“Do you really think we’ll make it?” Tiara asked.
Adina looked into Tiara’s trusting face and thought about Alan holding out his arms, waiting to catch her, promising he would. She hadn’t believed him, but her mother had, and Alan had come through for her. In the past several weeks, Adina had learned to take that fall, and these girls had proved to her that you could still trust in the world, that there was good among the bad. Sometimes, that was all you needed to keep going.
“We’ve made it this far, haven’t we? Don’t count a pageant girl out, Miss Mississippi.”
Tiara smiled weakly. “You sound like Taylor.”
“Well.”
“I can’t believe I used to worry so much about people not liking me. Seems so unnecessary now,” Nicole said, watching a group of black shirts laughing over some private joke. “I swear, if I get out of this, I’m going to tell my mom to back off and let me live my own life.”
“I’m going to go to law school and start changing some things,” Miss Ohio said. She dabbed at her eyes. “Crap. Is my mascara smeared?”
“You’re good,” Petra said, wiping a smudge from Miss Ohio’s cheek. “I’m going to hunt down Sinjin St. Sinjin and get my heels back. And then beat him with them.”
“I’m gonna stop worrying about that third nipple,” Brittani said.
“What if we don’t make it?” Miss Montana said.
Shanti shook her head. “Don’t talk like that.”
“But the deck is really stacked against us. You really think we can win against all of that?” Miss Montana swept her arm toward the juggernaut on the beach.
“I don’t know. But I’m so totally not gonna just roll over for them.”
“Me either,” Petra said.
“I don’t give a damn ’bout my bad reputation,” Jennifer sang softly.
“What are you talking about?” Sosie asked. She looked to Jennifer, who softened.
“Kicking ass,” she spelled out.
Sosie nodded. “Go big or go home, bitches.”
“Go big or die,” Nicole said quietly.
There were shouts on the beach, last-minute preparations, the verbal-and-static gunfire of walkie-talkies. Farther out, waves broke on the rocks. The jungle insects tuned their constant hum to a high-pitched clamor.
Shanti closed the curtain. “Ready?”
Nicole put out her hand. Petra placed hers on top. The others followed till their hands seemed to form a giant fist.
“Miss Teen Dream,” Adina intoned.
“Miss Teen Dream,” the others echoed, and they brought their hands up and apart.
“I’m scared,” Miss New Mexico said.
The guard stuck his head behind the curtain. “Ten minutes, girls.”
A WORD FROM YOUR SPONSOR
In a few moments, the most important Miss Teen Dream Pageant ever will be broadcast live from a remote island. Backstage, the girls wait in their gowns. Oh, see how they shine in their sequins and glitter? But there is something more tonight, yes? A gleam in the eye. A determined set to those glossed lips. A refusal to play the part assigned. They are ready. Hidden in a stack of props is the jar of Lady ’Stache Off and the flare gun, their twin hopes for making it out alive.
In his white Elvis jumpsuit, MoMo B. ChaCha waits to be entertained before making his arms deal, and Agent Jones waits with him, a cold sweat breaking out on his forehead. In the shadows, the black shirts wait, unseen, costumes on, guns at the ready, while in a television studio for Barry Rex Live, Ladybird Hope sits in a chair as a makeup artist prepares her face. She glances at the notes she’s written in her palm, rehearses what she will say when the time comes, when she, the most famous Miss Teen Dream who ever lived, will announce live the murder of the beauty queens. It will be her face America sees reassuring the nation in time of crisis, promising vengeance on the shores of the ROC. It will be Ladybird Hope’s finest hour — until her election.
And across the great land, from the glistening malls on the prairies to the department stores in the teeming cities to those small, cracker-box houses that can barely contain the bottled-up dreams and discontent of those who must be more, the televisions flicker, bathing the watchers in its seductive blue-gray glow. Already, the narratives are being written: Scrappy beauty queens survive in hostile jungle. How they lost weight! Learn their secret jungle beauty tips!
The world has tuned in. It is watching.
All of this is brought to you by The Corporation.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR