Braless in Wonderland

by Debbie Reed Fischer

  Sean squatted down a few yards away from me, pointing the camera upward. “Okay, Allee, take a few steps into the water, get your feet wet. Now act excited. Kick up some water—that’s it. Don’t look at the camera. These are lifestyle shots, they’re supposed to look candid.”

  There was a stray hair in my mouth. I blew it out and attempted to keep my smile going. Oh, wait. I forgot to kick the water. What did I do with my arms?

  “Come on, a bit more energy. Get excited, pretty girl.” I was trying, but my movements were awkward and jerky. Sean wasn’t clicking away like he did yesterday. I must have looked as stupid as I felt. “You’re giving me too much chin. Keep your chin down.” He stood up. “This isn’t working,” he said quietly.

  A few yards off, two pudgy old ladies were sitting in aluminum chairs, watching. Their sun-damaged skin was the color and texture of beef jerky. I just knew they were laughing at me. I bet everyone in that yoga class way down the beach was thinking it was too bad I didn’t have any natural grace like they did. I wanted to cry. How could I fail at something as simple as taking a stupid picture?

  Sean and Lily were whispering. Juan came over to me. “Close your eyes,” he said, brushing eye shadow on my lids. “You’re too stiff. You need to get loose.”

  “I know. But I don’t know how.”

  “It’s easy. Just be a beautiful girl.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Until you believe you’re beautiful, you’re not going to be comfortable with your body. Believe you’re beautiful. Open your eyes. Look up.” He smeared something under each eye. “So imagine yourself as the girl with the perfect face, the perfect body, a perfect ten. Really see it in your mind.” He held up my chin and looked at my face, tapped the top of my head. “It’s all up here. Tell yourself you’re beautiful, say it in your mind while he’s shooting, okay?” I nodded back at him. “Be that girl in your head.”

  “Okay, let’s try something different,” said Sean. “Allee, you’re getting wet.”

  Of course I was getting wet. I was standing in the water, you—Hey, why was Lily holding a big plastic pail? Oh no. No. No. She was not throwing a bucket of water at me, she was not—

  She was. I screamed, jumping out of the way to block the spray. My rear end got soaked anyway, and I heard laughter and orders to jump again. So I did, just as another pail of cold water blasted my legs. I laughed along with the others to show I was Playful, Amusing Allee now, but this was so not even remotely funny or amusing. It totally sucked to be doused in freezing water. But I forced out a laugh, because that’s what they wanted.

  “Twirl,” Sean said. “Now throw your hat up. Great.” Great? This was not great. Whoosh. Another wave of water, this time courtesy of the ocean. I screamed.

  “Scream ‘whee,’” said Sean.

  “Wh-what?” I asked. My teeth were chattering.

  “Scream again, but scream the word ‘whee.’” What was he talking about? “Can you do that?”

  “Sure. No problem.”

  “On three. Lily, get ready with the water. Allee, scream ‘whee’ when the water hits you. One, two…” Wham. Lily didn’t wait for three.

  “Wh-whee.”

  “Louder!” Sean shouted.

  “Whee!”

  “Louder!”

  “WHEEEEEEE!!!” I shrieked with insanity, throwing my arms up and kicking the crap out of the water.

  “Got my shot,” said Sean, giving me a thumbs-up. I knew where he could put that thumb. I wasn’t loving him so much anymore.

  But wait. I wasn’t stiff. My arms and legs felt connected to my body. My blue lips were smiling for real now. And Sean was clicking like crazy. I arched my back and twirled around in the surf. I was being that girl, like Juan said. You’re beautiful, Allee Rosen. You’re a perfect ten. And you can do this.

  But it couldn’t be that simple. Just to tell yourself you were beautiful and poof, you were.

  Could it?

  chapter 9

  It was Modeltopia. There must have been a hundred girls at this catalog casting, and they were all winners of the genetic lottery: tall, thin bodies, graceful necks, arched eyebrows.

  What was I doing here?

  This client was more glam than me, and definitely more interesting to look at, starting with his hair. Think Crayola red, like Elmo. Spiky clumps of it, all over his head. Then there were the black, square glasses, unbuttoned leopard-print shirt over a tank, flour-white skin, and red, penciled-in eyebrows, and don’t forget the German Arnold Schwarzenegger accent. “We haven’t seen you in South Beach before.”

  “I just got here three weeks ago.” Three weeks of castings every day and not one booking yet. Not even close. This demeaning process might have been worth it if I was making money. I’d gone out for that L’Oréal commercial, made it to the callback, and got the agency all excited, and then they didn’t book me. And what a waste of time the Progresso beans casting was. After waiting an hour for the casting director to group me with a Latina “mom,” we had to sit at a table and pretend we were eating rice and beans and really enjoying it. Then when the casting director said “Now,” we had to suddenly explode with laughter for no reason. From what I knew about beans, they made you explode a different way. And I’d like to know what was in the beans that supposedly made people laugh their heads off, and if it was legal, why didn’t they put it in Oreos or something more fun to eat?

  “Your book, please,” Elmo-hair ordered. I slid my portfolio across the table to him. Mine was nothing like the thick books most of the other models had, full of tear sheets ripped from magazines with all the ads and editorials they’d done. He zipped through my five shots, the ones from my test shoot, and five from another two tests I did, and said: “So you have no experience whatsoever.”

  “No, I’m a new face.” It’s the phrase Momma told me to use. “I’m in development.” That was another one. Like I was going through a second puberty.

  “Ya, we can tell by your book. There’s nothing here.” He fanned himself with my composite card, the version with ALLEE ROSE printed on the front. Momma liked the image of a rose, thought it would sell me better. The agency had printed two sets of comps, fifty with ALLEE ROSE for Anglo jobs and fifty with ALLEE ROSA for Latin castings, and posted them on their Web site too. Clients could log on with a password and see our comps and portfolios online. Summer’s comp said SUMMER J. but I knew neither the “Summer” nor the “J” was real, because the mailing labels on her magazines were addressed to Darlene Mole.

  Elmo-hair jabbered something in German to the man sitting next to him, a stumpy dude sporting an unlit cigarette behind his ear, a small hoop earring, and a black bandanna around his head. Pirate Man was looking at me like he had X-ray vision, and it was creeping me out. I guessed he was the photographer. They were usually the straight ones.

  Based on all the “ya, ya”-ing between the two of them and the way they kept scanning me from top to bottom, it was obvious they were discussing my body. I forced a smile, suppressing my urge to stand on a table and yell “Fresh meat! Come get your fresh meat here!”

  There was a girl walking toward me. “Damn, we might as well go home now that April’s here,” some model whispered behind me.

  “Yeah. She books everything,” someone else said.

  What were they talking about? This April chick had limp hair the color of dead grass and matching freckles carpeting her face like a stain. And she wasn’t just skinny, she was bony. The girl looked like she was barely holding on to life, let alone a modeling career.

  She was right next to me now and it looked like she was going to say something to me, but no, she stepped right in front of me and what the—? The back of her head was in my face! Where did she get off cutting the line like that? I tapped her bony shoulder blade. She ignored me because Elmo-hair and Pirate Man were popping up from behind the table as if their underwear were on fire. They kissed her on both cheeks, falling all over her. “Ooh, look who’s here, April, you’r
e looking fabulous, can’t believe we haven’t seen you since Eleuthera,” and on and on. Now she was talking about some shoot she’d just done, and they were laughing at every stupid thing she said.

  What was I, invisible? There was an order here, and number 126, my number, was up. April the Great could take a number like the rest of us. I tapped again. She just gave me her profile, like she couldn’t be bothered to turn all the way around. “This’ll only take a minute,” she said. “I just stopped by to say hi. I’m already booked for this job.” Her voice was bland and kinda whiny, as if the prospect of yet another modeling gig was just muy inconvenient, like a dental appointment.

  “Well, are you done saying hi yet? Because we’re in the middle of a casting here.” Being assertive was easy when I didn’t know the person. This time April turned all the way around to face me. I gestured at the goddesses sitting along the wall behind me. “There’s a line, you know.” Some nodded, agreeing with me, and one girl even raised her fist to show solidarity. I raised mine too, right back at ya, girlfriend. Except…she was listening to her iPod, bobbing her head to the music and not even paying attention to me. She probably just meant “rock on.” Oh well, it worked anyway. April kissed the clients auf Wiedersehen, stopped to give me a nasty look, and dripped away on her long, toothpick legs.

  “So, Allee,” said the pirate. “How old are you?”

  “Sixteen. Almost seventeen.”

  He clasped his hands behind his head, and a powerful B.O. cloud floated directly into my nostrils. Ew. Summer had warned me that afternoon go-sees were thick with the smell of photographers and stylists who’d been shooting on the beach all morning and hadn’t showered yet.

  “It’s so hot in here,” Elmo-hair said, taking off his leopard-print shirt. He was wearing a Blink-182 tank underneath. So he was into punk. I wonder if he listened to—

  Shprink! (That was the sound of a lightbulb going off in my brain.)

  Just as Elmo-hair handed me my book, about to shake my hand and point me toward the exit I’m sure, I took him by surprise. “Do you know Brainless Wankers?”

  “No, but give them my number. I’m not picky.” He let out a shriek that morphed into giggles. I loved it. Then he stopped abruptly, looking at me with new eyes. “Just a joke, of course. You listen to them?”

  I clicked a few keys on my BlackBerry and my ring tone screamed out the Wankers hit song “Beach Life Is Tough.” His smile was as big as mine. “I saw them play at Friedensfest last summer.” He turned to Pirate Man and said something that sounded like he was working up a loogie, something like: “Ichachchchachchchgutenfur junior line?”

  And then Pirate Man went something like: “Yamitein Polaroid-badeanzug.”

  “Allee, we’d like to see you in a bathing suit, please.” He pointed behind the elevator. “Go down this hall. We taped a paper sign on the door—Scarlett Print Productions. We take a Polaroid, ya?”

  Ya! With a side order of hallelu-ya! Maybe I’d finally get booked. Thank you, Brainless Wankers!

  Except where was Scarlett Print Productions? There was no sign on any door. I walked into a guys’ casting by accident. They all had the best hair I’d ever seen on guys—buzzed short, surfer long and messy, neat and preppy, gelled, blown, highlighted. I recognized a few of them from the agency and we waved to each other. Summer had told me not to go out with any models. She said they were all players. I left and kept looking for Scarlett Print Productions.

  Yesterday I’d learned the hard way that sometimes hotels had several castings going on at the same time. Brynn had told me to go to the pool area instead of the conference room, and I wound up showing my book to the wrong client. Turned out he was casting for Marlboro, and you had to be twenty-five to pose for cigarettes, so the client called the agency and yelled at Dimitri for wasting his time. And then Dimitri yelled at me in Greco-English, which, believe me, was a little scary.

  I finally found the right room. It was an office with a desk, a floor-length mirror, a hanging rack of clothing, and a bulletin board with composites and Polaroids all over it. A handful of models in bathing suits, including Summer and Brynn, were in the corner. They were watching a lady snap Polaroids of a girl in a bra and underwear. I watched from the doorway until the lady took the girl’s comp, stapled it to the Polaroid picture she’d just taken, and said “Next” while another girl walked up to the bare wall to be Polaroided.

  Summer waved me over. Brynn didn’t even bother to look up, as usual. “Hey, you guys,” I said, dropping my big canvas bag, then pulling off my shorts and tank for the fifth time today. My bathing suit was underneath, a dark yellow two-piece.

  Summer’s face was scrunched in pain from the deep squat she was doing. In a string bikini. I had to ask, “Why are you doing that?”

  “Makes your leg muscles pop,” she grunted. “Look at the clothes.” I tried, but it was hard to see them. Some of the outfits were covered in plastic with composite cards taped to them. One of them was April’s. “Shorts and camis. It’s a summer line. They’re lookin’ for fit.”

  “Oh.” Brynn leaned against the wall and watched me join Summer in a halfhearted knee bend. Half of my bathing suit bottom embedded itself where the sun don’t shine. How come Summer’s didn’t do that? “I got lost. There was no sign on the door.”

  “Yeah,” Summer said. “Someone playin’ dirty musta ripped it off. Narrows down the competition if people can’t find the room. Stuff like that happens sometimes.”

  “Only in Miami,” one of the other models said. “The girls here are like snakes.”

  “Yeah,” her friend agreed. “It’s worse here than in New York.”

  “Nah, New York’s just as bad.”

  I shot a pointed look at Brynn, remembering how she’d directed me to the wrong client yesterday. She glared at me. “What? Are you saying I ripped off the stupid sign?”

  “I didn’t say anything.”

  “You gave me a look.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Yeah, you did and don’t lie. Look at me. I don’t need to play those reindeer games.”

  “Neither do I.” Excellent response, Allee. Witty.

  “Next,” the Polaroid lady called out, saving me.

  While Brynn got her picture taken, Summer quietly gave me tips. She’d really taken me under her wing these last few weeks. I didn’t know how I’d learn all this stuff without her. “Make sure you smile a whole lot, and don’t pose all sexy-like. This here’s catalog, not a fashion thing. Here, take my lotion for your legs.”

  “How do you get your, uh, top to look like that?” I pointed to her perfectly pushed-up, smushed-together breasts.

  “What, these?” She cupped herself.

  “Yeah. They look so…up and out. What’s your secret?”

  “No secret. Chicken cutlets.”

  “Really? Chicken cutlets?”

  “Yep. Everybody in the business does it. You’d be surprised at how good they work.”

  “Wow. Who knew? I’ll have to pick up KFC for lunch tomorrow.”

  Summer laughed, throwing her head back. The other models stopped talking to watch her. It was as if her laugh was a performance and she expected everyone to applaud when she was done. “Allee, look.” She pulled out a flesh-colored silicone insert from the side of her bathing suit top. It looked like a breast. A chicken breast, to be exact.

  Oh.

  “Never you mind, Allee. You might be slow, but you’ll catch on, you will.” Imagine her thinking I’m stupid! Summer tossed her chin toward Brynn. “Watch how she poses for bathing suit shots. She does it good.” Brynn had one leg in front of the other, her front foot angled at two o’clock, front knee slightly bent. It was a more relaxed version of a beauty pageant pose. The lady took four shots of her—front, back, and two profiles. Brynn used that stance every time she turned. “See?” Summer said, demonstrating it for me. “It makes the line of your body look thinner and taller. You should always stand like that for Polaroids, Allee, ’special
ly since you’re not so tall as most of us.”

  I tried it in front of the mirror. “Good,” Summer said. “Bend that knee more and air up your lungs real good.” She took a deep breath. I mimicked her. “There ya go, now your chest is bigger so your waist looks smaller. Yep, makes ya look taller, too. It’s one of them topical illusions.”

  “You mean optical.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Optical illusions. Not topical.”

  “Whatever.” Whenever Summer got it wrong, she just went “Whatever” and forgot about it. What a stress-free way to go through life. Sometimes I wished I was simpler, like her. She was happier than most people.

  “Next,” the lady said.

  “You go ahead of me,” said Summer. “I have to pee real quick.”

  She took off and I pulled out my composite, handed it to the lady, and walked up to the wall while Brynn slipped on her slinky tube dress and huge sunglasses. “Hey, Allee,” she said, strutting toward the door. “Here’s a tip from me to you. When you wear a school-bus-yellow bikini?” She stopped, lifted her sunglasses, zeroed in on my backside. “It makes your ass look like a school bus.”

  Oh no, she was not. She was not going to do that to me. I knew I didn’t have a big butt. It stuck out, yes, like a butt is supposed to stick out. And it wasn’t as if mine was extra large, like it was the Big Gulp Family Size serving of butts or something. I was a runner. I had well-developed glutes, that’s all.

  I did not, absolutely did not have a big butt.

  chapter 10

  “Do I have a big butt?”

  “For the last time, no.”

  We were leaving the lobby, weaving through the models still waiting around. I was tagging along behind Summer. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously. And stop squeezing your own bee-hind. The clients can see you.”