by Ni-Ni Simone
Cha-ching!
So, with parents like mine my life added up to this: my social status was better and bigger than the porno-tape that made Kim Trick-dashian relevant and hotter than the ex-con Paris Hilton’s jail scandal. I was flyer than Beyoncé and wealthier than Blue Ivy. From the moment I was born, I had fans, wannabes, and frenemies secretly praying to God that they’d wake up and be me. Because along with being royalty I was the epitome of beauty: radiant chestnut skin, sparkling marble brown eyes, lashes that extended and curled perfectly at the ends, and a 5’ 6”, brick house thick body that every chick in L.A. would tango with death and sell their last breath to the plastic surgeon to get.
Yeah, it was like that. Trust. My voluptuous milkshake owned the yard.
And it’s not that my shit didn’t stink, it’s just that my daddy had a PR team to ensure the scent faded away quickly.
Believe me, my biggest concern was my Parisian stylist making sure that I murdered the fashion scene.
I refreshed the pink gloss on my full lips and took a quick peek at my reflection in the mirrored entrance door. My blunt Chinese bob lay flush against my sharp jawline and swung with just the right bounce as I confirmed that my glowing eye shadow and blush was Barbie-doll perfect and complemented my catwalk-ready ensemble. Black diamond studded hoops, fitted red skinny leg jeans, a navy short-sleeve blazer with a Burberry crest on the right breast pocket, a blue and white striped camisole, four strands of sixty-inch pearls, and a signature Gucci tote dangled around my wrist.
A wide smile crept upon me.
Crèmedelacrème.com.
I stepped across the glass threshold and teens of all shapes and sizes lined the marble hallways and hung out in front of their mahogany lockers. There were a few newbies—better known as new-money—who stared at me and were in straight fan mode. I blessed them with a small fan of the fingers and then I continued on my way. I had zero interest in newbies, especially since I knew that by this time next year, most of them would be broke and back in public school throwing up gang signs. Okay!
Soooo, moving right along.
I swayed my hips and worked the catwalk toward my locker, and just as I was about to break into a Naomi Campbell freeze, pose, and turn, for no other reason than being fabulous, the words, “Hi, Rich!” slapped me in the face and almost caused me to stumble.
What the...
I steadied my balance and blinked, not once but four times. It was Spencer, my ex-ex-ex-years ago-ex-bff, like first grade bff—who I only spoke to and continued to claim because she was good for my image and my mother made me do it.
And, yeah, I guess I’ll admit I kind of liked her—sometimes—like one or two days out of the year, maybe. But every other day this chick worked my nerves. Why? Because she was el stupido, dumb, and loco all rolled up into one.
I lifted my eyes to the ceiling, slowly rolled them back down, and then hit her with a smile. “Hey, girlfriend.”
“Hiiiiii.” She gave me a tight smile and clenched her teeth.
Gag me.
I hit her with a Miss America wave and double-cheeked air kisses.
I guess that wasn’t enough for her, because instead of rolling with the moment, this chick snatched a hug from me and I almost hurled. Ev’ver’ree. Where.
Spencer released me and I stood stunned. She carried on, “It’s so great to see you! I just got back from the French Alps in Spain.” She paused. Tapped her temple with her manicured index finger. “Or was that San Francisco? But anyway, I couldn’t wait to get back to Hollywood High! I can’t believe we’re back in school already!”
I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t. And I didn’t know what shocked me more: that she put her hands on me, or that she smelled like the perfume aisle at Walgreens.
OMG, my eyes are burning . . .
“Are you okay, Rich?”
Did she attack me?
I blinked.
Say something...
I blinked again.
Did I die . . . ?
Say. Something.
“Umm, girl, yeah,” I said, coming to and pinching myself to confirm that I was still alive. “What are you wearing? You smell—”
“Delish?” She completed my sentence. “It’s La-Voom, Heather’s mother’s new scent. She asked me to try it and being that I’m nice like that, I did.” She spun around as if she were modeling new clothes. “You like?” She batted her button eyes.
Hell no. “I think it’s fantast!” I cleared my throat. “But do tell, is she still secretly selling her line out of a storage shed? Or did the courts settle that class action lawsuit against her for that terrible skin rash she caused people?”
Spencer hesitated. “Skin rash?”
“Skin to the rash. And I really hope she’s seen the error of her . . . ways. . . .” My voice drifted. “Oh my . . . wow.” I looked Spencer over, and my eyes blinked rapidly. “Dam’yum!” I said tight-lipped. “Have you been wandering Skid Row and doing homeless boys again—?”
“Homeless boys—?” She placed her hands on her hips.
“Don’t act as if you’ve never been on the creep-creep with a busted boo and his cardboard box.”
“How dare you!” Spencer’s eyes narrowed.
“What did I do?!” I pointed at the bumpy alien on her neck. “I’m trying to help you and bring that nastiness to your attention. And if you haven’t been entertaining busters, then Heather’s mother did it to you!”
“Did it to me?” Spencer’s eyes bugged and her neck swerved. “I don’t go that way! And for your information, I have never wandered Skid Row. I knew exactly where I was going! And I didn’t know Joey was homeless. He lied and told me that cardboard box was a science experiment. How dare you bring that up! I’m not some low-level hoochie. So get your zig-zag straight. Because I know you don’t want me to talk about your secret visit in a blond wig to an STD clinic. Fire crotch. Queen of the itch, itch.”
My chocolate skin turned flaming red, and the South Central in my genes was two seconds from waking up and doing a drive-by sling. I swallowed, drank in two deep breaths, and reloaded with an exhale. “Listen here, Bubbles, do you have Botox leaking from your lips or something? Certainly you already know talking nasty to me is not an option, because I will take my Gucci-covered wrist and beat you into a smart moment. I’m sooo not the one! So I advise you to back up.” I pointed my finger into her face and squinted. “All the way up.”
“You better—”
“The only commitment I have to the word better, is that I better stay rich and I better stay beautiful, anything other than that is optional. Now you on the other hand—what you better do is shut your mouth, take your compact out, and look at the pimple face bearrilla growing on your neck!”
She gasped.
And I waited for something else nasty to slip from her lips. I’d had enough. Over. It. Besides, my mother taught me that talking only went thus far, and when you tired of the chatter, you were to slant your neck and click-click-boom your hater with a threat that their dirtiest little secret was an e-mail away from being on tabloid blast. “Now, Spencer,” I batted my lashes and said with a tinge of concern, “I’m hoping your silence means you’ve discovered that all of this ying-yang is not the move for you. So, may I suggest that you shut the hell up? Unless, of course, you want the world to uncover that freaky blue videotaped secret you and your mother hope like hell the Vatican will pray away.”
All the color left her face and her lips clapped shut.
I smiled and mouthed, “Pow! Now hit the floor with that.”
3
Spencer
I can’t stand Rich! That bug-eyed beetle walked around here like she was Queen It when all she really was, was cheap and easy, ready to give it up at the first hello. Trampette should’ve been her first name, and ManEater her last. I should’ve pulled out my crystal nail file and slapped her big face with it. Who did she think she was?
I fanned my hand out over the front of my denim mini-dress, shifting t
he weight of my one-hundred-and-eighteen-pound frame from one six-inch, pink-heeled foot to the other. Unlike Rich, who was one beef patty short of a Whopper, I was dancer-toned and could wear anything and look fabulous in it. But I chose not to be over-the-top with it because unlike Rich and everyone else here at Hollywood High, I didn’t have to impress anyone. I was naturally beautiful and knew it.
And yeah, she was cute and all. And, yeah, she dressed like no other. But Trampette forgot I knew who she was before Jenny Craig and before she had those bunched-up teeth shaved down and straightened out. I knew her when she was a chunky bucktooth Teletubby running around and losing her breath on the playground. So there was no way Miss Chipmunk wanted to roll down in the gutter with me ’cause I was the Ace of Spades when it came to messy!
I shook my shoulder-length curls out of my face, pulled out my compact, and then smacked my Chanel-glossed lips. I wanted to die but I couldn’t let pie-face know that, so I said, “Umm, Rich, how about you shut your mouth. After all the morning-after pills you’ve popped in the last two years, I can’t believe you’d stand here and wanna piss in my Crunch Berries. Oh, no Miss Plan B, you had better seal your own doors shut, first, before you start tryna walk through mine. You’re the reason they invented Plan B in the first place.”
I turned my neck from side to side and blinked my hazel eyes. Sweet... merciful... kumquats! Heather’s mother’s perfume had chewed my neck up. I wanted to scream!
Rich spat, “You wouldn’t be trying to get anything crunked would you, Ditsy Doodle? You—”
“OhmyGod,” London interrupted our argument. Her heels screeched against the floor as she said, “Here you are!” She air-kissed Rich, then eyed me, slowly.
Oh, no, this hot-buttered beeswax snooty-booty didn’t!
London continued, “I’ve been wandering around this monstrous place all morning . . .” She paused and twisted her perfectly painted lips. “What’s that smell?” London frowned and waved her hand under her nose, and sniffed. “Is that, is that you, Spencer?”
“Umm hmm,” Rich said. “She’s wearing La-Voom, from the freak-nasty-rash collection. Doesn’t it smell delish?”
“No. That mess stinks. It smells like cat piss.”
Rich laughed. “Girrrrl, I didn’t wanna be the one to say it, since Ms. Thang wears her feelings like a diamond bangle, but since you took it there, meeeeeeeeow!”
The two of them cackled like two messy sea hens. Wait, hens aren’t in the sea, right? No, of course not. Well, that’s what they sounded like. So that’s what they were.
“I can’t believe you’d say that?!” I spat, snapping my compact shut, stuffing it back into my Louis Vuitton Tribute bag.
“Whaaaaatever,” London said, waving me on like I was some second-class trash. “Do you, boo. And while you’re at it. You might want to invest in some Valtrex for those nasty bumps around your neck.”
I frowned. “Valtrex? Are you serious? For what?”
She snapped her fingers in my face. “Uh, hellllllo, Space Cadet. For that nastiness around your neck, what else? It looks like a bad case of herpes, boo.”
Rich snickered.
I inhaled. Exhaled.
Batted my lashes.
Looks like I’m going to have to serve her, too.
I swept a curl away from my face and tucked it behind my ear.
Counted to ten in my head. ’Cause in five . . . four . . . three . . . two . . . one, I was about to set it up—wait, wait, I meant set it off—up in this mother suckey-duckey, okay? I mean. It was one thing for Rich to try it. After all, we’ve known each other since my mother—media giant and billionaire Kitty Ellington, the famed TV producer and host of her internationally popular talk show, Dish the Dirt—along with Rich’s dad, insisted we become friends for image’s sake. And in the capital of plastics, appearance was everything. So I put up with Rich’s foolery because I had to.
But, that chicken-foot broad London, who I only met over the summer through Rich, needed a reality check—and quick, before I brought the rain down on her. Newsflash: I might not have been as braggadocious as the two of them phonies, but I came from just as much money as Rich’s daddy and definitely more than London’s family would ever have. So she had better back that thang-a-lang up on a grill ’cause I was seconds from frying her goose. “You know what, London, you better watch your panty liner!”
She wrinkled her nose and put a finger up. “Pause.”
Did she just put her finger in my face?
“Pump, pump, pump it back,” I snapped, shifting my handbag from one hand to the other, putting a hand up on my hip. My gold and diamond bangles clanked. “You don’t pause me, Miss Snicker-Doodle-Doo. I’m no CD player! And before you start with your snot ball comments get your facts straight, Miss Know It All. I don’t own a cat. I’m allergic to them. So why would I wear cat piss? And I don’t have herpes. Besides, how would I get it around my neck? It’s just a nasty rash from Mrs. Cummings’ new perfume. So that goes to show you how much you know. And they call me confused. Go figure.”
“You wait one damn minute, Dumbo,” London hissed.
“Dumbo?! I’ll have you know I have the highest GPA in this whole entire school.” I shot a look over at Rich, who was laughing hysterically. “Unlike some of you hyenas who have to buy your grades, I’m not the one walking around here with the IQ of a Popsicle.”
Rich raised her neatly arched brow.
London clapped her hands. “Good for you. Now... like I was saying, Dumbo, I don’t know how you dizzy hoes do it here at Hollywood High, but I will floor you girlfriend, okay. Don’t do it to yourself.”
I frowned, slammed my locker shut. “Oh . . . my . . . God! You’ve gone too far now, London. That may be how you hoes in New York do it. But we don’t do that kind of perverted nastiness over here on the West Coast.”
She frowned. “Excuse you?”
I huffed. “I didn’t stutter, Miss Nasty. I said you went too damn far telling me not to do it to myself, like I go around playing in my goodie box or something.”
Rich and London stared at each other, then burst into laughter.
I stomped off just as the homeroom bell rang. My curls bounced wildly as my stilettos jabbed the marbled floor beneath me. Welcome to Hollywood High, trick! The first chance I get, I’m gonna knock Miss London’s playhouse down right from underneath her nose.
But first, I had more pressing issues to think about. I needed to get an emergency dermatologist appointment to handle this itchy, burning rash. My heels scurried as I made a left into the girls’ lounge instead of a right into homeroom. I locked myself into the powder room. I had to get out of here!
OMG, there was a wildfire burning around my neck.
Ooooh, when I get back from the doctor’s office, I’m gonna jumpstart Heather’s caboose for her mother trying to do me in like this.
I dialed 9-1-1.
The operator answered on the first ring, “Operator, what’s your emergency?”
Immediately, I screamed, “Camille Cummings, the washed-up drunk, has set my neck on fire!”
4
Heather
My eyes were heavy.
Sinking.
And the more I struggled to keep them open, the heavier they felt. I wasn’t sure what time it was. I just knew that dull yellow rays had eased their way through the slits of my electronic blinds, so I guessed it was daylight.
Early morning, maybe?
Maybe . . . ?
My head was splitting.
Pounding.
The room was spinning.
I tried to steady myself in bed, but I couldn’t get my neck to hold up my head.
I needed to get it together.
I had something to do.
Think, think, think... what was it...
I don’t know.
Damn.
I fell back against my pillow and a few small goose feathers floated into the air like dust mites.
I was messed up. Literally.
A place where I was nothing like myself—Heather Cummings. I was better than Heather. I was Wu-Wu. A star. Every day. All day.
I lay back on my king-sized wrought iron bed and giggled at the thought that I was two crushed pills away from returning to Heaven.
I closed my eyes and just as I envisioned Wu-Wu throwing a wild and crazy neighborhood party, “You better get up!” sliced its way through my thoughts. “And I mean right now!”
I didn’t have to open my eyes or turn toward the door to know that was Camille, my mother.
The official high blower.
“I don’t know if you think you’re Madame Butterfly, Raven-Simoné, or Halle Berry!” she announced as she moseyed her way into my room and her matted mink slippers slapped against the wood floor. “But I can tell you this, the cockamamie bull you’re trying to pull this morning—”
So it was morning.
She continued, “Will not work. So if you know what’s best for you, you’ll get up and make your way to school!”
OMG! That’s what I have to do! It’s the first day of school.
My eyes popped open and immediately landed on my wall clock: 10:30 A.M. It was already third period.
I sat up and Camille stood at the foot of my bed with her daily uniform on: a long and silky white, spaghetti-strap, see-through nightgown, matted mink slippers, and a drink in her hand—judging from the color it was either brandy or Scotch. I looked into her glassy blue eyes. It was Scotch for sure. She shook her glass and the ice rattled. She flipped her honey blond hair over her blotchy red shoulders and peered at me.
