Gorgeous by Rachel Vail Page A

better without eye makeup anyway. More innocent. Just a little lip gloss, she recommended because of my lip issue, and waterproof mascara for special occasions. Jade thought I should de-emphasize my eyes so I wouldn’t look so much like an alien. Thus the long bangs I cut for myself. Nothing de-emphasizes eyes like not seeing them.
    But I slipped Roxie’s spare headband on, for something to do, and tried not to make eye contact with myself in the mirror. Instead I searched around pointlessly through her limitless supply of makeup.
    “You want to do smoky eyes?” Roxie asked. “I downloaded a how-to yesterday.” She opened the laptop on the counter beside her and clicked on a clip of a makeup artist talking about what she was doing to some girl’s eyelids.
    I did whatever she described, left eye then right, left then right, painting my face as if it were a canvas in art class: thick line, smudge it, blend toward the crease. Shadow, highlight, blend. Curl the lashes with the medieval torture device, then mascara, two coats.
    “Wow,” Roxie said, when the how-to ended.
    I checked myself out in the mirror. I didn’t look familiar, or not completely. I looked older, harder, tougher.
    I liked it.
    I picked up a concealer and dabbed it under my eyes and around my nostrils, then spread some tinted moisturizer over my forehead, chin, and cheeks.
    “Red lips, I think,” Roxie suggested, handing me a tray of choices. I lined my lips in the reddest pencil I could find and then filled them in.
    “Holy crap,” Roxie said. “Who the heck are you?”
    “No idea,” I answered from behind the mask.
    “I think maybe the devil went beyond his side of the bargain. Nobody could think you’re anything BUT gorgeous.”
    “You’re just a good friend,” I told her, feeling myself blush beneath the makeup.
    “I am that,” she said, her bright blue eyes all sparkly within her smoky-eyed makeup, and turned back to add some gloss to her pouty lips.
    “Roxie,” I started, determined to come clean and just tell her I’d gotten the callback.
    She stood up abruptly. “But meanwhile, what are you going to wear to go with all that gorgeousness?”
    I sat on the edge of Roxie’s bed while she started tearing things out of her closet. After a few false starts, we settled on a tank dress of hers with a tiny cardigan. She wore a tight T-shirt and a short skirt with boots. We stood in front of the mirror in her front hall, sticking out our tongues at our hot selves.
    “We are absolutely gorgeous,” Roxie gushed. “We are clean-cut but with an edge. That dumb magazine missed out, I tell you.”
    My stomach was churning as we piled into the backseat of her housekeeper’s car to get driven to the party. On our way there, with Roxie singing along to a “get-psyched” song, as she called it, I made a promise to myself: Tonight, I will pretend to be somebody who has fun at parties.
    We could hear the music blaring from down the block, where we got Roxie’s housekeeper to drop us off. Despite the fact that it was still warm out, I shivered as we waited on the top step for the front door to open. A senior guy with broad shoulders and a spiky ’do flung open the door and, waving his big red plastic cup toward the kitchen, announced, “Come in, come in!” Beer sloshed out behind him, narrowly missing a dark ponytail that swung away just in time, its owner putting on a pout before getting engulfed in the big guy’s thick arm.
    “Are we the only ninth graders here?” I whispered to Roxie.
    “Let’s go,” she answered, or didn’t, dragging me toward the kitchen.
    I reminded myself to pretend I was somebody else, somebody gorgeous and fun, and followed her. Within a couple of seconds there was a red plastic cup in my hand and two guys, one on either side of me, vying for my attention.
    It was surreal.
    I lost track of Roxie pretty fast, but looking for her gave me something to do. I smiled with my lips closed at the two guys and left.