Beauty Queens (11 page)

“No one,” the wind said, laughing. “No one,” it sang like a round. “No one,” it repeated until it sounded like the ringing of a temple bell signaling something sacred, some great happiness, a moment freed from attachment. “No one,” it chanted, and all Shanti heard was
Om.

Petra sat by the river’s edge listening to the night sounds and watching a frog hopping along the marshy, muddy bank. When Petra was
little, her mother used to tell her a bedtime story. Now she found herself inside the story, which went as follows:

Once upon a time, when magic was not questioned and the miraculous showed itself in every dewdrop and moon shadow, there lived a frog. The frog had fine, strong legs and a wonderful, full-throated croak and was the pride of its mother and father. They loved the frog’s jolly temper, its warm greeting to the sun each morning, and did not mind at all that the frog thought itself a princess.

When the frog said, “Once I am grown, I shall have the most beautiful golden hair,” they said only, “To match your beautiful heart.” When the frog asked, “When shall I become a princess?” they answered, “When you are ready.”

And so it went, the frog cheerfully insisting to all in the meadow that it was a princess-in-waiting, until one day, a real princess strutted into the meadow, proud and vain.

“Hello, sister princess,” said the frog happily, for it was certain this was a sign that the time for its transformation had come.

“Why do you call me sister, little frog?”

“I’m not a frog,” the little green creature laughed (and Petra felt it deep in her belly). “I’m a princess, like you.”

“You?” laughed the girl. “You’ve no long golden hair like I. You’ve no alabaster arms and delicate feet with toenails painted a sweet pink. You’ve no honey-sweet laugh like mine. You’re just a lowly, croaking, ugly frog.”

“You’re wrong,” the frog said.

“I will show you,” the princess said. She led the little frog to the clearest part of the river. “See for yourself. You are a frog. And I am a princess. And nothing, nothing on this earth, will ever change that.”

The frog gazed at itself in the cursed water as if seeing for the first time and saw that what the princess said was true, and its sadness was beyond measure. In her dream, Petra felt warm tears on her cheeks.

Before sleep each night, the frog prayed to the four winds, to the great fish, to the sun above, and to the goddess moon that when it
woke, it would be a princess. Yet each morning, the frog opened its eyes to find it was still only a frog. How could nature be so wrong about something so important? The frog grew bitter and lonely. It despaired. The frog’s parents became terribly frightened.

“We must do something,” croaked the mother.

“What can we do?” croaked the father.

They sat with their little frog and said, “We wish you only happiness. If you are meant to be a princess, then so be it. We will love you no matter what. Perhaps you should visit the Wise Witch of the Woods. She will know what to do.”

It was a daring plan, for the woods were full of many dangers, but the little frog was determined. After kissing its mother and father good-bye, it traveled far and wide in search of the mysterious, elusive Wise Witch of the Woods. For years it searched without luck. The frog feared it would never become a princess.

“Don’t give up,” Petra whispered in her dream, and as if the story-frog heard her, it came upon a large acorn covered in vines. The half-buried acorn was easy to miss, but the frog saw straightaway that the acorn was a false shell hiding something inside.

“Hello? Is there anyone there?” the frog croaked out.

“Yes! I am the Wise Witch of the Woods. I’ve been trapped inside this acorn by a terrible spell,” came the response. “If you can release me, I will grant you your heart’s desire.”

The frog didn’t know how it could possibly save a witch from so great a spell. But it sat for a while and it thought and eventually it came up with a plan. It summoned up all its courage and let loose a mighty croak, which cracked the acorn to bits and freed the witch.

The Wise Witch was very grateful to the little frog. She kept her promise. “What is your heart’s desire?” she asked.

But the frog had almost given up on its wish. It didn’t know if such a wish were possible. “Well,” it said softly, afraid, “I have always wanted to be a princess. But I have seen myself in the river. And it has shown me that I am a frog.”

The witch smiled. “The river does not know everything. Look again.”

Together, they traveled to another part of the river. It was hard to see anything here, but the witch said, “If you are brave and your heart is true, make your wish and jump.”

The frog dove into the water, and soon its legs began to lengthen. Its three spindly fingers became five slender ones with jeweled rings on each. And when the frog broke the surface, its long golden hair shone in the sun.

“I am a princess!” said the frog in a voice soft and sweet as first spring clover.

“Princess,” Petra repeated.

The frog on the bank croaked in response and leapt into the moon-dappled river. On the water’s surface, a bright orange fish swam through Petra’s reflection, blurring all definition.

Nicole could not sit still, and so she went for a walk in the glistening green of the jungle. To her surprise, she came upon a gingerbread house that smelled of cinnamon and cloves. Smoke pumped from its chimney.

“I wonder where I am?” she said.

A beautiful café au lait teen stuck her head out of one of the windows. She wore a pointed princess hat with a #1 on it. “You’re on the corner of stupid and clueless.”

Canned laughter echoed in the trees. It sounded like the laugh track on all those teen TV shows Nicole had seen a million times.

“I’m sorry?” Nicole said.

Another comely sister stuck her head out a window. There was a #2 on her hat. “You a couple snaps short of a gingersnap, aren’t you?”

“I beg your —”

A third girl in a hat marked #3 shoved her hand out the window, palm first. “Talk to the hand.”

The laugh track roared and subsided again. The house, the trees,
and the sidekicks cast tall shadows that reminded Nicole of an art exhibit she’d seen by an African-American artist. The exhibit was a series of silhouettes of slaves and minstrels. It was very controversial and pissed off a lot of people. But Nicole had found it powerful; it had made her angry and afraid in equal measure.

“Excuse me,” Nicole said as she ran into the house, where she found her mother sitting at her vanity, putting more and more powder on her face. The vanity held a collection of hair relaxers, skin brighteners, oils, and flattening irons. Hanging from a department store rack was a sleek, sparkly dress in a doll’s size.

“There’s my baby now,” her mother said to the mirror. She frowned. “Oh, you look so rough, sugar. Have you been using your grease?”

“Mom, my plane crashed on this island and we had no food and people died and —”

“Don’t you worry, baby. We’ll get you fixed up in no time.” Her mother reached over and patted a collage taped to the wall. The glossy pictures had all been torn from magazines, a collection of pale, blond, hipless women with aquiline noses, bony legs, blank eyes, and thin, wan smiles. The body parts had been taped together like a series of lines, more Bauhaus building than woman. Sighing, Nicole’s mom ran a hand over the thickness of her thighs, the roundness of her bottom, and it was as if Nicole could feel the shame in her own body. “It won’t do, baby. It won’t do at all.”

“What should we do?” Nicole asked.

Nicole’s mother turned to her. It was hard to see her features under so much cover. Only her eyes shone out, wide and afraid. “The giant’s coming,” she whispered. “We don’t have much time to get you ready, Ne-Ne.”

“Ready for what?”

Her mother clapped and the sidekicks danced into the room. One did the moonwalk. They struck their poses, hips cocked, lips pursed, palms out in a talk-to-the-hand motion.

“I know you,” Nicole said to them. “You did pageants before you went to Hollywood. Now you’re on TV.”

“That’s right. We’re the sassy black sidekicks.”

“You know, the best friend of the main character.”

“The comic relief.”

“The ones who can put you down and tell you off.”

“I’ve been working on my head swivel. Wanna see my head swivel?”

“What happened to you?” Nicole said, going down the line. “You used to play Bach on the viola and work at a nonprofit after school.
You
wanted to go to London and start that cool underground theater and you never, ever moonwalked. And
you
… you were Episcopalian.”

Number 3 swiveled her head perfectly. “Not no more, sugar.”

“Why are you talking like that? What’s with the double negatives?”

“I’m about to double negative your head in a minute!” She snapped twice, and the laugh track erupted again. In it, Nicole heard barks and screams.

The ground shook. Nicole’s mother gasped and the girls went into their head-swiveling, finger-snapping minstrel show at a frenzied pace.

“What’s happening?”

Number 1 offered Nicole’s mother a large pair of garden shears. Her mother looked balefully to the collage. “It’s the only way, baby.”

Nicole understood and she felt frightened. She didn’t want to cut herself down. The jungle shook with a giant’s footsteps.

“Quick!” Nicole’s mother lunged at her with the scissors and Nicole ran out of the house and into the menacing shelter of the jungle. Behind her, footsteps thundered. Trees cracked and fell. The jungle was losing color, becoming a silhouette. The white space nipped at Nicole’s heels, tugged at her hair. She could not outrun it, and then she was lost inside, a feathery black cutout in the background, her hand still reaching for safety.

CLASSIFIED
ISLAND
09:00 HOURS

Inside the volcano, the elevator’s thick steel doors whisked open. Agent Jones entered the control room. Glowing green maps flickered on wall-size screens. The constant hum of work filled the cavernous space — the clicking of fingers on keyboards. This base had existed for some time, privately financed by interested parties. Unregulated by the government, it had operated without rules or oversight, almost as its own country, and it had done as it pleased. But now, the island’s resources were nearly tapped out. Something new was needed. That’s why there was Operation Peacock.

The agent poured himself a cup of free trade coffee from the wheezing pot, took a sip, and frowned. French Roast. Was it so hard for these guys to get Hazelnut like he’d asked? Every month, he filled out coffee requisition forms in triplicate. To date, they’d received Arabica, French Vanilla, House Blend, Viennese, even Kona. But no Hazelnut. The agent sighed in irritation.

“Yo, Agent Jones, my main man!” An Ivy Leaguer in a Lakers T-shirt popped his head above the cubicle partition. Harris Buffington Ewell Davis III, aka the Dweeb, was the son of The Corporation’s former CEO. The kid had never held a job in his life and was spending his summer break from the Ivy League here, ostensibly to get training. Mostly he played covert games of Pong and annoyed the hell out of Agent Jones. “What’s going on?” Harris raised his hand for a slap.

Agent Jones left the kid’s hand kissing air. “Hello, Harris. How’s production going?”

“Okay. No love for the hand. Production’s good. See?” The Dweeb flipped a switch and the factory floor came up on the monitor in grainy black and white. Agents in black shirts stood guard while scientists in lab coats busied themselves over a stainless steel table filled with jars. “Who knew hair remover could also make a cool explosive?”

“Miracles never cease.”

“Oh, hey, wanna see something megacool? I rigged the compound’s override system to respond only to PowerPoint.” Harris cackled.

Agent Jones was stone-faced. “So, in the event of a self-destruct initiation, the only way to stop the sequencing is by making and uploading a full PowerPoint presentation?

“Yeah. Isn’t that awesome?”

“No. Not awesome. Change it back.”

Harris glowered. “Well, I think it’s awesome. I took Advanced PowerPoint last semester. You guys are always misunderestimating me. I’m totally ready to handle the big stuff.”

“The word is
underestimate.
And when you’ve got a few more years under your belt, then we’ll talk big stuff, Harris.” Agent Jones forced a smile that he hoped passed for benevolent. His performance reviews all praised his skills but said he lacked warmth. He was not someone anyone wanted to have a beer with.

Harris made a face. “Did you just cut one? ’Cause you’re making a face like you did.”

Agent Jones stopped trying to smile. “Briefing in the conference room in five.”

The fortresslike conference room was an interior room with concrete walls, fluorescent lighting, and ergonomically correct leather chairs that cost five thousand a pop. Agent Jones resented the chairs as much as the lack of Hazelnut coffee. Back before the agency had been bought by The Corporation and privatized, they’d had adequate seating but great benefits. Now, they were lucky to get dental.