My Body(18)

I was allowed to buy one bathing suit each summer, and the one I wore for that afternoon had seen better days. Sadie and I had spent our entire summer at the beach, and my bright red top was fading and frayed. Booking jobs that paid meant I could get a new bikini and shiny white patent-leather high heels like the ones Sadie was wearing that day. Money meant freedom and a whole other kind of power that I was only beginning to understand but felt desperate for.

The strings of my bikini wrapped around my rib cage, pushing my boobs up and together. I arched my back and stuck my butt out as I walked dutifully behind a young assistant, past the agents sitting at their computers.

“That body,” crooned a gay male agent, his eyes flashing up at me as I walked by. I grinned.

Sadie had her pictures taken after me, pushing her chin down and squinting her eyes slightly as she shifted her weight to pop a hip out. Her bikini was black and low and hit her hips just at the right point. I watched her, comparing our dimensions in my head. I felt too curvy, maybe even fat, and definitely too short next to Sadie in her heels.

“Work it, girl,” the assistant said as he watched Sadie move and pose. I stood up straighter and sniffed the air, trying to see if I could smell my BO.

As soon as the digitals were done, the agent snapped, “Let’s take a look at your books, girls,” spinning around in his office chair, waving us over.

We shuffled over to his wide desk, still half naked, clutching our oversized white portfolios.

“Girls, you leave these in the hot car too often, I can tell. The plastic pages are wrinkling.” He tsk-tsked, flipping through page after page of our pictures. “Can we get these girls some new books?” Sadie and I exchanged glances, knowing these new portfolios would show up as deductions in the fine print of our next paychecks.

I peered down as he paused at side-by-side, up-close images of my face, my lips pursed and mouth open on one page and my eyes half closed on the other.

“Now this is the look. This is how we know this girl gets fucked!” He pointed down at the pictures.

Sadie shoved me and smirked. “It’s true,” a female agent chimed in from her desk. “We always know which girls are having sex by their pictures.”

My face felt hot as I glanced from the agent to Sadie. I wanted to check in with her—was this something to be proud of?

I felt a strange sense of confidence rise up in me as the agents nodded approvingly. I was the “sexy” one, and everyone around me seemed to agree that was a good thing. It made me different and special, and maybe even powerful. I wrapped my hands around my rib cage and pushed my boobs up farther, smiling.



* * *



One of the Britney songs everyone but me loved was “Lucky.” In the video Britney appears in two roles: she sings the lyrics, acting as a kind of narrator while watching over her other, more glamorous self, who receives awards and basks in the adulation of her fans. This second Britney lives in a huge, fancy, empty house and walks around alone in a pink robe and diamond necklace, staring into an old-fashioned hand mirror. At times, there are three Britneys in the frame: the narrator, the adored and lonely Britney, and the latter’s reflection. Sad Britney was not what I wanted to see. I didn’t want to hear about how lonely she felt despite all her success. The video ends as glamorous Britney rolls over in her bed, her makeup smeared and a look in her eye not unlike the one we’d see just a few years later, as she stared into a mirror with a clipper in her hand.

She’s so lucky, she’s a star

But she cry, cry, cries in her lonely heart, thinking

If there’s nothing missing in my life

Then why do these tears come at night?



I don’t ever recall liking modeling, really, and I’ve often wondered whether Sadie did either. I remember watching myself in a mirror once at a shoot, though, professionally made up, looking years older than I actually was, opening my mouth, pushing my lips out, and arching my back as the photographer clicked away. I liked my image in that moment, or at least I was struck by that girl: I was desirable; I was wanted; and I knew that if any girl from school (particularly Sadie) saw me like this, she’d be wild with jealousy. So even when I felt scared and uneasy at the apartments of middle-aged male photographers, who had me change in their tiny bathrooms, where I was surrounded by their deodorants and shaving kits and condoms, and who, as I emerged into their “studios,” asked me whether I had a boyfriend or made comments about my body, I told myself I was lucky. I had photographic evidence of my value, and I was even beginning to save some money.

Lost in an image, in a dream …

And the world is spinning, and she keeps on winning



In high school, when I told people I was debating between college and a full-time modeling career, they’d warn me, “Models have an age limit. Their careers are over by thirty.” This always annoyed me. I thought those saying it were being sexist and ageist, implying that women couldn’t be older and still be beautiful. But now, I think they were right, even if by accident. Maybe women can’t keep winning past the age of thirty.

Sadie and I drifted apart during her senior and my junior year. We’d never known how to be real friends, anyway—how to protect each other, how to talk about the things that happened to us at house parties or at castings or with agents. Early in our friendship, we began seeing one another as competitors rather than allies.