“Dream on,” I say sourly.
What if Nadine does make it as a model? She looks so different now. I stare at her and it suddenly all seems real. She looks just like all the models in Spicy magazine. She’ll win this heat. She’ll go through to the final. She’ll get to be the Spicy cover girl. She’ll be photographed with a pretty little pout for all the magazines, she’ll prance up and down the catwalks, she’ll jet across the world on special fashion shoots . . . and I’ll stay put, still at school, Nadine’s sad fat friend.
I feel as if this title is tattooed to my forehead as I go up to London with Nadine. I have to go with her because she is my friend. I’ve put almost as much thought into my appearance as Nadine has into hers. I’ve left my hair an untamed tangle, my face is belligerently bare, I’m wearing a huge checked shirt and black trousers and boots, and I’m carrying my sketchbook to try to show every single person at the Spicy place that I don’t want to be a model, I couldn’t care less about my appearance, I’m serious-minded, I’m creative . . . OK, OK, I’m talking crap, I know. And they know when we get to the special studio Spicy magazine has taken over for the day.
It is crowded out with a galaxy of gorgeous girls, thin as pins.
“Oh, God, look at them,” Nadine says. She shivers. “They all look like real fashion models already.”
“Well, so do you,” I say.
“Oh, Ellie,” says Nadine, and she squeezes my hand.
She’s clammy-cold, clinging tight like we’re little kids in Primary One on our first day at school.
“I wonder what we’re going to have to do?” she says. “If I have to stand up in front of all these girls I’m going to die. They all look so cool, as if they do this kind of thing every day.”
They do, too. They’re all standing around in little groups, some chatting, some smiling, some staring, looking everyone up and down, looking at Nadine, looking at me, raising their perfectly plucked eyebrows as if to say: Dear God, what is that squat ugly fat girl doing here?
I try to stare back. My face is burning.
“I’m desperate for a wee, Ellie. Where’s the ladies’?” Nadine asks.
It’s even worse inside the crowded ladies’ room. Girls crowd the mirror, applying glimmer eyeshadow and sparkle blusher and lip gloss so that their perfect oval faces are positively luminous in the fluorescent lighting. They tease their hair and hitch up their tiny jeans and smooth their weeny T-shirts with long manicured nails.
“Help, look at my nails,” Nadine wails. She clenches her fists to hide her little bitten stubs. “Oh, God, this is a waste of time, Ellie. Why did I ever open my big mouth to everyone at school? I don’t stand a chance. I must be mad.”
“Well, we don’t have to stay. We can just push off home again.”
Nadine looks at me like I’m mad. “I can’t give up now!”
“OK. Well. The very best of luck, Naddie,” I say, and I give her a quick hug.
“I’m so scared,” she whispers in my ear, hugging me back.
But she’s fine when it comes to the crunch. All us friends and relatives are told to sit at the back, minding the coats and bags, knowing our place in the dark. All the model-girl contenders are invited to come forward into the spotlit area. A bright bossy woman in black tells everyone what to do. She says she thinks everyone looks great and that they could all be a super Spicy cover girl. She wishes everyone luck. Then she gets them to do these funny warm-up exercises. Some of the girls blush and bump into each other first, losing their cool—but others leap into action, teeth gleaming, determined to show themselves off to their best advantage.
I’d planned to make sketches but instead I just gawp. Enviously. I stare at their long lithe limbs and their beautiful willowy bodies until my eyes water.
Now the bossy lady shows them how to walk like a model. They all have to prance forward, hips swinging, heads held high. Nadine catches my eye and goes a bit giggly, but then she puts her chin up and strides out, her lips parted in a perfect little smile. I put my thumbs up, trying to spur her on. She’s doing well. Maybe she’s not quite as swishy and sophisticated as some of the others but perhaps that’s good. They want someone with potential, not someone already polished. Nadine looks fresh and sweet. The bossy lady is looking in her direction.
Now it’s standing still and posing time. They take group shots of all the girls smiling at the camera, then looking up, sideways on, head tilted. They keep calling out to the girls. Look sassy, look sad, look happy—call that happy, come on, it’s happy-happy-happy time. My own mouth puckers in a silly little grin as all the girls bare their teeth. Some of the friends and relations really let rip. One terrible mum keeps shouting, “Go for it, Hayley! Big smile now. Look like you’re enjoying it. You look a million dollars, darling!”
It’s easy working out which one is Hayley. She’s the girl who’s purple with embarrassment, looking like she wants to kill her mother.
There’s a coffee break and then suddenly it’s the real thing. The girls are called out one by one in alphabetical order. They are videoed as they walk right round in a big circle and then stand in the spotlight in the center and pose while a stills photographer flashes away. Then each girl has to go to the mike and say who she is and add a sentence or two about herself.
Hayley’s surname is Acton, so she gets to go first. She makes a muck-up of it, tripping over her own feet as she walks in a circle, blinking like a trapped rabbit while she’s photographed. She stammers her name into the mike and then there’s a long silence while everyone closes their eyes and prays. Eventually she whispers, “I don’t know what to say.”
My shirt is sticking to me with embarrassment. The poor girl. Oh, God, I’m not going to be able to stand it if Nadine makes a fool of herself too. Hayley’s mother can’t stand it either. She’s rushed up to the bossy woman, insisting that it’s not fair her Hayley had to go first, she didn’t know what she was doing, all the others would have someone to copy (though who would wish to copy poor Hayley?). The bossy woman is kind and says Hayley can wait if she wants and have one more go right at the end. Hayley’s mother is thrilled. Hayley isn’t. She’s walking right out of the studio.
“Hayley! Hayley, come back! Don’t go, sweetheart! You can have another go, darling,” Mum yells, rushing after her.
I am glad I’m not Hayley, even though she’s much thinner than me. The girl who gets to go next is almost as nervous, practically running round the circle. She forgets about posing for her photos and is in the middle of announcing herself when the photographer starts flashing so she stops and blinks and gawps. This is awful, total public torture. I’m starting to feel almost sorry for them.
Almost. The next girl is blond and tall, very pretty, very skinny. She doesn’t lose it like the other two. She walks proudly all around, swinging her tiny hips, and then she stands and smiles, head back a little, eyes shining, turning this way and that as the photographer clicks. She says softly and sexily into the mike, “Hi, I’m Annabel. I’m fifteen and I like acting and singing and skiing—and reading Spicy magazine.” She smiles cheekily and then saunters off. Little Ms. Perfect.
I catch Nadine’s eye from across the room and mime being sick. I feel sick when it’s Nadine’s turn. My own legs wobble as she strides out. My own mouth aches as she smiles bravely.
Nadine walks in a perfect circle, slowly, gracefully, with a little bouncy twirl as she steps into the spotlight. She smiles at the guy with the camera and he waves his fingers at her. She poses brilliantly, turning this way and that. All those hours staring at herself in her bedroom mirror have paid off at last. She seems entirely at her ease. She doesn’t blink when the camera flashes right in her face. She smiles at the lens. Then she reaches for the mike.
“Hello, I’m Nadine,” she says. “I’m nearly fourteen. It feels weird to be standing here looking so girly. I usually have a white face and black clothes. My best friend, Ellie, calls me a vampire. But it’s OK, I actually feel faint at the sight of blood.” S
he bares her teeth in a jokey way and everyone laughs and claps.
Fancy Nadine mentioning me! She’s so clever to say all that stuff so that people like her and remember her.
“Great, Nadine. Well done,” I whisper as she comes over to join me. I give her a hug. “Hey, you’re shaking.”
“It was so scary standing there with everyone staring,” she whispers. “I didn’t make a complete idiot of myself, did I?”
“No, you were great. Honestly. Heaps and heaps better than the others—even that awful Annabel.”
“Do you think I should have said I read Spicy magazine too?”
“No, it sounded far too sucky. What you said was brilliant. I can’t believe you could do it all so well. I couldn’t have acted like that in a million years.”
I couldn’t—even if I was as thin and striking as Nadine. She’s sitting cross-legged like a little girl, her neck bent so that her hair falls forward, the weeny plaits looking cute. Her jeans are almost baggy on her, she’s so skinny. Her tiny T-shirt is taut against her body. She doesn’t have even one little roll of fat, sitting hunched up like that. Her elbows stick out, delicately pointed, emphasizing the skinniness of her arms.
It’s so unfair. Nadine eats like a horse. On cue she fumbles in her jacket pocket and finds a Twix bar. She offers me a chocolate stick.
“I’m on a diet.”
“Oh. Right. Sorry,” she says, munching. “Yum. I’m starving—I was too het up to eat any breakfast.”
I didn’t have breakfast either. Or any supper last night. It’s easier to skip a meal altogether rather than discipline myself to nibble just a tiny amount. Once my mouth starts chomping I can’t stop it. I breathe in the rich chocolatey smell wistfully.
“Don’t look at me like that, Ellie. You make me feel bad,” says Nadine, gobbling the last little bit. “Still, you’ve done ever so well. I never thought you’d keep it up like this. You’ve lost quite a bit of weight now.”
“No, I haven’t.”
“You have. Look at your tum!” Nadine reaches across and pats my tummy.
I try to suck it in, hating even Nadine to feel how huge it is.
“It’s all gone. Practically flat,” says Nadine.
“I wish,” I say sourly.
We sit through endless hours while each girl has her go. I stare at their stomachs, all much much flatter than mine. I cuddle into my check shirt and under cover of its enveloping material I pinch my waist viciously, wishing I could tear pieces off with my fingertips.
Some of the girls are so nervous they muck it up like Hayley. Some of the girls are so gorgeous they prance professionally like Annabel.
“Only three girls get chosen from each area,” Nadine whispers. “I haven’t got a chance.”
“Yes, you have! Wait and see. You’ll walk it. You’re heaps more attractive than any of the others.”
“Not that Annabel.”
“Especially that Annabel.”
But when they announce the winners Annabel is the first to be chosen. Then another blonde, an Annabel clone.
Nadine tenses beside me, praying to herself so hard I can almost see a please-please-please speech bubble above her head. I squeeze her hand. The third girl is announced. There’s one squeal of triumph—and dozens of sighs all round the room. It isn’t Nadine. It’s a redhead with long white limbs and big green eyes, a striking girl, but she can’t hold a candle to Nadine.
“It’s not fair!” I wail.
Nadine says nothing. She looks totally stunned.
“So—is that it?” she says. She swallows hard. She’s trying not to burst into tears.
Some girls are already crying, and another mother from hell is remonstrating with the bossy lady, demanding to know why her daughter wasn’t picked.
“All you girls did splendidly. You look model-girl marvelous,” says the bossy lady into the mike. “I just wish it were possible to pick you all. Thanks so much for taking part. Have a safe journey home—and please pick up a complimentary copy of Spicy magazine on your way out.”
It’s the last thing most of the girls want to look at now.
“Never mind, Nad. It’s obviously a total lottery. You still look terrific.”
Nadine shakes her head, her face contorted.
“I look idiotic,” she says, unraveling her cute plaits, tugging so hard it’s a wonder her hair doesn’t come out in handfuls. “Come on, let’s get out of here, Ellie.” She starts pushing her way through the crowd, her lips pressed tight together, a vein standing out on her pale forehead.
“Hey, hang on! You! The dark girl!”
Nadine whips round, sudden hope flashing across her face—but it’s just the photographer.
“Bad luck. I really thought you were in with a chance when I spotted you at that shopping center.”
Nadine shrugs bravely. “I just came along for a laugh,” she lies.
“I still think you’ve got a hell of a lot of potential. I don’t know what you’ve done with yourself today though. You don’t stand out from the others. I didn’t even recognize you at first. You should have stayed with the white face and the dramatic sweep of hair.”
“Oh!” says Nadine, stricken.
“Never mind. You could really make it as a model, you know. You should get yourself a decent portfolio. Look, here’s my card. Give me a buzz and I’ll take the photos for you at my studio. I’ll have to charge, of course, but as you’re a half-pint I’ll do you for half price.”
“Oh, right! Great!” Nadine burbles.
I seize her wrist and drag her away.
“Hang on, Ellie! Oh, wow! Look, he gave me his card. And he says he’ll photograph me for half price.”
“And probably half clothed. For God’s sake, Nadine, get real. It’s the oldest con trick in the world. That’s just such a seriously sleazy offer, can’t you see that?”
“No, it’s not. He’s nice. He says I’ve got real potential. He’s a professional photographer so he ought to know.”
“Yes, I bet he gave his card to half the girls here today.”
“Well, maybe you’re just being bitchy because he didn’t give his card to you,” Nadine snaps. “Fat chance of that!”
She stops. I stop. We both stand still in the street outside the studio. Nadine’s words buzz in the air, sharp as stings.
“Thanks,” I say weakly.
“Oh, Ellie. I didn’t mean it to sound like that.”
“Yes, you did,” I say. “Look, I came today when I didn’t want to, I tried to be ever so helpful and supportive, I’ve sat for hours and hours and hours watching all you lot, I’ve tried to stop you minding too much when you didn’t get chosen—and when that cheesy photographer hits on you I try to make you see this is a seriously dodgy proposition—because I’m your friend, Nadine. Not because I’m a fat jealous bitch. I’m sorry you feel that way.” I turn on my heel and march off. Nadine follows me, tucking her hand in my arm, telling me she’s really sorry.
“Of course you’re not a bitch, Ellie. I’m a bitch for saying it. Oh, come on, don’t go all moody on me. I’m the one who should be cast down with gloom because I didn’t get chosen.”
I let her carry on as long as possible, rather enjoying it. We pass lots of would-be model girls, all of them letting off steam. Several are quarreling just like us. One girl is being dragged along toward us by her mother.
“It’s not just that you’ve let me down so badly. You’ve let yourself down too,” the mother shrieks. “Now we’re going back to the studio and you’re going to ask them to give you another chance.”
Oh, God. It’s Hayley. Her mum’s managed to drag her all the way back—though it’s too late now.
“Never mind poor you and poor me. Poor Hayley,” I say.
“Poor poor Hayley,” says Nadine. “Ellie—are you still in a huff?”
“Sure, I’m as huffy as hell,” I say, putting my arm round her.
It’s a pain maintaining my self-righteous pose. I’m ready to make frie
nds too. On the train going home we see a whole load of boys playing footie and we wonder if Magda’s Mick is one of them. We strain our eyes but don’t spot her blond head and fur jacket on the sidelines.
“I wonder where they’ll go after? Do you think he’ll take her out clubbing?” I ask.
“No, he’ll be too knackered after playing football. A meal, is my bet. Hey, shall we go out for a meal, Ellie? My treat, because you’ve been a real pal today.”
“Not a meal. My diet.”
“Oh, Ellie. Look, we could go for a pizza and you could just have a weeny slice and some salad.”
“No, Nadine.”
“You’re still mad at me.”
“No, I’m not. Though I don’t exactly relish being called a fat bitch.”
“I didn’t! You said that.”
“But you implied it.”
“No, I didn’t. Listen, if you don’t mind my saying so, Ellie, you’re getting positively paranoid.”
“So now I’m a paranoid fat bitch?” I say—but I’m laughing now, because even I can see I’m getting ridiculous.
I still bow out of the meal idea, even so. When I get home I tell Dad and Anna that I’ve eaten with Nadine. I don’t hang about downstairs. I go up to my bedroom and play music and do a huge crayon drawing—a mad landscape where the sun is a giant pizza, the mountain peaks are vast cherry-tipped iced buns, the forests are fairy cakes, the rivers are bubbly strawberry milk shakes, and the grass is studded with Smarties flowers.
I go to bed early and try to sleep late because it’s one way of avoiding eating times.
Anna comes into my room at ten o’clock.
“Magda’s on the phone for you, Ellie.”
Oh, God, what does she want at this time? I remember her big date with Mick. She probably wants to boast and give me a blow-by-blow account. I groan and get out of bed. The room suddenly spins.
“Ellie?” Anna’s by my side looking worried. “Are you all right?”