Trapped in Forever

34 ~ Even That Mandy Girl

An array of many-hued of cars, ranging from sedans, their paint gleaming and glittering underneath the setting sun, reflections flickering off of their windshields, spotless and without smudges or dead bugs smushed by the wiper blades, to half a dozen beat up trucks, with mud gathering on the rims of the tires, no doubt owned by some contestant’s boyfriend, his phone neatly concealed in his pocket, just waiting to go back home, and a few mini-vans decorated the parking lot, one even with a lone to-go cup of coffee on the roof, abandoned, with a ruby red lipstick print over the lid. As I parked, pulling into a space beside a black SUV with those white, stick family stickers on the windows and a large, beige, stripped van in the handicapped parking space, I couldn’t help but scan the lot of the cars parked, searching for something I knew wouldn’t be there, but couldn’t help but look for anyway. Then I rolled my eyes at myself, my mind echoing my stupidity, as I turned off the engine, because what I was looking for wasn’t there.

I could hear the muffled conversations of the families of the contestants in the lobby, their hands holding freshly brewed cups of coffee, and they were all smiling, laughing at something an another parent said, probably about cost or about how much their wives just loved pageants and how they couldn’t wait to go to bed. They looked like such a contrast to my family, striking me with just how dysfunctional mine really was. I had always assumed that since my parents weren’t divorced, what we had was normal. But now, as I stood there alone, while my dad removed some poor kid’s wisdom teeth, maybe at best telling his patient that I was a few towns over, probably winning a trophy, because that’s just what dads thought. Their baby could never lose. And Mom and Mikayla were at home, either sipping tea and trying to wash away their parental frustrations out with Spill the Beans reruns or propped against her bed, teenage angst consuming her, but her heels left untouched and leaving parties unattended, simply lying there, alone, blasting music that it seemed impossible to make out the lyrics to. And here I was, alone, with a bitter taste in my mouth as I walked past the regular families, supportive and there, even if their cellphones happened to be there too.

When I found my way into the dressing room, where my nostrils were filled with the overwhelming smell of perfume—or more like the combinations of dozens of brands of perfume, squirted in the air and poised faces stepped through the fading droplets, head held high, and girls were leaning against their dressers, light bulbs attached around the mirror and casting bright light on their faces as they turned and conversed with the other contestants, some with malice tugging on their tweezed eyebrows and others with a genuine smile directed for their countenances, compliments finding themselves falling from their dark or glossy lips.

“Mandy!”

The squealing voice, the one that even got the attention of some of the other contestants who were immersed in other conversations, only for them to be broken by the shrill voice that sliced through them, was vaguely familiar. It felt like a haze, of horrible perfume, and then I felt two hands gripping onto my upper arms, a pearl grin pointed for my direction, and I found, standing in front of me, giggling, with aqua glitter eye-shadow sparkling as she blinked at me, was Kara Webber, Louis’s sister, and one of the girls with Reese, who suggested this all to me to begin with, and all I could hear in my head as she spoke, squealing Mandy, Mandy over and over again, was ugly Grandma sweater and the image of my tiger sweater, wrinkling their noses.

“Um, hi, Kara,” I said, my graze drifting from her bright azure one to over her shoulder at the other models, a frown furrowing their painted expressions as they spoke, slowly, and then turned away, their eyebrows wiggling. “I didn’t . . . I didn’t know you’d be here.”

She pulled back, her thin eyebrows raised dramatically and nearly touching her hairline, her dark hair adorning various, multicolored gems and smelled strongly of hairspray as she moved, titling her head to the side, and I realized she was wearing extensions as her hair was about four inches longer now than it was at the party last month. “You didn’t know I was going to be here?!” she said, her glossed lips ajar, but she didn’t look offended. “What about you?! I didn’t know you were a model. You seemed so . . . newbie-ish before.”