by Aubrey Dark
“It’ll be good comic relief, at the very least,” Piers said.
My lips parted, trembling. I wanted to throw Piers’ phone across the field. I wanted to break the screen. But I couldn’t stop watching. Comic relief? That’s why he had brought me on the show?
“I’m not sure,” the woman said. “We have other options that I think would work better for a villain. The third contestant, what was her name?”
I frowned as she argued with the other two judges. I thought I recognized her voice from somewhere, but I couldn’t place it.
“Alright,” Piers voice was saying. “So we agree to keep her on, at least for the first episode?”
“Yes,” the last man said. The other two judges nodded.
“Good,” Piers said. “Let’s run through the deliberation again, this time for the camera.” He paused. “So what do you think of Lisa?”
“I liked her,” the last man said. “What a bold personality. She’s not afraid to say what she wants.”
“She’s going after the man for his money,” the woman chimed in. “Is that who we want on The Billionaire Dating Game? A gold digger?”
“At least she’s honest about it,” the last man said.
“True, true,” the woman said, clasping her hands in front of her.
“And I think she has a spark to her. I vote to keep her.”
“Me too,” the first man said. “If her attitude changes, she could be a contender.”
The woman nodded.
“Then it’s decided,” Piers interjected. “Lisa is in?”
“Yes,” the first man said.
“I have my reservations,” the woman said, “but I’ll vote yes—”
“What are you doing with my phone?”
I dropped the phone, startled. The video kept going as I fumbled on the ground to turn it off. I looked up into Piers’ piercing blue-green eyes. His face was slanted in a deep frown.
“I wasn’t—I was looking for you,” I said.
“You shouldn’t be snooping through my phone,” he said, reaching out for it.
Something inside me snapped, and a rush of anger brought blood to my face. I shoved the phone into his chest, letting my anger flow freely.
“Fine! Take it!” I said. “Take it and good riddance!”
“What were you looking at?”
“Oh, nothing. Just you and the producers discussing how fat and old I am. How terrible of a contestant I would be. How much of a gold digger I am.”
Piers’ face dropped. His lips parted.
“Lisa… Lisa, I don’t—”
“Nice to hear that I’m just a joke contestant. A villain to be shoved off of the show at the first opportunity.”
“Lisa, it’s not what it sounds like.”
“Really? Because it sounds to me like you’re a complete fucking asshole.”
“Lisa, I had to get you on the show somehow—”
“Of course you did! You needed me on for comic relief, right? Look at the unfashionable woman who’s ten years older than everyone! She’s so desperate! All it takes is one erotic massage, and she’ll do anything you want!”
“That wasn’t—”
“You used me!” There were tears in my eyes. I couldn’t believe I had fallen for this manipulative jerk. I had known it from the beginning, hadn’t I?
“Lisa, please calm down.”
“What? You want me to calm down? But what about the drama?! It’ll help your ratings if I go crazy, won’t it? Won’t it?!”
“I can explain.”
“No explanation is necessary!” I yelled. “You just stay away from me, and I’ll stay away from you, until you and your producers find a way to sabotage me and kick me off the show. It’ll make a great fucking article for Moi!”
“You wouldn’t dare.” Piers’ face was pale.
“I would dare!”
I bent down and picked up a twig from the grass, and threw it as hard as I could at Piers’ chest. It bounced off his shirt and landed back on the ground.
“A twig?” Piers asked, staring down at the twig in disbelief. “You threw a twig at me.”
“Yes! And I’d do it again!” I said. “Because I’m bummed, and it’s all your fault!”
“If you hadn’t looked through my phone—”
“Oh! So it’s my fault that you’re a manipulative asshole, because I caught you being a manipulative asshole?” I threw my hands up in the air. “I am done with you. I should have been done with you the moment I saw you!”
“Lisa, it’s not—”
“And—and—Dylan just kissed me!” I yelled, stabbing one last finger in the air to make a point. “I think he actually likes me! So good luck kicking me off anytime soon!”
Piers stood there with his phone dangling from his hand as I stormed away.
Dylan was right. I’d felt much better after I threw that twig.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I smiled the brightest, fakest smile I could muster at Piers as he stood in the middle of the penthouse living room, talking about the next contest. I wasn’t about to give the cameras any ammunition to use against me. I would be the happiest, most cheerful person ever. I would be positive and upbeat and one hundred percent friendly.
If Piers was going to twist my words, I was going to make it as hard as possible for him.
“Today,” he was saying, “we’re going to have a very special guest judge. From America’s Runway, please welcome Tina Toronto!”
The contestants around me burst into excited applause. I did my best to cheer excitedly alongside them, even though I had no idea who we were cheering for.
“Who’s Tina Toronto?” I whispered out the side of my mouth to Kate.
“She hosts a fashion show on the same network,” Kate whispered back. “You’ve never seen America’s Runway?”
Fashion show? My face almost dropped, but I wrangled it back into a fake smile.
“And today we’ll all be creating our own fashion in a crossover episode!”
Oh, shit. So this was how Piers was going to get rid of me. Fashion was my weak spot. It was worse than a weak spot. It was a nonexistent spot. I was lost when it came to fashion. And he knew it.
My teeth gritted into a hard grin. He wasn’t going to get me.
“You will all be designing a high fashion outfit with a partner contestant from America’s Runway,” Piers was saying. “But! There’s a twist.”
Dylan stood up.
“It’s a superhero fashion show!” he said. He cleared his throat and looked down at the note card in his palm. “As—as some of you may already know, I am a big fan of comic books! Especially DC comics. So for this fashion show, you should be picking a superhero—or supervillain—from the DC Comics universe, and designing your outfit around that. Then you’ll be modeling the outfit down the fashion runway.”
“We have to make a superhero costume?” Julie squinted hard.
“Not quite,” Piers interjected. “You’re designing an outfit inspired by a comic book character. A character itself, or the color scheme—you can use any of these to help inspire you. We’ll be going to a comic book store first thing this morning, so that you can browse through the characters and find some inspiration.”
God, his smooth talking voice was so irritating. How could I have fallen for this guy? He seemed so fake. Just then he caught my eye, staring hard at me, and I quickly looked away.
“Now let’s all get into the limo and go look at some comics!”
“Woo!” Dylan said, pumping his fists in the air.
The comic book store manager was staring at Mia’s tits. He couldn’t tear his eyes away. I wanted to roll my eyes, but instead I plastered on a smile and forced myself to look at the comic in my hands instead. I wasn’t going to give them any drama to tape.
“I don’t know what superhero to pick,” Kate said, flipping idly through a comic book. “What do you think?”
“I’m going to pick the one that has the best color scheme,” I said. “Or
maybe just Batman. He likes Batman, right?”
“Oh!” Kate exclaimed. “That would be so cool! What if you did a sleek dress with, like, the Batman logo on it? And, like, a cape type thing, but you could make it a shawl…”
“It sounds like you want to do Batman,” I said.
“I don’t want to steal your idea.”
“Go for it,” I said. “I can’t come up with a fashion idea to save my life.”
“You could do the Joker!” Kate exclaimed. “Like, a sexy dress version of the Joker.”
“Why does everything have to be a sexy dress?” I groaned.
“Because it’s a fashion show,” Mia interjected. She grabbed up a comic book from between me and Kate. “Are you both really going to pick a guy superhero as your inspiration?”
“Maybe.”
“Why not?” Kate asked.
“Batman with tits? Ugh,” Mia scoffed. “I just can’t imagine something like that being sexy.”
“That’s because you have no imagination,” I said, then clamped my lips shut. Dammit. I wasn’t supposed to be getting into arguments today!
Kate was silent, looking down studiously at the comic book.
“What are you going to do for your outfit?” I asked Mia, trying to make up for my last remark.
She brushed her long hair back.
“I haven’t decided yet. Not like I would tell anyone once I did. You’d just steal my idea.”
“Right,” I said, with a forced grin. “Well, good luck!”
“I don’t need luck for this contest,” Mia said. “I’ve done hundreds of catwalks before.”
“Wow. Hundreds! You don’t say?”
“So you ladies are just going to have to fight for second place. Understood?”
I smiled and nodded.
“You got it! Second place, here I come!”
Mia stared at me like I was crazy.
“Whatever. I’m going to go pick out my comic. See you losers later.”
“Bye! Have a great time!”
Kate eyed me sideways.
“What on earth was that all about?” she asked.
“I’m trying to act more friendly,” I said. “How’d I do?”
“Great acting,” Kate said. “But I think I like your bitter, sarcastic side better.”
“Too bad!” I said brightly. “I’m going to be so happy to be second place! You won’t even believe it!”
“I wouldn’t mind second place for this show, that’s for sure,” Kate said.
It took me a moment to realize what she’d said.
“Wait—second place? Why? Don’t you want to win?”
“I mean, sure,” Kate said, blushing a bit. “But you know you win if you decide to walk away from the billionaire at the end.”
“No I don’t. What do you win?”
“You haven’t heard?”
“Kate, you’re making it hard for me to not say something sarcastic and bitter.”
She laughed.
“Sorry. If Dylan picks you and you decide not to date him, you get a hundred thousand dollars. He can pick someone else, of course. But you still get the money for walking away.”
My eyes nearly popped out of my head.
“A hundred thousand—are you serious?”
“Totally serious.”
“But it’s a rumor,” I said. “That’s not official. Probably Mia made it up so that we would walk away at the end.”
“I asked Dylan about it,” Kate whispered, looking around the comic book store.
“And?”
“He said it was true.” Kate’s eyelashes fluttered, and she looked down at the comic book with a strange expression on her face.
“Kate? Are you telling me the truth?”
“Yes!” Her face flashed pink.
“Why are you looking so guilty, then?”
“I don’t—it was something else Dylan told me.”
“What?” I asked. My chest felt hollow.
Kate bit her lip and avoided looking at me. I knew what she was going to say before she said it, but it didn’t make it any easier to hear.
“He said… he said he’s going to have a hard time choosing between us.”
The set for America’s Runway was in the same building that I’d gone to for the first auditions of The Billionaire Dating Game. As we walked down the hallway, I studiously avoided looking at the door to the break room where Piers had taken off my shirt.
Piers had gone back to ignoring me. In fact, I don’t think he had so much as made eye contact since I’d confronted him at the picnic. I told myself that it was good riddance. I told myself that I didn’t need the stress of competing for two guys’ affections at the same time. But as much as Dylan talked with me, and gave me attention, I couldn’t seem to make myself care. All I thought about was Piers holding me in his arms.
Stupid, was all it was. I was in the running for a billionaire. And if Kate was telling the truth, I was one of the top two contestants. I trusted her, even though sometimes I thought that she was keeping something secret from me. If it was true, though, I would either be getting a hundred thousand dollars… or a date with Dylan.
The memory of Dylan kissing me made me jerk myself back to reality. I didn’t know if that was what I wanted. He was a nice guy, sure, and I’d had a lot of fun with him. Maybe I was wrong to dismiss a guy for being immature. And even if he was—
“Hi, partner! I’m Amanda!”
I blinked. The girl in front of me was a foot shorter than me, with a bright pink mohawk and earrings dotting her eyebrows, nose, and lip.
“Hi there!” I said, a bit dazed. “Partner?”
“Let’s hurry,” she said, grabbing my hand and pulling me toward one of the tables on the set. It was covered in tissue paper sewing patterns, thread, and a sewing machine that looked like a medieval torture device. “We aren’t going to have a lot of time to make this before the show. Let’s get your measurements while you tell me what you have in mind for an outfit.”
“Uh—okay,” I said.
“Strip down!” she ordered. “I have to measure you.”
I looked around. The other girls were sitting on chairs, chatting with their partners. Mia had her drawings out and was explaining exactly what she wanted done. I was apparently the only one being ordered to doff my clothes.
“I’ve won three of these contests already,” Amanda hissed at me. “Trust me!”
“I trust you, I trust you,” I said, holding up my hands.
“Now strip! Hurry!”
I did what she said, wishing I’d worn matching underwear for the show. She wrapped measuring tape around my waist, my arms, my hips.
“So what’s your superhero?” she asked, pinning some linen-type fabric around my middle.
“Uh, the Joker,” I said.
“Good one.”
“Thank you,” I said, trying not to shiver as she pressed the cold measuring tape up into my inner thigh.
“Do you want to do classic Joker, or like, a play off his suit, maybe something with the silk tie, you know…”
I shrugged.
“I don’t know. I’m not really into fashion.”
“Oh, jeez. Really?”
“Really.” I saw the camera crew hurrying our way. Oh, no! I crossed my arms to cover my chest and plastered on a smile.
“Arms down, please!” Amanda chirped. She measured from my wrist up to my shoulder. The camera crew looped around us. Oh, God. They were taking video of my ass. I should have worn better lingerie today. I should have—
“Okay, got your measurements. This is going to be interesting.”
“Interesting?”
“In a good way. I think you’re going to rock this. Now, let’s talk design!”
I pulled on my clothes as quickly as I could, and the cameramen decided to go film someone else.
“How do you know so much about the Joker, anyway?” I asked. “Did they have you do research, too?”
“Nah. I used
to be super into movie costuming. I watched all those old Batman movies.” She pulled out a sketchpad. “Okay! So, no ideas for the dress?”
I shook my head.
“Good,” she said. “I’m gonna spitball some ideas, and you tell me if you like it.”
Her pencil flew across the paper. I was amazed to see the lines of a dress form within seconds. She’d nailed my figure, too. As I admired her work, she talked nonstop.
“Now, this is high fashion, so we can do whatever we want. And with a comic book theme, I’m thinking we go big.”
“So the shoulder pads like that—”
“Emphasizing the lines of the Joker suit. Only it’s not a suit, it’s a dress. The suit jacket is a cape. You’re gonna look evil and classy at the same time.”
“Evil and classy? I like it.”
“And your makeup—”
“Can I wear really bright red lipstick?” I asked.
“Yes! We’ll go pale, but maybe not too pale. And let’s get some bright green extensions for your hair.”
I grinned. This was my kind of fashion.
“Now, I think this will work with the flowy purple, but we’re going to have to see what fabric will work for the dress part.”
“Cool,” I said, and held up the sketch she’d made. If we could pull this off—
“Hurry!” Amanda said, brushing her hand up over her head, ruffling her fierce pink mohawk. “Let’s make this happen!”
The rest of the contest was a blur. Amanda was an evil genius when it came to fashion, I realized. She kept me standing for an hour while she pinned the fabric up around me, adjusting and readjusting the suit top until it fit me perfectly. Every once in a while, she’d stick me with a pin and mutter a brusque apology.
Meanwhile, Mia was in a screaming match with her partner over what kind of fabric to use.
“I can’t believe they’re still going at it,” I said, after fifteen minutes of yelling.
“I can,” Amanda said, rolling her eyes. “Kathleen always gets what she wants.”
“So does Mia.”
“Then I guess they’ll go on forever.”
“A perpetual complaining machine.”
We both burst out laughing. I hadn’t realized that fashion could be this fun. By the time Piers and Dylan walked in, I had almost forgotten the main part of the competition.
