But not nearly enough.
Chapter 52
Dress for Success
Temple finally understood Fonzie’s appeal when she returned to the Teen Queen Castle.
The Fonz was the black-leather-jacketed “hood” on the Happy Days sitcom hit set in the fifties. The Bad Boy.
Xoe Chloe Ozone returned free and triumphant to the Castle.
Being taken away by the police, and released to return, made her a model of Teflon charisma.
Eyebrows may have raised but they’d been lifted by botox or Dr. Perricone formulations anyway. Xoe Chloe was cool. Nobody could tie her down.
Except maybe makeover madness.
“Where have you been?” Vanetta, who’d obviously had her head in her makeup case all day, asked frantically when Xoe appeared. “We’re pulling wardrobe for the makeover debut and talent review. All the good stuff could be gone by now.”
“That’s all right. I’ll take the bad stuff that’s left over.”
Temple could not believe that with two rooms taped off as crime scenes, the show would go on. But apparently it was good to go, for reasons best known to Molina and Co.
Somebody shrieked at seeing her. A fireball rushed down the corridor and embraced her like an upright lobster.
“Mariah?” Temple had to detangle from the hyper teen to see her.
Whoa! The makeover team had been busy during Temple’s unhappy interview with the maternal unit.
Mariah’s shiny brunette bob with bangs (so reminiscent of her mother’s unfussy do) had been … well, further bobbed. And cut. And streaked. With—what else?—blonde.
It was still mostly brunette, though styled into one of those raggedly cheerful upflips so popular now. Oddly enough, the waifish cut emphasized Mariah’s blackberry-dark eyes and even some surfacing cheekbones, thanks to a diet of beans and veggies.
“You look very cool,” Temple told her.
Then she was yanked away into the adjoining library, which was filled with racks of clothing.
Kit Carlson came rushing to greet her, looking relieved. “I’ve saved some outfits for you.”
“You shouldn’t have,” Temple began. But when she glimpsed the goulash of lime green ostrich feathers, sixties Op Art prints, and leopard skin draping Kit’s arm, Temple knew Xoe Chloe had found her fashion muse.
Kit leaned close to whisper, “I wasn’t wardrobe mistress for my high school production of Hair for nothing.”
While Temple tried on various combinations of hip-huggers and chunky jewelry that would have made rock-star chicks look as staid as Laura Bush, Kit brought her up to date on the mood inside the Teen Queen Castle.
“The police are on us all like a cheap suit—that Detective Alch is sure kind of Columbo-cute—and the camera crew is eating it up. Our show has morphed into a combo of Cops and Survivor
“Everyone said you were a murderer when the police took you away, so the producers have been madly assembling clips of every inch of footage on you for a special Xoe Chloe memorial montage. You are a star, kiddo! Clay Aiken has nothing on you.
“The Clairol horde were thrilled at your exit and are so terminally pissed at your triumphal return that I notice they’re shedding brittle hairs like a miffed alpaca. Negative emotions are so bad for one’s looks.
“Mariah is feeling supergirly about her transformation but she missed showing off for you, Big Sis.
“Savannah Ashleigh’s glowery bodyguard, that Heathcliffy Rafi-guy, has been patrolling the halls and snooping around like a cop on the beat, way beyond his blonde bimbo duties.
“So has that black alley cat mascot that showed up. He looks a lot like your Louie, but surely he’s safe at home and I suppose all black cats look alike. Does that old gigolo have a harem, or what? There are these white and yellow Persians with him.”
Temple finally got a word in edgewise. “That is indeed Louie. He’s doing some investigative legwork for me. And we say ‘silver’ and ‘golden’ in the Persian game.”
“Well, la-di-dah. The fluffy black one must be an `ebony,’ then.”
“She’s not a Persian, just a long-haired American domestic. They call her Louise now, but I don’t think she’s Louie’s girlfriend; she’s way too independent.”
“Well, call me a short-haired American domestic.
Does madame find favor with her wardrobe selections?”
“They rock, Kit! And so do you. Thanks a gadzillion!”
“Only if I make it on The Apprentice with Donald ‘Mr.
Comb-over’ Trump next. With my luck, I’d have ended up on The Benefactor with that cheapo Mark Cuban sports nut.”
“May the Force be with you.” They slapped palms, then Temple gathered up her garish armful and fled.
Mariah ambushed her again in the hall. “I need you to check out my performance outfit.”
“In the bathroom, no doubt.”
“Where else?”
They returned to the room, and Temple found she’d been oddly homesick for it.
Steam heat was less welcome. Bleached blonde hair had a tendency to frizz, but Ken Adair had handed her an arsenal of moisturizers, softeners, and conditioners for its upkeep. Being a blonde was hard work, but Xoe Chloe remade (and still reasonably disguised) was worth it.
Mariah sat Temple down on the closed bathroom throne (Temple thought of Elvis’s last hour) and grabbed her hands. “I was so worried.”
“About me?” Foolish Temple. Teens were teens.
“No, about me! What do you think? Do I look hot? Will my mom kill me? Does this new haircut make my face look even more fat? What about these loser clothes they picked for me? What about my talent song? Is ‘Defying Gravity’ too obscure, too dweeby? Whaddayah think? Whaddayah think?”
“Chill, Baby-O. Xoe Chloe is on your case. Wicked is the hottest musical on Broadway, and ‘Defying Gravity’ is the current overcoming-teenage-angst anthem. Every girl feels like a misunderstood witch at your age. Plus the song’s a showstopper for a darker voice, which you have in spades! As the song says, until you try, you’ll never know. We’ll run the wardrobe and the routine and we’ll both come out smelling like, oh … Rose’s green apple juice in a killer martini.”
“Yeah. That’s cool. Apple green. I saw those feathers. You’ll knock ‘em dead.”
“Speaking of which—”
“The show’s over, right? That’s what my mom hauled you outa here to say. She always ruins it for me.”
Temple grabbed Mariah’s plump little shoulders and refrained from shaking.
“Mariah. She does not. She’s putting her shield on the line to keep the lid on the murders here, just so you can get up there and be shallow like all the other little ‘Tween Queen wannabes.”
Mariah stared at Temple’s sudden stern turn. Then her eyes teared over. “I don’t know what happens. Sometimes it seems like everything’s so endlessly awful.”
“Sometimes it is. Not now. You’re just feeling Wicked Witch of the Westly. The police aren’t going to close the show down. They want everybody bottled up here while they do some very complicated background checks. And they’ve imported some undercover pros to prevent any more violence, so expect to see a couple new crew members. Your mom is following some very interesting leads, thanks to … us. We have to keep it together and let the show go on until the police have enough evidence to name and charge the person behind all this. We are … undercover distractions. We gotta be good at it, right? That’s our real job. This stupid contest isn’t the point. I’m not Xoe Chloe, and you’re not Madonna, Jr. We’re us, underneath it all, and we have more important jobs than winning this thing, right?”
“I guess.”
“You guess right.”
“But the talent show is tomorrow and then they judge and then it’s all over.”
“Right. Then we judge and then it’s all over. Capische?”
“That is so Sopranos.”