George R.R. Martin - [Wild Cards 18] (28 page)

“I’m not Michelle LaFleur,” I whispered. “I mean, that’s my real name, but I work under the name Michelle Pond. I’m a model. I mean, I was a model. I started young. You know, I was the OshKosh B’Gosh girl for like five years when I was a kid.”

“You? A model?”

I laughed. It did sound ridiculous, given my current appearance. “I know, it seems goofy, doesn’t it?” I said softly. “I was in demand, and since I never went through an ‘awkward’ stage, I kept working solid from the time I was two years old until well, just about now.”

Tiff adjusted the top of her bikini. I tried not to stare.

“Anyway, I pretty much did it all,” I said. “Runway shows, fashion modeling, the works. And I had a great career, except that I was working like a dog and not seeing any of the money from it.”

“I can barely hear you,” she said, scooting closer. She dropped her voice lower as well. “But if you were working, where did the money go?”

And there it was. The question that I dreaded. The reality of my life that was so bitter to me, I could barely stand to think about it, much less talk about it.

But there was Tiffani with such sympathy in her eyes, and the wine made me feel disconnected from myself. I drained my glass for Dutch courage.

“Well, that’s the embarrassing part.” I put my glass on the side of the pool. “My parents both quit their jobs to be my full-time manager and agent. I worked nonstop. Worked like a mule. All that stuff normal kids get to do, I got to pretend to do in commercials and pictures.” As I talked about it, I felt queasy. “For a long time, I didn’t want to believe what was happening. But when I was fourteen, I figured out how to get into their computer, and I saw their accounts.

“By law, they were supposed to be putting away a certain amount of my income for when I became an adult. But I could see that they hadn’t done that. Not only that, but there were these accounts set up overseas.” I closed my eyes and swallowed. “They had been stealing from me for years. I should have had enough money to have my own life when my modeling career was over. Go to college, start a business. But they had been spending most of it and hiding the rest. My own parents stole everything from me.”

For a moment it felt like it had been the first time I’d realized what they’d been doing. Like someone had kicked me in the stomach. There was a terrible lump in my throat, and I closed my eyes and thought I might start crying. I felt Tiff’s hand stroking the back of my neck. “You poor child,” she said. Her accent made her voice honey-smooth. “I’ve never heard of such a thing!”

I snuffled and knuckled my eyes to keep the tears at bay. When I thought I had myself in hand, I looked at her.

“You’ve lived a kinda sheltered life,” I said quietly. “Money makes some people subhuman.”

She poured the last of the wine into my glass, then handed the glass to me. “What did you do?”

“I was only fourteen when I found out. It took me a year to get a lawyer who would take me seriously. We filed for my emancipation and sued my parents. I won my emancipation suit, but by the time we got a judgment they’d fled the country. We managed to seize one account, so I wasn’t completely broke, but most of that money went to pay my lawyer.”

Tiffani leaned closer and I could smell her scent even over the chlorine. “And then your wild card turned and you can’t work anymore?”

“Oh, I could work,” I said. “If I bubbled down to my normal size, I could probably have plenty of work. But then I couldn’t bubble.”

She frowned. “You mean, you could make a nice living by wearing pretty clothes and getting your picture taken, but you’re here?”

I sighed. I knew she wouldn’t understand. Being poor drove her. She wanted to give her family what they’d never had. But her family would love her, no matter if she won or not. Mine had never loved me. I was just a payday for them. “I guess that’s one way to look at it,” I said. “But the bubbling, it’s changed things for me. I can do something worthwhile with this power. Modeling doesn’t do anything but help sell stuff.” I lifted my hands out of the water. They were pruney. “Not only that, but I’m nineteen. That’s practically ancient in the modeling world. And I was getting sick of seeing the things the girls would do to stay thin and keep working.” I picked up my wineglass and drained it. It felt good to finally tell someone.

Tiff sipped her wine and stared off into space. “But what does that all have to do with your purse?”

I’d forgotten all about the purse. “As I was packing up my stuff before I left my parents’ place, I noticed my mother’s closet door standing open. I couldn’t believe what I saw in there. She had, like, five of those Hermes purses. This was how she was spending my future—on freaking handbags. So
I took them. I sold off all but one, and that’s my emancipation bag.

“Mommy got me back, though. After the decree came down in my favor, I got a box from them. It was all my stuffed animals. They’d been ripped apart and the stuffing was pulled out. It was carnage in that box.”

Tiff choked back a giggle. “They killed your stuffed animals?”

I gave her a little push on the arm. “Stop! You make it sound so…goofy. I loved those stuffed animals!”

She had taken a drink of wine, and it spurted out of her mouth as she laughed. “Oh my god—that’s so
lame!”

I tried not to laugh. I did love those stupid stuffed animals. I loved them every bit as much as Dragon Girl loved Puffy.

“What’s the party about?” Drummer Boy walked up to the edge of the Jacuzzi. He thumped out a complicated pattern on his chest with his lower pair of arms.

“There are only two of us here,” Tiff said. “That’s hardly a party.”

For a moment, he stopped thumping and raised all of his arms over his head. It made his chest and abdominal muscles flex. I rolled my eyes and then looked at Tiff to see what her reaction was. She gazed at him with lowered eyelids. It was an appraising gaze.

“Is there room for me? Or is the fat chick taking up too much space?”

Tiffani laughed. It was throaty and made me shiver. “There’s plenty of room for everyone. This tub is huge.”

Drummer Boy shucked off his pants. He was naked underneath. The producers were going to love this. He hopped into the tub and settled himself across from us.

“So, are you two an item?” he asked. “Like ‘Fat Chick’ and ‘Rhinestone Lass’—BFFs?”

I blushed. But Tiff just playfully splashed some water at him. “Yes, you are so smart. Two women in a tub always means that they’re lesbians. And if this were a porn film, we’d just be waiting for you to be the man-meat in our girl sandwich.”

He grinned at her. “Works for me.”

“I’m outta here.” I wasn’t going to stay while he insulted me and flirted with Tiff.

“You sure, Michelle?” Tiffani asked. “There’s plenty of room. And I’m sure DB will play nice.”

“I never play nice. Where’s the fun in that?”

I grabbed my beach towel, wrapped it around me, and went upstairs to my room.

I’d just finished changing into my pajamas when there was a knock on the door. I could still hear Tiff and DB laughing outside in the Jacuzzi. When I opened the door I was surprised to find Ink standing there.

“Hey,” I said. “Is anything wrong?”

She crammed her hands into the pockets of her jeans. “I heard about the incident at the mall today and I wanted to see if you were all right.”

“Of course,” I said, feeling a bit nonplussed. “I’m the girl that can take getting hit by a bus. It was no biggie, really.”

“Ah.” Ink frowned and shook her head. “Well, I’m glad to see you’re all right. Just checking in.”

“Uh, okay.” I stood there for a moment, at a loss for what to say next. “Well, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She looked as if she wanted to say something else, but then she just said, “Goodnight” and left.

The clanging of the challenge alarm woke me up. I fumbled for the alarm clock and groaned when I saw the time: five
A.M.

I threw on my usual challenge outfit: stretchy, baggy sweatpants, a long-sleeve XXL T-shirt, and a hoodie. They were extremely tight on me this morning. The run-in with the bus had fattened me up. As I ran downstairs, I pulled my hair back into a ponytail.

No one was in the living room, and the front door was open. I figured I was the last one out, and trotted as fast as I could at my current size to the waiting limo. But Jetman was the only other teammate in there.

We sat in the back waiting for another twenty minutes until
Tiff and Drummer Boy came out, with Ink and the mobile crew following behind them. A slippery, sick feeling went through me.

It was still dark when we got to the studio. The guard waved us through the gate, and we were dropped off at makeup. I guess they wanted to get going on the challenge quickly, because there was none of the usual hurry up and wait.

We were hustled to the set. The full challenge-taping crew was there. The bank facade was lit up like the Fourth of July. The director came over to us. “Good morning, Diamonds. Ready for today’s challenge?”

“Ready for anything,” Drummer Boy said, hitting what sounded like a rim shot off his chest.

The director gestured toward the set. “Here’s the story. A bank robbery is underway. Your challenge today is to free the hostages, take care of the henchmen, and defeat the ace that’s running the show.”

“Who’s the ace?” Jetman asked.

“Well, that’s part of the challenge. You won’t know until you get in there.”

That made me nervous. There were lots of aces and some of them had powers that weren’t immediately obvious. Mind-control powers were what worried me the most. They could take over and have us at each others’ throats if we weren’t ready for it—and maybe even if we were.

“Ready on the set,” came over the loudspeaker. Immediately there was silence. And then: “Action!”

There was the sound of explosives from inside the bank. Then the
rata-tat-tat
of a machine gun. Even though I knew it was just effects, it got my adrenaline going.

“So what’s the plan?” Tiffani asked. She looked up at Drummer Boy as if he had all the answers.

“I think we need to get the hostages out first,” I said. Jet-man nodded.

“Sounds good to me,” Tiff said. “Bubbles, do your stuff.”

I let a bowling ball-size bubble loose at the front door, which exploded like a cheap firecracker. Bits of wood and glass flew across the street. “Tiff and I should take point. We’re invulnerable to projectile attacks.”

“I’m going aloft,” Jetman said. “I’ll come in from behind.” He hit the power button on his jetpack. It sputtered, then the engine caught. It made a putt-putt noise, like an anemic Vespa, but it took him airborne in seconds.

Smoke rolled out of the opening I’d made. Tiff went diamond again, and then we ran into the bank with Drummer Boy behind us. A barrage of paint-balls hit us. They did nothing to me except create more fat. Unfortunately, Tiff was hit in the face and the paint coated her diamond surface, obscuring part of her vision.

I saw a group of people sitting in a circle on the floor. Their hands were tied behind their backs. Standing in front of them were six guys with paint-ball guns. I didn’t see anyone who looked like an ace, but with aces, it was hard to tell.

Another round of paint-balls were fired at me and Tiff. “Goddamn it,” I heard her say. I glanced over my shoulder and saw that she had run into one of the prop desks. Most of her face was covered in paint. She probably couldn’t see a thing.

Drummer Boy ducked behind one of the desks. If he or Jetman were hit by enough paint-balls, they’d be declared dead and out of the challenge.

I fired a barrage of bubbles at three of the henchmen who were grouped together. These were baseball-size bubbles, and I made them extra hard and dense. One guy was hit on his hand and screamed as he dropped his weapon. Another got one in the gut, and he doubled over.

I missed the third, but Jetman didn’t. He burst through the front-door transom windows and fired his “jetnet.” It whistled past my head and opened in midair, catching the lights and gleaming like a silver spiderweb. Then it wrapped around the goons and they fell to the floor.

More paint-bullets spattered me. I laughed and flung another hail of bubbles at the remaining goons. I missed one because he dropped to the floor, but the other two took direct hits to the chest. Their weapons went spinning out of their hands, and then the hostages shrieked with what sounded like real fear.

I glanced at the hostages and saw that one woman had
been struck by one of the guns. She had a nasty cut on her forehead, and it looked like she would have a black eye. I knew they were extras and that they knew injuries might happen, but no one should have to bleed for a paycheck.

Jetman was hovering overhead—the ceilings were high in the bank, fifteen feet at least—and firing down at the three goons. A cloud of gas enveloped them, and moments later, they fell down unconscious. Now we could rescue the hostages. I ran to Tiff and gave her my hoodie so she could wipe the paint off her face, then I helped Drummer Boy untie the extras.

Another henchman appeared.

He was a young guy, maybe a few years older than me, maybe Jetman’s age. He was maybe six-one, six-two. His blond hair was cut short, almost military style. He was dressed like the other goons, but he was unarmed. I knew I’d seen him somewhere, but I just couldn’t place him.