by Tyra Banks
“What? That’s impossible,” Ci~L whispered, placing her hands authoritatively on her hips. But even she took one timid step backward.
The figure hefted its body onto the top of the wall and then dropped down in front of them in a cloud of dust to rest on its haunches. It had a gnarled, hunched back. It licked its lips as if it hadn’t eaten for days and considered them an acceptable meal. Thick saliva dripped down its chin. Piper shrank behind Dylan. Tookie squeezed her hand.
The scaly, charred monster turned and stared directly at Tookie. Its sooty eyes narrowed, and hundreds of cracks of dry mud covered its face. Tookie’s gaze fell to the monster’s hands. There was a filthy, tattered doll tucked under its arm. A doll Tookie knew all too well. This wasn’t a LeGizzârd. It was …
“C-C-Creamy?” Tookie cried, and promptly passed out.
41
STONE TO BONE, AND FLESH
“Tookie, get up, damn it!”
The voice sounded foggy and far away. Bright light shone in Tookie’s eyes, and she sat up, looked around, and gasped.
She was in her old bedroom in Peppertown. The room was its usual mess, Myrracle’s things strewn over every inch of space. Myrracle lay in her bed by the window, giggle-snoring happily.
Tookie ran her hands down her face, her heart pounding fast. Everything she’d endured and experienced, Piper, Shiraz, and Dylan, Bravo and Ci~L and seeing her mother climbing over the wall … none of it had been real.
It was all a dream.
She felt a strange mix of loss, devastation and relief—at least she didn’t have to face Creamy’s wrath in Modelland now. But then tears dotted her eyes, revealing the truth and her disappointment.
“Tookie, get up!”
Tookie looked around her bedroom, and before she could respond, her vision went foggy. Giggle-snoring Myrracle started to fade, and once more, Tookie descended into maddening darkness.
“Tookie, I know you hear me, damn it!”
She opened her eyes again. And leaning over her was the monster. A giant wall rose up behind it.
“If I have to tell you one more time to stand. The hell. Up …”
Tookie sat up and stared at the monster with the voice of her mother. A hot ball of fear simmered in the pit of her stomach. She felt suspended between two worlds.
“C-Creamy?” Tookie whispered again to the creature, drawing back.
Shiraz helped Tookie to her feet. “Who is monster, and how you know it?”
“It—it’s my mother,” Tookie sputtered. The girls gaped at her. Tookie reached out to the cruddy beast. “Are you real?”
“Did you fall on your big head just now?” Creamy spat. “Of course I’m real!”
Tookie gazed around dazedly. She felt caught between the Tookie she had been and the Tookie she now was. The M building loomed in the distance. The golden plaza sparkled.
Piper, crouched in a ball, screamed. “Look! Another one!”
Another hand appeared at the top of the wall. An instant later, a second body dropped spastically into Modelland. When it turned, Tookie’s heart stopped in her chest. Those perfect aqua-blue, single-colored eyes! Myrracle!
“My sister?” Tookie said in disbelief. The words didn’t sound quite right coming out of her mouth.
“Your sister is part LeGizzârd?” Piper asked, looking at Tookie with the same fearful expression she had once reserved for Ci~L. Dylan grabbed Piper’s hand.
Everything seemed like it was happening in both slow and sped-up motion. Tookie felt dizzier and dizzier. Creamy and Myrracle were … here?
She remembered Creamy pointing to the sky as if she was cursing Tookie when Ci~L had carried her away in her pouch on T-DOD. Then she thought of what she’d overheard in the BellaDonna’s chambers. How the BellaDonna had switched a girl who rightfully belonged at Modelland with Tookie.
And now Tookie’s suspicions had proven true. That rightful girl was … Myrracle. And Creamy was there on a mission.
“Long time, no see,” Creamy said to Tookie, taking her in from head to toe. “You look … different.” She reached back and yanked the hunch off her back. A cruddy backpack fell to the ground. She then forcefully pulled Tookie up. “Take us to the BellaDonna. Now.”
“Excuse m-me?”
Her mother’s grip on Tookie’s arm strengthened. “Are you deaf?” she mocked.
For a moment, Tookie couldn’t speak. She couldn’t take Creamy to the BellaDonna. If she did, her stay at Modelland would be all over. “Y-you could get in huge tr-trouble, Creamy. Y-you can’t be here.”
Creamy waved her hand dismissively. Then her eyes brightened as she noticed something behind Tookie. She marched ahead, crossing the golden M plaza. Golden exclamation marks followed her as she made her way to the O. “Myrracle, come!” Creamy shouted, snapping her fingers and shifting Bellissima in her arms.
Myrracle and everyone else trailed behind. Tookie turned and felt a momentary jolt of pleasure at seeing Myrracle looking so wretched while she herself wore Modelland Dress Uniform couture.
Creamy marched right up to the BellaDonna statue and stared at it. “BellaDonna!”
The statue remained still. Creamy stomped her sooty foot. “BellaDonna! I know you hear me!” Creamy roared. Brown spit spewed from her mouth with every syllable.
“Lady, today Madame BellaDonna may be a bit stone-faced and temperamental,” Ci~L said in a teasing, confiding voice, leaning close to Creamy. “Especially ’cause today’s the 7Seven Tournament.”
Creamy rolled her eyes, which, after months of starvation, looked like deep pits far back in her skull. “The 7Seven Tournament? That idiotic pomp and circumstance?” She turned back to the statue. “BELLADONNA!” she roared. “STOP IGNORING ME!”
“Oh my God! Look!” Dylan shrieked. The BellaDonna statue’s eyes began to blink. Her hands moved from their alluring pose. She arched her neck way down and gazed upon the filthy woman in the O. Her brow furrowed. The corners of her mouth dipped into a frown. Then she burst into song.
“Silly moppet, foolish wench,
Creatures of abominable stench,
You crosseth mine gold path today,
So welcome to your dear doomsday.
The punishment deserved you
Will—”
Creamy stomped her foot again, interrupting the BellaDonna’s song. “Will you stop that ridiculous singing?”
Tookie and the Unicas exchanged shocked looks.
The BellaDonna continued to scowl. Her gaze scanned the others. Her eyes narrowed, especially when she noticed Ci~L. “Of course you’d be part of this,” she hissed.
“I don’t know what this is, but it’s pretty damn entertaining,” Ci~L said.
“Well?” Creamy stared at the statue. “Where the hell are you? You and I need to have a serious talk!”
The BellaDonna paused. More cheers exploded from inside the 7Seven stadium. Drums beat wildly. Tookie waited for Modelland security to approach. She knew the BellaDonna would not conduct a visit with a mere mortal just as the most important tournament of the year was about to begin. Not with her public waiting. Not with grand, important, life-changing decisions to be made. Not with the entire Bored waiting for her.
Amazingly, the giant BellaDonna statue sighed and stretched her arm toward a thick hedge. “All of you, go to the last ZipZap on the left through there! Now!”
Tookie gasped. Seriously? Then the statue went stiff, the decision made.
Everyone marched off toward the hedges to the ZipZap. “Creamy!” Myrracle cried. “Do we have to go inside that jiggedy-aggedy thing?”
Tookie turned to Ci~L, who lingered outside the hedge with her. “You’re coming with us, right?”
“I don’t think so, Tookie,” Ci~L said, scratching her back. “Your mom and your sister remind me of when I, um … when I dug up my …”
Then Tookie heard a horn blare behind her. When she turned, she saw a familiar face staring with wonderment at the brand-new stadium. His hair slicked back
, his formal Bestosterone uniform tightly fitted to his body, and a little bruise over his left eye, perhaps from where someone smacked him hard during ManAttack.
Bravo.
He turned, as if sensing Tookie watching. When he saw her, his expression was one of utter confusion. The last he knew, she had said she was leaving Modelland.
Everything Bravo had told Tookie just before they fought in ManAttack flooded her brain like a disease. I made a bet. The weird-looking ones … they’re the ultimate challenge. She let out a sniff. But as she was about to turn away, she noticed the look on his face, as if he didn’t want her to break eye contact. And then he licked his thumb and pantomimed wiping Tookie’s eyebrows.
Tookie’s mouth fell open. How dare he do that, of all things? She made up her mind that she would never forgive him. Ever.
You might as well be dead to me, Bravo.
“We’re waiting!” Creamy said from inside the hedge.
Ci~L backed away. “I’m sorry, Tookie, you’re on your own with this one. I’m so sorry, but I’m feeling the urge to go find a reed.”
But Tookie looked at Ci~L pleadingly. This was all too much: her mother’s return, Myrracle, the stress of Bravo … “Please, Ci~L? I can’t do this alone. And I don’t want you to be alone right now.”
Ci~L wavered for a minute, then nodded.
Tookie walked into the clearing and approached the ZipZap on the end. She glanced over her shoulder and then ducked inside. Creamy followed. In seconds, they had all slid through the long tube and emerged at the end of a dim corridor.
Piper inhaled. “Blood oranges.”
“At least somethin’ smells fresh,” Dylan said, eyeing Creamy and Myrracle.
And then they heard them: the calming, soothing undulations of the unseen voices chanting “Ooh” and “Ahh.” Tookie glanced at her friends. The BellaDonna had ordered them to the OoAh?
“Guess Madame BellaDonna needed her butt waxed before her big 7Seven speech,” Ci~L said, smirking.
They walked into the spa lobby. It was much more humid than when Tookie had been there. Purplish light spilled into the hall. The check-in desk was unoccupied, and a serene tableau was reflected on the walls. A cobblestone street, church towers, a burgeoning butcher shop, a cobbler’s shop, and a spinning windmill surrounded them. The sound of church bells reverberated so loudly that Tookie felt they were suddenly trapped in a belfry.
“Quaint,” Piper murmured, looking around.
“It like village in Labrian fairy tale!” Shiraz whispered. She reached out to touch a jolly white-bearded man with droplets of sweat on his brow, but her fingers slipped through his transparent image. There was no one else in the room.
“BellaDonna?” Creamy called out. “Where are you? This place has you written all over it!”
“It does?” Tookie whispered. Ci~L caught her eye and shrugged.
“BellaDonna?” Creamy roared again. “I swear to God, woman, if you don’t answer me, I’ll—”
“In here,” a voice boomed, and everyone jumped.
A gauzy curtain materialized in the corner. Persimmon stepped through it, her hands clasped at her waist. As soon as Creamy saw her, she let out a gasp. “Good Lord, what is that?”
“She’s naked and has black eye-whities, Creamy,” Myrracle said fearfully.
Tookie nudged her. “That’s Persimmon. A Mannecant. Myrracle, have some respect.”
“More like Persecution,” Creamy muttered. Persimmon flinched slightly.
Then Persimmon gestured to the curtain. “I will lead you to see the BellaDonna now. But let me run down the rules first. No touching of the BellaDonna. No getting too close. No incessant breathing in her presence.”
Piper nudged Tookie. “We’re going to actually see the BellaDonna?”
“Like, all up in the flesh and everything?” Dylan said, her eyes wide as saucers.
Persimmon listed the last of the rules. “Only speak when spoken to. If in doubt, remain silent.”
“Oh, puh-lease!” Creamy exploded, pushing past Persimmon and bursting through the curtain.
Everyone followed her inside. Tookie held her breath, unsure of what they were about to see, but it was just an empty room. The walls were blank. There were no cushy chairs, no cashmere walls, no treatment beds. The only thing in the room was a large slate-gray statue of the BellaDonna in the corner.
All at once, as Creamy moved closer, a giant jagged crack appeared on the statue’s shoulder. The crack widened, snaking all the way to the BellaDonna’s belly button. The rocky exterior rumbled, as if stricken by a tiny self-contained earthquake, and an enormous chunk of the shoulder and torso broke off and smashed into a hundred pieces on the ground.
Everyone jumped back. Myrracle shrieked. Tookie clapped her hand over her mouth.
“Ooh, you broke it,” Dylan murmured under her breath to Creamy. “And as we say at the Bou-Big-Tique Nation: you bou-break it, you bou-buy it, baby.”
Another chunk fell off the statue. Its right bicep crumbled, then an elbow, then the stone that formed the BellaDonna’s sinewy fingers. But there was something inside the statue’s stony interior, something the crumbling rock was slowly revealing. Five human fingers emerged from their slate shell. A thin rose-gold sleeve, made of the finest silk, appeared next. Then a swanlike neck and a pair of round, pert breasts.
Flesh, bone, a person was under there.
And then the person began to move. The fingers on the right hand twitched. The chest heaved in and out. Its feet, which were clad in sharp seven-inch-high stilettos, tapped.
Everyone, even Creamy, stared as more and more pieces from the sculpture tumbled to the ground. Finally, the entire statue had chipped away except for one large piece of stone over the face.
“How dare …,” a muffled voice said from behind the stone.
Tookie glanced at the others. It was definitely the BellaDonna’s voice. They were actually going to see her. In the flesh.
“… you demand to see …,” the BellaDonna went on.
Tookie, her friends, Myrracle, and even Creamy took one step backward, holding their breath. This is it, Tookie thought. Here it comes.
“… me!” the BellaDonna boomed.
The BellaDonna’s stone mask fell to the floor and shattered.
42
LES TROIS COPINES
“Oooh,” all the Unicas said at once.
“Boooo …,” the BellaDonna answered, like a seductive ghost.
“A humor of sense, she has,” murmured Shiraz.
A heavenly glow emanated from the BellaDonna, as though she was not a human but a goddess. Her hair was wild and black and fell past her waist. Her skin was olive, her cheekbones high, her lips defined. And her eyes … the darkest coal-black irises Tookie had ever seen. The expression on her face was one of utter poise but also extreme annoyance.
She was beyond striking. Possessing a divine, otherworldly type of beauty.
Shiraz dropped to her knees, and the rest of the girls followed.
“Supernatural!” Piper blurted out reverently.
“Dang, am I seeing things? Did her dress just up and change up on me?” Dylan whispered.
The BellaDonna’s dress had quickly morphed from metallic rose-gold ruffles to a kaleidoscopic snakeskin frock with thousands of pleats. The shape-shifting dress finally settled into a dramatic black floor-length gown with sharp spikes around the high-necked collar. Every so often, the spikes writhed and twisted, alive.
Ci~L whispered, “She’s a fashion dictator. Her clothes shift, and the world’s fashion trends follow. I’ll bet my Ci~L–face money that tomorrow, spike-dresses will be all the friggin’ rage.”
“Shh!” Persimmon hissed, giving Ci~L a swift kick in the side with her pointy-toed boot. “Speak only when spoken to! And if you don’t have anything worthwhile to say, say nothing!”
The BellaDonna stared—or actually, squinted—at Creamy, almost like she couldn’t quite see her very well at first. Then her forehea
d crinkled in a scowl. “This is not happening. This creature has not invaded my chambers on such an important day.”
Creamy bristled. “I’m not afraid of you, Rock-Wench.”
“You know,” Ci~L murmured to Tookie, “I kinda like that mother of yours. She speaks my language.”
“You can have her,” Tookie murmured. Her heart was pounding wildly. What was the BellaDonna going to do to Creamy? She’d overheard what the BellaDonna did to Ci~L, and was sure that the “Rock-Wench” was capable of worse. “Creamy, maybe we should go,” she whispered to her mother.
A bemused smile crept onto the BellaDonna’s face. “Creamy? What’s with this Creamy nonsense? Is that what you’re making your children call you? If I am seeing what I think am, you are a far cry from creamy. Clumpy is more like it. Or Craggy.”
“At least my soul isn’t rotten,” Creamy shot back. Then she turned to the group. “Listen up, everybody, there’s a rumor going around that the BellaDonna’s soul is as filthy as a truck-stop urinal. Word has it that she traded it away.”
“No, I can’t say I had any idea.” Ci~L moved closer to Creamy, intrigued and amused. “And how did she sell her soul, if I may ask?”
Creamy’s eyes gleamed. “Well, she—”
“Silence!” the BellaDonna roared. “I’m supposed to be changing lives right now! Making the grand decisions that keep the world as we know it running smoothly!” Then she snapped her fingers and stared at the bare walls. “Environment, STADIUM!”
With a whoosh, the majestic grandstands of the stadium appeared on the walls. The BellaDonna walked up to them until she was about an inch away, taking in the scene. The stage was a half-moon of pure gold, and the various challenges for the obstacle course were set up and waiting. The 7Seven upperclassBellas stood in a nervous huddle in the wings, many of them holding hands and chanting calming prayers.
The Bored filed in and sat on the tic-tac-toe risers Tookie had seen in the M building. Only the middle square, the BellaDonna’s seat, remained empty. The Bored glanced at it with alarm, perhaps worried that she hadn’t yet appeared. Gunnero eyed the middle seat as if he wanted to be in it.