Excerpt: Some other story/ Out of Harms Way

24. One Slick at a Time

Ellie/Belle hesitated, savoring the moment of completion. To paint, even a face, was to her total satisfaction. As a teenager, not being that outwardly rebellious at the necessary and particular age, she hadn’t dabbled with it. Having watched her mother, at special times “put on her face” from a large and variegated palette of hues she admired it immensely but never felt it her place to start using it. She had through osmosis gathered a perception in the household that to start using make-up, even though grown and respectable women did, was somehow cheap and tawdry. Ellie did not feel entitled. Make-up was something reserved for dancing shows, drama productions and perhaps in a light and pre-approved form, school socials. At any other time, particularly in the daytime it was frowned upon… noticed and commented on.

So as it was, approaching her third decade, on the surface it’s hard to know what had changed. Why start now? Why, with such a perfect complexion to begin with?! This, coupled with the fact that she could (like few others she’d encountered) “get away with it” while looking well presented and almost made up even in it’s absence. In the fourth form she had been teased by girls in her art class for wearing “lipstick to school… again” despite her protests to the contrary and demonstrations that this was in fact not true she simply had dark crimson lips, they reserved the right to doubt this fact and keep composure through their mascara’d lashed stares.

There was also the fact that she frequently felt it absurd that people put on makeup to look ‘better’ or feel better about themselves, when it is plain to see they’d look better without. Often this ‘looking better’, would be more to do with the accumulated quantity and thoroughly careless application, than lack of need. Mascara is a fine culprit, while going around feeling that they had lengthened their lashes, they often came across as garishly gross. in that you can see and almost feel the unnatural lumpy coating on the ends of a diminishing number of lashes. Lipstick can and is often seen to bleed down the creases, which start to form around the lips with age… not of course on the top of the line product models! Oh no, they have Photoshop and the benefit of no weather, sweat or tears to contend with most of the time. It is funny how the models in the more high class magazines of fashion are often made up like the undead, ghouls, waifs and drug addicts with dark smeary under-eyes… is this in jest, or are the appeasing the everyday woman by exaggerating the struggles they face?

Belle had simply found one day that coupled with her passion for colour and painting she had felt the desire to be noticed, to feel good in her skin again, in a way that had not seemed necessary before.
Perhaps, she had mused, if she was with older women (the ones with very obvious war paint), she was seeking the feminine as a kind of reinforcement, a safety net? Something left to make her woman? Something to assure herself of a place, a role in the world. She suspected, since her illness that the desire to be noticed was coupled with the desire not to ‘disappear’ was because people found her pain to hard to witness for any length of time and it clearly made them uncomfortable. Being self-critical and having time, she had thought this through from several angles and although it wasn’t completely out of the picture, she knew it to be not the main factor. She had always had relatively robust self-esteem, even in her weaker moments. Her sense of things being just in the world, was better served by her positivity and good self image, this she knew this from recent experience

Once this spark had been ignited she started to notice every magazine glamour puss on passing the stands at the supermarket checkout, the film actress in the vintage of 1920’s to 1950’s style currently in vogue, or the quick-footed modern trendsetters in Cuba St in their 80’s style punk and careless 90’s grunge. For Belle, she started with a little coloured gloss, saved from her wedding then an unplanned trip to a bath & body store before an interview for a little free eye make up ‘demonstration’ in an attempt to look the ‘corporate’ part required. Being told that she could in fact wear blue eye shadow with her hazel eyes was a revelation! The gave her the advice, as a beginner it was best not to ‘go to town’ and that restraint in the order of at least selecting only eyes or lips as a focus, was the key to daytime makeup, that and sticking to one coat of mascara to the top lashes (in brown if possible) with not too much in the way of nighttime dark or sparkly sheen. Avoid rouge if it’s humanly possible and if you must wear foundation try a mineral powder first. There was also a tip about how to get it right with concealer, but since she didn’t need it herself, that went in one ear and… From there to the mid range expensive counter in the up market department store in town, after getting chided for fingering the samples (without the unseen, unannounced cotton bud), she coveted the full range and settled on three to start with. The smooth sheen of powder, was encircled in a cute black compact, nestled within a cute little black box… retail hook, line, sinker and now home to hide said purchase (futile) after a guilty application.

The venture into daytime wearing went off without a hitch, her next meeting at the employment agency, they didn’t bat an eyelid (pardon the pun). Belle seemed to fit in around there perfectly, now if only they had a job to offer. The problem with jobs is on paper she was well qualified, perhaps a little overqualified for some of the positions, but in a recession and her position she could not afford to be choosy. But she was being choosy and in the positions of choice she seemed to get an interview, three so far! The problem being on arrival, when obviously in pain, there are some things you can’t hide… they could ask all the questions they felt comfortable with and seem like they understood but it was clear at the end of the day, if there was someone equally (or perhaps slightly less) qualified, they would be getting the call. Three positions! The first of which she was certain she had got, so much so that she went home on a high about it, only to wait a week with no response and to know, before receiving the impersonal letter, the result. This was a previously unknown situation for Belle, in the past, even with a slight impediment she had always been able to talk her way into a job, especially when in need. She had felt that it’s because she was sincere and genuine and people can usually sense if you are honest and enthusiastic, between that and some glowing references… she had simply never had to look for long, the right thing always sorted itself out in a short period of time. It had been ten months.

Rich cream coating, followed by pale turquoise under grey-tinged cobalt blue, finished with a slick of purple or perhaps dark green tinged kohl to the corners. Next was mascara, which definitely did seem to have improved in quality and applicatability over the years. It was not half the drama of the dancing days...a quick touch up with a removing wipe to catch the rogue staining dust on her cheeks or any cheeky little blobs and she was done. A doll, a picture, a Woman.