scene.

This isn’t high school. He invited me and we’re going
,

Audra told her juvenile self, pulling the mantle of

dead Hollywood dames around her consciousness

like a shield. She strode deeper into the place, her

too-round hips bumping and jostling against the

sharp angles of the dancing young people, scanning

the corners of the room for her host’s broad-

shouldered silence. She had already decided: She’d

greet him with that famous line from
All About Eve
:

“Fasten your seat belts. It’s going to be a bumpy

night!” and see what developed from there.

“Marks!”

Audra turned toward her name and saw him,

standing in a dark crevice of the room where

the stone bar curved toward darkness. “Marks!”

Bradshaw shouted again over the music, waving his

arm. “Here!”

The sound of his voice erased her carefully pre-

pared dialogue, but the awkward memories of

teenageness also dissipated, so Audra wasn’t en-

tirely mad at him. Her heart skipped a quick beat

as a feeling of excitement and eagerness replaced

the unease that had been there a moment before.

She waved back, smiling, and began her approach,

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Karyn Langhorne

moving determinedly through the dancing bodies

toward the rear of the room.

He looked delicious: like the sweetest bar of milk

chocolate, luscious from the gleaming skin of his

head to the tips of his toes, and Audra could imag-

ine gobbling him up in a single serving as she took

in the pure sexiness of the man. He looked like he’d

just stepped out of a magazine, from his crisp

seventies-style butterfly-collared shirt in a soft fab-

ric that looked like linen, opened to the smooth

mocha of his perfect throat. He wore dark slacks

and shoes. But it was his face that most capti-

vated Audra’s attention: those liquid eyes, strong

cheekbones—and those lips! Audra imagined her-

self getting a nibble of those beautiful bow-shaped

lips and just the thought of it was better than the

thought of a bag full of Oreos—with a candy bar on

the side.

She pulled at the yellow shawl, baring a bit more

rounded, ebony shoulder, and willed the butterflies

in the pit of her stomach to stillness as a wide,

happy grin spilled across her face.

“Hi, Bradshaw—”

“Art,” he corrected, blessing her with a curve of

those luscious lips.

Audra’s heart did another desperate flutter up

her windpipe and then down to her kneecaps before

she panted out, “Art.”

“Glad you could make it. You look . . .” his eyes

swept over her. Audra gave the yellow top another

tug, showing even more plump shoulder, before he

finished, “nice.”

“Thanks. So do you.” She glanced around. “Looks

DIARY OF AN UGLY DUCKLING

63

like your daughter has a good turnout.” She peered

around the dance floor. “Which one is she—?”

A woman approached them, gliding confidently

up to Bradshaw and slipping her arm through his

with a certain possessiveness that couldn’t be mis-

taken for anything else. At first, Audra thought she

must be Bradshaw’s daughter, but in another instant

she realized her mistake.

Her skin was the shade of roasted almonds—fair

and smooth. Her hair, long and dark, burnt straight

and smooth by the latest chemical process, gleamed

off her forehead until it disappeared down her back

in a tumbling wave that brushed against the soft

fabric of her blouse. Audra’s breath caught in her

throat: She was wearing the same top Audra had

struggled so mightily to fit into the day before, but

clearly, based on the delicate bones of her shoulders

and the thinness of her, in a very much smaller size.

A tiny flare sprang to life in Audra’s soul, burning

with the unfairness of it all . . . and then the woman

locked eyes with her.

“Audra Marks,” Art Bradshaw turned toward the

woman, his eyes shining with an emotion Audra

thought must be desire, but she couldn’t be certain

in the low lights. “I’d like you to meet Esmeralda

Prince.”

Esmeralda Prince. Esmeralda Prince. The name

tripped off the tongue, made little skipping sounds

through the mind. It was a pretty name . . . one that

suited her, conjuring as it did the very kind of

smoky, distant beauty this woman was in possession

of. Audra stared at her, drinking in every detail of

her features, from the perfect café au lait of her skin

64

Karyn Langhorne

to the sculpted bones of her cheeks and the way the

designer blouse hung as perfectly off her shoulder

as it had on the boutique mannekin. Audra realized

that the top she’d wanted to buy wasn’t a top at all,

but a tunic—and Esmeralda wore it like a dress,

with nothing beneath it but a pair of stiletto heels.

Audra watched her green eyes, shadowed with dra-

matic makeup as they flickered with some unspo-

ken thought and wondered if there were enough

makeup on the planet to make her own face look

like that.

Esmeralda Prince appraised Audra dispassion-

ately as she quirked an exquisitely shaped eyebrow

over a lovely sea-green eye, then shook her dark

tresses.

“Nice to meet you,” she said in a husky, sexy

voice.

With a fresh stab of ugliness, Audra felt the con-

trast. Standing side by side, Esmeralda was like a

sunrise and Audra the deepest midnight; Esmeralda

was a leggy twig . . . and Audra a dumpy donut, a

hole in her center where her heart should have been.

But it wasn’t the voice or the woman’s obvious

beauty that made a sharp pain skewer her heart like

a shish kebab. It was the way Art Bradshaw’s hand

curved over the woman’s shoulder, the way his eyes

locked on her face when she spoke, even though she

wasn’t looking at him.

Art Bradshaw was completely in this elegant

woman’s thrall . . . in the same fascinated way Au-

dra was in his.

Queen of Denial
. . . her mother murmured in her

ear.
Queenie D
. . .

DIARY OF AN UGLY DUCKLING

65

Looking at the two of them was like a rock in the

face of her perfect fantasy. Audra watched her illu-

sions fracture and shatter like so much glass.

But there they were, staring at her, waiting for her

to say something. Audra suppressed the thousand

needles of mortifications prickling beneath her skin,

and tossed her head, diva-style.

“Charmed, darling,” she purred, offering a limp

hand in perfect imitation of the silver screen legend.

“Bette Davis,” Bradshaw said immediately, his

smooth low voice rumbling over the hip-hop beat

surrounding them. To Esmeralda: “Audra’s a fan of

the old movies.”

Esmeralda’s eyebrow arched even higher as she

said in a not entirely pleasant tone: “You two would

be perfect for each other.” She reached for a small,

shimmery handbag resting on the table. “I’ll be in

the ladies’.”

There was an awkward pause as she shrugged

Bradshaw’s hand from her shoulder and stalked

away.

Art Bradshaw frowned. “Don’t mind her,” he be-

gan, his eyes following the sway of the woman’s

hips as she disappeared. “She’s—”

“Rude,” a youthful voice completed the sentence,

replete with attitude.

Bradshaw turned toward the table behind him. In

the dim candlelight, a teenage girl in a relatively de-

mure black dress hunched over a soda, her shoul-

ders drawn tight to her shoulders, as though trying

to blend into the scenery.

“Cut it out, Penny,” Bradshaw said, warning in

his tone.

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Karyn Langhorne

“But it’s true, Dad—”

“No, it’s not—”

“She only gets away with it because she’s pretty,”

Penny insisted. “The rules are always different if

you’re pretty enough—”

“That’s enough, Penny,” Bradshaw snapped,

sounding at the crust of his patience. “Now come

and say hello to Ms. Marks.”

“Do I have to?”

“Now!” Bradshaw barked, making it clear that

that remaining crust of his patience had now been

consumed. Even over the loud music, several youth-

ful heads turned toward them.

Penny slid out of her chair, rolling her eyes. “Gee,