Red (19 page)

And then she heard Celeste’s voice. “Oh, hang on, Ginger. Do you mind coming to my office for a sec? I brought that dress I was telling you about, and I want to know if you think it’s too slutty for tomorrow.”

“Cece, I’ve known you thirty years, and I’ve never seen you look slutty, including at Lisa Randall’s ‘Dress Like a Stripper’ birthday party senior year.” Felicity jumped as her mom dropped a stack of papers on the desk directly above her head.

Celeste giggled. “That was the first time I ever saw pasties. I was
mortified
. Come on, will you just look at it? It’ll take two seconds.”

“All right, fine.” The footsteps moved back toward the door.

“Hey, do you really think Matty can handle running sound? That kid is—” Celeste’s voice cut off as the door slammed.

Felicity couldn’t believe her luck. She scrambled out from under the desk, snatched the paper from the printer tray, and ransacked the office for extra gold envelopes. After three horrible minutes, she finally located one in the filing cabinet next to the Miss Scarlet crown. She stuffed Gabby’s question inside, scrawled a number four across it with a Sharpie, and slipped it into the box. Then, with the ripped, oily papers balled in her fist, she bolted out of the office and up the stairs.

As she crouched on the landing, panting, she heard her mom emerge from Celeste’s office and open her own door. “I could swear this was locked,” she mused aloud. “I must be going crazy.” Felicity fled before Ginger had time to think too hard about it.

She raced across the second floor, pounded down the stairs on the other side of the building, and burst out into the spring twilight. As she cut across the lawn toward the parking lot, Felicity could barely keep from skipping. Sure, she’d had a few very close calls, but the questions were swapped, and now she could execute her plan. She did a little jig next to Yoko before collapsing into the driver’s seat. She was only fifteen minutes late to pick up the twins. If her mom got home before her, Felicity could easily attribute her delay to the boys losing their shoes.
I am a criminal mastermind,
she thought as she plunked down her lip-gloss-smeared bag and turned on the car.

It was only when the Sharks in Heaven album started blasting through the speakers that she realized she’d forgotten to swap the music for her tap routine.

F
elicity woke to the strange experience of hearing her own name on the radio.

The DJs at KRED were in a festive mood. “As we all know, Scarletville takes these competitions
very
seriously,” said one DJ. “We’re expecting a tremendous turnout at City Hall—all seven hundred Miss Scarlet tickets sold out twenty-three minutes after they went on sale.”

“Several of these girls competed in the Miss Ruby Red pageant five years ago, including winner Madison Banks and first runner-up Felicity St. John,” added the other DJ. “I can’t wait to see them go head to head again this afternoon. We also have some promising newcomers to the scene. Who will take the crown? Join us at two o’clock as we broadcast live from City Hall.”

Two o’clock—that was only five hours away. Felicity’s stomach tied itself into a series of complicated knots. Five hours from now, she’d be waiting in the wings, ready to act the part of a pageant girl for the very last time. Six hours from now, she would take Gabby down in front of the entire town, and the blackmail would finally end. Seven hours from now, if all went well, she’d be a titleholder armed with the money she needed for art school.

Or everything could fall apart.

Her door burst open, and her brothers came barreling in. “Lissy, you’re on the radio!” Tyler announced.

Felicity rolled over and shut off her clock radio as Andy climbed onto the bed and bounced up and down on her feet. “Are you going to win?” he demanded.

“I hope so. Do you want me to win?”

“I guess, but not as much as Mom. She
really
wants you to win.”

Felicity smiled grimly. “Yes, I know.”

As if she had been summoned, Ginger bustled into the bedroom, carrying a breakfast tray adorned with a tiny vase of flowers. She kissed Felicity on the forehead and deposited the tray in her lap. “Breakfast in bed for my beauty queen!”

Felicity looked with dismay at the scrambled eggs, buttered toast, fruit salad, and orange juice. The gesture was sweet, but she wasn’t sure she could force any of the food down.

“Thanks, Mom. You’re the best,” she said with a wan smile. She took a small bite of toast. It tasted like dust in her mouth.

“Make sure you eat all the eggs. You need extra energy today.”

Felicity reached for her napkin and found a sky-blue envelope tucked underneath. “What’s this?” she asked.

“It came in the mail for you. Call me when you’re done showering, and I’ll do your hair and makeup before I go over to City Hall, okay?”

Ginger herded the twins out of the room as Felicity tore open the envelope. Inside was a handmade construction paper card decorated with a child’s drawing of twelve girls in evening gowns. In the middle stood the winner, a glitter glue crown on her head and a bunch of flowers in her hand. Underneath, in careful block print, she was labeled
felicity
.

Inside, the card read:

Dear Felicity,

Good luck in the Miss Scarlet pajent! I can’t wait to see youre beautiful dress. I am youre biggest fan. I am sure you will be the pretiest one. I really really really really hope you win!

Your friend,

Katie Vaughn

Felicity’s stomach lurched and twisted dangerously, and she pushed her breakfast tray aside. She wanted nothing more than to have Gabby thrown out of Scarletville, and she was just starting to come to terms with exposing Rose. But she had completely forgotten about Gabby’s little sisters. Katie was in Andy and Tyler’s class—Felicity saw her all the time when she picked up the twins from day care. She was small for her age, with cartoonishly large eyes, long brown pigtails, and an adorable gap between her front teeth. Picturing her little face made Felicity feel even sicker, and she tucked the card out of sight under her duvet. She tried to banish all the empathy from her mind and replace it with steely resolve.

The blackmail had to stop. There was only one way to make it stop. Gabby had left her no choice.

Felicity abandoned her untouched breakfast and took a long, hot shower, then sat quietly as her mom curled her hair and peppered her with competition pointers. When Ginger was happy with her work, she pulled out the hair spray and enveloped her daughter in a sticky cloud. Felicity coughed, tasting the bitter chemical tang at the back of her throat.

“Perfect,” her mom announced. “That should hold just fine, but spray it again before you go onstage. Now, let me see your nails.”

When Felicity was thoroughly painted and primped, her mom stepped back, clasped her hands, and regarded her daughter with misty eyes. “Oh, Felicity, you look
so
beautiful. I’m so proud of you I can barely stand it. You have no idea how wonderful this is for me, watching you up there, dancing to my music. You’re just like a mirror of what I used to be.” Ginger hugged Felicity fiercely, careful not to muss her hair. “You know I can’t show favoritism once we get to City Hall, but remember that I’m sending you all the love in my heart and rooting for you with every cell in my body.”

The toast churned in Felicity’s stomach as she thought about how furious Ginger would be when she saw the new tap routine. Her mom had spent seventeen years forcing her into a mold she didn’t fit, but Felicity knew that every moment had been out of love. It wasn’t just about the prize money—Ginger believed in Miss Scarlet with her entire heart and soul and truly thought this was the best possible path for her daughter. The guiltaconda slithered back around Felicity’s chest and began to squeeze, and she was suddenly afraid she might cry. “I could never have gotten here without you,” she said.

“I know you’ll pay me back by winning.” Ginger pulled back and touched Felicity’s cheek. “I always knew you were a winner, right from the second you were born, and today you get to prove it to everyone. Just do everything exactly like we practiced, and I know that crown will be yours. Do you need anything else before I go?”

Felicity shook her head. “I’ll be fine. But thanks, Mom. For everything.”

Ginger embraced her one last time, and Felicity hugged her back, hoping that somewhere deep down, her mom would understand that she couldn’t go through with the pageant exactly as planned. She wanted to win, but she needed to do it her own way and for her own reasons. Even though her mom loved her and wanted the best for her, she had no idea who Felicity really was.

Today, it was time to show her.

It was time to show everyone.

City Hall was in a state of jubilant chaos. When Felicity opened the front door, a cheer rang through the packed lobby, and she had to swim through a sea of patting, squeezing hands to reach the auditorium. She gave the crowd a quick wave, as she knew her mom would want her to, and a fireworks display of camera flashes went off in her face. Momentarily blinded, she stumbled through the auditorium doors. “This is insanity,” she muttered as she heard another cheer go up outside.

The room was empty except for two volunteers taping down cables on the stage. Felicity made her way to the sound booth, praying it would be unoccupied so she could swap her music before anyone noticed her. Unfortunately, the scrawny, sullen sound operator was already there, bent over a graphic novel.

“Hi,” Felicity said. “Matty, right?”

The boy looked up slowly, as if it took incredible effort to raise his head three inches. His squash-colored hair fell over his eyes, and he made no effort to brush it away. “Uh-huh. ’Sup.”

Felicity put on an authoritative voice. “I’m Felicity St. John. The music for my talent sounded a little weird yesterday, so I burned a new CD, and I need you to swap them.”

She worried for a moment that he’d argue with her, but Matty was far too catatonic to care what she did. He leaned sluggishly to the side like a melting snowman, providing her access to the box of CDs on the table. Felicity slipped into the booth and swapped the discs, stuffing the old one into her bag. “There,” she said. “Thanks.”

“Uh-huh.” Matty righted himself and returned to his book.

“Hey, listen,” Felicity said. “When you play this, someone might come running up here to tell you it’s the wrong music, but it’s not. Don’t let anyone turn it off, no matter what, even the people in charge. Okay?”

Matty shrugged one shoulder and mumbled something that might have been “Whatever.” Felicity wasn’t sure her comment had registered, but there was nothing else she could do. She headed backstage.

The dressing room reeked of hair spray and hot curling irons and was packed with pageant volunteers, mothers, and contestants in various states of undress. The sickly-green linoleum floor, fluorescent lights, and rolling costume racks were hardly glamorous, but they were familiar to Felicity from past pageants, and the sight of them made her relax a little. Ginger was nowhere to be found, so Felicity checked in with Brenda, then found an empty spot at the mirrors next to Haylie. Her friend was sitting perfectly still in one of the orange plastic chairs, eyes closed and earbuds in, oblivious to the chaos around her as she did breathing exercises.

As she did before every competition, Felicity lined up her beauty supplies in tidy rows on the table: magnifying mirror, hair spray, curling iron, round brush, bobby pins, tissues, makeup, antistatic spray, Topstick fashion tape, lint brush, sewing kit, stain stick, and a Sharpie for blacking out unexpected scuffs on her tap shoes. Seeing everything laid out neatly made her feel safer, like she had some small measure of control over the day.

Ivy found her as she was digging through a costume rack for her personal introduction outfit. “It’s completely
insane
out there,” her friend said, eyes wide. “Is it like this every year?”

“Pretty much.” Felicity found her outfit and extracted it. “Are you nervous?”

“I wasn’t before, but I am now. I’m kind of afraid people are going to mob the stage and start speaking in tongues or something.”

“Is Darren coming?”

“Are you kidding? I’d never subject him to a pageant.”

“Hey, Ives?” Felicity said. “Thanks for going through with this. I know how much you hate being here.”

Ivy shrugged. “It’s okay—it’s not that big a deal. I know how important it is to you and Haylie. And it might be fun for the audience to see something a little different up there for once.”

Cassie bounded over to retrieve her costume. She looked as if she’d had a play date with a jet engine and then dipped her head in shellac. “Wow, Cass,” Felicity said. “Your hair is … really something.”

“Isn’t it?” Cassie spun around to show off the back, which resembled a mound of cotton batting that had been gnawed by rats. “My stylist said messy was all the rage this year.”

“Is her stylist a category-five hurricane?” Ivy muttered under her breath, and Felicity tried to cover her giggles with a coughing fit.

They were headed back toward the mirrors when Felicity noticed Ariel, the pageant’s token strawbie, sitting across the room and roughing up the bottoms of her new heels with sandpaper. Her long straight hair fell around her shoulders like a curtain as she leaned forward over the shoes, and Felicity was surprised by how beautiful it looked. All the other girls were mingling and chatting, but everyone looked right through Ariel as if she were invisible. When she thought back, Felicity realized she hadn’t seen anyone speak to Ariel during the rehearsals, either. She certainly hadn’t made any effort to do so herself, despite the fact that underneath a coat of dye, they were exactly the same.

She was no better than the rest of Scarletville. No matter what Felicity’s new music said, she
would
be a cookie-cutter girl until she stopped acting like one.

“Go ahead,” Felicity told Ivy. “I’ll be right there.” And before she could think too much about it, she marched over and sat down next to her fellow strawbie.

“Hey,” she said.

Ariel looked up, surprised, and glanced over her shoulder. When she finally determined that the greeting was intended for her, she gave Felicity a tiny, puzzled smile. “Hi?”

Felicity realized too late that she had nothing to say, and a long, awkward silence stretched between them. Finally, she blurted out, “So … how’re you feeling about this whole … thing?”

“I’m so excited, but I’m really, really nervous. You have any tips? You were so great in Miss Ruby Red—I still remember that dance you did, with the feathers on your costume? You totally should have won over Madison.”

Felicity smiled. “Thanks. Don’t worry, you’re going to be fine out there. It’s all about confidence. Even if you have no idea what you’re doing, just act like you do, and everyone will believe it.”
That’s what I do every day of my life
. “What’s your talent? I didn’t get to see yesterday.”

“Scottish Highland dancing. I’m doing a sword dance.”

“A
sword
dance? Like, with real swords?”

“Yup.” Ariel reached into her duffel bag and pulled out two long blades, and Felicity recoiled. “It’s okay, they’re not sharp. And I don’t swing them around like a ninja or anything. I just put them on the floor and jump over them a lot.”

Across the room, Haylie finished her meditation and flickered back to life, and she beamed and waved when she spotted Felicity. “I should go get ready,” Felicity told Ariel. “But break a leg today.”

“Thanks.” Ariel flashed her first genuine smile, and it lit up her whole face. “Kick Madison’s butt this time, okay?”

Felicity returned to her table, and Haylie jumped up to hug her. “I am so ready for this,” she squealed. “I feel like I’m totally in the zone, you know?”

Before Felicity could respond, Madison brushed by. “Hey, Felicity, I meant to tell you yesterday that your dance costume is
super
cute. I used to have a jacket just like that, with a big sparkly heart on it. I think I was in … second grade?” She gave a simpering smile and flounced away, her curls bobbing in an excellent imitation of Georgia Kellerman’s.

“Don’t let her get to you,” Haylie said. “Your tap costume
is
cute.”

Felicity sighed; her stupid costume was the only thing she hadn’t been able to fix at the last minute. “No, she’s right. That heart is hideous.”