chapter 23
Ambrosia guides me by both shoulders into a swivel chair with a thick cushion of white brocade. I don’t like what I see in the mirror. I never do. I know that when Brendon was kissing me, I felt beautiful. I want to feel that way again. My eyes make a quick scan of everything that’s wrong: eyes too small, pores too big, lips too thin, nose too thick, cheekbones … what cheekbones? Brendon said he doesn’t want a hot girlfriend, but come on! I think of all the girls he’s dated and know that I don’t measure up. Ambrosia removes the stretchy band tying back my hair, the worst part of me. As she undoes the braid, each section springs into its usual frizzy, wild mass. I can’t help but compare my hair to Ambrosia’s hair, which shines like satin. She’s wearing it in two silly buns like Princess Leia, and still manages to look gorgeous and sophisticated. She flicks on the circle of lights that surrounds the mirror.
“It’s hopeless,” I say.
Lights off. She moves aside the mirror so that I can no longer see myself. “Off limits until I’m done. Your lack of self-esteem causes wrinkles, you know. All that frowning and worrying—it’s as damaging as cigarettes. Beauty is about the right confident attitude. And of course, using the right products.”
She rummages through her drawer of cosmetic goodies until she comes up with the bottle she wants. The glass is deep sapphire-colored and there’s no label on it, so I assume it’s a homemade concoction. She shakes it hard, pours a quarter-sized spot of clear gel into one hand, and rubs her palms together. When she smooths it on my hair, my scalp tingles.
“What is that?” I try to grab the bottle, but she whisks it out of reach.
“Old formula dating way back. I swear by it. In fact, I was named after it.”
She pours a dab onto her finger, only this time it comes out thicker and gold-colored. Instead of putting it on my hair, she licks it off her finger with a moan of pleasure. “It’s anything you want it to be, whatever you happen to need at the moment.”
The sample she puts on my finger tastes like honey, orange blossoms, and ginger. If Ambrosia with her perfect skin and hair swears by it, that’s good enough for me. I hope this truly is a miracle cosmetic, because a miracle is what I need.
I sit back and let her go to work, following her nonstop string of orders. Widen my eyes, close my eyes, relax my mouth, puff out my cheeks, arch an eyebrow, and pucker my lips. Sometimes the miracle cream is gold and flaky to be dabbed on my eyelids; a minute later, it comes out of the bottle rich and white and she spreads it down my neck as a thick moisturizer.
Out of my line of vision, Alix and Stephanie are also busy. I hear them moving around and fiddling with things that crunch and ping. Ambrosia checks over her shoulder and orders, “Tisiphone, more flowers and vines. Weave them into those dreadlocks.”
Then Ambrosia is leaning over me again, her hands moving with her usual skillfulness as she curls, sprays, pats, and smudges. When she’s done, she spins my chair around and takes a critical look at her canvas. I notice that there’s an actual bead of sweat on her forehead. That’s how hard she had to work on me. Ambrosia never, ever sweats.
“The verdict?” I ask.
She pronounces me “magnificent.”
“I want to see!”
“Not yet. We’re almost there.”
She disappears into her closet and emerges with three large shopping bags hooked around her elbows. Alix, her face, arms, all of her skin glimmering with a silvery powder, receives the first bag and we watch enthusiastically as she pulls out a two-piece outfit. There’s a pair of very short shorts, bronze in color, with a matching midriff halter that laces up the front. This is clearly not the fabulous outfit that Alix had in mind. Can’t say I blame her. It reminds me of a jogging suit—if, say, Robin Hood were running a half-marathon.
Alix’s mouth twists. “I’m not the halter type.”
Ambrosia ignores the complaint. “You are going to love the accessories. They totally make the outfit.”
Next she hands Stephanie a bag that’s twice the size of the other two. It takes some manipulating to get her costume out in one piece.
“That’s more like it!” Alix says with envy.
Wings! A full set of them. Not the small, fluffy, frilly white wings that some girls wear with their underwear as part of a Hot Angel costume. These are solid, big, black, and veiny. What fabric is that? Nothing I’ve ever seen before. The wings look dangerous, like if you turn too fast in them you can poke out someone’s eye.
Stephanie is deliriously happy with her costume, jumping up and down and clapping her hands. “Bat wings! Most people hate bats, but they’re my favorite animal. Bats are totally misunderstood.” She lifts the wings in front of her and spins them like a dance partner.
My turn. I plunge right into my bag and rummage around. But my enthusiasm withers quickly. It doesn’t look very thrilling in there, just a couple of pieces of fabric of different sizes and shapes. I try to stay positive. Ambrosia does want me to look great. I remind myself that she wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble if she didn’t. The material is soft and silky, the color of a caramel chew, almost exactly my skin tone. I pull out a piece that looks like an extra-long scarf, and hold it at one end so it dangles limp in front of me. “Um, excuse me, but I don’t have a clue what to do with this.”
Ambrosia grabs it from my hand, but I can tell her annoyance is only put on. “You are helpless without me,” she teases. To Alix and Stephanie: “You two team up to get ready. Tisiphone, give Alecto a hand with her hair. We need to get it all up. Don’t be stingy with the gel.”
Ambrosia hustles me into her giant walk-in closet, where she orders me to strip. I get down to my underwear, but she insists: “No prudishness. All of it.” Good thing I’ve lived in so many group homes, where you quickly get over modesty in front of other girls. I stand in front of Ambrosia naked, goose bumps erupting everywhere. I feel her eyes running over me, and I realize how desperately I want her approval. She has gone to so much trouble just for me. She cares about me and wants me to look incredible. In the confined space of her closet, the perfume on her body and lingering on the dozens of hanging outfits closes in on me, makes it a little hard for me to breathe normally.
She trades my white cotton underpants for the pair of skimpy flesh-colored ones at the bottom of my costume bag. She doubles and twists the scarf-like material and wraps it where my bra used to be. Next she takes out some fabric that’s been folded into a rectangle, holds it at one end, and gives it a hard shake. It’s bigger than I thought, the size of a bedsheet, and it floats like a parachute before settling slowly back to earth.
I think, She’s going to burrito-wrap me in a bedspread. That’s my costume?
She counters my obvious disappointment with “Have I ever steered you wrong?”
I shake my head.
“Trust me?”
There’s no reason not to.
Ambrosia begins by draping the fabric across one of my shoulders, then wraps it around my midriff, tucking it here and there, arranging and rearranging the cloth so that it swoops down to my ankles and then back up in a loop, finishing in a U-shape that dips to the small of my back. She does this without using even a single safety pin. I never understand this fashion magic, how some girls can take hand-me-downs, like an old scarf or an outgrown skirt, and turn it into something new and flattering. My costume—it’s a dress, sort of a tunic-toga—fully covers one leg, but the other leg peeks out from a slit when I walk. It’s bare all the way up to the hip, which makes my legs look super long and thin. The fabric makes a whoosh when I move.
Ambrosia snaps two fingers. “Elegant, classy, irresistible.”
“Are you sure?”
“Hmmm, it’s a little too tasteful.” She pushes her elbows together. “Do like this.”
I imitate the motion, which emphasizes my cleavage. In the past week, I swear that I went from an A cup to a C. I love it, but … panic.
“I can’t wear this.”
She looks surprised, even a little hurt. “Why not? You don’t like the fabric?”
“That’s not it. It’s beautiful and comfortable. What is it, anyway? It looks and feels like another layer of skin. Only…” I search for the words. I think about the Meg I’ve been for so many years, the one with the overbite and frizzy hair and no waist, the one who hides in baggy clothes and avoids her reflection in the mirror. “This outfit is … not me.”
“Why isn’t it you?”
I point first to the bulging boobs and then to the naked thigh. “You know what I was for Halloween last year? An old man. Size 12 pants pulled to my armpits. Mustache. Pillow for a pot belly. That’s me.”
Ambrosia takes a big hank of my hair, which, thanks to the miracle formula, is wavier and softer than it’s ever been in my life, and drapes it over my bare shoulder. “Not anymore. This is you now. You have beauty and power. Accept it. Flaunt it. Embrace it.”
“You’re sure? I don’t want to look pathetic and ridiculous, one of those girls who’s trying to be someone she’s not.”
“I know exactly who you are. I worked too hard for too long on this project to have any doubts. Go ask the others their opinion.”
I turn toward the closet door, but she orders me to stop. “One more thing.” She leans in with a pair of tweezers, plucks a wild hair sprouting from a small mole on my back.
“Ouch!”
She extends her arm with the dagger index finger pointing. “Toughen up. Pain and sacrifice are necessary. Go!”
Barefoot, glistening with oil, half naked except for the two pounds of makeup on my face, I step out of the closet and suddenly I don’t need any more reassurance. My arms, which were crossed on my chest in uncertainty, drop to my sides.
All the proof I need stares back at me. I know I look amazing because Alix and Stephanie look amazing. I know I am magnificent because they are magnificent. We are our costumes and our costumes are us, inseparable, spitting images of who we are inside, three different versions of the Furies, our powers no longer hidden but turned into fabric and flesh, buttons and zippers, for everyone to see.
Alix, Alecto, her skin a metallic shimmer. She has the complexion of an ancient statue. Her hair is slicked back to resemble a warrior’s helmet, tufts of it gelled to stand up like a thick row of feathers curving from her forehead to the nape of her neck. The short shorts of her costume emphasize every bulge in her legs; the outlines of her quadriceps are like something you see in an anatomy book, nothing wasted, nothing extra. She pulls the halter lace tight, calling attention to the ripple of tendons in her arms. You can count every muscle in her stomach. You could serve dinner on the broad, straight plane of her back.
“These shoes rock!” she says. There’s no foot, no sole or heel, only circles of brown leather from her instep to knee. It takes her several minutes to latch the dozen or so metal buckles, and when she’s done, Ambrosia tells her to stand very still for one final accessory.
She brings out a long strand of seaweed that smells of the ocean and ties it around Alix’s bare middle.
“Show us who you are, Alecto, and what you can withstand.”
Alix flinches and sweat breaks out on her forehead. This is not ordinary kelp plucked straight from the sea. It comes from Ambrosia’s collection of mysteries and it is hot, branding-iron hot. I smell flesh burning. I want to help Alix. I reach out to rip off the seaweed, but Ambrosia blocks my way. She puts a finger to her lips, a warning and encouragement.
Pain and sacrifice are necessary.
If Ambroisa has faith that Alix can withstand this test, she can. I know she can! Her eyes squeeze closed and her jaw clenches with the enormous effort needed not to yell out in pain.
Then finally the sizzling sound stops. Alix’s features immediately relax. The test is over and she has passed. When Ambrosia removes the seaweed, Stephanie and I examine the wound. There is no jagged scar or oozing open sore. Alix, amazed, runs her fingers around her midriff. Here is the perfect finishing touch to her costume, a tattooed impression of kelp, fish scales, and the tentacles of an octopus. She is part warrior, part mermaid—a furious Warrior Mermaid—and she glows with pride.
Stephanie, Tisiphone, is up next. She’s the perfect manifestation of the Earth she loves so much. You can’t see any hair on her head, only petals, vines, blossoms, and leaves. Her cheeks radiate pink like she’s part sun. Paired with a black satin unitard, the bat wings no longer seem like a costume that she slipped on. They spring from the curves of her shoulder blades like a natural growth. I can see the pulse of—is that blood?—flowing through them. She models the wings, experimenting with the different ways they beat.
Ambrosia places a dab of liquid behind each of Stephanie’s ears. That, too, must be boiling hot, but she understands what she must do. Stephanie goes deep inside of herself to hold firm against the pain. She merges with it. When the perfume finally cools, her eyes open and she smiles with an otherworldly blissfulness. The room fills with the scent of a freshly planted garden: basil, oregano, thyme, mint. The odor is so thick that as soon as I think of an herb, I taste it on my tongue.
And finally there’s me, Megaera, not some shy, awkward girl anymore, but—what adjectives did Ambrosia use?—elegant, classy, irresistible. Sexy, too. Very sexy.
“You look wow.” Alix lets out a whistle of admiration.
“When did you get that long neck?” Stephanie asks. I lift my hair to show off a neck that has turned lean and graceful.
To get better looks at ourselves, we hurry to the huge hallway mirror. I take it all in, the way my hair mimics the shine and intricate waves of the metal filigree. My eyes are slanted in black and the lids glisten with gold flakes. I run my hands along the curves of my torso and hips, then peer over my shoulder to check out my bottom, which sits high and round, two ripe cantaloupes. Even my toes look fabulous. I wiggle them. Sexy, purple jewels.
Ambrosia comes up behind me, leans closer, and I feel the flutter of her breath as she speaks into my ear. “You’ll need privacy tonight. My room. It’ll be vacant, off limits to everyone but you and him.”
“You trust him, then?”
“Go party with your prince. Indulge your desires. Don’t hold back on your fun. Why would you? But deep down”—she reaches around and places her palms flat on my belly; they rise and fall with my breath—“deep down, be prepared. Maybe you’re right about him and he’ll pass the test. Just don’t lose your heart. Remember who has the power.”
I shiver, and it’s not only because of the skimpy costume. How would it feel not to hold back? I want to experience that, to indulge my desires. Ambrosia runs a nail the length of my arms, and the sensation causes even more goose bumps to spring to the surface.
From a fancy leather case she takes out a necklace designed to resemble a coiling serpent. “Stay awake,” she reminds me. When she drapes the jewelry around my neck I flinch, expecting it to be burning hot, my trial of pain and sacrifice. But there’s only the slight chill of metal, which quickly warms to my body temperature. I know by the weight and texture that the necklace must be real gold. The front clasp is a three-headed cobra with ruby, sapphire, and emerald eyes. When I tilt my head to my chest to admire it, there’s a hiss and three darting tongues. It’s over so fast that I wonder if it really happened.
Ambrosia disappears into her room and returns with a tray that holds four shot glasses filled to the brim with a clear liquid. We follow her lead and each raise a glass to toast. The drink has an unusual and strong odor—definitely alcohol, but also hints of cinnamon, cloves, and other spices that make me think of pumpkin pie.
“Opa! Party!” Ambrosia shouts. “This drink will turn a colorless world very vibrant.”
I imitate the others and chug it down, only I’m the one who chokes because I’m not used to drinking. Alix pounds me on the back. After the burn in my throat fades, I decide that I like it. It’s so cold and sweet that it makes my teeth tingle, and it tastes like licorice.
From our position at the top of the stairs, we hear the band warming up in the living room. There’s feedback from the speakers, a jarring, painful electronic screech. The doorbell rings. The front door opens. Voices. Laughs. Squeals of recognition. A guitar plays a familiar nine-note riff. A boy’s voice yells: “Hell, yeah!”
“Don’t make your entrance too early,” Ambrosia advises. “But not too late, either. Timing is everything.”
The doorbell again. And again. Sounds merging together. We wait unseen, the three of us fussing with each other, making little costume adjustments and offering compliments.
Ambrosia nods.
It’s time.
I remind myself: Every desire. Don’t hold back.
We put on our masks, which are small, simple, and black, with holes for our eyes. I link arms with Alix and Stephanie. I feel their power and I know they feel mine. We walk down the stairs. Ambrosia throws an electrical switch. The entire house, inside and out, glows and pulses with thousands of orange lights.