Back in New York City, he wined and dined network executives, sent out letters with clips of reviews to broadcasters and newspaper editors at his next stops, and used that single to persuade Carole King, Leonard Cohen and Burt Bacharach to write for his hidden protégé’s full-length album.

Within a few months, Nola's single made it to the top of both the teen and pop charts, surprising everyone but Wade.

Days after Nola graduated from high school at seventeen, he applied the proceeds from her first single toward a stay at a discreet East Side townhouse, where a world-renowned plastic surgeon’s patients could enter and leave unobserved.

Nola arrived with a small bag, apprehension and excitement filling her. In three weeks, she will inhabit a new shell. She had pored with the surgeon over her photographs, and although she had approved each detail of the upcoming change, she couldn’t picture what it would feel like to be pretty.

Her green eyes, which had been indistinct, came to life once the surgeon deepened the folds above them. He trimmed her nose, tucked back her ears, reshaped her chin, and embedded cheekbones where none had existed. He filled up her lower lip to a sexy pout, and implanted gelatinous pouches in her tiny breasts. He liposuctioned fat Nola hadn’t known existed from beside her gluteal muscles, defining her buttocks.

Sedated and blinded underneath the bandages, Nola stayed in the townhouse for two days, then was taken back to Mama, who clucked over her bandaged head and body with the worry of a mother hen. From under the bandages, the closed door, and the fog of pain relievers, Nola thought of what Jenna had endured as a baby. How frightened she must have been.

Ten days later, most of the swelling had subsided, and even Mama exclaimed, “So beautiful! Principessa!” Dozens of times a day Nola returned to the mirror to study the face of the beautiful creature that couldn’t possibly be her, yet was. She touched the tip of the nose, searching for the missing bulbous cartilage.

Could a person remain the same after their face had changed? Nola did feel different. New. With her new face and body came a chance for a new identity, one that didn’t have to remember her childhood pain in every pore. One that could be a star if she wanted to.

She waltzed naked in front of the mirror, examining her new contours still covered by deep purple bruises. She cupped her breasts, now full. Perfect for her slim frame. It’s me, Nola, she whispered to herself. Believe it. It’s me. That’s what she would tell Jenna next week. It’s me, Nola. And I’m doing it all for both of us, so I can make money and we can be together.