Diary of an Ugly Duckling

by Langhorne, Karyn

  Bradshaw,” she said in a tone that suggested she

  was trying very hard not to sound smug and failing

  miserably. “I don’t want to say ‘I told you so’—”

  “Then don’t,” Audra snapped, dragging the

  garbage bag toward the front door.

  “That’s just how men are, Audra,” her mother

  continued, following her. “It’s not that they’re not

  interested in the rest of the package, but they appre-

  ciate the efforts we make on the outside—”

  Esmeralda Prince rose like a vision in Audra’s

  mind. Art Bradshaw appreciated the outside, all

  right. That much was very, very clear.

  Audra opened the front door, dragged the

  garbage bag of junk food out into the corridor and

  slammed the door on it like it was an unwelcome

  guest. Edith shook her head.

  “So you’re going on a diet. Again. Do you have to

  make such a production out of everything? After

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  you lose a few pounds and do something with your

  hair, there’ll be plenty of men—”

  Audra whirled on her, angry words rising in her

  throat as she stared into her attractive cinnamon

  face.

  “Will there, Ma? Is that all it takes—twenty

  pounds and a hair weave?” she gestured at herself,

  bra and all. “Look at me, Ma. When is the last time I

  had a date, huh?”

  “Back when you were in criminal justice school, I

  think,” her mother frowned calling up a memory.

  “Nice boy. Leon or Larry or something—”

  “Lamont,” Audra said bitterly. Her mother

  couldn’t keep track of the names of the people in a

  conversation about today, but she could get within a

  few syllables of the name of a rotten jerk she’d had

  one date with years ago. “And he wasn’t so nice,

  Ma. You know why he went out with me? To win a

  competition with his buddies. A competition over

  who could sleep with the ugliest girl.”

  Edith sighed a sigh that suggested Audra should

  have known better. “Well, he was really handsome,

  Audra. You can’t expect a guy that handsome—”

  “Why can’t I, Ma?” Audra roared her anger and

  frustration and humiliation beyond containment.

  “Why can’t I?

  “Because that’s not the way it works, Audra. An

  ugly man has as good a shot as a good-looking one,

  but an ugly woman is a sin against nature,” she

  preached. “I earn my living on the truth of that. Do

  you think I caught your father with my personal-

  ity?” She shook her head. “No—”

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  “And that great love story worked out really

  well,” Audra scoffed. “He left you when I was nine.”

  “Well, there were lots of reasons for that.”

  “Tell me about it,” Audra muttered, closing her

  eyes against the memory of the night her father left.

  Edith hesitated, her eyes fixed on Audra’s face.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked in a low

  voice, that suggested to Audra that she didn’t really

  want to know.

  “It means I heard you, Ma!” Audra shouted. “I

  heard him, I heard you—” she paced away from the

  sight of her mother’s horror-stricken face. “I know

  what he accused you of that last night.”

  Audra’s mother’s hand flew to her mouth.

  “Listen, Audra . . . you don’t understand. He was

  just angry, he didn’t mean—”

  “He said I wasn’t his,” Audra hollered bellowing

  out the words at the top her lungs. “He said there

  was no way he could have had a child as black and

  ugly as me, Ma—”

  “Hush! You’ll wake Kiana—”

  “Are you ever going to admit it, Ma?” Audra

  swung on her, her fists clenched. “Are you ever go-

  ing to tell me the truth?”

  “Can’t nobody tell you nothing, Audra,” Edith

  snapped. “And that’s what’s wrong with you. Now,

  I’m going to bed. And if you were smart, you’d go to

  bed, too.” She hurried past Audra toward her bed-

  room up the hall. “And put some clothes on. No-

  body wants to see all your jiggly stuff,” she hissed, a

  final parting, hurtful shot before closing her door

  and shutting Audra out for what must have been the

  thousandth time.

  DIARY OF AN UGLY DUCKLING

  77

  * * *

  She flipped through every channel of the dial at least

  twice, but there was nothing—no distraction in film

  or otherwise. Not tonight. Sleep was impossible . . .

  and she knew it. If she fell asleep, if she allowed her

  mind to wander for even a second, she’d hear the

  girl’s words all over again— I don’t want to be like

  you—or see the expression on Art Bradshaw’s face as

  he watched Esmeralda Prince sashay away from

  them. Or she’d be nine years old all over again . . .

  “Why?” her mother wailed, in a voice more des-

  perate that Audra had ever remembered hearing,

  before or since. “Why now, James?”

  “Because I’m sick of the whispers and the looks,

  that’s why! Because I’m tired of playing this game

  with you, Edith!” And she heard him throwing suit-

  cases, drawers opening and closing . . .

  “James—”

  “That girl ain’t mine,” her father had growled be-

  hind the partially closed door of her mother’s bed-

  room. “You know it, and I know it—everybody

  knows it. Ain’t no way I could have a child as black

  and ugly as that. Get the guy you been fucking to

  raise her. I’m not doing it—”

  Audra snapped herself back to the present, will-

  ing her mind to focus on the television screen.

  “I mean, look at these pants,” a slender woman in

  one of those tops with a single thin strap over one

  shoulder and full-length arm on the other was say-

  ing. She stretched a pair of what seemed to Audra to

  be perfectly acceptable gray sweatpants toward the

  camera, while gesturing to several other pairs in the

  closet behind her. “This is all she wears! Sweatpants!”

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  and the slender woman shook her straight, blonde

  locks in disgust.

  “But they’re comfortable!” Another woman

  stepped into the frame, clutching the sweatpants de-

  fensively. And of course, she wore a pair of dark

  blue sweats, matched with a faded orange T-shirt.

  Her dark hair was tied back in a long, frizzy pony-

  tail. She looked just fine to Audra. Just your average-

  looking white girl, the sort of woman Audra might

  see on the subway or pass on the street a thousand

  times in a typical New York day. Unlike her tarted-

  up friend, who looked like something off a televi-

  sion commercial or a movie set.

  “Just because I don’t dress like you doesn’t mean I

  look bad,” the average-looking girl was saying, and
>
  Audra found herself nodding her head in absolute

  agreement.

  “Listen, girlfriend,” a masculine voice lisped,

  snatching the sweatpants so violently, Audra felt a

  deep sympathy for the poor girl whose wardrobe

  was being savaged. “Sweats have their time and

  place,” he announced, like some kind of authority,

  and to punctuate that point, the words kenny close,

  master stylist appeared on the screen beneath him

  as he continued. “If you’re cleaning your apartment,

  you wear sweatpants. If you’re at the gym in winter,

  you wear sweatpants. After that . . .” and he tossed

  the sweats into a waiting garbage can that clearly

  had been placed in the room just for that purpose.

  The dark-haired owner of said pants gasped in

  horror. Then to Audra’s surprise the fashion man

  yanked the remaining pants out of the drawer and

  tossed them into the trash with glee.

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  79

  “You can keep the ones you have on,” he finished,

  slapping his hands together like he’d just finished a

  particularly distasteful chore, while the brown-

  haired girl fairly wept with dismay. “Don’t worry,

  honey,” Kenny Close Master Stylist offered comfort-

  ingly. “When we’re done with you, you’ll have for-

  gotten all about sweatpants, I swear. We’re gonna

  give you a hot new look and have men lining up out-

  side your door!”

  Then the program cut to a promotion for the next

  segment, through which Audra learned that the

  name of the program was Recreate Me, and that after

  this program ended, a show called Style Spy prom-

  ised to update the looks of unsuspecting passersby,

  and that both were part of Makeover Madness

  Weekend on the Beautify! Channel.

  “Pretty Up with Beautify!” a pleasant female

  voice suggested in a tone that mixed encouragement

  with command. Audra could almost imagine the

  words “or else” being added to the tag line.

  Pretty Up . . . by any means necessary. That’s what

  Penny Bradshaw had advised. Pretty Up . . . her

  mother was always nagging. Lose weight, change your

  hair—then the boys will like you . . .

  “Are your looks ruining your life? Are you tired

  of being the “ugly girl,” the “plain Jane?” a calm fe-

  male voice asked from the television screen, star-

  tling Audra’s attention back to the box. But there

  were no graphics, no stylish pictures or products.

  Instead, the screen was filled with the elegant image

  of swans, floating calm and serene on a quiet lake. It

  was mesmerizing in its stillness and beauty.

  “We can help. Accepting audition tapes now for

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  Karyn Langhorne

  Ugly Duckling, the Beautify! Channel’s ultimate

  makeover show. Call us at 888-UGLY DUCK for de-

  tails, or visit our Web site at BeautifyChannel.com.

  Hurry, tapes must be postmarked by Monday, April

  second.”

  Ugly Duckling. It was like the stupid ad was

  talking to her, recounting the night’s failures. Her

  looks were ruining—had ruined—her life. She was

  the original ugly girl . . . ugly enough to give lessons

  in it.

  Pretty Up, the words echoed in her brain, pulsing

  toward a moment of decision. Pretty Up . . . but not

  just with a new outfit, and some over-the-counter

  beauty consultant comestics. But Pretty Way Up, dra-

  matically, drastically, permanently.

  Because her mother and Penny Bradshaw weren’t

  wrong. For all the platitudes the ugly girls of the

  world were asked to live with, accept, embody, the

  girl wasn’t wrong. It didn’t matter how smart you

  were, how funny, how great a person—the package

  was the deciding factor when it came to the opposite

  sex, and even this child’s own father, who for just a

  second, Audra had thought might be just a little dif-

  ferent, had turned out to be a full-fledged member

  of the club.

  Her own father was certainly a member, too—if

  that’s who the man who had raised her until she

  was nine really was.

  The gauzy, hazy light from another dawn filled

  the bedroom. The last of Beautify! Network’s make-

  overs surrendered to fresh programming focusing

  on home décor, and Audra flipped the channels list-

  lessly. In another couple of hours, the apartment

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  81

  would come to life, and her mother would bustle out

  of the door for sixteen hours at the salon, pretending

  once again that nothing was wrong between them—

  nothing except that Audra needed to Pretty Up!

  Kiana would need care. There would be things to

  clean, errands to run . . . Audra saw her life stretch

  hopelessly out in front of her: predictable and safe

  and entirely alone.

  Ugly Duckling . . .

  The commercial raced around her brain, its pitch

  resonating in her mind. What would it be like to be

  totally transformed, to see yourself remade, not just

  in new clothes and fresh makeup—how many times

  had she tried that, only to be disappointed—but re-

  shaped from the bones outward? What would it be

  like to look in the mirror and find, not fat, black and

  ugly, but something lovely and desirable. What did

  it feel like to glance in the mirror and find a reflec-

  tion like a movie star’s, like Esmeralda Prince’s, like

  Petra’s? Could it be as close as a telephone call? As

  close as 1-888 UGLY DUCK . . .

  But I can’t do that. I couldn’t possibly call some reality

  television show, Audra thought, flipping down the

  dial toward Classic Movies Channel. I couldn’t possi-

  bly call . . .

  Why not? another voice in her brain answered.

  Nothing else has worked.

  I don’t have time. The deadline is Monday—

  And you’re off, the other voice in her head re-

  minded her. You’re on administrative leave, indefi-

  nitely, thanks to Princeton Haines, remember?

  I don’t have a camera—

  But at the same instant she remembered something

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  Darlene Fuchs had said, drunk as a skunk at that re-

  tirement party. Something about a place in Green-

  wich Village. A place where they help actors make

  audition tapes . . .

  I couldn’t, Audra told the voice again. I’m no actor—

  Fine then, the insistent voice challenged. Do noth-

  ing. Let your perfect guy date some boring, selfish

  woman just because of her outside packaging. Sure, you

  could change your own package and find happiness . . .

  but no. You can’t. You won’t . . .

  And again she saw the look on Art Bradshaw’s

  handsome face as his eyes followed Esmeralda

  Prince into the ladies’ room and beyond. He’d never

  looked at Audra like that . . . In fact, when she really


  thought about it, he’d never looked at her much at

  all if he could help it.

  Not mine . . . Ain’t no way I could have a child as black

  and ugly as that . . .

  Maybe . . .

  This is madness, Audra told herself firmly, shaking

  the idea and the insistent, challenging voice egging

  her onward from her mind and focusing on the TV

  instead. A movie was starting as Audra resettled

  herself under her comforter with a deepening sense

  of depression. Bette Davis was in the movie, and

  Paul Henreid . . . and as the credits faded into the

  opening scene, Audra knew exactly what she was

  watching.

  Even the movies seemed to be sanctioning her

  course.

  Now, Voyager. The ultimate forties makeover film.

  Bette Davis played an ugly spinster, stuck and sti-

  fled by her domineering mother, who, after a nervous

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  83

  breakdown, completely remakes herself and finds

  love with a married man on an ocean voyage. She

  returns home, stares down her mother and—

  Audra watched, transfixed. It was as if Bette were

  speaking to her . . . telling her what to do . . .

  They probably won’t pick you anyway . . . Why not at

  least find out? It couldn’t hurt to find out . . .

  By the time the newly glamorous Bette Davis

  challenged her strict mother’s control and vowed to

  wait, forever if necessary, for the man she loved,

  Audra had the phone in her hand.

  It couldn’t hurt to find out . . .

  “Welcome to the Ugly Duckling,” a smooth,

  recorded voice said. “To be considered for a spot as

  a contestant on our show—”

  Audra snatched a pencil from the drawer in her

  bedside table, ripped a clean sheet of paper from a

  notepad beside it and began to write.

  Tuesday, April 3

  Petra,

  I’ve done something . . . It’s probably crazy but I didn’t

  know what else to do. It’s a long shot, but with all the

  movies I’ve watched, I know a little about how to tell a

  story.

  I told them my story, Petra—at least as much of it as

  I know. I didn’t leave out anything—not Ma or Dad or

  the stuff I heard. I only had a day to work on it. While

  Kiana was at school Monday and I usually would have

  gone to work, I found this video place, made a tape and

  mailed it before I lost my nerve. It came out rather

  good, if I do say so myself.

  I didn’t tell Ma about it—and don’t you do it. She’ll