Description: Eve's news to her older, conservative sister that she has entered a beauty contest has been met with sizable apprehension, but Pops strikes to the heart of the matter.
PART 3. The Miss Teenager Pageant.
Eve could tell that her news had stunned Julie. Like an egg tossed at the door of the household that didn’t participate in trick-or-treat. Like the cat that expected fish for dinner and got beer and pretzels. This was a shock that Julie would need to process.
For one brief moment in time, Julie had lost control over protecting her baby sister, and to take it back, she demanded answers. She got up in Eve’s face. Before Eve could say another word, tensions had suddenly escalated faster than a military coup in Caesar’s court.
“Go ahead,” Julie said. “You entered a ‘Miss Teenager’ contest and…”
Suddenly Eve was a soldier on the battlefield, boldly proclaiming that a strike was imminent. She decided to draw first blood.
“And I won!” she exclaimed. She was holding nothing back now. This was her dream on the line.
“I mean I won in our town,” Eve clarified.
There was no reason to blab that she would represent the whole town at the contest if she were selected. The day she had learned that she had been chosen out of a handful of other teenage girls to be Miss Devon was a day she would remember for the rest of her life. Now she had a chance to be in a national beauty contest. The excitement of that possibility was going to cause her heart to burst through her chest if she didn’t say anything. All she really wanted, maybe all she ever wanted, was just for Julie to be proud of her.
“Julie, aren’t you absolutely thrilled!” she exclaimed with jubilation.
Juliet softened briefly. “Depends,” she conceded. “Is this one of those bathing suit jobs?”
Eve had struck gold. Julie was on board. “Not just bathing suits, Julie,” Eve explained with wide triumphant eyes. “But you’ve got to prove you’ve got real talent, too.”
Pops had been listening, his paper still open to the sports section that he hadn’t glanced at since Eve had floated in the house. He would throw in his two cents, yes, but he was on an entirely different level. He struck to the heart.
“Those noises I heard in your room – and all that crying…” he began. “Did that come under the head of talent?”
What was she to say to that? It had not been long since Misha had returned to his home country and left Eve heartbroken. Yet he was gone now. Doting over him was uncalled for and superfluous. No matter what she did, it wouldn’t bring him back to her. He had made his decision to go. Besides, it was his home, his world, the place where all his dreams were waiting for him.
All of her dreams were right here. She could pretend well. She always had. Maybe now those tears could be categorized the same.
“Of course, Pops,” Eve replied. “My forte is acting, you know that.”
