The vanity (the furniture, not the ego issue) was TART’s sanctuary. Sharing a room with all her brothers and sisters meant a lot of shouting matches over space, but this one spot was all hers. With her makeup on stands and her brushes ready for the day’s beautifying, with a little dainty painted plate to set her morning pastry on to nibble at while she made herself presentable.
Everything was calm, with her already grown siblings out and her one little brother, Sweet Prestige, still snoozing away in bed with his jelly.
This was a perfect morning to a perfect day of looking rather perfect herself.
Every day should be the day to look perfect. Even when hair is at a weird stage of long enough to not look good in short styles, but short enough to look awful in long styles, something can be done. Careful taming of the curls and clever use of barrettes to pin up and decorate hair can fix fussy manes, just like how a wonderful little petite treat could fix a frown right up to a pretty smile.
All seeming imperfection was only a ruse. It only meant that there was more of a challenge, but perfection, or to be fair to all the poor phonies not blessed with her father’s genes, near-perfection, could be attained by all. TART’s fussy too-long-to-be-short hair, the weight of it pulling the heavy curls out, was just another challenge, and one she embraced. Just like learning a new recipe, the trick was to understand that this was something new, not something unmanageable. It only felt unmanageable because it was new.
Makeup was a great bridging of worlds, making everyone look like shining stars, like how good food bridged people, bringing delicious happiness wherever a platter of deserts went.
It felt funny now, to remember how much she had fretted over her purpose in life, when it felt so obvious now. She could make phonies beautiful, inside and out. Swirls of brushes masking flaws and tasty pastries feeding hungry maws. She could delight people like she delighted herself every morning. She could show them that they were beautiful.
Maybe even as beautiful as herself. But no promises.
