by Amity Allen
“That’s crazy. It sounds like some of these people need a lesson in sportsmanship.”
Skylar snorted. “That’s a good one, Poppy. Sportsmanship. Some of these people don’t know the word.”
Skylar was right. I knew Hollywood was a seriously competitive business, but I was starting to think the people out there acted better than some of these pageant folks.
The competition continued and as the girls got older, the outfits got fancier and the hair got bigger. Some of the little girls had so much hair that it was impossible to tell how many wigs and hairpieces they had on and how much could possibly be their own. I had been informed that the perfect teeth I kept seeing were the result of a kind of denture the pageant people called “a flipper”—basically a fake set of teeth that could be worn over their own. They helped because lots of six-year-olds were missing teeth or had new ones coming in that looked funny.
Well, that might have looked normal for most six-year-olds, but not for most pageant contestants.
The dresses were remarkable, and honestly, more intricate and embellished than anything I’d seen on the Miss America pageant a few times in the past years. These girls looked like wedding cakes, decked out from top to bottom with everything from butterflies to flowers to big ol’ diamonds, and I couldn’t help but feel sorry for the few contestants whose dresses weren’t as fancy.
And the faces they made as they struck pose after pose? They reminded me of the duck-face selfie that had been so popular for a while. Girl after girl strutted across the stage, twirled and flirted. The good ones made eye contact with us judges. Just when I’d start to wonder what the world was coming to with small children prancing around this way, I’d get lost in the performance of one of the more accomplished contestants, and be completely won over.
As much as the task of judging held my attention, by the time lunch rolled around, my stomach was starting to growl. Once it fussed so loudly that William McWilliams shot me a disapproving look. Like I could control it.
When the lunch announcement was made, there was a mad dash for people to line up to be fed. I waited a few minutes, checked my phone for new emails and social media notifications. Then I got up and checked the line. Still too long, so I went out to my car to get my lip balm, which I’d accidentally left in my console.
While I was out there, I saw Denise Tellerman drive into the parking lot and I waved to her as I headed back inside.
I was on my way to get in the food line when a woman wearing a ball cap that said “Boujee” ran out of the dining room screaming, “Something has happened to Heather! I think she might be dead!”
People were running around, speaking behind hands raised to cover their mouths as they spoke, the buzz spreading like wildfire on a windy day.
“Oh my God!” One woman kept saying over and over.
“What’s happened?” I asked another lady who had just come from the area where the food was being served and who seemed among the calmest.
“Heather Morgan just collapsed face down in the potato salad,” the woman said in a hushed tone.
“Is she okay?” I asked.
“No. I don’t think so.”
“Is she really dead?” Heather couldn’t be dead. She was just introducing the age eight- to eleven-year-old age group less than an hour ago . . .
I stood there in the middle of the chaos, shaken. Suddenly the space around me took on a surreal quality and I felt a sharp pain behind my left eye.
Now was not the time for a migraine. Or for one of those strange, unsettling “magic powers” moments.
A few wails broke out, and the moms gave each other worried looks. The grim mood that rolled in had infected the children as well, and soon we had a bunch of toddlers screaming and crying. Next the makeup started running, and the mamas started fussing, and I felt like I was in the middle of a hurricane that was ramping up to a category five.
William McWilliams walked up to me, grinning so hard he looked like he was trying to pass something. “An awkward business, this. Great time to take ten, wouldn’t you say? Care to join me for a smoke outdoors, Miss Parker?”
“No, but thank you for the offer,” I said, wringing my hands as I watched him leave.
Unsure what else to do, I went back to sit at the judges’ table.
Cecily didn’t look up. She just sat there, scrolling through her phone. She’d made a point to ignore me ever since we’d first been introduced. I think she’d placed me immediately in the category of “this person can’t do anything for me,” and it didn’t look like the possible death of the woman who had hired us had done anything to change that.
Suddenly, the conversation I’d overheard the night before played back in my head.
Don’t worry. She’ll get what’s coming to her.
That was it. I couldn’t sit still any longer.
What were we supposed to do? I had no idea, unless Heather told us. As far as I knew, the director didn’t have an assistant or a second-in-command. The Bloomin’ Belles was a pageant run by one woman and one woman only.
About a half an hour passed before, unable to wait any longer for more news on Heather’s condition, I popped up.
“Be right back,” I said to Cecily.
Without looking up, she held up a finger in acknowledgment. I wasn’t sure if it was more like a “shut up, Mommy’s on the phone” or a “check please, waiter” finger, but I got the message. She considered me an underling, and she could care less what I was doing.
As I left the performance hall and entered the lobby, I was greeted by a mad house of chaos. Children of all ages, crying and whining, some screaming. One little girl was beating her fists on the hotel carpet, her gyrations threatening to dismantle her wig. “I don’t wooooont to!” She’d already kicked her shoes off, and her father was retrieving them, while her mother tried to placate her.
Mostly people were just running around with nowhere to go in particular, but they appeared panicked without the secure, if severe, leadership of Heather Morgan.
I stood to the side of the mass of people, against the wall near the entrance and exit to the building. Technically, I wasn’t supposed to talk with anyone. At least anybody who might have a kid competing, and as I stood there trying to decide whether or not I should break this cardinal rule, Denise Tellerman walked through the door as if in a daze.
“Denise!” I called out to her.
“Yes.” Denise stopped and stared at me blankly. “Poppy.”
“Denise, are you okay?” She looked a bit green around the gills.
She bit her bottom lip. “Have you seen Heather? I got a text message.”
“From who?” I asked.
“A friend,” she answered vaguely.
“What did it say?”
Denise shook her head, bewildered. “Just that she stopped breathing and collapsed while eating her lunch.”
A man and a woman in EMT uniforms rushed past us. “Excuse us,” they said as they pushed through the crowd. They carried with them something that looked like a portable gurney.
Relief flooded my chest. The cavalry was here. Whatever was the matter with Heather, they would tend to her. She might have to go to the hospital, but everything would be fine now.
“Oh.” Denise glanced over at the paramedics then back at me. “I have to go . . . my sister . . .” Her voice trailed off and she followed along behind them as they made their way into the smaller ballroom, where I assumed Heather was.
After the paramedics rushed out with a lifeless Heather, everyone stood around gaping at each other like a herd of wild sheep that had just lost their shepherd. I almost expected the lady standing next to me to start bleating.
Then a remarkably handsome man dressed in an expensive suit stepped to the middle of the room and began speaking.
“I know this is all quite a shock to everyone, but I’m sure that Heather would want the show to go on. Some of you have come from very far away to compete in this pageant so we will take an extra
hour to finish lunch then start back up again at two thirty. The caterers are moving the food into the lobby so if you haven’t eaten, please be patient. Give them a few minutes, and service will continue in there.” He pointed to the large open space near the entrance.
I could feel my eyeballs wanting to pop out of my head. He was sure Heather would want the show to go on? Who the heck was this guy?
Then someone in the crowd asked the question out loud.
“That’s Bruce Martindale,” was the hissed answer, spoken in a tone that indicated we were all supposed to recognize the name.
I sighed. Sometimes being an outsider was exhausting.
Before I went back to join the ebullient Miss Watermelon Patch and the anchorman for an hour of awkwardness, I decided to get a peek at where Heather had been found. The timing of her falling ill seemed suspicious to me. What were the odds she’d keel over just as her pageant was getting underway?
On my way there, I ran into Skylar.
“Do you have any eyelash glue?” she asked.
“No. Why?” The minute I asked the question I knew it was a stupid one. Almost every female in the place besides me had on a pair. I wasn’t sure what that said about me. What kind of TV star was I? Possibly the kind who wasn’t fancy enough to come home and judge beauty pageants. Maybe I needed to move to Seattle. Wasn’t that where they’d invented grunge?
“Imogene over there lost one of hers, and the tube I brought is out. We could probably borrow some but I’m kind of paranoid. We could start a run of pinkeye with all these kids . . .”
Pinkeye? I shuddered. That would have never occurred to me.
“Hey.” I reached for Skylar’s arm, impeding her quest for eyelash adhesive. “What do you know about that dude who just took over the pageant like he owned the joint?”
“Bruce Martindale?”
“Yeah, him.”
“Oh, he’s a big deal coach from Las Vegas.”
“Like a pageant coach?”
“Yep.”
“But he’s a dad too, right?”
“Yes, his daughter Anna Beth is competing this weekend.”
“He’s awfully well put together.” I didn’t mention handsome. There was something about him that made me not want to admit aloud how attractive the man was. Plus I knew Skylar would mention that for me.
“And handsome—in a plastic sort of way. I think he has on more makeup than the contestants.”
I giggled. He did look an awful lot like the news anchor who sat next to me, with his slightly orange pallor courtesy of the pancake makeup made for TV.
“Is he gay?” I asked Skylar. It felt like a politically incorrect question, but I knew Skylar wouldn’t take offense.
She shrugged. “Probably.”
Of course that didn’t account for him having a daughter, but families were made a hundred different ways these days. I asked because I didn’t imagine a lot of straight guys made pageants their business. The only other men here were contestants’ daddies who got dragged along for the ride.
Something about Bruce Martindale unsettled me, particularly the way he so easily stepped into the role of pageant director. Almost as if he had known in advance he’d be asked to step in . . .
I want to go see where it happened,” I whispered to Skylar. Even though Heather was gone, I was dying to see any clues as to what had happened.
“Poppy, this is not one of your shows.”
“No, it’s super real. That’s why I have to know.”
“Suit yourself. I’ve got to go check on my clients. Make sure they don’t need anything.”
I made my way to the room the EMTs had removed Heather from, only to find people being herded out as I was trying to enter.
Bruce was standing in the doorway giving directions to everyone. I walked past him purposefully, knitted brow and eyes fixed in front of me. You were less likely to be bothered by someone if you strode by quickly with a determined look on your face. A technique I picked up to discourage autograph seekers when I was shopping.
Catering staff cleared out a few remaining plates, and a police officer stood regarding the table where I assumed Heather had collapsed.
There were a few random people milling around the room but for the most part it looked as though the police officer was trying to shoo people out. “Can I help you, ma’am?” he asked.
“Me?” I asked, stalling.
“Yes. We’ve asked everyone to evacuate this room.”
Then some screeching and voices came through on his radio. He held up a finger to me, indicating I should wait a minute. Then, after speaking to someone on the other end of his radio, he continued, “Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to leave. This place may have just become a crime scene.”
“A crime scene? What do you mean?”
“I’m not at liberty to say.” He pointed at the doorway. “Out.”
I didn’t budge. “What happened? Is Heather dead? Did someone put something in her potato salad?” Maybe all those years of pretending to solve crimes had made me jump to conclusions, but that’s what I did.
“I can’t speak to that, ma’am, but I will not ask you again to leave.” He pulled out a roll of crime tape and began wrapping it around the table. Once he was done with that, he ushered me the rest of the way out the door.
The walls were lined with backpacks and random personal items left behind, but I guess those people were going to be out of luck. I only hoped some of the toddlers’ pacifiers weren’t in some of those diaper bags. I could just hear the howling now.
What could have possibly happened to Heather?
Heather was the kind of woman who made people daydream about killing her.
Maybe one of those people had decided to live out that dream.
On my way back into the performance hall, the woman I’d seen in the white pantsuit at the B&B the night before stopped me. This time she was wearing a lime green getup with a pair of matching glasses.
“Yes?” I asked, wondering where one found frames that color.
“Hi, Miss Parker. I’m Liz Stoner, producer of Babies and Beauties. Maybe you’ve seen our show?”
I had seen a number of cameras around and wasn’t sure if the pageant itself was filming, or if it was an outside crew. This answered my question.
“The reality show about the little girls’ pageant circuit?”
Her eyes widened in excitement. “The very one.”
“I’ve seen a couple of episodes. I know it’s quite popular.” Once I agreed to judge this pageant I Googled “judging beauty pageants” and found Babies and Beauties. I admit to watching a few of the episodes online. But normally, people would be surprised at how little television I watch. I’m more of a bookworm.
“You’re too kind. If you don’t mind, I would love to interview you for our show.”
I hesitated. Reality TV wasn’t the most comfortable venue for me; the only TV I knew how to do had a script. My experience involved memorizing lines someone else wrote for me.
“Of course,” I said foolishly, thinking she meant some time later, but Liz Stoner took it as my assent to be interviewed on the spot.
She hustled me over to a blank backdrop, motioned to a cameraman, and clipped a mic to my blouse.
“How does it feel to be a judge at the Bloomin’ Belles pageant?” Liz asked.
I gulped. “You want to do this right here? Now?” My temples began to throb.
She smiled and nodded, the way you do when you’re coaxing an animal to come towards you. Smile, hold out the food, take a step back, nod subtly, and smile some more.
As manipulated as I felt by her coaxing, it seemed to work because I hardly noticed the bright light that turned on and flashed in my eye.
“Uh, it’s an honor,” I stammered. “I was thrilled to be invited to be a part of it. The energy of these young girls is contagious. They’re so accomplished. It gives you so much hope for the future.”
Even as the words were coming out of my
mouth, I couldn’t believe the malarkey I was spouting. Half a day at this pageant and I was starting to sound like these people. Somehow I had just channeled Miss Watermelon Patch. Could it be that magic power that I didn’t yet know how to harness? I wasn’t sure, but I didn’t like feeling like someone else had taken over my body and was spitting out propaganda that felt foreign to me.
I unclipped the mic and handed it back to Miss Stoner.
“Thank you so much. I had a few more questions . . .”
I was sure she did, but that was all she was getting out of me for now. “Later. I need to get back to the judging panel.”
“Okay, later would be great.”
I had just made it back to my seat when Mr. Martindale climbed up onstage in his newly self-appointed pageant director role and commenced with the next age group.
The rest of the day we spent judging little girls in the swimsuit portion of the competition. This involved a lot of sequined bikinis and outfits one couldn’t possibly wear in the water. Seriously? One had see-through chiffon sleeves, for goodness sakes. But the kids were cute, and I loved their sassy routines that were more playful than anything else and really allowed the girls’ personalities to shine. Once again, I found myself smiling and enjoying the performances.
Most of the kids strutted around in their bathing suits the same way they did in the beauty portion, making fish faces, drawing hearts in the air, blowing kisses and playing peekaboo with the audience. They all wore bikinis, and I had to admit I gave an additional point to those whose bellies poked out a little more in the middle, evidence of a few extra cookies. My small way of fighting the outrageously unrealistic body expectations Hollywood and the media had placed on my gender. Score one for real females!
When the last contestant finished twirling around the stage, I thankfully put pen to paper for the last time that day, marking her score along with my notes. I shuffled my voting cards into a stack and I was as ready as a third grader on the last day of school waiting for the dismissal bell. I had already decided I would give my votes to Mr. McWilliams and let him turn them into whoever we were supposed to turn them into, and I was going to be the first person to the parking lot. No getting in line behind seventeen honking, fussing pageant moms for me. My plan was to be the first one out of here.