Description: Juliet and Eve return to the Hotel Star and discover, to Eve's heart's delight, another Miss Teenager contestant. Does this prove that Glenn Sabine's Miss Teenager Pageant is indeed a legitimate contest?
Eve Goes to New York. PART 9.
The lobby of the Hotel Star was nothing short of a mob scene that night. Guests were coming and going in droves, and the check-in counter was bearing the weight of a massive queue behind one front desk clerk who was holding down the fort with politeness and a smile.
That was when Juliet and Eve returned to the hotel through the revolving glass door. Eve was still reeling from the run-in with Hector the photo guy who charged an arm and a leg for a professional pre-pageant photo shoot. Glenn Sabine had conveniently disappeared for the time being.
Then over by the elevator doors, Eve spotted another teenage girl with her mother. She looked tall, healthy, well put-together, and smiling. Eve gasped. Those were the exact four characteristics of a Miss Teenager contestant! It couldn’t be… but… it must be!
Grabbing the attention of her sister, Eve pointed out the girl who stood by her mother. “Julie, there’s another one, I’ll bet!”
Julie had been in her own little world as well, probably still reeling from having lent her sister two hundred smackeroons out of her own pocket.
“Another what?” Julie asked, glancing around.
“Miss Teenager contestant, of course!” Eve beamed.
For the next few minutes, Eve and the girl found common ground in conversation. Her name was Paulina Ima Effin Sickles, or just Paula, as she preferred to be called. They talked of their photo shoot, the gown they were planning to wear to the big event, the dashing Glenn Sabine, and even the weirdness of Pike-something. Neither one of them could remember his full name in that moment.
Just off to the side, the girl’s mother was practically shaking with apprehension for what her daughter had done. “Oh, dear,” she murmured to Julie confidentially. “I don’t know how we ever got into this. Frankly, I’m terribly confused.”
Julie glanced back at Eve and Paula yapping and laughing like the cackling of hens on a farm. She shook her head. “Frankly, Mrs. Sickles, aren’t we all!”
