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“I won’t,” I snarled at her. “No way.”
She approached me with fast steps and slapped me so hard I fell back on my ass. My cheek hurt, my body blazing with adrenaline as she stood above me.
“Don’t make me call the men,” she told me darkly. “Don’t make me put you in the bad cell.”
I bit back the tears. I would be damned if I’d let her see me cry.
Instead, I picked myself up and sat in front of the vanity mirror. Without saying a word to me, Pia’s team went back to chattering and working on me, and I stewed in my anger, my eyes fixed on my reflection in the mirror as they worked. She may have won the battle, but she would never win the war.
I watched them working. The man seemed to be a hairstylist, and every time he picked a strand of my hair, he sighed dramatically. One of the women, a short redhead, seemed to be his assistant. She put a plastic sheet over the floor and over me, and then the man started cutting my hair.
I told myself not to cry. I’d been growing my hair since I was a little girl, and it reached all the way down to my butt. I loved my hair. Seeing it drop to the ground in long blonde tendrils made me want to sob. It was the only remnant of the girl I’d been, and now they were taking it away from me. I hated it.
The other girl consulted with Pia and took my measurements for clothes. There were some I’d noticed earlier in the closet, but they were mostly leggings and plain tanktops. Now, they were talking about different clothes. Dresses and skirts and blouses, heels and jewelry and lingerie. Things I’d never had before, brands I could have only dreamed of. Whoever was in charge of my new prison was most definitely well off.
They acted as if I wasn’t ever there. Everything they did, they discussed with one another, never asking for my opinion. I quickly learned I didn’t get a say in what was happening to me. The only thing I could do was stare at my reflection in the mirror and watch my face and my body transform.
After they cut my hair, they told me how I was supposed to apply makeup every day. The seamstress reappeared with countless swathes of fabric and clothes, all in my size. They fit perfectly, and they made me try them all on. I paraded around in slinky, tight dresses, too-short skirts, and trousers so tight they dug into my skin. Everything I would own from then on would be sexy in some way. Meant to enhance my features and make the good ones stand out while the ones they deemed undesirable were carefully hidden. The hairstylist gasped when he saw the state of my toes, and I fought the urge to roll my eyes at him.
Of course my toes looked weird. I was a ballerina, they were supposed to look that way. But instead of letting them be, they soaked my feet and manicured my toes to perfection, even though I knew the traces of the polish would disappear when I danced again.
I missed dancing with my whole heart. But since I’d been in that place, I couldn’t have done it. It was like they’d torn it away from me, and I wasn’t sure whether I’d ever be able to dance in their presence. My life was split forever into before and after. Now, the only goal I had was to get away from this madness and dance again, because it was what I lived for.
Time was passing, and my stomach was rumbling impatiently as I waited for them to finish. My nails were repainted, long fake tips added to them and I was sprayed with cloyingly sweet perfume that I hated. Finally, they decided I was done.
“I bet she can’t wait to see what we’ve done!” The hairstylist clapped his hands together, once again choosing not to address me. I hated him even more for that. Slowly, he turned the chair I was sitting on until I was facing the mirror. And what I saw, my own reflection, took my breath away.
I looked like a different person.
My hair was cut to just below my boobs, now with highlights that brought out the freckles on my nose. My makeup was minimal but pretty, and they’d stuck a jeweled headband in my hair. I was wearing a dress, something in white with a black bow around the neck. I looked beautiful. But I wasn’t beautiful. It wasn’t me. I hated it.
I turned my eyes away, fighting back the tears. They must have noticed, because they fled the room, murmuring something about how ungrateful I was.
The only person who stayed behind was Pia.
