Brooke (11 page)

I was afraid to use that word. Did I dare think it? “Different. Am I pretty?”

“I've been telling you that ever since I set eyes on you. Now that you are made up and see what you can look like, you should feel more comfortable and confident about yourself. I want you to do more in the way of makeup every day so you get used to it, Brooke.”

“You mean put on makeup for school?”

“Of course. That's why I bought all this for you and had it here before you arrived. Every day from now on, I want you to prepare your face as if you were entering a beauty contest. That's what life is for us, anyway, a continually running beauty pageant.”

“But none of the other girls wear makeup yet. They'll think I'm trying to look older and fit in with the older girls,” I complained.

“Let them think what they want. They don't have half the beauty I . . . I mean you do. Let's go,” she said. “Back downstairs to practice the runway walk now.”

She paraded me back and forth in the hallway for nearly another hour, using music, showing me how to turn, to pause, to look out at the audience, to make myself look seductive or innocent.

“Every contestant, every model, is really an actress, Brooke. You have to assume a persona. Think of yourself as someone special, and be that person for a while. Sometimes I imagined myself like Marilyn Monroe, and sometimes I was more
subtle, an Ingrid Bergman or a Deborah Kerr. Nowadays, all the girls your age are trying to be like one of those dreadful Spice Girls, but you will be someone unique. You will be . . . me,” she declared, and laughed. “Just keep studying me all the time, and it will come.”

Pamela's words scared me–she really did want to make me into her, and my talents and wants just didn't matter. I didn't understand–why couldn't Pamela like me for me? And, if she wouldn't even like me, how would she ever come to love me?

The next day, I began to feel a little better when I realized at least the kids at school liked me for the real me. On the bus that morning, everyone wanted to sit next to me and talk about the game. In homeroom, Mr. Rudley, who admitted he had yet to attend a school sports event, said he heard he had better show up at the next softball game. The school had a star. I knew I was blushing all over. When I looked at the others, I saw Heather staring at me. She looked so furious, it made my heart thump.

At lunch, I received all sorts of invitations. I was asked to girls' houses, told about upcoming parties and events, and invited to join clubs. Lisa Donald, who was one of the school's best tennis players, volunteered to give me instructions at her family's tennis court.

“You could come over next weekend,” she said. “I'm having a few friends over, including some
boys from Brandon Pierce.” I knew that was an all-boys school nearby.

“Whom do you know at Brandon Pierce?” Heather challenged.

“My cousin Harrison, who's bringing a friend. We might play doubles,” she told me.

All the girls looked envious. I had to admit that I had never played tennis before, ever.

“Never? How come?” Heather demanded. “Don't your parents have a court?” She made a tennis court sound as common as a bathroom.

“Yes,” I said.

“So?”

“I just never played.”

“Why wouldn't you play if you had a court?” she countered, stepping forward to put her face right up to mine.

“What's the difference?” Lisa demanded. “She'll learn now with a good teacher, me.”

The girls laughed, but Heather just stared at me with those small, beady eyes. Helen Baldwin pushed in front of her to ask me something about our social studies homework, and then Helen started to talk about Lisa's cousin Harrison.

“He's a sex maniac,” she declared. Everyone paid attention after she blurted that. “Right, Lisa?”

“It's on his mind more than it is on other boys' minds, I guess. When we were both seven and eight, he only wanted to play doctor whenever he came over.”

“Did you play?” Eva asked.

“No, but once he chased me all around the property trying to get me to take off my panties.”

“I wouldn't mind him taking off mine,” Rosemary said. The girls giggled.

“Yes, you would,” Heather charged. “Stop trying to sound like a big shot.”

“He's good-looking. You said so yourself, Heather. You said you wished he would look at you,” Lisa told her.

“I
did
not. Liar.”

“What did you say, then?” Lisa questioned.

Heather looked at the rest of us. “I said he was wasting his time with that Paula Dworkins, that's all,” Heather insisted.

“I bet he'll like Brooke,” Rosemary said. The girls turned to me.

“Why should he like me?” I asked.

“He likes anyone new for a day or so,” she replied. “But once he sees you swing your bat, he'll fall head over heels in love,” she added.

“Yeah, and with all that makeup you're wearing, you'll be an easy target,” Heather sniped at me.

The girls cackled, Heather the loudest.

“She's joking,” Lisa said, “but he does like girls who are into sports. I know. He told me.” They grew quiet. “That's why you want to learn tennis quickly,” she said. “I imagine it won't take you long.”

“It seems very strange that your father would never teach you,” Heather insisted. “Don't you get along with him?”

“Mind your own business,” Helen said.

“Of course we get along,” I said. “He's just very busy.” I was glad to turn the conversation away from the awful makeup Pamela had made me wear that morning.

Heather smirked. “That's exactly what my father says every time I ask him to do something with me,” she remarked.

“The only difference is that Brooke's father's not lying,” Eva said, and the girls laughed hard again. I had to smile. Heather gazed at me. If her eyes could throw darts, I'd have been full of holes.

The rest of the week went smoothly. Everyone was more excited than ever at softball practice. I did well on two tests, and my teachers gave me compliments on my efforts. Mrs. Harper actually stopped me in the hall to tell me I was making a very good transition.

“Just stay on course,” she told me. Her eyes were so fierce, it sounded like a warning. I thanked her and quickly moved on.

At home, I performed my piano lessons with an attitude of resignation. I had come to the conclusion it was something I had to do, like going to the bathroom. Professor Wertzman didn't think any better of my playing, but he didn't criticize and complain as much as he usually did.

Peter was away most of the week on a big case that took him to New York City. The conversations about school and other interesting things that were
happening in the world disappeared from dinner. Pamela continued to use the meal as a classroom, developing my education in proper mealtime manners. She was impressed that I had been invited to Lisa Donald's house for lunch and tennis. On her own, she had found out that Lisa's father was one of the Donalds who owned the local department store.

“I just knew you would make friends with people of quality,” she said.

What did that mean, people of quality? What gave one person higher quality than another? Was it just money? I hadn't found the girls at Agnes Fodor to be any nicer than the girls I knew at my public school. They had the same hangups, problems, worries, and complaints.

Despite Mrs. Harper's resounding flattery and compliments, I discovered that her girls, her perfect girls, were not so perfect after all. They were just more subtle, more sneaky about the things they did. When the teacher left the room, they cheated. They passed notes, and they smoked in the girls' room, but they did it by the window so they could blow the smoke outside. Afterward, they always flushed the butts down the toilet. As far as graffiti went, someone wrote “Brooke wears a jock strap” on my gym locker, and Coach Grossbard had to get the janitor to find some strong detergent to wash it off. No one told Mrs. Harper. It was as if she had to be protected from any news of wrongdoing so she could continue to believe her girls were perfect.

Peter returned from New York on Friday night, and Pamela had me do the runway walk for him. She made him sit in the high-back antique chair in the hallway and watch like a judge at a beauty contest. I half expected him to burst out laughing when I began, but the look that came over him was different–I'd never seen him look at me so intently before.

“Well?” Pamela asked as soon as I made my last turn.

“Amazing. You've done amazing work, Pamela. She looks . . . older.”

“Of course she does. She's more mature, more sophisticated and confident. She's been invited to the Donalds' for lunch tomorrow,” she told him.

I didn't think it was a very big deal, but she made me describe the invitation, Lisa's offer to teach me tennis, and the rich boys who were joining us for lunch and tennis. Peter wore this serious look on his face, but he gazed at me with amusement in his eyes.

“You don't have a game this Saturday?” he asked.

“It wouldn't matter if she did. She would still go to the Donalds',” Pamela interjected.

Of course I wouldn't, but I let her believe what she wanted.

“No. Our next game is at home the following Saturday,” I told him. “Will you come?”

“I'll try,” he said, withholding a promise. “The way this Jacobi matter is playing out, I don't know
when I'll have free time this month. We thought they'd settle, but they've decided to play their hand, it seems.”

Pamela didn't ask him to explain more. I realized that all the time I had been living with them, she never asked him about his work or showed any interest in any of his cases unless there was a client who interested her, and then she was more curious about the person than the case, anyway.

“What's the matter with Jacobi?” I asked.

“It's not what's the matter with him,” he explained. “It's his matter, the case.”

“Oh,” I said, feeling stupid.

To make me feel better, he started to talk about the case, but Pamela interrupted to ask if he had gotten me the sponsor.

“What does that mean? Why do I need a sponsor?” I asked.

“For the beauty pageant. Each girl has to be sponsored, and not by her own family,” Pamela said. “The company will pay all your expenses, not that we need them to. It's just the way it's done.”

“Who would sponsor me?” I wondered aloud.

“A number of companies,” she declared irritably. “Peter?”

“I'll talk to Gerry Lawson tomorrow. He already gave me a preliminary approval. Don't worry,” he urged her, and she relaxed.

Was this really going to happen? Was I really going to participate in a beauty contest? Me? I felt as if something was in my chest tickling my heart with a feather, but I was afraid to utter the least bit
of reluctance, as it would put Pamela into a horribly mean mood.

Saturday, Peter drove me to Lisa's home. Pamela stood over me at my vanity table to make sure I did my makeup right.

“Who knows who you'll meet?” she said.

Pamela came along with Peter and me so she could see the Donalds' house. It turned out to be even larger than ours, which I didn't think possible. They had more grounds, a bigger pool, a guest house, and two clay tennis courts. Pamela said the house was a Greek Revival, and she was envious of the recessed front door.

“I wanted that,” she moaned. “We should redo our front.”

“There's nothing wrong with our entrance, Pamela,” Peter insisted. She pouted, but when I stepped out, she brightened up to warn me to behave myself and remember all the manners she had taught me.

“Especially when you eat,” she called. I waved and hurried to the front door.

Lisa answered the bell herself. She was already in a tennis outfit.

“Good, you're a little early. Come on,” she said before I could say hello. She took my hand and pulled me through the large house. I could only get glimpses of the large rooms, the expensive-looking furnishings and paintings. I did realize the decor was different from ours, more antique-looking.

We burst out a side door and headed for the tennis court. There was a machine set up on one side.

“What's that?”

“Daddy bought that for us to practice returning serves. You'll see,” she said.

She gave me a racquet and told me it was one of the best. Then she showed me how to hold it and went through the motions of how to swing. She was so excited about teaching me.

“I never met anyone who had never even held a tennis racquet before,” she declared, but she didn't cross-examine me as Heather would.

Despite practically growing up with a tennis racquet in her hand, Lisa wasn't very good. It didn't take me long to master the basic motion, and after a dozen or so practice swings, I began to develop a passable serve. I didn't think I was hitting the ball that hard, but she had difficulty returning my serve. I quickly discovered that all I had to do was hit the ball to one side and then return it to the other a little harder to defeat her. I held back, because I saw she was getting annoyed.

“You're so damn athletic,” she complained. Then she stopped and looked at me suspiciously. “Were you lying? Have you played tennis before?”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I really never have.”

“It does seem strange, especially now that I see how you play.”

I realized that she wasn't going to believe me. “I really haven't played,” I said. “Honest.”

She accepted that, and anyway, there wasn't time to talk about it anymore. Harrison and his friend
shouted to us from the front of the house and started down the lawn toward the tennis courts.

The girls at school had been right: Harrison was a very good-looking dark-haired boy. He was tall, with long, slender legs jutting out of a pair of milk white tennis shorts. He wore a white polo shirt with black trim on the sleeves and collar. As they drew closer, I saw Harrison had thick, dark eyebrows. His eyes were almost black and set in a narrow face with sharp cheekbones and a strong mouth. He wore an impish smile on those firm lips and carried himself with an arrogant air, just the way a boy who knew he was good-looking and rich would.