CHAPTER SIX

Petra woke before the others and began the search for her overnight case and the necessary medication hidden inside the lining. The tide had delivered a few more of their belongings in the night — random shoes, clothing, beaded headdresses, gloves — and Petra’s heart beat with new hope as she moved up the beach toward a skull-shaped rock and its tongue of a jetty where a few colorful garments floated, stopped by the natural barrier.

Silently, she cursed herself for entering the pageant in the first place. It was a foolish, desperate move, and now here she was, stuck on an island with only a week’s worth of pills. Once that ran out … well, she wouldn’t think about it. Stay positive. That was the thing.

The salt spray kissed her skin, and Petra thought back to the first time she’d played dress-up when she was eight. Sitting at her mother’s makeup table, she’d felt a giddy joy as she’d applied the eye shadow — blue and too heavy — the pink blusher, the powder, and finally, a coat of red lipstick. When Petra had looked at herself in the mirror, she’d felt pretty for the first time, a fairy-tale frog transformed into a princess.

So enamored was Petra of her new self that she didn’t hear her mother come up from her art studio in the basement. Her mother’s lips were parted slightly, as if she were calculating the answer to a math problem that had been in her head a long time but she had only just come upon the answer. She kissed Petra’s cheek and said, “Through playing?”

Petra wasn’t through playing, not by a long shot, but she nodded, and her mother helped her wash her face and then treated her to a special moisturizing mask, which was cold and green and made them both giggle.

“Will I be beautiful like you someday?” Petra asked her mother.

“You already are beautiful,” her mother answered.

“No. Like you,” Petra repeated, and her mother’s expression was unreadable.

“I guess we’ll have to see.”

A bikini-clad Taylor emerged through the skeletal rock’s mouth like a beauty from a Loch Lomond⁸ movie. Watching Taylor, sun-kissed and bronzed and effortless, Petra felt jealous and more than a little out of her league. What was she doing here? What did she hope to prove? That she, Petra West, had just as much right to the Miss Teen Dream crown as all these other girls? That there was beauty in her, too? She could still drop out, she supposed. Give it all up. After all, she’d been in the spotlight before, and while it had been exhilarating in some ways, it had been a nightmare in others. Would she handle it any differently this time? Or would it implode as it had before?

During her mother’s chemo, Petra had promised she would go after her dreams. “Life is too short not to be who you are, honey,” her mom had told her. She thought of her mom back home in her art studio in Providence, scarred and shorn and still beautiful, full of fierce belief in the rightness of her daughter. And Petra knew she would see it through.

“Good morning!” she called as politely as possible.

“Good morning, Miss Rhode Island. Oh, Miss New Hampshire!” Taylor called out. “How was first watch? Anything to report?”

Adina trudged over sleepily and plopped down onto the sand with a groan. “Yeah. I have five humongous bug bites on my legs and arms, my butt crack has been thoroughly exfoliated with sand, I’m hungry, exhausted, and I haven’t seen a ship anywhere.”

“Don’t you have anything positive to say?” Taylor chided.

Adina glared. “There’s still a possibility this is all a very bad dream.”

“My goodness. Somebody needs to learn resilience. It’s a miracle you’ve gotten this far in the pageant system, Miss New Hampshire. I myself slept just fine.”

“Did you see a green overnight case with an Audrey Hepburn decal on top?” Petra asked. She bit nervously at a fingernail, thought better of it, and hid her hands behind her back.

“Nuh-uh. I did see some weird lights up near the volcano, though. Flashes, like signals or something. At least, I thought I did. I don’t know. I was really tired.”

“Battle fatigue, my daddy calls it,” Taylor said with assurance. She rubbed at the stains on her minidress with seawater.

Adina ignored Taylor. With a stick, she wrote This sucks in the sand. “I had this weird feeling that we were being watched last night.”

“Watched by what?” Petra asked.

“I don’t know. But it gave me the total creeps.”

“Sounds like Most Holy Name Academy,” Mary Lou said, joining them. Damaged spangles hung from her dress on hair-thin threads like some molting bird. “When those nuns say they have eyes everywhere, they are not kidding. I didn’t pee at school for the first two years. I wore a pee pad.”

Petra put a hand on Mary Lou’s shoulder. “TMI.”

“I think we should go check it out,” Adina said.

Mary Lou glanced at the great lava wall protecting the heart of the jungle. “You mean go in there?”

“Yes. As a journalist, I am compelled to know the answers.”

“As a girl, I am compelled to protect what’s left of my manicure,” Petra said.

“But what if the rescuers are looking for us there and not here? What if …” Adina swallowed hard. “What if there’s somebody else on this island with us?”

“Somebody with food?” Mary Lou asked weakly.

“Or somebody who wants to make us into food,” Adina said.

Mary Lou’s eyes widened. “Oh, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.”

Taylor smoothed the wrinkles from her wet dress and wiped her hands on her knees. “I am team captain. And I say we’re doing our pageant prep first, according to plan. Priorities.”

“Shouldn’t our priorities be food, shelter, and rescue?”

“Miss New Hampshire, I appreciate your concerns. But I am eighteen. This is my last year to compete. I do not intend to lose my edge. Besides, I’m sure the rescue team will be here today. And we want them to find us at our best. Miss Teen Dreamers! Let’s get to it!” Taylor clapped in a cheerleader rhythm for attention and began to give the day’s structure. Adina cupped a hand over her eyes and squinted in the direction of the volcano. The top disappeared into mist. It seemed unassailable and uninhabitable. She’d probably imagined the lights.

After a breakfast of rationed airline pretzels and four sips each from the rescued water bottles, the girls worked on their opening dance number. Each girl had received a DVD of the dance steps in her prep packet, but they’d never had a chance to rehearse it as a unit. That’s what this week before the pageant was supposed to be about. Now, without the choreographer, it wasn’t coming together smoothly. Somebody would inevitably high-kick when it was time for spirit fingers, the timing was off on the contagion, and the whole thing was such a disaster that Petra pronounced it “so dinner theater on Mars.” After an hour of work in the hot island sun, Taylor called a break.

Nicole tapped Adina. “Taylor wants you to play Fabio Testosterone⁹ and ask all the questions.”

“Why me?”

Nicole faltered. “Um, I guess because you’re smart and good at questions and …”

“Because you pissed her off,” Petra said, dabbing self-consciously at the sweat on her upper lip. “Count me out. I already know where to find Iran on a map and I have to look for my overnight bag.”

Nicole whistled. “That won’t make Taylor happy.”

“Tell her I’ll keep a watch out for a rescue ship. That I’m taking one for the team.”

“Tell her I’m doing that, too,” Adina seconded.

“I got there first,” Petra said.

Nicole patted Adina’s shoulder. “Sorry. Guess you better go round everybody else up, Fabio.”

Ten minutes later, the girls lined up as they had in every pageant. It was a relief to know this part. All they had to do was be charming and answer the questions with confidence.

“Remember, don’t show fear,” Taylor called. Over the firewood, she struck two rocks together, trying to catch a spark. “Judges are like dogs: They’ll smell it. If you don’t know the answer, answer it like you do anyway.”

“Can I get started?” Adina snapped. The heat was making her bug bites itch and she hadn’t had a decent meal since yesterday. “Our first contestant is Brittani Slocum, Miss Mississippi.”

“I’m Miss Alabama,” Brittani corrected.

At the end of the line, Tiara raised her hand. “I’m Miss Mississippi.”

Adina looked from one tan, blond southern goddess to the other. They both cocked their heads to the left and smiled in a practiced, patient way.

“Whatever,” Adina grumbled. “So, Miss Alabama, Tiara —”

“Brittani!”

“Brittani Slocum. First question. The pageant has come under fire for perpetuating an unrealistic image of superthin girls as beautiful, and many people feel this is harmful to girls’ self-esteem. What do you say to these critics? And what do you personally feel about these narrow standards of beauty?”

Brittani’s smile remained Vaseline smooth, but her eyes showed fear. “Um, what does perpetuate mean?”

“Keep something going.”

“Keep what going?”

“No, perpetuate means to keep something going.” Like I am perpetuating your stupidity, Adina thought.

“Oh. Um, well, I would say that being skinny and stuff is good because you can, like, fit into supercute jeans, unlike my friend Lisa? She totally ballooned up to a size six and none of her pants fit, and she had, like, three-hundred-dollar Sandeces¹⁰ jeans!”

In the line, several girls gasped.

“Seriously! And she got all depressed and stuff? And she wouldn’t come out of her room or do cheerleading anymore because her uniform wasn’t fitting right and her parents had to do, like, a li’l benefit concert to raise the money to send her to fat camp, and when she came back from fat camp, she was super, super angry and started piercing things. She took a nail gun and nailed all her old Barbies to the wall in a cross pattern just like little Barbie Jesuses. It was so, so freaky. And we had, like, nothing in common anymore, and before she got fat we used to go shopping every weekend and watch all our favorite Corporation shows. It was super, super tragic, and so, like, I know the pain of this because I lost my best friend in the whole world over it and stuff, so, yeah, it’s bad and, um, what was the question again?”

Adina stared, openmouthed. “I have no idea.”

“My turn!” Miss Ohio walked the makeshift runway. She stopped beside Adina, her body turned in a perfect three-quarter pose, which her handler said made her look thinner. She gave Adina a flirtatious, fingertips-only wave.

“What was that about?”

“It’s my flirty wave so I can get Fabio’s attention and we can establish a joking patter and maybe end up as a clip on ViralVideo. See, you have to do something to stand out. I’m going to be the naughty one.”

“The naughty ones don’t win Miss Teen Dream,” Taylor called. She’d started a small fire. Now she fanned the flames by performing military dance exercises.

“I don’t need to win. I just need to get noticed. So for now, I’m pretending you’re Fabio Testosterone.” Miss Ohio waved again and winked.

“Well, I’m not, so don’t.” Adina slapped at a mosquito on her arm. “Miss Ohio, what are your life goals?”

Chin held high, Miss Ohio beamed at an imagined crowd. “I want to be a motivational speaker.”

“What are you going to motivate people to do?”

Smile still in place, she cut her eyes at Adina. “You know. Motivational … stuff.”

“Well, are you going to motivate people to bring peace to war-torn nations, or are you going to motivate people to join a cult and drink the Kool-Aid?”

“The first one.”

Adina sighed. “Nice. You might want to take the gum out of your mouth next time.”

The sun was hot. It burned holes in the fog cover and wilted the girls’ spirits. Periodically, they scanned the horizon for signs of a ship or plane, but there was nothing but those same darkening clouds in the distance. Only Taylor seemed unbothered by the heat, the bugs, the fear.

“Again!” she called from her perch on the rock as the girls marched forward one by one addressing an imaginary audience:

“I’m from Ohio, birthplace of seven U.S. presidents, and I hope you elect me to be your next Miss Teen Dream!”

“Hello from New Mexico, Land of Enchantment. We’re the forty-seventh state, but I want to be number one in your hearts tonight!”

“Hi. I’m from Arkansas, the cantaloupe state. And tonight, I hope you will hold my melons close to your heart and vote me your Miss Teen Dream.”

Adina cocked her head. “Umm …”

“What?”

“Nothing. Miss Colorado?”

“Oh. Sorry!” Nicole sprinted to the sandy runway and walked it carefully, making sure to wave to the crowd with her elbows against her sides as she’d been taught. That way you didn’t get jiggle. She took her place beside Adina, towering over her, all legs.

“Hello. I am Nicole Ade from the heart of the Rockies, the great state of Colorado!” She beamed.

Adina slapped a fly on her cheek. She missed the fly, but now her cheek stung. “Miss Colorado, how do you feel about being the only African-American girl in the pageant?”

“What do you mean?” Nicole shifted on her legs like a flightless bird.

“You’re the only black contestant out of fifty states.”

“It’s … it’s an honor to represent the great state of Colorado.”

“I didn’t even know they had black people in Colorado,” Tiara said. “You never see them in the ski brochures we get at church.”

Adina kept her focus on Nicole. A journalist was relentless in her questioning. “You don’t think the pageant’s a little racist? I mean, in the whole history of the pageant, an African-American girl has only won once — Sherry Sparks.”

Nicole knew about Sherry Sparks and the scandal. Everybody did. In the forty-year history of the Miss Teen Dream Pageant, she was the only African-American winner — until it was revealed that Sherry had once shoplifted an eye shadow from an Easy Rx store and she was drummed out in shame. It didn’t matter that in the years since then, two white contestants had been disqualified for sexy phone photos, or that last year’s winner, Miss Florida, had been forced to apologize when it was discovered that she had gotten drunk at a frat party and a video surfaced of her sloppily twirling batons in her underwear and bra. No, it was still Sherry Sparks they talked about.

“Well, you know how they are,” Nicole had overheard a pageant mom say to a hairdresser backstage once, and the hairstylist had nodded knowingly, as if they were discussing rambunctious toddlers or shelter dogs, things hard to train.

Nicole hated that she could never quite feel like she was just herself, just Nicole, but that she was somehow representing an entire race. That’s how they saw her, as a “they” and not a “she.” She knew how to deflect this question, and she did so now with a boxer’s dodging grace. “The amazing thing about Miss Teen Dream is that it’s all about girls coming together — different races, creeds, ethnicities,” she said, looking from girl to girl with a reassuring smile. “There is no race in Miss Teen Dream. You are only judged on the strength of your character.”

“Absolutely,” Shanti chimed in quickly. “Just like I’m Indian, but nobody’s judging me on that.”

“You’re Indian?” Miss Arkansas brightened. “Oh my gosh, I bought the cutest Indian beaded bag at a gift shop in the Best Western outside Sedona.”

“I’m not that kind of Indian,” Shanti said, her practiced smile never leaving her face, though it faltered just a bit, and in that slight wobble was something hard and angry, something that looked like centuries of colonial oppression boiling up into an I’m-going-to-kick-your-ass-in-this-pageant-and-then-take-over-all-your-beauty-out-sourcing-needs hatred.

“So you don’t think racism plays a role at all, Miss Colorado?” Adina prompted.

“No,” Nicole continued. “Miss Teen Dream represents the melting pot of American girls. I mean, just four years ago, a Latino girl took first runner-up. Before that, Miss California was first runner-up, and she was half Japanese. And that Filipino girl made first runner-up, too.”

“You know what they say — the first runner-up is important in case anything should happen to Miss Teen Dream,” Shanti called.

Nicole cut a glance at the Indian girl trying to horn in on her show. “Exactly. First runner-up is important.”

“Very important,” Shanti echoed.

“I said that,” Nicole muttered. She chewed at her finger.

“Thank you, Miss Colorado. Who’s next?”

“Me!” Shanti strode forward with a dazzling smile. She locked her position like a gymnast after a dismount, never wavering. “Hello. I am Shanti Singh, Miss California, and as an Indian-American, I represent the rich immigrant tradition of this great country. Though I am as American as apple pie, I can also make popadam as my mother and grandmother taught me. Bollywood meets Hollywood,” she said, attempting a joke.

Jennifer raised an eyebrow. “She’s using her multicultural grandma? Man, she’s good.”

Shanti adopted her earnest face, the one she’d practiced in the bathroom mirror every day for weeks. “My parents immigrated to this country for a better way of life. I am so grateful to this country that allows me to be whatever I want to be, whether it’s a television anchorwoman, a contestant on America Sings!, or the future Miss Teen Dream. Thank you.”

The girls sat in the sand, sapped of all energy. Two contestants had salvaged pieces of metal from the downed plane and were using them as tanning reflectors.

Taylor jogged in place on the beach, punching the air in a series of dancey boxing moves. “Let’s go, go, go, ladies! Miss Michigan, you’re up! Miss New Hampshire, you’re doin’ great. I almost believe you’re Fabio himself.”

“I almost believe you’re not a colossal jerk,” Adina muttered under her breath. She was hot and tired and thirsty. Her words were like gunshots. “Miss Michigan! Yo! Front and center!”

“I don’t think Fabio would say, ‘Yo!’” one girl complained, and Adina had to resist the urge to strangle the girl with her own hair extensions.

Miss Michigan, Jennifer Huberman, sauntered over. Unlike the others, she looked like she enjoyed the occasional cheeseburger. She had real curves and a pantherlike walk. “Yeah. Hi. Jennifer Huberman, Miss Michigan. Go, Blue! I’m from Flint, the smaller Motor City. Well, before they went bankrupt. Now, I’m from Repossessed City. Sorry. Little gallows humor there.”

“Great. Swell. Why don’t you tell us about your platform?”

Jennifer gave Adina a shove. “Yeah? Why don’t you tell me about your platform, Homeroom?”

“Whoa. Chill.”

“Why don’t you chill?”

“What pageant did you enter, Miss Orange Jumpsuit? What’s with the hostility?”

“Maybe I don’t like people asking so many questions.”

“Okaaaay. That’s kind of an important part of the competition.”

“It counts for forty percent of your overall,” Tiara said as she practiced a circle turn in place.

Jennifer relaxed. “Sorry. I don’t mean to get all up in your face. I’m just not used to this beauty stuff.”

“You aren’t?”

“No. First time. My guidance counselor got me into it. Some new program they’re trying out for at-risk girls.” Jennifer rolled her eyes. “Like this isn’t a gang. Please. It’s the freakiest gang ever.”

“Just curious: How did you manage to win Miss Michigan?”

“I didn’t. I was second runner-up.”

“What happened to the winner?” Adina asked.

“She tripped.”

“And the first runner-up?”

Miss Michigan cracked her knuckles. “She tripped, too.”

Adina swallowed hard. “Right. So, Miss Michigan, can you tell us about your platform? Please. I mean, if you’re okay with that.”

“Oh. Sure. My platform’s called Don’t Even Think About It. I go into schools and I say, ‘Whatever bad thing it is you’re thinking of doing, don’t even think about it. ’Cause I can see into your soul, and I will hide in your closet and come for you in the night, and the last sound you ever hear will be my sharp teeth popping through the flesh of my gums, ready to eat you.’ Their eyes get all big. It’s awesome. I love little kids, man. They’re the cutest.”

“Next!” Adina practically shouted. “Tiara, Miss Mississippi, right?”

Tiara stared. “Is that my question?”

“It is a question. I just wanted to make sure I got your name right.”

“Oh. Hi, y’all! I’m Tiara Destiny Swan from Jackson, Mississippi, which is spelled M-I-double-S-I … um … shoot.”

Adina looked to Taylor to end this travesty, but Taylor was trying to keep the signal fire going. The ominous clouds had moved closer to the island, and a strong wind came up, blowing sand and promising rain. “Tiara …” Adina had lost all steam. “What’s your favorite color?”

Tiara’s eyes darted left and right in fear and her smile was strained. “Um. Thank you, Fabio. I personally believe that we have a duty such as … as Americans … to help other people who are not Americans such as the peoples of the China and the Alaska and the freedoms we enjoy in our great nation and such and that is my opinion which I personally believe will make us a stronger nation. Thank you.”

Adina squeezed her hands against her head. “What are you even saying? You just made my brain die a little. You know, people, just being beautiful isn’t enough.”

Tiara looked confused. “But … it always has been.”

Petra gave a sudden cry, startling the others. “There it is!” She barreled down the beach in the direction of the skull-shaped rock and its long tongue of a jetty.

The cry went up. “Oh my God! Is it a ship? It must be a ship! Ship! Ship!”

The girls stumbled over one another on their way after Petra.

Nicole cupped her hand over her eyes. “Where? I don’t see anything but some nasty-looking clouds out there.”

Petra waded into the chest-high water, fighting the heavy surf, and grabbed at a small, green leather satchel. “Oh, Holly Go-Overnightly — thank God you showed up!” Grinning, she held the luggage aloft. “My overnight case — I found it!”

“Are you kidding me?” Shanti complained.

The wind rose, blowing sand into the girls’ faces. The cloud army advanced. It began to rain hard, then harder. The strip of beach seemed to vanish within seconds, and the girls were calf-deep in the sea.

Nicole pointed out at the horizon. “Um, does that ocean look kind of high to you?”

“How can the ocean get high? It can’t inhale. I know a lot about it. My platform is called Don’t Do Drugs Because They Make You Dumb,” Brittani explained.

“And I thought it was just inbreeding,” Petra quipped.

Nicole began to back away from the beach. “Hey, y’all, I don’t like the looks of that wave out there.”

The back of the sea curled up and fanned out, blocking the sky, threatening to bear down on the island.

Taylor gave three short, attention-focusing claps. “Miss Teen Dreamers! This is your team captain speaking. It is time to get our Rumpelstiltskins in gear and run for higher ground. Ready? Okay!”

Taylor tried to lead the way, but many of the girls ran scattershot for the forbidding jungle, scrambling over brambles, scraping their tender flesh against the prickly trunks of the palms. They were nearly up the first hill when the wave hit full force, upending girls like bowling pins, the fast-moving current carrying them down, out, under.

Tiara, Shanti, and Nicole had managed to climb into the branches of an ornately limbed tree. Below them, Petra held tight to a low-lying branch with a precarious crack in it. The water tugged at her overnight case, bending the tree dangerously close to the raging waters and threatening to bring them all down.

“You have to let go!” Shanti yelled.

“I can’t!” Petra shouted. If she let go, her pageant dreams and her secret, more important dream would wash away with it.

“Let it go!” Shanti tried to kick the case loose. The strain broke the tree’s limb, and the four girls plummeted into the water and were borne along by the fast-moving current. They bobbed up and down like a wet Whack-A-Mole game, their screams cut off only when they disappeared for a few seconds before fighting their way back to the surface. They barely even noticed the falls as they slipped over them.

Jennifer had been the first one away from the beach. She broke right, running hard and fast toward the volcano and the mist-shrouded circle of mountains that bordered it. The water caught her like a giant Slip ’N Slide, spinning her through trees, making her dizzy.

“Holy f —!” she managed before going under again, as if the water sensed that young ladies of such beauty and promise should never curse.

“Move, move, move!” Taylor shouted to her crew as the angry sea chased them relentlessly. “Go higher, Teen Dreamers!”

The girls clambered over the steep terrain. The growth was thick here, and the ground turned to mud as if by an alchemist’s touch, but they managed to reach the top of the mountain.

Taylor addressed the soaking, exhausted survivors. “Ladybird Hope says a lady’s true colors come out in times of crisis. These circumstances are not as big as you are! We are bright, shining lights in the darkness, and nothing can extinguish the fierce light of a Miss Teen Dream’s true heart.”

“That’s mixing your metaphors!” Adina spat out bits of mud and grass.

“Don’t be a hater, Miss New Hampshire,” Taylor scolded.

“I hate everything about this! It’s the beauty pageant from hell! I didn’t even want to be a Miss Teen Dream! Do you know why I’m here? I’m an investigative reporter for the New Castle Knights school paper. I embedded myself so I could expose the pageant from the inside.”

“That explains the budget weave,” Miss Ohio said.

Adina whipped around. “This is my own hair.”

Miss Ohio put her hands up in a “whatever” gesture.

“Why did you want to do that?” Mary Lou asked.

“Because it’s wrong! It exploits women. We’re parading around in bathing suits and evening gowns, letting people judge us for the way we look. No wonder the world doesn’t take us seriously.”

“What’s wrong with wanting to look pretty?” Brittani asked.

Taylor’s face was as hard as the lava cliffs jutting up from the island green. “I am shocked, Miss New Hampshire. You are a real Judas. When we get back, I intend to make a full report to the pageant officials and have you replaced with your state’s first runner-up.”

Adina threw her hands in the air and laughed bitterly. “Fine. You do that. IF we ever get back, Little Miss Perfect!”

“For your information, I have not held the title of Little Miss Perfect since I was six. We will be rescued, Miss Teen Dreamers. I have absolute faith in that. And you, Miss New Hampshire, will be reported.”

“Cripes, you guys. Let’s not fight. At least we’re safe here,” Mary Lou said.

The muddy ground shook. Adina’s eyes widened. “Oh sh —” The earth beneath them gave way suddenly, and the girls were swept down the mountainside in a spiral of mud and sequins and screams.