MADISON

Padding out I hear Denise’s favorite show streaming from her iPad. “You still here, D?”

“Where else do I have to be?” she calls back.

Smiling I walk over to the living room, see her on my sofa with Bucky beside her. “You two look comfy.”

She surveys me. “Your eyes are clearer. Get some good sleep?”

“Yes. I set the alarm but I can’t believe I actually slept all the way until it went off.” Petting my dog I smile into his sweet face. “Guess I needed it.”

With her curiosity unable to be contained a moment longer, she asks, “So what happened with you and Nicholas?”

I hold her excited look for a beat before answering, “He wants to date me—I think just me.”

Her eyebrows rise as she squishes her lips with appreciation. “He stepped up, huh? Interesting.” On a shrug she admits, “I knew he would.”

On a laugh-snort, I argue, “Yeah, right!”

“I knew it all along. He just needed a second to get his act together.”

“Uh huh.”

“That’s why I told him you were a wreck and needed him, when I ran into him at Piedmont.”

“Yeah, sure you did.”

She shrugs, stifling a smile, watching me climb onto the couch, snuggling up to Bucky, the three of us taking up every inch of space now. “Well?”

“Well what?”

Closing her iPad she cries out, “Tell me everything he said! Duh!”

I grin, and while I absently scratch behind Bucky’s ears, the story unfolds, all details included.

She shares with me what happened at the park, too, interjecting pertinent moments here and there.

And when she tells me that he implied he’d be sticking around for a while with his You might have company exit-line, I cast a smile to Bucky’s sleeping face.

“It’s all because of you, boy,” I whisper.

“I think it was before that, Maddie. Whatever you said to Nicholas in Billy’s old bedroom, made him bring you a drink and stick around.” Denise opens her iPad again. Pointing to the glowing time on her screen, she cocks an eyebrow. “He’s going to be here in a half hour.”

Yelping, I wake up the dog, jumping into action. “I need to shower! Sorry, Bucky! Oh God, I need to shower!” Running to my bedroom where I left the phone, I send a quick text saying I need fifteen more minutes.

He replies back: No worries, Slugger.

Biting my bottom lip with a smile at his quick, cute response, I stare at it a second longer, then dash off.

“Whoa,” I blurt at my terrifying reflection. “He wants to date this? Denise! DENISE!!!”

She comes running, skidding into view, gripping the bathroom door jamb to stop her velocity, eyes wide. “What is it?”

I circle my face with a hasty, disgusted finger. “Dude.”

Her worry drops. “You look better than you did, trust me.”

“I need your help.”

Crossing her arms she dryly jokes, “You want me to bathe you? Because that’s where I draw the line.”

“I need you to help me look my best.”

Waving her hand toward the shower she says, “Get in there and wash off that yuck!”

As soon as I’m out, she’s got a counter-height stool waiting for me. “Sit.”

Drying off I sigh, “I can’t stop thinking about rent.”

My dear friend eyes me. “Honey, does anyone make good decisions when they’re unhappy?”

Blinking, I think about it. “No.”

“What you need is some fun! You’ve been in a depression. Shake that shit off! We’ll figure out what to do about your money situation. Now what are we doing here?”

Wrapping the towel and hooking it over my breasts I sit down, both of us facing the mirror. “I just want to look more like the best me. But not too much of anything, because that’s not me, you know?”

“I hear ya, Madison. You’re never gonna go to all the trouble I do. You just want to be…fresher.”

“Exactly.”

She grabs the dryer. “What if you worked at my store? I bet I could talk Leah into hiring you.” She flicks a look to me and turns it on, picking heavy wet strands from my bare shoulders.

“I would do that, but you’d have to help me dress. Maybe go through my wardrobe and come up with some variations I haven’t thought of?”

“You mean all of them?” she teases me. As she blow dries my hair, Denise explains, “You’ve gotta look at your features and step back from all the things you think you know. Ask, what are my best attributes? What am I most proud of? I’m talking about makeup now—we’ll do clothes when we have at least ten months to prep.”

“Har har.”

She laughs, but quickly goes back to teaching me, “You have full lips so you want to accentuate that. If you had smaller ones, you’d probably work on your eyes more, add some lashes, all that jazz. Your cheeks need some color—everyone looks better with some color, highlight over the top of your bone, some contour underneath—but not too much. You should never see behind the curtain. Makeup should blend, and not draw too much attention to itself. Even if you wear a lot—like I do—it’s always blended well so that it flows, you get me?”

“I’m not going through the trouble of a highlighter and contour, I can tell you that.”

Throwing me a droll look in the mirror, she pauses, then continues. “For someone like you, who doesn’t think this is as fun as I do, all you need are three things.”

“Oh good.”

“No, five.”

“Five?”

“Six.”

“Denise!”

Waving the brush at me, she demands, “You want my help or not?”

Slumping I stifle a smile, “I do.”

“Then hush up!” She goes back to blow drying my hair into submission. “Number one: sunscreen, sunscreen, sunscreen. You want to look like you’re thirty when you’re forty? Sunscreen! Ever leave something in the sun and see how much it faded? That’s your skin!” She pauses. “One-point-five: Powder to cover the shine if there is any, but not a lot, and only on the places where you’re naturally oily. A dewy glow is good.”

Unplugging the blowdryer, she wraps the cord around it with expert speed, and shoves it under my sink. “But since it’s nighttime, we’re skipping that and jumping straight to item number two: a little mascara.” She digs around for some, and turns to do the job while teaching me. “Apply by slowly blinking on purpose. Drag your lashes over the wand, not the other way around. This curls them. Slowly, slowly, like this. If you want more of the effect, you bend your lashes back just a bit—not a lot! Because mascara is wet, they become malleable, and when it dries fast, your lashes will stay curled.”

“Huh.”

“Three: fill in those brows. Since you’re not an expert, use some powdered eyeshadow the color of your eyebrow. It’s more forgiving than a liner. Apply a light amount with a firm brush. You can always add more. What you want to do is follow the natural contour of your existing brow. Don’t get crazy. Stay within the lines, and maybe draw the end longer in the exact direction it’s already pointing. See? Same way I did this on your date night. Only that night I had a shitload of eyeliner on you, which we’re skipping today.”

Studying her brow technique I nod and hum—doesn’t look as hard to do as I thought.

“Four: apply some blush right over the apples of your cheeks when you smile.” I fake-grin for her and she brushes some on while I watch in the mirror. “Not a lot, just where you can see it. Most people do a contour underneath, but since you like to go natural, you just want a healthy glow.”

“Okay, thank you.”

All business, she continues, “Five: a little trick. Since you won’t do highlighter, apply lotion right here on your laugh lines, and along the high point of your cheekbones. Never put powder here. You can put it here, by your nose, but not under this outside part of your eyes. Even if it looks like you swam in vaseline. Blot it with a tissue instead. This area isn’t naturally moisturized. You want your crows feet accentuated?”

“I don’t have any yet.”

“You want to invite them to show up?”

“No.”

“Moisturize here and you’re ahead of the game. And it catches in the light and will also double as a highlighter.”

“Nice,” I murmur, turning my head.

“And sex, I mean six.” She winks at me, digging around and producing the magenta lipstick she gave me. “Lips lips lips. Make him look at these as often as you can. Your eyes are second.”

Laughing I argue, “I don’t know about that.”

“Trust me. Your man loves your eyes, but his cock loves your lips more. Wake it up for constant satisfaction.” I crack up, and she stares at my reflection with a smile. “There’s my girl. Good to see you back.” As she concentrates on applying my lipstick for me, she mutters, “Guess picking up that dog’s huge poop was good for something.”