The Pretty App (13 page)

I
stood outside Audrey’s apartment building in my rain boots. The air was cold and the sky was dark with the promise of a storm. I texted Audrey:

I’m standing outside your place. Not to be a stalker but I know you’re there bc I can see thru your window. Can I come in?

It was less than ten minutes after my father’s warning. I’d told my parents I’d forgotten a book at school and needed to go back.

Audrey: I’m not going to leave you out there all night w/ Roger and Nicorette, so yeah, come in.

I waved to Roger—Audrey’s apartment complex’s super who shaved his legs and wore sandals year-round—and his Chihuahua, Nicorette, and walked along the sidewalk, careful to avoid the spray from Roger’s bright green hose.

I shoved open the front door. Audrey’s apartment
building didn’t have a lobby like the ones you see in the movies, and there wasn’t an elevator, either. A row of bronze mailboxes lined the side wall. The floors were covered with dull white carpeting, and the walls were painted a flaking, dusty pink. I hadn’t been there in years, but the details flooded back like it was yesterday. I remembered the cracks that ran over the wall along the stairs in a diamond shape. When we were ten, Audrey told her dad that the cracks looked like a spiderweb, and he picked her up and stuck her in the middle and said, “Now you’re Charlotte.” We laughed as she giggled and squealed to be put down.

I made my way up the stairs to apartment 313 and rang Audrey’s buzzer. The smell of fresh bread seeped from below the door, which meant Audrey’s mom was cooking. I was nervous, but not as much so as I thought I’d be. At least Audrey had invited me inside. That wouldn’t have happened a few months ago.

The door stuck against the frame, and Audrey’s mom had to yank hard to open it. She stood there with her brown curls piled high on her head and pinned back at the sides with bobby pins. “Blake,” she said, looking not altogether happy to see me.

“Hi, Mrs. McCarthy,” I said. And then, quickly, I added, “Audrey invited me in. Is that okay? I know it’s dinnertime.”

“Don’t be silly,” she said. “Come inside.” She gestured across the living room with a long wooden spoon. “Audrey’s in her room.”

I thanked her and moved past the flowered sofa and
the glass coffee table covered with gold-framed pictures of Audrey’s dad. I didn’t need to ask why they’d never moved from their apartment to a nice house, even now that they could afford it. I knew Audrey and her mom well enough to know that moving would feel like leaving Audrey’s dad and the place they had spent their life with him behind.

I knocked on Audrey’s door. I was surprised she hadn’t come out to let me in, but then she said, “Pass code,” and I realized she’d done it on purpose.

I knocked to the beat of the
Friends
theme song, and Audrey started laughing. She swung the door open, wearing black leggings and a Pearl Jam T-shirt that I was pretty sure was Aidan’s. “You’re lucky you remembered it,” she said.

I shut it behind us and said, “You’re lucky I was clever enough to make up such a good pass code.”

We moved to her bed and sat opposite each other. It was an old habit, and it happened before I realized it. I grabbed a fluffy white pillow and held it in my lap, toying with the white tassels.

“My parents suck,” I said.

“Tell me something I don’t know,” Audrey said, rolling her eyes. But she said it like she was on my side.

“My dad has managed to make this reality show all about how it could benefit his campaign for governor,” I said. I ran my hand across the pillow’s soft cotton. I felt more relaxed just being in Audrey’s room with the familiar yellow walls and Radiohead prints. She’d even kept her
HANG IN THERE
poster with the furry gray kitten falling
off the shelf. It had to be over a decade old. Programming manuals were stacked next to her computer, and her father’s worn leather Bible rested beside her bed.

She looked at me expectantly, like she was waiting for me to say more. When I didn’t, she unscrewed the top of a Mountain Dew and took a few swigs. “He’s so predictable,” she said.

“The thing is, I want to go—I want to do this, to prove myself.” I tucked a dark strand of hair behind my ear. “So it doesn’t really matter what he thinks, I guess. At least he’s letting me go.”

Audrey nodded like that made sense. “I want you to be careful there,” she said. “You know how dangerous Public is—and they’re behind the show.”

“Come with me,” I blurted. It came out different than how I’d practiced on the drive over. I held my breath as we stared at each other.

“What? Where?”

“To LA,” I said. “I’m allowed to bring one person to the reality show as long as they’re over eighteen, too. It’s just a few days out of school and you’re already into college and practically have a job lined up, anyway. You’d have your own room in a separate guesthouse. It could be like a vacation.” I took a breath. I needed to tell her exactly how I was feeling, how ever since today with Leo in the woods I’d realized that she was trying to help me, not take something away from me.

“I trust you, Audrey,” I said. “You were right about
Leo. He’s hiding something. I’m not sure what it is, but I realized today that you were trying to look out for me, not ruin what I thought I had I with him.” I tried to read the look on her face, but I couldn’t tell if she was horrified at the LA idea or just surprised. “I mean, whatever, if you don’t want to—”

“I don’t know, Blake, I . . .” Her voice trailed off. “When would we even go?”

“We’d leave on Friday. And it’s only for a long weekend because it’s filmed live. So we’d only need to miss Friday and Monday of school, and you know my uncle will sign off on it.”

Audrey wasn’t exactly a fan of my uncle Aloysius, the principal of Harrison. Still, she was smiling a little, and I could tell I almost had her.

“You and me,” she started, “you’re sure this is a good idea? We’re not exactly Brad Pitt and George Clooney.”

“How do you still make Brad Pitt relevant to any conversation?”

Audrey shrugged. “It’s true,” she said. “Things got so bad last semester.”

“Things got so bad a long time ago,” I said, and Audrey nodded. I held the pillow tight to my chest. I wasn’t used to feeling so vulnerable, and it kind of made me want to throw up, but it was now or never. “I feel like you never forgave me after my dad said that awful stuff about your dad,” I said.

A flush rose to Audrey’s face, and the words hung heavy
in the air between us. I knew how painful that whole thing was, and the last thing I wanted to do was remind her of it. “I’m sorry,” I said, “I—”

“It wasn’t just that, Blake,” Audrey said, and I heard pain mixed with annoyance, like I was too dense to understand what really happened. “I mean,
that
was beyond awful,” she said, “but
you
were being awful, too. You were being so nasty to everyone at school.”

“But I was taking such good care of you!” I blurted. “Didn’t that count for something?”

Audrey pursed her tiny lips. “Of course it did,” she said. “It was why I held on to you—to us—for so long.”

Embarrassment streaked through me. The way she said it made me sound like a charity case.

“But then I just couldn’t anymore,” Audrey said, her voice a whisper.

I hated the warm tears that spilled over my cheeks. I hated letting my guard down. But everything between us still felt so raw, like a fresh wound reopened. I could feel the pain of her letting me go like it was yesterday. “So you just gave up on me?” I asked. “How was that okay after everything we’d been through?”

Audrey took my hand. “I’m sorry,” she said, holding me tight. “Please try to understand how tired I was, and how sad. I wasn’t okay without my dad. And I couldn’t deal with the shit you were doing. It didn’t seem right. And I didn’t have the energy to try to fix you.”

I sniffed. “You couldn’t have fixed me, anyway,” I said,
wiping my eyes. I’d watched enough Oprah reruns to know I was the only one who could fix myself. “And I’m sorry I did those terrible things,” I said. “They weren’t right. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, Audrey, I really don’t.”

“Come on,” Audrey said gently, squeezing my hand. “We all mess up. We all make mistakes.”

“I’m trying to fix mine,” I said, meeting her gaze. “I promise.”

Audrey gave me a small smile.

“But I’m still going to be a tiny bit bitchy, as the need arises,” I said.

“Fair,” Audrey said, really smiling this time.

I took a breath. “I know I can’t make you trust me; I know I have to earn it. But I will. You’ll see.” My voice was quiet. “And right now . . . I need you.”

Audrey took a deep breath. “If my mom says yes, I’ll do it,” she said, nodding. “I’ll go with you.”

I covered my mouth, trying to mask the squeal escaping it. “Thank you, thank you!” I said, still teary as I reached my arms around her shoulders. “You won’t regret it.”

Audrey shrugged as I pulled away. “It’ll be kind of fun to see the look on the Public people’s faces when I show up,” she said, smiling. “And it will get me points with Infinitum for keeping close tabs on our enemy.” But then her expression turned serious. “Public is smart. And they’re dangerous. The stuff they were up to last year—who knows what else they’re capable of. Promise me we’ll be careful.”

“I promise,” I said. “Of course we’ll be careful.”

But I felt invincible with Audrey by my side. And really, what could they do to us? It was just a reality show: the kind of test I could handle. Entertainment, really. A title for which I’d been born to compete. And one I was set on winning.

I
’d like to say that I forgot about Leo over the next four days, or that I didn’t stare at my phone, waiting for a call/text/email/photo/anything. But of course I couldn’t forget him. Not even close. Not even when Audrey and Lindsay came over and Audrey played on my computer while Lindsay picked out every single outfit she wanted me to wear during the show. She’d put together stuff in my closet I’d never even thought about pairing, and she brought some of her own stuff, too, like a lace-back cardigan she got at the Barneys Warehouse sale when she was in New York City for her fashion internship. She scanned the outfits laid out before us, each marked with fashion notes she wanted me to remember, like:
Wear this vintage pendant as an exit necklace with your backless Cushnie et Ochs gown, so it lightly bounces on your bare skin when you
turn and walk away from people, leaving a devastatingly glamourous impression.

I didn’t forget about Leo when Joanna, Jolene, and Xander came by with a pink stuffed bear clutching a balloon that said,
GOOD LUCK
!, either, and I didn’t forget about Leo as I walked on eggshells around my father, or when my uncle Aloysius sent me a singing telegram on behalf of Harrison High School, or when Nic came by with flowers and an envelope that she made me promise I wouldn’t open until I needed it.

“How will I know when I need it?” I’d asked her.

“You just will,” she said.

Still. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t bring myself to contact Leo. I didn’t want to be stubborn about it, but it didn’t feel right. He’d left me, and he’d done it without any real explanation. I felt pathetic for reliving our last kiss in my mind, the way his perfect lips devoured mine, the way his scruff felt against my cheek. I felt pathetic for holding on to his promise that he’d come back to me. But I couldn’t help it. It was all I had.

On Friday, Audrey and I spent the first half of the plane ride to Los Angeles playing Rummy 500 and obsessing over reality show strategy. Things were feeling so new between us, and yet familiar, too. Sometimes I’d feel nervous and try to say the right thing, but mostly I was just myself.

Lindsay had made me a list of reality show dos and don’ts, like:

DON’T make out with any member of the camera crew or production staff.

DO make them think you might. You’ll get more camera time.

DON’T sleep in mascara. They’ll get a.m. shots and you’ll look like something the cat dragged in.

DO cry in a pretty way. One or two tears. No sobbing.

DON’T wear anything that has brand names or mega patterns on it.

DO try and mention my blog if you can.

DON’T forget to eat to fuel your body and maintain your strength. But like going to the bathroom, eating is best done away from the cameras. There’s a reason there aren’t pics of fashion editrix and reality star Carine Roitfeld grazing at the craft service table.

DO befriend the hair and makeup people. These people can make or break how you look under the glare of harsh lights. Talk to them about astrology—they LOVE astrology.

DON’T wear short shorts.

DO remember that after reality shows end,
endorsements begin, so maintain an active social media presence and curate categories that brands like to have ambassadors for—fashion, beauty, health, home. Rent a puppy if you think Purina may be looking for a new celebrity to star in its campaigns. Try and have its coloring complement yours.

Audrey said to just focus on smiling and being myself. She was dressed for the plane in her dark skinny jeans and the gray hoodie with black wings on the back that she wears when she wants to feel brave. I was wearing an outfit Lindsay called
What Would Heidi Klum Fly In?
, which turned out to be well-worn ankle boots over skinny black leggings with corduroy patches on the knees, and a lightweight gray cashmere sweater. I fell asleep once, and when I woke, Audrey was bent over her computer poring through a slideshow of photographs.

“What’s that?” I asked, my voice filled with sleep.

“Oh, nothing,” Audrey said quickly. She closed her laptop before I could get a good look. “Can you move your long-ass legs so I can pee?”

The air felt different when we landed in Los Angeles, and I don’t mean the temperature, or the smog. I had the distinct feeling we were somewhere wild and new, in a place where anything could happen.

Audrey and I practically ran down the Jetway into LAX airport. The chilled air smelled like espresso and chocolate.

“Is that Liam Hemsworth?” Audrey asked, pointing to
a guy wearing a black-and-white-checked scarf talking on his cell.

“Don’t point,” I hissed at her. “I think it’s him. We have to play it cool,” I said. But then, as we stepped closer, something came over me. “Liam!” I screamed.

I swear it felt involuntary, like breathing. It just happened.

“Oh my God,
Blake
,” Audrey said, practically tripping over herself as she tried to steer me out of his path, like maybe that could save us.

“Is it him?” I asked.

“I think it’s him,” she hissed.

Audrey pulled me behind a plant.

“Holy crap,” I said, “what’s wrong with me?” I wanted to be embarrassed for myself, but Audrey was laughing so hard that I couldn’t help but give in and start laughing, too.

“
We have to play it cool?
” she repeated. “Did you seriously say that and then scream his name?”

“I think I did,” I said, laughing harder, trying to catch my breath. “But I think he thought we were hot.”

“Or insane,” Audrey said, giggling. We finally settled down, and Audrey said, “I’m glad you got that out of your system. They’re probably going to have celebrity judges for your show.” She elbowed me gently in the side. “You can’t do
that
on live TV when you see them.”

When we stepped out of the gate area and into the main concourse, I started taking it all in, just like Nic had made me promise.
Keep your eyes open to how different it is out there. Things won’t always be like they are here
. But I felt thrown as
I did what she’d said. My eyes were open, and what I saw was the most beautiful population of people I’d ever seen in one place. Everyone was tanned and toned with shiny hair like mine. Each person was more beautiful than the next. I couldn’t stop staring, and my giddy mood suddenly evaporated. This wasn’t what I’d expected; I wasn’t used to blending in, to not looking special.

I tried to steady my breathing, tried not to give away how shaken I felt, but I knew Audrey sensed something. “You okay, Blake?” she asked.

“Yeah,” I said quickly. “Just a little nervous, I think.”

My ankle boots tapped the tile, and my thoughts went somewhere dark.

I was the most beautiful baby in the nursery, according to my mother. I was the most beautiful child in elementary school, according to school pictures. I was the most beautiful girl in junior high and high school, according to anyone who ever laid eyes on me. I was the most beautiful girl in any room I’d ever been in, and I was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen in real life.

And now I most definitely was not.

I was a pretty face in a sea of pretty faces, many of them more so than mine. My entire reality felt like it had shifted over the course of mere minutes.

“Blake?” Audrey asked as I slowed to a stop. A brunette girl whizzed past me wearing white capri pants and a suction-tight black top. Her tan looked airbrushed, and her nose was perfectly sloped and sized, like mine. Her dark eyes were even bigger than Nic’s, and her lips were
heart-shaped and glossy. A blonde in a maxi dress followed her, holding a Starbucks coffee and chewing gum, which sounds like a gross combination, but the girl was so beautiful that it looked perfectly natural, like an ad for chewing coffee-flavored gum. Another woman dressed like Jennifer Aniston in a white tank and boyfriend jeans appeared makeup-free, but her skin was glowing even more than mine did after an application of highlighter powder. I turned to see an African-American girl and a redhead in line at a juice bar. I could only see them from the back, but their bodies matched the Pilates instructor from the video I halfheartedly leg-raised along to every few weeks.

Where
were
we? Was this what all of LA looked like?

Even the men were tight-skinned and tanned and gym-bodied. And the ones who weren’t looked like sharks, like they could eat you alive with one phone call to your agent.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Audrey asked. She pried her headphones from where they’d caught on her T-shirt.

“Um—I’m . . .” I fumbled, unable to say the words out loud to her, because I knew how shallow they sounded. I’d built my entire life on the foundation of my own beauty, my own aesthetic superiority, and now that foundation had just cracked like chapped lips. “I’m fine, I really am,” I told her. “I think I just need some fresh air.”

Audrey slipped her hand in mine and we stepped onto the motorized rubber walkway, not saying anything. The shops passed in a blur: Hugo Boss, Kitson LA, Harley-Davidson.

We descended an escalator, and when we got to the
bottom Audrey squeezed my hand and said, “
Look
.”

Standing next to the baggage claim was a man with shaved white hair wearing a suit and holding up a sign that said
DAWKINS
.

“Oh my God,” I said. “That has to be for us, right?”

Audrey’s face was ashen. “It’s definitely for us,” she said. She slowed her steps and checked out the guy before he could see us. “Blake,” she said. “It’s going to be okay, I promise. We have each other, remember?” She lowered her voice. “But it’s weird that we’re tangled up with Public again. Don’t you think? It just seems . . .
off
.”

It wasn’t what I was thinking about right then. I gestured to the mass of bodies around us, my anxiety climbing sky-high. “Have you not noticed how attractive everyone here is?” I asked her.

Audrey looked around and then shrugged, like she didn’t give a crap. “Yeah,” she said. “It’s LA. This is where the beautiful and famous people live. Most of them have to look like this to get jobs.” She shook her head. “Can you imagine if your job was based on how you looked?”

Um,
yeah
.

“Why didn’t anyone warn me?” I asked, my question shrill and ridiculous even to my own ears.

Audrey adjusted the white drawstring on her hoodie. “What’s the big deal?” she asked.

“You don’t get it,” I said. I didn’t want to be sharp with her—I’d only just gotten her back as a friend. But this wasn’t something she could understand. “You have so many other
things going for you. But this is all I have, Audrey.”

“Your looks?” Audrey asked, acting dumbfounded. “How can you even say that?”

“Because it’s true.”

“
Blake
,” Audrey said. She put her hands on my shoulders. I wanted to squirm away, but I didn’t. “Listen to me,” she said. “There’s a lot more to you than your looks, but your stupid father warped you into thinking that’s why you’re valuable. He’s wrong. You’re valuable even without any qualities at all. Like, as a person, you idiot. You don’t have to do anything other than just be.”

“Are you the Dalai Lama now or something?”

She rolled her green eyes like I was the dumbest person on earth. “Fine,” she said. “You want me to name your other qualities?” Her hands bore down harder on my shoulders, like she needed me to hear this. “You’re one of the most loyal people I know, and you’re a really amazing friend when someone’s on your good side. You’re funny. People listen to you when you talk, because there’s something magnetic about you. And you’re great on camera—you could be an entertainment reporter, or a journalist someday. What more do you even want?”

“I want more friends,” I said. I could’ve listed a lot of things I wanted: for my dad to love me unconditionally, for Leo to show up at the baggage claim and say he couldn’t live a Blake-free life, for my ass to always stay this high. But
more friends
seemed like a good place to start.

“Then try being nice to people,” Audrey said in her
exasperated voice, the one she’d used on the airplane when a toddler threw Cheerios at her.

“Fine,” I said. “I’ll try. But I hate it here. I want you to know that.”

“We haven’t even left the airport,” Audrey said. “Maybe you should spend this beauty contest figuring out that beauty isn’t everything, and then you’ll be able to hang in LA like a normal person.”

“You know you’re not normal, either, right?” I teased her, suddenly feeling a little better.

“Yeah, but I figured that out a long time ago,” Audrey said, grinning. “Now let’s go tell that scary bodyguard man that you’re Blake Dawkins.”

“The one and only,” I said.

We crossed the tiled floor to where the man stood beneath a glowing
EXIT
sign. Pilots breezed by us with luggage and name tags, one of them telling a joke as the others laughed.

“Hello,” Audrey said to the man as we stepped closer. “I’m Audrey McCarthy, and this is Blake Dawkins.”

The man’s smile looked more like a twitch. “Pleased to meet you,” he said. “I’ll be your driver. Let’s get your luggage, shall we?” He helped us lug our suitcases from the baggage carousel, doing a double take when Audrey pointed to a pink fluffy duffel featuring Rainbow Brite.

“You need to get new luggage before college,” I said as Audrey smirked. “You don’t even like pink.”

We followed the driver through sliding glass doors to
the curb, where a sleek black town car was parked. The air was as warm as an early summer day in South Bend, but not as sticky. A boy on a skateboard whizzed past us singing an Eminem song. A statuesque woman who looked like Uma Thurman pushed a stroller with a towheaded toddler. She met another woman at the curb and gestured to the neon-colored lollipop the toddler was sucking. “It’s organic,” she said.

The driver opened the curbside door, and Audrey slipped inside. I followed, sinking into the smooth black leather. Two water bottles rested in a console between our seats. Audrey twisted one of the water bottles open with a huge grin on her face, like she was used to this kind of treatment even though I knew she wasn’t. She lifted it and said, “Cheers to our big LA adventure.” I was so glad she was with me. I felt lighter just seeing her pixie-perfect face across from mine.