Beauty
Authors: Lisa Daily
BEAUTY
BEAUTY
An Imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
Beauty
RAZORBILL
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Young Readers Group
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Copyright © 2012 Razorbill
All rights reserved
ISBN: 978-1-101-57188-0
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ALWAYS LEARNING
PEARSON
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One: The Nature of the Beast
Chapter Two: A Work of (Frizzy) Art
Chapter Three: Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, Who’s the Fairest One of All?
Chapter Four: Welcome to the Twilight Zone
Chapter Five: A Little Birdie Told Me Hudson Taylor Is H.O.T.
Chapter Six: Who Cares about the Beast When You’ve Got Beauty?
Chapter Seven: Just a Little Puppy Love
Chapter Eight: Prison Break
Chapter Nine: It’s Not Just Clothes in That Closet
Chapter Ten: It’s What’s Inside (Your Purse) That Counts
Chapter Eleven: Flirting With(out) Disaster
Chapter Twelve: When They Said Walk a Mile in Someone Else’s Shoes, They Didn’t Mean Literally
Chapter Thirteen: Everything’s Gone Bananas
Chapter Fourteen: One Hudson Please, with a Cherry on Top
Chapter Fifteen: If the Shoe Fits
Chapter Sixteen: It’s Not Lying If It’s Acting
Chapter Seventeen: Eat, Drink, and Play Monopoly
Chapter Eighteen: Just Because She’s the Queen Bee Doesn’t Mean She Can’t Sting
Chapter Nineteen: The Magic Touch—Ahem, Face
Chapter Twenty: C’est la Vie
Chapter Twenty-One: Even Sleeping Beauty Plays Hooky Sometimes
Chapter Twenty-Two: You’re Never Too Old for a Muppet Show
Chapter Twenty-Three: She’s a Royal Something
Chapter Twenty-Four: Freaks and Geeks and Dorks, Oh My!
Chapter Twenty-Five: All Hail the Queen
Chapter Twenty-Six: Under the Knife? Over My Dead Body.
Chapter Twenty-Seven: The Mother of All Cover-ups
Chapter Twenty-Eight: That’s Très 90s
Chapter Twenty-Nine: Who Says You Can’t Do a Do-over?
Chapter Thirty: All Grown Up and Only One Place to Go
Chapter Thirty-One: Wish I May, Wish I Might, Be (Plain Old) Me Again Tonight
Chapter Thirty-Two: Beauty Is in the Eye of the Boyfriend
Prologue
THE OHIO FAIR used to be a family thing. Every year, my parents, Seth, and I would go for hours, stuffing our faces with burgers and cotton candy, playing Sharp Shooter until we won, and fighting over who got to ride the upside-down roller coaster with Dad first. It was my favorite night of the year, hands down. The air was warm, winter finally sliding into spring, and it was like when we stepped into that fairground, we left the rest of our lives behind. Seth was less annoying, Dad forgot about his boss and his clients and whatever case he was on at the moment, and even Mom stopped thinking about how we all looked and just let us run wild, donuts staining our cheeks and cotton candy sticking to our hair.
And then, of course, there was the fishpond. It was my favorite part of the fair, and I always insisted on leaving it for last, so it could dangle in front of me all night long, a wide-open possibility. At the very end of the night, after we’d ridden all the rides and played all the games, we’d gather round the pond and pluck out the plastic fishes floating inside it—one for each of us. The plastic fish had colored circles drawn on the bottom of them. A red circle meant you’d won an eraser in the shape of a fish. A silver circle meant you’d won a real goldfish. But a
gold
circle—that was the special one. A gold circle meant you’d won a Yellow Tang fish.
The Yellow Tang fish were beautiful: as bright as the sun and ten times the size of a goldfish. They were rare, too. There were only a few gold circles in the whole pond. But I swear, it was like that game was magic for me. Because every year, every time, I picked a gold circle. It was the only time in my life when I felt like I could do no wrong.
The last time I’d come to the fair with my family, I remember standing there at the end of the night, my fish squirming in its bag as I watched the rides spinning and the people laughing. Couples were tucked into corners, the sky glowing above them like a thousand moons hung overhead. And I remember thinking how at the fair, even the night itself seemed different. Alive almost, like under its drape of darkness, anything at all could happen.
The Nature of the Beast
“YOU EXCITED, MOL
” My mom smiled over at me eagerly, and I could tell just how much she wanted me to say yes.
I shrugged. “Should be okay.” I leaned my forehead against the car’s window, watching the corn stalks of Miracle, Ohio, fly past outside. In the backseat, my little brother, Seth, and his best friend, Matty, were whispering.
“You used to not be able to sleep for
weeks
before the fair came to town.” My mom kept her head forward, eyes on the road, but I could feel her stealing quick glances at me. “Remember that, Mol?”