I shake my head. “No, like I said, I’ve never worn much makeup. Some eyeliner, lipstick, that’s about it. Nothing this dramatic.” I don’t mention that I don’t own anything, much less something so frivolous as makeup.
“It’s a good look for you. Makes you look mysterious. A little intimidating, I think.” She yanks a plastic grocery bag out of a cabinet in her station, dumps the makeup into it. “For you. I have more. You practice. Come Friday, I teach you, if you want.”
“Thanks, Mei. I—”
She ushers us to the door, waving her hands as if herding chickens, cutting off my thanks. “Now, go. Go. I have another client soon, and I have to clean up.”
We’re outside in the late-morning sun, walking to Logan’s SUV. When we’re in his truck and waiting at a stoplight, I turn to him. “So. What do you think, Logan?”
He looks at me long and hard. “It’s an incredible transformation, Isabel. You are absolutely gorgeous. There’s nothing you could do to ever make yourself look anything other than stunning. But this look? It’s perfect for you. Like Mei said, it makes you look even more mysterious than you already are.”
“How do you know Mei?” I ask.
“Oh. Um. Well, I hired her to do some programming for me. She’s actually an insanely talented computer programmer too, like seriously one of the best I’ve ever met. So she worked for me programming our website and debugging some of our systems as a freelance contractor. But then when that was done, we stayed friends.”
“Just friends?”
He eyes me. “Jealous?”
I blush. “Maybe a little. It’s an unusual emotion, for me. I don’t know how to process it.”
He just laughs. “We went out once. I went to kiss her at the end of the date and we were both just like . . . nah, it’s not there. We’ve been friends since.” A glance at me. “Jealousy is totally natural and normal, by the way. Just be honest about it with yourself and with me.”
“It’s just new for me. I never . . . it never occurred to me to be jealous until I saw Caleb with someone else. He did it on purpose. He was mad at me about . . . well, that’s a long story. But he was mad at me, so he arranged for me to see him kissing another girl on the street below my apartment. My old apartment, I mean.” I try not to remember. I don’t want those memories crowding out my new sense of self. “As far as tactics go, it was effective. But that was the first time that I can remember feeling jealous. I thought he was . . . I don’t know. Not mine, because it didn’t work that way between Caleb and me. But it just . . . it never occurred to me that he’d have other women in his life. It wasn’t a good feeling.”
“I don’t suppose so.” It’s all Logan says on that subject. Smart of him, I think. Nothing good could come from his opinion of Caleb. I know how he feels and why, and there’s no sense discussing it.
Miles pass under the tires, past the windows. The radio is off, silence is thick. I don’t know where we’re going.
“What do you want to do, Isabel?” Logan asks, abruptly breaking the silence.
“I was wondering where you were going.”
He shakes his head. “No, that’s not what I mean. Right now I’m taking us to lunch, this great Mediterranean place I know in Brooklyn. I meant with your life. With yourself. What do you want? How will you live?”
Optimism leaves me in a rush. “I don’t know, Logan.”
“I only ask because I know you well enough by now to know you’ll only be content if you’re making your own way.” He reaches out and takes my hand, glances at me briefly. “You can stay with me. I’ll support you. Everything I have is yours. If that’s what you want, you’ll never have to work another day in your life. I’m not as wildly rich as Caleb, but I’m doing pretty fucking well for myself. You’ll never want for anything. My point wasn’t that you’re not welcome, or that there’s some kind of expiration date on you staying with me. But I feel like you need your own space. Your own thing. So that’s what I’m asking. What do you want for yourself?”
He’s right. I would feel owned all over again if I relied on him. Even if that was not his intention, even if he went out of his way to make sure I didn’t feel that way, it would seep in.
So what do I want?
I have absolutely no idea. What am I capable of? What am I good at?
I spend a long, long time thinking. And I can only come to one sad conclusion. “I’ve only ever done one thing. I only know how to be Madame X, and I cannot be her anymore. But what else can I do?” I am near tears, but I keep them down. Force them away.
“What if you don’t have to be Madame X anymore, but still perform that same basic service, just . . . on your own? For yourself. Not as Madame X, but as Isabel de la Vega.”