The Pretty App (16 page)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

THE PRETTY APP LIVE
PREMIERES #1 IN ITS TIMESLOT

Public is thrilled by the overwhelmingly enthusiastic response to the Pretty App and
The Pretty App Live
, a joint production with SBC Network, announced Alec Pierce, CEO of Public Corporation. Join hundreds of thousands of others who’ve taken part in the
Pretty App Live
’s interactive fan site filled with quizzes, contestant profiles, live video footage, and much, much more. Download the Pretty App and visit ThePrettyAppLive.com today for your inside look at the hottest reality show on television.

3:46 p.m.

LiveTvJunkie.com

With the live premiere only hours away, it seems
America has already found her sweetheart. Blake Dawkins’s weepy video footage has made her a fan favorite, as thousands of viewers ask: How can this sweet, beautiful girl think she doesn’t belong?

But what will tonight bring? Check out this video of Ice Queen Sabrina calling Farm Hand Amy a “manure-shoveling cowgirl.” We predict high drama as the most beautiful young women in America compete for the title of Prettiest.

3:52 p.m.

EntertainmentNet.com

Will Danny Beaton’s arrest preclude him from judging tonight’s the
Pretty App Live
beauty pageant on SBC? It appears not. After being taken into police custody at 4:27 a.m. today and being charged with disorderly conduct, public urination, and animal endangerment (a surveillance video shows him peeing on a pigeon near the Mulholland Fountain in Los Angeles), the pop star is rumored to be out on bail. Minutes ago this tweet appeared on his authenticated Twitter account.

@DannyBeaton: who’z pumped 4 tonight’s live premiere of The Pretty App Live? Tune in at 9 pm EST to see me and the beauties hit the stage. #PigeonsSuck

3:59 p.m.

TeensBlogToo.com

By Xi Liang

We already have a favorite
Pretty App Live
contestant here at TeensBlogToo. (That is, if she shows up for the competition!) How can you not love Blake Dawkins? She’s so insecure! Can’t even believe how emotional I got when she started crying and ran away from the other girls. And then her confession in the woods about how she hasn’t always been a good person? I totally know how she feels! We’ve all made mistakes, Blake! Your honesty makes you beautiful.

Keep being real, Blake Dawkins, and you’ll get my vote!

4:06 p.m.

RealWomenSoundOff.com

By Betty Collins

Give me a freaking break! Why is America falling for Blake Dawkins’s “poor me” routine? Oh yeah, Blake, the rest of us fatties and uglies feel so sorry for you, you gorgeous piece of crap!

I’m so sick of these entitled types whining about their misfortunes. Blake Dawkins is ready for Hollywood with her 2-bit sob story.

Love, Betty

4:09 pm

Twitter.com

@JoannaMartin: @BlakeDawkins we are so proud of you! America loves you, just like us! @JoleneMartin @XanderKnight

A
t five that evening, after obsessing with Audrey over the online responses to
The Pretty App Live
, I tore through the woods and across the lawn toward the mansion. Marsha sat on the front steps. Her headset was lopsided, and she was chewing on something that looked like a straw. When I got closer I saw it was a Pixy Stix.

“Blake,” Marsha said, perking up. She dumped the powdered pink contents of the Pixy Stix onto the grass. “You decided to stay and compete?”

I nodded. “And I’m sorry I ran off like that,” I said. “It was stupid.” The wind had picked up, and the cool breeze felt good on the back of my neck. “Am I still eligible?”

Marsha let out a bitter laugh. “You couldn’t get kicked off now if you tried, baby doll.” She smirked at me. “Reality TV loves a train wreck.”

I’d watched enough reality television to know exactly
what she meant, and it stung.
A train wreck.
That was how she saw me?

“You’re the one solo-eating soggy Pixy Stix,” I said before I could stop myself.

Marsha raised her eyebrows. She tucked a strand of red hair behind her ear, and pink sugar dusted her fingertips and left a trail along her cheek. “I can’t stop eating these ever since I quit smoking. Don’t ever start.”

“Good advice,” I said.

“Anyway, if you listen to what people are saying online, your little maneuver actually turned out to be pretty smart.”

I couldn’t tell if she was annoyed or impressed. She had one of those scrunched faces that was hard to read. Mostly she just looked constipated.

“I won’t do it again,” I said, feeling completely unprepared for how this was all turning out.

Marsha stood and brushed grass from her black jeans. “Come on,” she said. She pushed through the heavy wooden door and I followed. The dining room was still set like the Queen of England might visit. “You’re a little late for the Dressing Room, which is where you’ll be expected at five p.m. sharp every night before the show.” She led me down a long, marble-tiled hallway. A cameraman appeared and started following me.

Marsha opened the door to a space the size of three classrooms with floor-to-ceiling mirrors just like in the Martins’ basement. A waist-level shelf ran along the perimeter like a ballet bar. Twelve stations were set up, each with a black leather chair, two curling irons, a hair straightener,
and so many beauty products that the room looked like the makeup department at Macy’s. My luggage and garment bags were waiting in the only empty station. It was like they knew I’d show up.

The eleven other contestants stared at me: Delores with her periwinkle eyes and auburn curls, Casey with her whiter-than-toothpaste teeth, Delia with her weapon-sharp cheekbones. I tried to smile, but my mouth wouldn’t cooperate. I didn’t want to feel so nervous. Audrey had told me to pretend that these girls were any eleven girls at Harrison, but it’s not like I felt comfortable at Harrison, either. Maybe I could pretend I was at Notre Dame with Audrey, or in Chicago with Leo. They were the last places I’d felt peaceful.

“You all remember Blake,” Marsha said.

“Hi, Blake,” Amy, Maddie, and Betsy said, but the rest of the girls just stared at me. Sabrina looked like she might start laughing. I beelined for my station between Amy and Maddie.

Marsha checked her watch. “You all have five minutes until the makeup artists arrive and we start filming. Use this time to change into your dresses, unless you want that filmed for national television.”

She turned on her heel and left us alone. I felt the heat of the girls’ stares on my back. I tried to act casual, stuffing my luggage beneath the makeup counter at my station, but I heard their whispers. I unzipped the garment bag holding a sleek black Yigal Azrouël dress. Lindsay had let me borrow it after she assured me it was
sophisticated yet provocative,
like Angelina Jolie
. Just looking at it draping perfectly on the hanger made me feel a little better.

Amy cleared her throat and I flinched. I didn’t want to talk about what had happened with anyone. “Wow,” she said. When I turned, I saw she was staring at my dress.

Maddie from Wisconsin whistled her appreciation. “Last season’s Yigal Azrouël capsule collection?” she asked.

I nodded. Maddie would’ve been Lindsay’s favorite. She was by far the most fashionable besides me, and that was only because Lindsay had picked out all my outfits.

“So what happened, Blake?” Sabrina asked in a singsong voice from across the room. I turned to see her standing next to Cindy, who wore a white fluffy robe with her initials over her ample chest. “Yeah, what
was
that?” Cindy asked, chomping gum and smirking. “A mental breakdown?”

The mean girls.
I thought it before I even realized what I was thinking. And then I thought something else:
They’re just like me
. Or at least, the way I was before things started changing. Too bad they didn’t realize that I knew all of their secrets. Or at least, the most important one:
Beneath every mean girl is an insecure girl.

I smiled. It was kind of funny, actually. I knew
exactly
how to deal with them. If I lied and told them it was all a strategy, they’d be thrown off their game.

But I didn’t want to lie. I didn’t want to play by the mean-girl rules. It was too easy: I could take these two beauty queens down faster than they could say
double-sided breast tape
.

“I panicked,” I said instead. This honesty thing was so
refreshing. “I mean, you’re all so beautiful.”

Nine of the girls smiled appreciatively. Sabrina and Cindy looked suspicious. But what did it matter? I didn’t need to win them over. I suddenly liked having the majority on my side, instead of the only two Ice Queens in the room.
Blake Dawkins: woman of the people?
Wait until I told Audrey.

“You girls ready to strip?” I asked, and a few of them laughed. I pressed a button on my phone and Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies” blared.

“All the single ladies, all the single ladies!”

Ten of us whooped and did our best Beyoncé moves while we took off our clothes and slipped into our evening gowns. Sabrina and Cindy rolled their eyes. The thought struck me, not for the first time, that mean girls were usually so busy being cooler than everyone that they missed out on the fun.

“Will you buckle me?” I asked Amy as Beyoncé sang about her Deréon jeans.

Amy hooked the bronze buckle on the back of my dress. And then she said, “Hot stuff,” and we laughed. I turned to look at myself in the mirror. I’d scrubbed my face clean because I knew we’d be getting our makeup done. Still, I wasn’t used to seeing myself without makeup, and it made me think of Audrey’s app. Every day the first thing I did was put makeup on, and I didn’t take it off until I was about to get into bed at night. I looked different without my usual dose of concealer, mascara, and blush. Almost like a stranger.

“Girls! You better be dressed!” said Marsha as she swung open the door. When she saw we were all clothed, she said, “Good.” And then, “Rich?”

Rich Gibbons entered wearing a black turtleneck and khaki chinos. “Ladies, ladies, ladies,” he said. He smiled at us like he had the best news of his life. “The cameras are about to start rolling. You’ll be in hair and makeup for an hour, and we’ll continue to use the footage online and in promos as we’ve done throughout the afternoon.” Rich turned and grinned at me like he and I were in on it, like we’d planned the effect my footage would have on the show’s viewers. I felt a few of the girls look at me, and I wanted to shout out that it wasn’t true, that it wasn’t my intention. “We’ll be live as soon as we arrive at the amphitheater. Marsha can answer any questions you have from here on out, right, Marsha?”

“Right, Rich.”

“Good luck, ladies,” Rich said. And then he left the room. Commotion sounded from the hallway. I could hear his voice giving the same kind of spiel to whomever was outside.

“Please be seated, ladies,” Marsha said as two cameramen and the gray-haired woman stepped into the room. Two dozen men and women dressed in black followed, wearing apron-like pouches around their waists stuffed with varying sizes of makeup brushes and hair sprays.

A petite woman with sleepy brown eyes and long, blond wavy hair like Brigitte Bardot’s made her way over to me. “I’m Jamie,” she said, smiling. “I’ll be your makeup artist.”
She extended a small hand with short manicured nails painted gray, and I shook it.

I saw one of the cameramen filming Sabrina out of the corner of my eye. “I’m so excited!” Sabrina said into the lens. Then she smiled like she was posing for a Glamour Shots photo session. Watching her was nothing like watching Amy, whom they filmed next. “I’m from Cynthiana, Kentucky, and I have four brothers and sisters,” Amy said. “And I’m born on the cusp of Capricorn and Aquarius.” She paused and laughed a little to herself. “Anyway,” she said, her southern accent charming, “what else do you want to know?”

“How about what you hope to gain from this competition?” the camerawoman prompted her. I knew from studying a few behind-the-scenes videos that the director or person interviewing you usually got cut out of the footage. That’s why you were supposed to repeat the question in your answer. Maybe Amy knew it, too, or maybe she was just a natural, because she said, “The main thing I hope to gain from this competition is the new house prize. Our house is pretty small for all seven of us.” I watched as she smiled sheepishly. There wasn’t a fake bone in her body.

The camera spun around to catch me staring at Amy. Thank God I was smiling. I couldn’t help it: I liked her.

I gave the camera a little wave. And I figured they’d want me to talk about what I wanted out of the competition, too. I knew better than to say I wanted to be a TV host. That’d be like when the
Bachelor
contestants say they want to be actresses. Still. I
was
trying to be more honest.

“Well, I’m interested in TV,” I said as my makeup artist smoothed foundation over my skin. “In how it all works. And I like talking on camera so far. But I guess it’s more than that,” I said. The camerawoman nodded behind the camera. She used her hand to make a beckoning motion, like she wanted me to say more. “I want a fresh start,” I said. “I want to do something that matters. I haven’t done that yet in my life—not even at all. I’m going to college in the fall, and I don’t want to be like I was in high school. So I was thinking this show could be my chance to show everyone that I’m different. That I can be good.” And then I thought of Lindsay, and said, “That I can be the kind of person America needs right now.”

The camerawoman put her hand up. She shook her head just slightly, but in that good kind of way that someone does when you’ve done something better than they thought you would. She looked up and winked at me before crossing the room to film Jessica and Mura.

“That was
so
good, Blake,” Amy said. Her hair person had put rollers all over her head. She looked like the Kate Upton version of a Muppet.

“So was yours,” I told her.

“Hold still,” Jamie said. She brought an eyelash curler close to my lids and squeezed. When she was done, I asked Amy, “So what kind of house would you want them to build for your family?” I felt stupid asking it, but I wanted to know. I already had a nice house. Maybe if I won, I could give the new home part of the prize to Amy. Not like Public would ever go for that.

Amy shrugged. “Nothing special,” she said. “Just more bedrooms. We only have two now.”

Two? For five kids?

I tried not to let surprise show on my face, but I could tell by the way she glanced away that I had.

“My parents sleep on a pull-out sofa in the living room,” she said. “Us three girls sleep in one bedroom, and the two boys sleep in the other one. It’s not that bad, actually,” she said, and something in her voice made me believe her. “Except my sister talks in her sleep about nonsense stuff and wakes everyone up.”

I laughed. When we had finished getting our hair and makeup done, Marsha lined us up like cattle. “We’ll be transporting you now to the Westbrook Theater in a stretch limousine provided by Pepsi,” she said, smiling as the cameras filmed her. She looked us all over, her gaze settling on me when she said, “I hope each one of you is ready for the most important night of your lives.”

I hadn’t felt the buzz of something so good since my date with Leo. Maybe this night could finally help me put Leo out of my mind. Maybe it could help me forget how crazy I was about someone who had never even been my boyfriend.