Pretty in Plaid: A Life, a Witch, and a Wardrobe, or the Wonder Years Before the Condescending, Egomaniacal Self-Centered Smart-Ass Phase (13 page)

Again, she’s right. I don’t want to quit, because I’m confident I can win. Most of the score is based on an interview, which, again, hello, I’ve been preparing for my whole life. Plus talent weighs heavily—I’m planning to do a dramatic interpretation. I might not be the best actress in the school, but I guarantee I’ll be the best in the pageant. Plus, how great will I look in a crown?

Grudgingly, I give in. “Okay, okay, you win. I do the pageant and I wear the white dress.”

As the cashier completes the transaction and wraps the gown in plastic, my mother tries to make me feel better. “You know the white dress will serve so many purposes. Not only will you wear it to the pageant and dance, but you’ll have it for college formals. Really, this is almost like a bridesmaid’s dress—cut it off and you can wear it again and again.” I ignore this last bit of advice because it comes from a woman who incorporated enormous magenta fur muffs into her wedding party garb. Bet she told her bridesmaids they could reuse their muffs, too.

We leave Hudson’s and we’re strolling by the ice rink when my mom slaps herself on the head. “I almost forgot! We have to get you a bathing suit while we’re up here.”

“For what? Both my suits from last year are still good.”

“No, for the swimsuit competition.”

And that’s when I realize I’m a month away from standing in front of an entire auditorium with nothing between me, my naked chest, and the audience but a millimeter of Lycra.

Suddenly the white dress seems delightfully conservative.

This
is the prom?

This
is what all those cheesy songs and overwrought John Hughes movies were about?

This
is what I’ve been building up to during my last twelve years of public education?

This?

Most magical night of my life, my ass.

Listen, I can accept that we’re not having our prom in a big hotel ballroom like every other school in the universe. The closest nice place is in Fort Wayne and we already have the drinking-est, driving-est senior class in years,
⁷⁹
so obviously making everyone travel thirty Night Train-fueled miles each way is a bad idea. And it’s not like we could hold the prom in the small conference room of the LK Motel, where my dad attends his Rotary Club meetings on the first Thursday of every month. I understand the only logical place to host a dance for five hundred seniors and their dates is our gym—but does it have to look like a ballgame could break out any second now? For Christ’s sake, I can see the nets! The scoreboard is visible! People are dancing on the goddamned three-point line!

The junior class is responsible for throwing the prom. Last year my class spent nine months turning the basketball court into One Fucking Enchanted Evening Under the Sea. We had people walking around in scuba suits and mermaid costumes and we created a sandy beach area where kids could kick their shoes off and dance barefoot. Anything vaguely sports-related was draped in fishing nets and strewn with seashells. We made giant Neptune-y pieces out of papier-mâché. We did
not
get together a week beforehand to blow up balloons, string some streamers, and hang a half-assed banner painted with some child’s interpretation of how the French Quarter would look if it were one-dimensional and located next to the concession stand in a gymnasium.

Instead of decorating the entire gym, our lame juniors only created enough artwork to fill a small portion of it. They built a stage for the band, but there’s nothing behind it but two-thirds of open court. Also? I’m curious—is the French Quarter supposed to smell like sweat socks? You’d have thought they’d at least put out some candles or potpourri.

There’s not enough room for everyone to dance—prom’s sole purpose—so most of us are stuck in the bleachers or at the rented wrought-iron tables. Actually, I’m okay with this. Jimmy and I got up for the first Journey song and I quickly realized I should not lift my arms past my shoulders if I don’t want to flash the entire senior class. (At least I didn’t find this out while doing the victory walk-’n’-wave at the pageant.)

For the first time I’m glad I’m not in the lacy peach gown because a bunch of other girls keep getting their dresses tangled up in the chairs’ grillwork. I spend much of my night watching classmates trying to mend rips while crying off all their mascara. Their dates awkwardly attempt to comfort them—fail—and the chaperones are frantically breaking into the Home Ec room to procure thread, needles, and safety pins. And the junior class members are doing their best to hide from the seniors, who are shrieking,
“This is all your fault!”
Honestly?
Carrie
had a better time at prom.

When it finally comes to its merciful end, we only have half an hour to change and make it back to the gym before after-prom begins. I live about ten miles from school, so we go to Jimmy’s house in town. I’ve been planning my post-prom outfit for weeks. I settle on some turquoise capri pants and a baby pink cotton sweater cut in the shape of a polo shirt. I’ve got a big asymmetrical white leather belt that hangs low on my hips and loads of white bangles to stack up my arms. I have three pairs of white shoes to choose from and an enormous palette of every color eye shadow Maybelline manufactures.

Yet as I unpack my bag I realize I brought everything except for the most important piece—a bra. I spend fifteen minutes just working up the courage to ask Jimmy’s mom for one. Which isn’t embarrassing. At all. We get back to the gym moments before the door closes and they lock us in for the next four hours.

The lock-in is supposed to keep us from drinking and d-o-i-n-g it tonight and it’s an effective strategy . . . for those of us who make it back in time. Those who get locked out end up going to the woods by the reservoir for a big party.
⁸⁰
Jimmy’s been begging me to ditch after-prom, but I’m not about to make out with anyone while wearing his mother’s bra—there’s simply not enough pie. Besides, the junior class is holding a raffle and what if they give away a ten-speed bike and I’m not there to claim it? Not that I want a dumb old bike—I just don’t want anyone else to have it if it’s supposed to be mine.

The post-prom event ends at five a.m. and I go right home (sadly, bike-free) and crawl into bed. My mother wakes me up at seven a.m. to hear all about the night then blows a gasket when I ask her to please get out and let me sleep for a while. My sarcastic (exhausted) mouth gets me grounded for the next two weeks.

An hour later, my dad makes me get up to wash the car. Since I’m grounded, I can’t even take it to the car wash.

Ridiculous.

Judge Not, Lest Ye Be Singing a Billy Ocean Song

(White Satin Gown)

“S
ay cheese!”

I don’t want to say cheese. I want to
eat
cheese. Unfortunately, that’s been off the menu in the weeks I’ve been getting ready for this stupid pageant.

I lean back against the tree and give a three-quarter smile. Three-quarters is the perfect amount for a photograph. Grin too big and you’re nothing but teeth, gums, and unattractive forehead wrinkles. Too small and you look like a sourpuss.

It’s superbright out here and I squint until a second before the photo’s snapped—that way my eyes are wide open in the shot and I don’t get blinded while I wait.

I applied Clinique bronzing gel to create contours on my face. I used navy liner to make my eyes brighter and cool-toned dark lipstick to make my teeth appear whiter. In person I’m a tad drag queeny, but I should look great on film.

“All right, one more time and . . . you’re done.” The photographer waves me off and then begins to monkey with his camera.

“Are you sure? Don’t you want to take some more?” I ask. I’m here in the park with the rest of the Miss Cow Town contestants. Our pageant is part of the city’s Ancestry Days festival and our photographs will be included in the newspaper’s special circular that comes out a week beforehand. I’m slightly aggravated because all the other contestants have posed for dozens of pictures but the photographer only takes, like, three of me.

“No, I’m good,” he replies. He calls contestant Lee over and I return to sit at the picnic table with Christy.

“That was quick,” she observes.

“Wasn’t it?” I ask.

“Did you make him mad or something? Why didn’t he have you pose by the water and on the ledge like everyone else?” She uses a vent brush to puff up her hair, then smoothes on some cream blush.

“That’s an excellent question.”

I wonder if it has something to do with my mother’s feud with the local paper? A while ago, the paper ran an article about a woman in town who’d found a letter Abraham Lincoln had written in a box of her grandmother’s things. The paper was so excited to have a local item of historical significance, they devoted half the front page
⁸¹
to the discovery. The second my mom read the article, she knew the letter sounded familiar . . . mostly because we’d already seen the same exact letter on a Girl Scout outing to the National Archives in Washington, D.C. She called the paper and informed them of their error, and they were duly mortified.

The paper printed a tiny retraction days later, but there’s been bad blood between my mother and the editor ever since. I suspect this has less to do with her discovery and more to do with her suggestion that they write an article on
her
since she’s in possession of a gift shop copy of the Declaration of Independence.
⁸²

Christy asks, “Who’s up after Lee?”

“Heather Mueller.”

“Then I may as well get comfortable.”

We both roll our eyes. Heather’s got a boyfriend now so she’s a little nicer to people than she used to be. Regardless, we’re still not fans. Buffy, our pageant director, has taken a shine to her because she’s a great singer. (Or maybe she’s just impressed that Heather was born in Paris?)

Buffy’s been transparent in her belief that Heather has the most potential in the Miss Indiana pageant
⁸³
so she’s been personally coaching her on everything. She even gave her a different dress for the evening wear competition. Now, instead of having a fullish satin gown like the rest of us, Heather’s set to compete in a skintight, straight silk sheath covered in a million rhinestones. With one extra-sparkly dress, Heather’s been transformed into s-e-x on a stick. And the rest of us resemble a pack of debutantes. Gee, I wonder what the judges will prefer?

Buffy’s pretty neutral about me and Christy. We aren’t her favorites, but she’s also not openly hostile toward us. She
despises
Lee and Dee, Lee because she lives in sin with her boyfriend, and Dee for having uneven eyes and a twisted spine that gives her kind of a lurching walk. Sin and spine notwithstanding, both these girls dance way better than Christy or me, yet they’re stuck in the very back for our production number. Plus, Buffy wouldn’t approve either of their bathing suits and made Dee cry by criticizing her singing in the talent rehearsal. (Yet she brought in a vocal coach to work with the already-perfect Heather. No favoritism here!) Also, Lee and Dee got stuck with the worst sponsors—the lube shop and the oil refinery. I’m totally appalled by the preferential treatment. I’d expect this kind of behavior in a bigger city, but we’re in a tiny little burg and we’re competing for $500 scholarships. Seriously, who’s got that much stake in a meaningless local pageant?

Just as Lee finishes her session with the photographer, Buffy swoops in out of nowhere and personally directs Heather’s shoot for the next half an hour.

Aarrgh.

My picture runs in the paper on Sunday and by Wednesday’s pageant rehearsal, I’ve already determined that I’m going to win Miss Photogenic.

How do I know?

Because I’m the only contestant who receives letters from prisoners in the local jail.

Three cheers for me! Three cheers for my drag queen makeup! And three cheers for the paper’s decision to print our home addresses!
⁸⁴

The pageant is tonight so today’s chock-full of activities. Our first order of business is the Cow Town Ancestry Days parade.
⁸⁵
I’d assumed we’d all ride on a float, and I’m sorely disappointed when I find out that’s not the case. Instead of building a flashy, exciting float and having us appear all together in pageanty solidarity, Buffy recruits the local Corvette club to drive us separately.
⁸⁶
And really, what’s more festive than watching a person ride by really slowly in a car?

We’re supposed to perch on the trunk with our legs hanging in the backseat. This wouldn’t be scary if (a) our parade route weren’t hilly and (b) I weren’t in a very short skirt. Complicating matters, I have to ride with my nemesis Justine Moore, whose dad is president of the Corvette club. She drives the entire parade route in fits and stops and by the time it’s over, I deserve a goddamned crown just for hanging on. And a trophy for not showing my underpants.

I’m windblown and crabby when we get to the high school for the interview portion of the pageant, but it’s fine because I’m totally going to ace this part. Put Heather in all the shimmery dresses you want, Buffy, but you can’t keep the judges from seeing my shapely brain!

I enter the room, trying to recall all the poise lessons we learned in practice. The only bit I remember is not to sit all the way back in the chair, which . . . why? Why is that impolite? I’m concentrating so hard on not touching the back of the chair that when I go to sit I almost miss landing on the front. Nice. Bonus points for me.

One of the judges, the local undertaker, says, “Jennifer, your bio says that you want to be a journalist.”

Am I supposed to be doing something with my hands? I’ve been told not to gesture, which is like asking me not to speak at all. Should they hang by my sides? That looks weird, like I’m waiting for the guards to strap them down so I can be electrocuted. They must go in my lap—should they be folded? Not folded? And what does hand folding entail anyway? Fingers linked? Unlinked? Stacked on top of each other like a set of flapjacks? Ooh, flapjacks—buttery, fluffy, maple syrup covered . . .

The judge interrupts my inner monologue. “Jeni?”

“Huh?” I snap to attention, deciding on the palms-down flap-jack stack. “Yes, hi. I’m Jeni.” I give them a three-quarter smile. Stunning!

The undertaker cuts a sideways glance at the Realtor to his left. “Yes, you introduced yourself already. I asked you a question.”

“Oh, sorry, I was looking at my hands. It’s very hard for me to talk without them but Buffy says it’s rude, but . . . whatever. What’d you want to know?” I flash another grin. My lip easily slides past my teeth because I put Vaseline on them. Actually, I put too much Vaseline on them and it looked like I’d eaten a piece of wax fruit so I had to floss the excess out with a folded note card.

“I asked what your thoughts were about the journalists who were kidnapped in Beirut. If you were in that situation, what would you do?”

“Oh, that’s easy! I wouldn’t get into that situation. I don’t want to be
that kind
of journalist. I want to be a television journalist who sits on a couch and has coffee with famous people. I imagine the set of
Good Morning America
is supersafe. Unless it’s, like, the day the people from the zoo come? And there are tigers on the set? Although I bet there’s a guy there with a tranq gun because there’s no way Joan Lunden is going to let some big cat slash up her face and mess with her moneymaker. Or wait, has that ever happened on
Good Morning America
? Or am I thinking of Johnny Carson? He’s always got snakes from the San Diego Zoo trying to climb into his pants, doesn’t he? But they probably aren’t poisonous so I’m sure it’s fine.” Buffy coached us to be honest and bubbly. I’m so effervescent right now I may well float off my chair.

“I . . . um, wow. Moving on, can you tell us about your platform?”

“Come again?”

“Your platform.” I smile and blink. Oh, no! Buffy specifically told us we didn’t need to pick a platform until the Miss Indiana pageant. “Your cause.” I mentally scramble to come up with something. The judges interpret my silence as misunderstanding. “The issue you feel strongly about. For example, Heather’s platform was touching children with music.” Okay, number one, eww . . . touching kids with anything sounds totally pervy, and number two, why does she have a fucking platform and no one else does?

Funny seems to be my only option here. “Heh”—I giggle nervously—“I’d say my platform is not getting kidnapped by the
Beirutians
! Heh!”

“I assume by
Beirutian
you mean the Lebanese?”

So . . . yeah. I might not have the verbal ability upon which I’d been banking. Possibly I should brush up on my interview skills before my first day at
Good Morning America
? Or, like, consult a map? Oh, well, I’ll do better in the swimsuit portion.

After all, I’m the only girl who doesn’t have to pad her suit.