School of Charm (16 page)

chapter twenty-one

O
VER THE NEXT FEW DAYS
, M
AMA HELPED ME PRACTICE
walking with the crutch and spinning the baton while standing in one place. Grandma would walk right by like she didn't even see us. She hadn't talked to me since the day I'd called her a liar, unless it was to ask me to pass the butter or turn off the light in the family room.

I showed Mama my baton routine and she set her arms on my shoulders. “I'm proud of you just for trying,” she said.

I grinned.

“You keep at this, now. I've gotta work with Charlene for a while. She's getting all antsy.” She rolled her eyes and walked inside.

For the next week, Mama and I practiced together until I felt like maybe I could make it across the stage and do my routine. I was just happy to be near Mama and feel the soft skin on her hands holding my arms or my shoulders. Just wait until she saw me on that stage.

 

T
HE MORNING BEFORE THE
M
ISS
D
OGWOOD
F
ESTIVAL,
I limped downstairs ready for a big day of practicing. But everyone was real quiet at the kitchen table. Grandma had the TV rolled into the kitchen and Mama, Charlene, and Ruthie were all huddled around, watching it.

“What happened?” I asked.

Mama dropped her arms on the table and started sobbing into them, harder than I'd ever seen. Harder even than the night I thought she was a hurt bird. “He's gone.” Mama sobbed. “He's gone.”

Charlene shook her head like I had caused whatever problem was making Mama so sad. She rubbed Mama's back.

“What?” I limped over to the table.

“Elvis died, Brenda. Yesterday. We just saw it on the news this morning.” Charlene kept rubbing Mama's back. “He was Mama's favorite singer. ‘Love Me Tender' was her wedding dance song,” she whispered. “You know he was real special to her. She has all his cassettes.”

Mama's chest was heaving. She tried to tuck herself into a little ball.

“Mama's crying like that because Elvis died?”

Charlene rolled her eyes and shook her head. Grandma clucked her tongue. Ruthie started crying too.

I skipped breakfast and went outside. I picked out a favorite cloud, one that looked like a ship. One that I thought Daddy would pick to sit on, one that I would climb up to, if I could. “Is she really crying for you, Daddy?” I said to the sky.

 

M
AMA STAYED IN HER ROOM ALL DAY AND
I
DIDN'T GET
to practice at all. The next morning, she put on sunglasses first thing. I wondered if she would wear them to the Miss Dogwood Pageant.

After breakfast I dragged myself back upstairs to put on my dress. That would make everyone think twice about me not being good enough for the pageant. They had never seen me in a dress like that and were sure to change their minds.

Oh, Brenda!
they'd say.
You are a vision. How beautiful!
All the kinds of things Charlene always heard. I even put on one shiny white shoe and one leg of my nylons on my good foot. I cut off the side I couldn't wear. We cut the strap off the other shoe so I could fit in my swollen foot. Then I walked down the stairs into the living room. My heart thumped and thumped while I stared at my feet, waiting for the courage to lift my head.

When I did, Mama, Grandma, and Ruthie were watching Charlene. I cleared my throat. They all looked up at me. My lips curled into a smile just waiting for their praise.

“You're interrupting my final fitting,” Charlene whined.

Grandma frowned. “Brenda, take that dress off before you get it a mass of wrinkles. You put it on after we get to the pageant hall at the school. Now get changed and get back down here so we can do your hair and makeup.”

Mama looked at me. “Do as your grandmother says, Brenda,” she said quietly.

No one said a thing about my soft blue dress and my shoes. No one noticed. No one could see Brand-New Brenda standing there. My lip wobbled and I caught my breath before I started crying. Maybe it'd be different when I was onstage. I decided not to say another word until the pageant. I changed out of my dress and went downstairs, waiting for my turn to get made up. I went over my lines to my answers again and again.

Charlene looked like a painting. Her hair floated past her shoulders, and her hair was shiny, as if it had been kissed by the sun. She looked like a beauty queen. I expected all the dolls in the cabinets to start clapping for her.

Ruthie's long curls bounced along her back and she was so pleased with her shiny pink lip gloss that she turned around and around, holding a tiny mirror and smiling at herself. She giggled, and her dimples were little pockets of happiness in her cheeks.

I looked like a head that someone had lopped off a mannequin's body with big startled eyes and hair like a wig plopped on its head. Like I had come to life and couldn't believe I was made of Styrofoam.

Mama looked at me after she finished my makeup and nodded. No one said I looked nice.

 

W
E HAD TO BE AT THE FESTIVAL GROUNDS BY ELEVEN.
They were holding the pageant right at the high school, in the gymnasium. The competition started at one. My tummy was already rumbling for lunch when we got there, and the sweet scent of fried dough and cotton candy out in the parking lot made it worse. “Can we get something to eat?”

“No. You don't eat before a pageant,” Grandma said. “You want your stomach nice and flat. Besides, it would ruin your lipstick.” She didn't even look at me.

We carried our clothes into the girls' locker room. I had my dress and shoes and my baton outfit. Mama had sewn a star made out of sequins onto my red bathing suit. She couldn't make anything fancier for my baton routine in time for the pageant, but I really liked it. It looked kind of dumb with my foot wrapped up, though. I didn't have to use a crutch anymore, but I still hobbled around a bit.

Charlene had two dresses, one for the competition and one for her talent. “I've got a surprise for Mama,” she whispered to me.

Mama still had on her glasses and hadn't smiled or said anything in a voice above a whisper since we'd learned the news about Elvis.

Ruthie only had to go onstage once, so she just wore her bright pink dress with white ruffles rolling underneath. She sat on a bench in the locker room with her hands folded on her lap as she waited for us.

“No jewelry, Brenda. Take off that ugly bracelet,” Grandma said. She held out her hand, waiting for it.

I blinked at her. I couldn't take off my bracelet. Miss Vernie had one rule about being in her school—you always had to wear the bracelet.

“Go on, take it off.”

My fingers trembled as I pried open the clasp. The metal slid off my wrist and pooled in my other hand. But I wouldn't give it to her. I set it in the locker with my other things. My breath hitched. This meant I wasn't in Miss Vernie's school anymore.

Grandma shook her head at me. “You really should be in a gown, too, Brenda. It would have covered up that ugly bandage.”

I checked out my foot. It did look ugly. “Miss Vernie said the Junior Miss girls should wear party dresses, not gowns.”

And that's when Miss Vernie walked by with Karen and Dana.

“There are certain rules to follow in a pageant, certain traditions,” Grandma said loudly. “Certain things that should be worn by certain people. A pageant isn't just for anybody,” she said, looking at Dana. She slammed the door closed on the locker where she'd put the clothes we'd worn from home. It didn't have a lock, and I hoped nobody would go poking around in there and steal my bracelet.

Miss Vernie kept walking, but Karen turned around and held up her bracelet. “We both lost another charm!” she whispered.

I waited for them to walk past before telling Grandma, “I have to go to the bathroom.”

She sighed. “Another reason not to eat or drink anything before the pageant. Hurry up about it.”

I shuffled from our section of the locker room, looking for my friends. They were already changed, and Miss Vernie was putting a sparkly necklace on Karen.

“Brenda! Good luck to you. You look just lovely,” Miss Vernie said. She opened a locker. “I brought your turtle for you.” She paused. “I wasn't sure when I'd see you again, and I didn't think I'd be welcome if I dropped by your grandmother's house. Of course, I can take him home and let him go if you'd like. You can decide after the pageant. He'll be right here waiting for you.”

I peered in the bowl. Earl looked more gray than green and didn't open his eyes until I poked him. “Thanks,” I said, swallowing a giant gulp of sadness. “So, what lesson did you guys learn when you lost your charms?”

Dana was adjusting her shoes and didn't look up.

“I lost my heart charm,” Karen said. “I had a long talk with my mom about how my stepdad upsets me so much, and she told me he just wants the best for me. That he wasn't really picking on me so much as trying to motivate me to lose weight, to get off the couch and do something. So I guess you could say we had a real heart-to-heart talk. They're both coming today.” She smiled so wide, her cheeks looked like they could burst.

“That's great.” I fingered my wrist and remembered Grandma made me take off the bracelet. “What about Dana?”

I hoped she would stand up and answer, but she was holding a picture, looking at it. Karen kept talking. “Dana lost her flower charm. She figures it was when she did an interview with the newspaper about being the only black girl in the Miss Dogwood pageant. Guess she felt like she blossomed. There are going to be newspaper reporters here and everything. Maybe even a TV camera! Did you know Jack Taylor, that news anchor, is the MC for the pageant?”

“Wow.” A new reason to be nervous. “Well, good luck, you guys.”

“You too, Brenda.” Miss Vernie looked at me with a smile that seemed more sad than happy.

I held up my wrist. “Grandma made me take my bracelet off for the pageant.” My voice dropped to a whisper. “That means I'm not in your school anymore.”

She cupped my cheek in her hand. “Don't you worry. You're still in my school if you want to be. I have a feeling there will be a lot to learn right here today.”

I didn't think so. I didn't think anything magical or important was going to happen, but I sniffed and nodded and went back to join my family.

chapter twenty-two

T
HE GYMNASIUM WAS FILLED WITH FOLDING CHAIRS AND
a stage that stretched out like the letter
T
. A big curtain hung from the ceiling along the back of the stage, hiding all the contestants lined up on the floor. A set of stairs led to a space on the stage behind the curtain. That's where contestants would wait their turn. I walked along the floor beyond the end of the curtain and peeked out at all those people fanning themselves with programs, their conversations buzzing in the air.

“All the girls go on first in their formal wear,” Grandma said. “First the Miss division, then Junior Miss, and so on.”

“There are only fifteen girls competing against me,” Charlene said, beaming. “I have a real shot.”

“Brenda, there are twenty girls in your division, but only eight up against Ruthie. I just know one of you will be walking away with a crown today,” Grandma said, looking back and forth between Charlene and Ruthie.

Mama and Grandma sat in the audience with Ruthie. Mama would bring her backstage when it was her turn. Charlene stood off on her own, like the other contestants might scuff up her beauty. I looked more closely and saw she was singing to herself. Probably practicing. But she looked more nervous than I'd ever seen her.

I was glad the talent competition was last. I was antsy about getting my words to the questions to come out right, never mind remembering all the baton moves and balancing on one foot. Climbing a tree was so much easier than this.

I snuck off and sat in a bleacher just beyond the edge of the backstage area so I could see the audience and the end of the runway. There were some very pretty girls in the Miss division. I could tell; they were the ones Charlene was frowning at.

She watched them line up. They all seemed to know each other, and most of them were glancing at Charlene too. Charlene took her place in line. She was going on sixth, wearing that pale yellow gown that did glow next to her tan skin. Just like Mama said it would.

Charlene looked over at me, and I whispered good luck. She must have been able to read my lips 'cause she smiled. Then she climbed up the stairs to the stage and waited behind the curtain for her turn. I really hoped she would win. She wanted that crown more than a bear wanted honey.

When her turn came, Charlene walked out onstage wearing her big smile and walking her slow, sure walk. I noticed the clapping for her was louder than it had been for the other girls. The contestants who were still lined up backstage whispered behind their hands as they peeked beyond the curtain. Dana was a few places behind Charlene. She was still staring at the picture in her hand, and finally she slipped it down the front of her dress.

Charlene finished her stage walk and came up next to the host for her interview.

“It's time to learn more about our next Miss Dogwood 1977 candidate, Miss Charlene Anderson. Why did you join the pageant, Miss Anderson?” Jack Taylor smiled as he waited for her answer.

“Thank you, Mr. Taylor. We watch you all the time on the TV.”

He blushed. “Why, thanks, darlin'.”

Charlene shrugged and showed the crowd her southern belle smile. “I just moved to North Caro-lina, but I have always been a Southern belle at heart. My mama was runner-up for Miss North Carolina 1963,” she said, nodding. “There she is.” She pointed to Mama. “The one who looks like Rita Hayworth.”

Mama's head snapped up and everyone looked at her.

“She is lovely. I can see where you get your beauty, Miss Anderson,” Jack Taylor said.

She nodded. “Thank you, Mr. Taylor. My grandma, right next to her, was Miss North Carolina 1939.”

Grandma waved and the audience politely applauded.

Charlene continued. “I think as one of the newest residents of Mount Airy, North Carolina, I can really appreciate what is wonderful about this great state, taking it all in with a fresh eye. I can represent the Miss Dogwood Festival with the energy and enthusiasm I genuinely feel as I discover all that's great about the state of North Carolina. I will be an ambassador who'll make you proud at the many appearances I'll be doing at nursing homes, schools, and grocery store openings. You won't be disappointed when you name me Miss Dogwood 1977.”

“You're certainly confident, too, Miss Anderson. Always a good thing. Thank you very much.” And he watched her wave to the crowd as she walked offstage while the judges sat at their table, smiling and scribbling on their notepads.

I could see Grandma holding her hands in the air, clapping. Would she do that for me?

A pretty girl with long black hair named Michelle Dawson went up next, promising to make the Dogwood Festival a household name in North Carolina. Charlene narrowed her eyes and had her hands on her hips the whole time Michelle was onstage.

Dana was next in line. I wanted to go up to her and wish her good luck. But I just sent her good wish thoughts instead.

The audience hum turned into a buzz as she walked out. A TV camera light turned on. People leaned next to each other and whispered, but Dana just kept her head high, a small, amused smile on her face. She didn't wave and she didn't race across the stage like some of the others had.

Jack Taylor used his important TV voice. “Miss Dana Jameson, I don't have to point out that you are the only black contestant in a typically white pageant. Why are you the right contestant to represent the Miss Dogwood Festival?”

She looked at him and then stared out at the audience before answering. “Dogwood blossoms come in different colors. Pink and white. Even some yellow. But they're all lovely. I think I am a good representation of the new diversity this nation needs to recognize. Some people think beauty is only a white thing. That I don't belong in this pageant.”

I looked at Grandma. She was staring at her hands in her lap.

“Choose me as Miss Dogwood 1977, and North Carolina is saying we recognize beauty no matter what the color of your skin. Or the flower of the beautiful dogwood,” Dana finished.

There was polite applause smattered with some loud claps and cheers. I saw one big black man in the back stand up, smiling and clapping.

“Thank you, Miss Jameson,” Jack said.

Dana nodded and stood still before the audience, looking them over instead of the other way around. Then she walked off the stage. Dana moved past all of us as she came backstage, and she went right to the locker room. I wanted to follow her, but I was up second in the Junior Miss division and I didn't want to miss my spot. I had no idea she'd shine on stage like that. I hoped I would too.

I practiced my speech while the rest of the girls in Charlene's division went onstage. “My heart belongs here. . . . My heart belongs here,” I mumbled to myself, trying to remember how the rest of my answer was supposed to go.

“Good luck,” Karen said to me.

I jumped, surprised to see her standing beside me. “Thanks.” I noticed she was still wearing her charm bracelet.

“Wow, your sister is so pretty.”

I shrugged. “Dana was something, huh?”

Karen smiled. “She sure was.” Karen walked away, looking less like a pastry than when she first tried on the dress. Her posture was different. She didn't slouch, and she didn't hold her hands in front of her tummy. It wasn't her main feature anymore.

I rubbed my own stomach, hoping to calm the bubbles filling up the empty space. I wondered what Daddy would've thought of this. I wondered if he was watching. I got in line and waited for my turn.

The girl before me was tall and skinny. She looked like she could have been in Charlene's division. She smiled at me. “Good luck,” she said, in that sweet, southern-pie, sugary way that left you wondering if she really meant it.

A lady with a clipboard waved me right onstage behind the curtain. “You're next!”

I looked back at Karen, two people behind me. She crossed her fingers.

“Next, let's welcome Junior Miss contestant Brenda Anderson, new to Mount Airy, just like her big sister, Charlene, who we met in our Miss division,” Jack Taylor said. “Brenda is sporting a sprained ankle.”

I walked slowly across the stage, smiling but not looking at the judges or at anyone in the audience, especially not at Mama or Grandma. Each step I took limping on my foot felt like it took a whole minute. Sweat tickled my forehead. The gymnasium was perfectly silent as everyone fanned themselves with their programs and watched my pathetic journey. Laughter and music from the festival outside floated in through the open gymnasium doors.

“Hi, Chip!” I heard Ruthie call. Everyone turned to look. Mama pressed her hand over Ruthie's mouth and smiled. Ruthie was still waving.

This finally made me smile. I waved back and saw Grandma frown.

I turned away from her and walked over to Jack and blew out a breath; I was going to have to answer his questions now.

“Miss Anderson, why are you the right person to be named Junior Miss Dogwood?”

I took a deep breath and waited for the words to find my mouth. I waited long enough that I could hear whispering start. Then I closed my eyes and remembered the words Grandma made me practice. “I am new to North Carolina, but I feel like my heart belongs here. Especially in lovely Mount Airy. What more could a girl want than to live in such a wonderful place and to represent the best of the South, the Junior Miss Dogwood title?”

“Very nice. Thank you, Miss Anderson. And very, very brave of you to come out with that injured ankle. How'd that happen, anyway?” He scrunched his eyebrows together, all serious.

I looked down at the floor. “I fell out of a tree.”

“So you're a tomboy, eh?” He chuckled, and looked out at the audience with a big shrug.

“Well, I used to be. But now I'm . . . different.”

“Very well. Ladies and gentlemen, let's have a big round of applause for Brenda Anderson.”

I scurried backstage, dragging my foot. I didn't wave or look at anyone.

Karen gave me a thumbs-up sign.

I stayed to watch her go on. She stumbled at first, but she smiled and kept walking. I saw her mom and stepdad in the front row. Her stepdad was taking pictures. I saw a glint of gold bounce off the stage.

When she came back, Karen was glowing. She held up her bracelet. “I lost my last charm—the flower. I have to go show Miss Vernie.”

Could Miss Vernie be right? Maybe I would learn something important during the competition too.