Chapter One-Mia
Mia James looked at herself in the mirror, today was the day she and her best friends Gina, Jessica and Zoe were all getting together at summer’s Coffeehouse tonight. The man who owned it was a local fisher man, he was married to Kathy Bates or as she liked to be called Kathy Summers. Since they had been married for twenty years. They has exactly one daughter Julie Summers who was always a grade below Mia and her friends in high school. She was nice but Mia couldn’t allow herself to be friends with her. Her friends Jessica, Gina and Zoe made it their personal mission to make Julie’s life hell for years. You see Julie had scabs all over her face ever since the third grade. Nobody knew where they came from, not even her parents who took her to a doctor and declared it a rare case of examea. Never the less everyone at school including her friends declared her the ugly duckling. One day Jessica and Zoe made fun of Julie so bad they pushed her up against the lockers and tripped her and threw her book everywhere. Mia just stood there and watched. She had to look away every five seconds she couldn’t bare to watch. She didn’t understand how Jessica and Zoe could be so nice to her and treat Julie so bad. She was a nerd to after all, so her and Julie weren’t all that different. The only difference was that Mia didn’t have scabs on her face. But because Mia was pretty everyone just called her smart and not a nerd or a geek. Sometimes she felt like her smarts were the only thing that set her apart from her mother and her sister. Her mother Helen and her sister Zara had been competed in local beauty pageants all their lives. Today it was Mia’s turn, she only agreed to do it because she knew it would her pay her way through college. After Helen turned 35 people didn’t see her as beautiful anymore. She worked as maid after Mia and Zara’s father left her. They could barely make ends meet. Zara got pregnant by some celebrity game show host when she was nineteen so she basically ruined her shot at competing ever again. Mia was the bright like for the future the last great hope for the James family. In walked her mother breaking her from her thoughts. Mia sat up straighter at her vanity. Helen was always going on and on about how a beauty queen has perfect posture.
“Hey honey I brought so make up to touch up your face with.”
Mia frowned. “I thought you said my face was already pretty.”
“Of course you’re perfect. But you need to make sure you don’t look so plain. You have a natural beauty about you. But you have to work a little harder to make it pop.”
“I know you always say that putting on the face that the judges want to see. Will grantee you the crown.”
“Exactly and don’t forget about the talent competition that’s where your smarts come into play.”
“I know that’s really the only part I’m looking forward to.”
“I know you don’t really want to do this honey but we need the money to pay for your college. And you can meet some really amazing people and go on some really amazing trips and really make a difference in world when you win these pageants. They can be life changing. At least they were for me.”
“I know and I want to make you proud mom. I promise I won’t be like Zara, I will let your legacy live on.”
“Your sister was pretty but she didn’t want to win as bad as you do Mia. She didn’t care about having a future for herself. Now she’s sitting in Rio with that white trash celebrity wanna be.”
“I know Zara really knows how to screw up.”
