Bulletproof Mascara: A Novel

by Bethany Maines

  “It’s better to have a purpose,” Nikki said, realizing the truth of the words as she spoke them. Ellen nodded; her round face, young-looking under the gray hair, carried such an understanding and sympathetic expression that Nikki felt embarrassed and looked away.

  “All right,” Jenny said, finishing her inspection of the guns Nikki had loaded. “Now we can shoot. Pick a gun.”

  Nikki picked a revolver because she knew it would be easier for her to reload.

  “I like that one,” Jenny said, smiling. “Now, point it out there at the target.” Nikki did so. “Now, see at the tip,” Jenny continued, “there is a little thingie with an orange dot on it?” Nikki looked, and sure enough there was. “OK now, back where the handle meets the barrel is a little notch.” Nikki nodded. “Now, try and line up the orange dot in the notch.”

  Nikki adjusted her hands, raising her wrists and lowering the barrel until the orange dot was between the two little thingies. Moments later they were all trooping out to the target to examine the hole Nikki had put in the target’s left hip. After a brief celebration, they returned to their shooting position to try again.

  “How’d you learn to shoot?” Nikki asked Jenny, aiming the gun again.

  “From my mama. She was a Miss Georgia,” Jenny answered proudly. “I did some pageants, too, but they weren’t really my thing.”

  “A former Miss Georgia taught you to shoot?” Ellen seemed slightly skeptical.

  “Well, I don’t know what it’s like at y’all’s high schools, but at mine, if you wanted a date on Saturday night, you’d better have your huntin’ license. My brothers got me into the handguns. But really it was Mama who taught me how to put the bullet where I wanted it.”

  “I guess I’ll be a little nicer to the next beauty queen I meet,” Ellen said with a laugh.

  They continued shooting, and by sunset Nikki could reasonably expect her bullet to be somewhere in the black, but she was still uncertain about her actual skills.

  “What if I forget everything tomorrow?” she asked as they walked back.

  “Nah,” Jenny said confidently. “You’ll do OK. Wait till they see you—” She stopped talking abruptly. Dina had come out of the house and was walking toward them, her arms pumping angrily.

  “If you were going to go shooting, you should have informed me!” Dina said. “I’m the team leader. I’m the one who sets all the practice sessions.”

  “I’m sorry, Dina,” Ellen said sweetly. “We thought you’d be bored. You said just this morning how good your target scores were.” Dina looked torn between the two horrible fates of admitting that she needed practice and agreeing with Ellen.

  “That isn’t the point,” she said at last. “I should have been there.”

  “Maybe next time,” said Ellen, and she walked around her. Dina made a peculiar snorting noise of irritation, and Nikki heard Jenny smother a laugh.

  The next morning, after classes, the women walked out to the range, each carrying her weapon in a hard plastic case. Nikki set up between Jenny and Ellen and squished the neon earplugs into her ears. The girls began to let off a steady pop of gunfire. Connie and Mrs. Boyer were stalking along the shooting line, offering tips and disparagement. Nikki nervously loaded her gun. It was the same revolver from the night before. She pointed the gun at the target, lining up the orange dot with the notch. Connie was behind Ellen now—only a few steps away. Nikki exhaled, pulled the trigger, and put a new white belly button in the target.

  “You’re overcompensating for the recoil,” said Connie, making Nikki jump. “Aim more truly at the heart.” Nikki nodded and tried again. A second white hole appeared only an inch or so above the first. “Keep trying,” Connie said with a sniff, and stalked on down the line.

  “Dina!” snapped Mrs. Boyer. “Stop waving your gun around like an idiot. If you can’t follow basic gun safety, then get the hell off my shooting range.”

  After Connie had passed by, Jenny put her head around the partition and gave Nikki a thumbs-up and a grin. Nikki smiled back; she couldn’t pretend the moment wasn’t sweet.

  CALIFORNIA V

  Phone Call Day

  Nikki followed the girls up to the main house. It was phone call day, and they were all excited.

  “I can’t wait to tell Mom about . . .” said Heidi, but Nikki lost track of the rest of the sentence as Carmella talked over her, raving about her boyfriend.

  “I think you’re making this guy up,” protested Jenny. “He sounds too good to be true.”

  “Well, he has his faults,” acknowledged Carmella.

  “They’re just harder to see from six hundred miles away,” said Ellen, with a twinkle in her eye, but an understanding smile.

  “My dad is going to be so proud that I learned how to pick a lock,” Sarah said.

  “It took you twenty minutes,” said Dina sourly.

  “You can’t tell him about it,” Carmella protested, ignoring Dina. “You’re not supposed to talk about training.”

  “He’s a locksmith,” said Sarah. “He’s been after me to learn the family business for years. How can I not tell him?”

  “But you can’t,” reiterated Carmella.

  “Just tell him you had to help one of the girls get into her locker or something,” Ellen said helpfully. “Just make it sound informal, and then . . .”

  “That’s not . . .”

  “My mom said . . .”

  “I think my brother might have gotten engaged . . .”

  “My sister totally lost it . . .”

  “Can’t wait to tell . . .”

  “Need to ask . . .”

  The sound of multiple moms and dads echoed across the field as they walked up to the main house. Phone calls were only allowed once a week, and Nikki had initially found the sabbatical from daily phone calls with her mother a little frightening. She kept reaching for a cell phone she knew wasn’t there and listening for the ring she knew wouldn’t come. Then she had become used to it and discovered that silence really was golden. She was starting to remember what it was like to make decisions on her own. She could almost envision a time when she wouldn’t have the looming specter of an unmade call lurking in the back of her mind.

  But as they walked up the hill in gathering gloom of evening, the cheerful anticipation of the girls began to rub off on her. And as she took her turn in the phone booth, she found that she was actually looking forward to hearing her mother’s voice. The phone began to ring, and Nikki slid down on the seat, pulling her feet up and bracing them against the opposite panel.

  “Hello?” her mother said in the fake, breathy voice that she thought made her sound like an underage babysitter. It was a clever ploy to throw off phone solicitors. Nikki thought that either the ploy was too clever or perhaps the telemarketers didn’t actually care, but she’d never been able to convince her mother of that.

  “Hey, Mom,” she said, consciously keeping her voice from rising to match her mother’s.

  “Oh, it’s you,” said her mother, dropping into a normal tone.

  “Don’t sound so thrilled,” Nikki said.

  “I didn’t mean it like that,” said Nell briskly. “I’ve just been ducking your grandmother’s calls all week.”

  “Why won’t you talk to Grandma?”

  “I left the womb for a reason,” said Nell tartly. “I wanted to get away.”

  Nikki laughed, and Nell joined in.

  “No, she’s just been pestering me to go back for a visit, and I just don’t have time. We’re super busy at work. I really can’t afford to take a week off. And you know I love your grandmother, but she drives me nuts. You wouldn’t understand, but I think that woman does stuff just to drive me insane. It’s enough to make me start smoking again.”

  “I can’t imagine,” Nikki murmured.

  “You have no idea what that’s like,” reiterated Nell, perhaps sensing Nikki’s incredulity.

  “Well, maybe this fall we can both go back,” Nikki suggested, trying to
redirect the conversation before it went down a path that neither of them wanted to tread.

  “Yeah, maybe. So what’s up with you? How is that training school of yours going? I can’t believe that they don’t allow cell phones! It’s the most ridiculous thing!”

  “They can be kind of disruptive,” Nikki said defensively.

  “What if there’s an emergency?”

  “The instructors have phones; they would take care of it.”

  “You know,” Nell said, switching topics and throwing Nikki off-balance, “this school of yours sounds overly intensive. My friend worked for the Gates Foundation, and they didn’t make her go through months and months of training. Just what are they teaching you?”

  “We might be expected to travel later, so they need the trainees to be up on all of their projects and know all about international regulations and everything,” extemporized Nikki.

  “Really?”

  Nikki could hear the discontent and disinterest in Nell’s voice and knew that it was because she had mentioned the T word. Travel wasn’t a concept that Nell had ever taken to.

  “They do really interesting work, Mom,” said Nikki, trying to reengage her mother in the conversation before it went completely south and they ended up talking about Nell’s crazy colleagues. “There were these nuns in India—”

  “I don’t approve of Catholics,” Nell said.

  “The schools for girls in Afghanistan—” Nikki tried.

  “I don’t want to talk about Arabs,” said Nell. “They make me angry.”

  “The political activist in Thailand,” Nikki began, remembering the day they’d watched the video. Nikki hadn’t immediately connected to the women in the film; it had seemed a bit like the instructors had needed the afternoon off and just popped in a video—it was the traditional method, after all. It had all seemed so very far away. And then like a burst of color in a black-and-white film, Nikki had been introduced to Lawan Chinnawat.

  “What’s he do?” Nell asked.

  “She,” corrected Nikki. “Lawan Chinnawat. She was born into a rural hill tribe, but she was kidnapped at age eight and sold to a brothel. But when she was fifteen she escaped, and ever since then she’s been working to end human trafficking and the sex trade. She runs her own foundation, which Carrie Mae contributes to.”

  “Huh,” said Nell, sounding totally disinterested, but Nikki wasn’t listening, she was remembering the overpowering emotion with which Lawan had talked about ending the suffering of the women forced to live in slavery and prostitution under a haze of drug addiction. Lawan didn’t give dry speeches about laws and policy—she made impassioned arguments against the cruelty of human nature and held out promises for the triumph of peace. She had made Nikki believe. None of the other girls had seemed quite as impressed as Nikki, but she couldn’t help wishing that she were more like Lawan.

  “She was amazing, Mom,” Nikki said. “She got an education, and instead of leaving Thailand or going to work at a nice cushy job, she began a grass-roots campaign to get tougher inspections on cargo ships, harsher sentences for slave traders, and a national database for missing persons. And she started a free health clinic in Bangkok. That’s the part that Carrie Mae helps with. They showed us a video of her picketing outside a brothel, and the bouncer came out and shoved her, but she just got up and stared him down. It was really cool.”

  “I hope they’re not sending you there!” said Nell, sounding annoyed.

  “I’m sure they’re not,” Nikki said. She meant to add that she couldn’t possibly be that lucky, but decided to keep that bit to herself. She would have given an arm to meet someone like Lawan, but she suspected that only the really good agents got to handle the high-profile cases.

  “Well, what else are they teaching you?” asked Nell, in a tone that sounded as if she were about as interested in the answer as a dog was interested in going to the vet.

  “Uh, you know, international survival skills,” said Nikki, searching for an appropriate answer, trying to remember something innocuous in the curriculum. “I think driving is next.”

  “Driving? You know how to drive. Why on earth would they need to teach you that?”

  “You know, in case I go to England. I’ll need to know how to drive on the left.”

  “I guess that makes sense,” Nell said, and Nikki looked at the phone in disbelief. She hadn’t thought her lying had improved that much. There was a tap on the glass of the phone booth, and Nikki looked up to see Heidi holding her watch up and pointing at it significantly.

  “OK, Mom, one of the other girls wants to use the phone, so I’d better go.”

  “She can wait,” said Nell firmly. “I want to tell you about work. You remember that old coot George Pembroke? Well, I had to go over to his office for . . .”

  Nikki looked up apologetically at Heidi, who rolled her eyes and walked out of view. With a sigh, Nikki settled in to listen to the ongoing tale of the crazy old coot, but realized that after tonight, she had a whole seven days before she would have to hear from her mother again. Yes, she was starting to like Carrie Mae very much.

  CALIFORNIA VI

  First Gear, It’s All Right

  As their group walked across the parking lot toward the bus, Nikki’s face was plastered into an immovable grin. Behind her the Saugus Speedway, a recent Carrie Mae purchase, hung as a backdrop to her delight.

  “Do we get to do this again, Jorge?” asked Nikki, as the driving instructor bounded up, clipboard tucked under one arm, multiple sets of car keys jangling from his fingers.

  “All next week,” he said, grinning back. “And motorcycles are the week after.” There was a groan from the group in general. Nikki looked around, surprised. She had to admit she felt a little on the tired and grimy side, but the exhilaration of learning how to drive backward at speed, forward through cones, slide the car, do 180s and burnouts, and just generally drive way too fast more than compensated for tired arms and a face full of track dust and exhaust fumes.

  Nikki looked back at Jorge, and he shrugged. “Some people don’t like speed,” he said. Nikki chuckled, and he smiled at her artless enthusiasm. “Then again, some people do.”

  The first question of the morning had been “How many of you know how to drive a stick?” Nikki had raised her hand and then glanced around, surprised to see Jenny intently studying the ground at her feet, hands firmly in her pockets. Four other girls had claimed ignorance, and the non-stick-shifters had been sent away with Mrs. Boyer and the guest instructor, Erica Elleson. Erica had her foot in a flexible cast, but was peg-legging it cheerfully along with a cane.

  Nikki was dying to ask Jenny how her driving lesson had gone, but she wasn’t sure how she would react. They filed onto the bus, and Nikki slid into her seat and dangled over the back to look at Jenny, who was stretched out on the vinyl-covered seat.

  “How was it working with Erica?” she asked, striving to bring up the subject tactfully.

  “Good,” said Jenny. “She’s got the patience of Job. Mrs. Boyer was freaking out by the end of the first five minutes, but Erica was as just as calm as anything. Even when Heidi nearly ran into a light pole. Mrs. Boyer yelled, of course, and Heidi started to cry, and then she had mascara running down her face. Which is when Mrs. Boyer really hit the roof and started screaming about waterproof mascara. It was scary.”

  “Mrs. Boyer is wound a little tight,” agreed Nikki.

  “Truer words were never spoken. Although, she’s got a point about the mascara. I may have to invest in some: I know it’ll be my turn to cry soon enough. I’m just terrible at shifting, Nikki. I don’t get it at all!”

  “I’m sure you’ll get it tomorrow,” said Nikki confidently. “How did Erica hurt her foot?” she continued, hoping a change of subject would lighten Jenny’s mood.

  “She said she ‘dropped in on a bar fight,’ but I think she might have been making a joke. Or maybe not. It was hard to tell, and Mrs. Boyer told us not to be impertinent.”

&nb
sp; “How do you hurt your foot in a bar fight?” asked Nikki, trying to visualize the scenario, picturing Erica John Wayne-ing up to a bar, all fists and swagger.

  “Kick somebody wrong, I suppose,” answered Jenny.

  “Yeah, I guess,” replied Nikki, revising her scenario to include Erica Jackie Chan-ing up to a bar, all flying feet and acrobatics.

  “Hey,” Jenny said, interrupting Nikki in the midst of her fight choreography. “I took a peek at Jorge’s clipboard. You had the fastest times of anyone in your group.”

  “Really?” Nikki had never been the fastest at anything before.

  “Yup. I don’t suppose you want do a little bit of homework with me and help me with the whole shifting thing?” Jenny picked at the seam of the bus seat.

  “I’d love to,” Nikki replied instantly. “Maybe tomorrow, after the War Games seminar, we can get a car from the motor pool.”

  “Thanks. You’d think I would have learned before now, but none of my brothers wanted to teach me on their trucks, and Mama said hardly anybody drives a stick anymore and not to worry about it, so I never did learn.”

  “That’s OK,” Nikki said. “I never learned to shoot. So now we’ll be even.”

  “Deal,” Jenny said, reaching up from her supine position to shake Nikki’s hand.

  “I don’t like all this mechanical nonsense,” Ellen said, dropping down next to Nikki as the bus trundled into motion. “First it was engines and hot-wiring, and now it’s driving.”

  “It’s not nonsense,” disagreed Nikki.

  “I can see how this would be useful knowledge, but honestly, if I want to change my oil, I will hire a man,” Ellen said.

  Jenny snorted in disgust. “And your generation claims that ours isn’t feminist enough,” she said, sitting up. “Do you even know how to change a tire?”

  “Yes, you call Triple-A,” Ellen said firmly.

  “What if you’re somewhere that doesn’t have Triple-A?” Jenny demanded.

  “You know, call me crazy, but I’m just willing to bet that in whatever foreign country I go to, there will be a man who knows how to change a tire.”