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Stephanie was quiet throughout the car ride, but Nick decided to ignore it. She obviously didn’t want to talk, and the one thing he had learned about Stephanie was that if she didn’t want to talk, he couldn’t push it. BJ wasn’t in the mood to talk either, so he just blasted the radio while he drove to start Operation: Make Steph Appealing. All three of the young people were lost in their own worlds when Nick pulled up to their first stop: clothing. He took them to a designer shop that Kirsten often shopped in. He knew some of the salespeople and they were good at picking out the slutty clothing necessary to female pop stars.
"Pile out, troops," Nick said, trying to lighten the mood. For his efforts he was just rewarded with a glare from Stephanie and a yawn from BJ, who had been dozing. He rolled his eyes and led them into the store. BJ immediately split apart from them to look for clothes on her own. Stephanie wandered around, looking at the clothes. After 10 minutes, she found a shirt she liked, and idly looked at the price tag. She squinted once, making sure that the decimal was in the right place, before turning to Nick, who was looking at clothes on the rack behind her.
"Nick!" she hissed.
"Yeah?" he asked, turning around.
"What the hell is with this place? $110 for this freakin’ shirt? I could get it for $15 at Filene’s or Marshall’s or something!" she exclaimed. He just shrugged in response.
"It’s really good quality, and it won’t turn colors or anything while you’re onstage and sweating. You should try it on," he recommended, looking at the shirt.
"There is no fucking way I’m spending my hard-earned money on clothing here."
"You aren’t spending your hard-earned money on clothing here," he mimicked her. "I am, remember?"
"You can’t do that."
"Sure I can. I’m your manager. Practically every manager at least loans money to their clients before they hit it big. You can pay me back when you’re ruling the Billboards," he said, smiling at her. She just glared back at him.
"This place reminds me of the clothes in Cruel Intentions or something. They don’t have a single shirt that covers both your chest and stomach!"
"So combine them or something. Start your own fashion. I’ve been here tons of times-"
"Are you a closet transvestite or something?"
He decided to ignore the crack. "I’ve been here tons of time when I’ve gone shopping with Kirsten and with my little sister Lesley-"
"You take your little sister shopping here? Isn’t she, like, 14?"
Nick was getting irritated. "You promises when I took you on that you would listen to me. And this is one of those days where you are just going to have to trust me. If you show up tomorrow with your guitar slung over your shoulder wearing blue jeans and a Bohemian tank top with your hair in a braid down your back, Lou Pearlman will laugh you out of Jive Records, no matter how good you are. I’ve tried to explain to you again and again that there is an image in the music industry. You have to listen to me. Or I’m going to leave right now and I’ll never talk to you again. What do you say?"
Stephanie narrowed her eyes at him. "You’re a real dick, you know that?"
"I don’t care what you think of me personally," he snapped back. "Do you want me to represent you or not?"
Her first instinct was to tell him to go to hell and take his $110 shirts with him. But she really was desperate for this record deal. "Fine," she snapped. He smiled. He knew that she would give in.
"Great. Hold on, I’m gonna go get a salesperson to help us." He rushed off to find someone to help them. Stephanie just shot his departing back the finger and turned back to browsing through the racks.
"You really hate my brother, don’t you?"
Stephanie turned to see BJ Carter standing next to her. She sighed. "I don’t. I really appreciate the help he’s trying to give me. But I don’t like what he’s trying to make me into."
BJ smiled sympathetically. "Just because you dress like that," she said, gesturing to a dummy with far more white plaster skin showing than clothing, "doesn’t mean that you don’t have substance. He’s not trying to change what’s inside you, just the wrapping paper."
"Haven’t you ever heard that you can’t judge a book by its cover?"
"True, but are you more apt to go see someone ugly or someone hot in concert?"
"Doesn’t matter. I just want to hear good music."
"Then you’re a better person than most people in this world." Before Stephanie could respond, Nick came back with three salespeople in tow, and BJ disappeared again, leaving her puzzled.
"Okay, let’s get started," Nick said as the people began to walk towards her. They all had measuring tapes in their hands and began giving her orders.
"Raise your arms please, dear."
"Don’t suck in now, I need to get a full measurement of your stomach."
"If you’re wearing any padding in your bra, please take it out."
She shot an apprehensive look at Nick, who was doing his best not to laugh as he looked at Stephanie. She was standing at attention with three women wrapping measuring tapes around every possible part of her body. Suddenly, someone tried to measure her waist, and she began laughing uncontrollably.
"Sorry, I’m ticklish!" she apologized. The person just glared at her and continued measuring. Once they had all of their measurements, they began talking about clothing.
"I think she needs winter colors, don’t you?"
"Definitely. She’s far too pale to wear bright colors."
"Have you ever thought about using a tanning bed, dear?"
Stephanie was about to snap back with a retort about how she would rather be pale than die from skin cancer, but she saw the disapproving look on Nick’s face and changed her mind. "Um, no," she said simply, and the salespeople exchanged glances and giggled at her. Stephanie just sighed.
Once they were done measuring her, they began running around the store and picking out clothes for her. There were miniskirts, tank tops, tube tops, spandex, leather, plastic, faux fur, bandeu tops, and every possible piece of clothing that Stephanie couldn’t stand. But she sucked it in and went into the dressing room to try on the clothing.
Her first outfit was a black mini skirt that barely covered her butt with a lime green tube top. She came out of the dressing room tugging at the top of the shirt self-consciously. "I feel like I’m about to fall out of this thing!" she complained. Nick and the salespeople looked at her critically.
"Steph," he said thoughtfully.
"What?" she replied, staring in horror at herself in the mirror.
"Have you ever thought about losing maybe 5, 10 pounds?" he asked. She turned around and stared at him in shock.
"Are you kidding me?"
"No," he said, shaking his head. He reached out and pinched her forearm lightly, and a minuscule bit of flab came up between his fingers.
"Well, now that you mention it, I haven’t," she retorted.
One of the salesgirls said, "He does have a point, hun. TV adds about 10 pounds."
"Well, if I’m dancing the way he wants me to, I’ll end up losing that weight anyway. Besides, whenever I lose weight I don’t lose it in my stomach or anything. My boobs just shrink."
"While we’re on the subject," Nick said, staring at her chest and making Steph feel uncomfortable, "what do you think about getting some-"
"Hell no!" Steph screeched. "I am not getting any fucking implants! I’m not gonna risk getting breast cancer and looking like a Barbie doll just for the sake of my image! And if I have to wear clothes like this and my boobs are any bigger, I’m gonna fall out of the God damn shirt!"
"Sor-ry," Nick said, rolling his eyes and holding up his hands in defeat. "Why don’t you go try on the next outfit?"
Stephanie just groaned as she walked back into the dressing room.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
After they spent 2 hours in the store, Nick and Stephanie weren’t speaking to each other as they walked out to Nick’s car. Both were carrying arms full of Stephanie’s new slut wear, including push-up bras, high heels, platform shoes, and virtually every piece of clothing she had tried on. BJ had a few bags herself, and even though Steph was mad at Nick, she felt bad about the amount of money he had spent on the two of them. But she was definitely not about to thank him for buying her clothes that looked more like underwear than outerwear.
"Where are we going?" Stephanie asked in a flat, annoyed voice once they were back in the car.
"Hair," Nick replied in an equally annoyed tone. BJ glanced between the two of them and giggled a little at the animosity. "Is that all right with you, Susan B. Anthony?"
"Shut up," she replied, too irked and tired to think of a better come back. Nick grinned at his obvious win and continued driving.
At the hair salon, Stephanie was quickly taken away. Someone pushed her into a chair in front of a sink and draped a towel around her neck. Soon someone began washing her long hair, despite her protests that she had just washed it a few hours ago. At first she looked around the salon, but after a while the shampooist complained that her glasses were getting in the way. So Stephanie took off her glasses and rested them in her lap, the world now blurry to her. Out of the corner of her eye she could make out two blobs talking; she knew that one of them was Nick from the blonde hair. She tried to decipher what they were saying, but they were too far away for her to hear. Finally she decided to shut her eyes and enjoy the shampooing job.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
While Stephanie’s hair was being washed, Nick was having a long discussion with the stylist about what hair cut to give her.
"She’s got fine hair, so what do you think about layers?"
Nick thought about it. "I don’t know . . . her face is kind of small and her hair might overwhelm it, ya know?"
The stylist nodded sagely. "I see. Do you want bangs?"
Nick shook his head again. "No, it could give her pimples along her forehead from the oil." The stylist gave him an odd look, and Nick shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. "Don’t look at me like that! My sisters and my ex girlfriend used to tell me about it all the time."
The man just shrugged in response. "How about this. We’ll give her blonde and red highlights; it could make a very interesting effect."
Nick tried to picture Steph like that, and he liked the mental image. "Great! Go for it."
"How long do you want us to cut it?"
"Maybe . . . a little below shoulder length?"
They continued to discuss Stephanie’s hair, neither bothering to think that she should be involved in the decision.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
When Stephanie’s hair had finally been blow-dried and brushed out a little over an hour later, she hurriedly put her glasses back on and spun the chair around to look at herself in the mirror. She was shocked. She had always loved her long, thin brown hair; it went halfway down her back. She loved to wear it in a long braid or just let it hang behind her like a curtain; she considered it her best feature. But they had cut more than 12 inches off, leaving her with hair that went just below her shoulder. The rich dark brown was streaked with blonde and red highlights, reminding her a little bit of Vitamin C. It flared out a bit at the ends, and it had a high, unnatural shine. She instantly turned to Nick, who was standing next to her.
"What did you do to me?" she said, about ready to burst into tears. She ran her hands through it, and when she caught air just below her shoulders, she was shocked. She had always been able to run her hands through it for a long time, and now she couldn’t. It was going to take a lot of getting used to, and for a long time she would probably try to use more shampoo than necessary in the shower, out of habit.
"It looks great!" Nick said happily, stoking her head as he looked at her in the mirror. "Totally unique. Not like all those bottled blondes."
"But-but-but-" Stephanie couldn’t make out the words. Just then, BJ appeared. Her own hair had been trimmed with a few highlights added.
"You look great, Steph!" she said approvingly. Stephanie managed a weak smile as she got out of the chair, fingering her shorn locks lightly. Nick paid the stylists and they left. Once again, Stephanie was eerily silent during the car ride, while BJ seemed to have regained her speech skills. She and Nick began chatting about their friends, while Steph stared at the window in the back seat. Finally, she spoke up, interrupting the siblings’ laughs about old times.
"Are we going anywhere else?" she asked quietly. Nick glanced at her in the rearview mirror.
"Just one more place. I need to pick something up for ya. Then we’re going back to my place. We’ll just order a pizza and watch a movie or something, okay?"
"What do we have to get me?"
"Contacts."
"What?"
"Steph, ya can’t wear glasses while you’re on stage. They’ll fall off while you’re dancing. You’ve got really nice eyes, so you should show them!"
"I’m scared to death of touching my eye!" she protested.
"It’s not that bad! You might even like them after a while. Your vision is better with contacts than with glasses."
"How the hell would you know?" she shot back. "You don’t wear either!"
"Well, yeah," Nick admitted, "but that’s what my friends said." They pulled into the eye doctor’s parking lot and Nick got out of the car. He walked over to the passenger side and opened the door up for Stephanie. "This’ll just take a few minutes, Beej. Do you want to come with us?"
"Nah, I’ll stay in the car. Just leave it on so I can listen to the radio, okay?"
"Sure thing," Nick said, tossing the keys at her as he and Steph walked into the doctor’s office.
"If it’ll only take a minute, why do I have to come in?" she complained.
"They have to show you how to put them in and take care of them and stuff," he explained. He walked up to the secretary and said, "Hi, I’m here to pick up contacts for Stephanie Chalifour."
"The doctor will be with you in a minute," she replied without looking up from her keyboard. Nick nodded his approval and sat down on one of the hard chairs of the waiting room. He picked up a magazine and leafed through it idly, patting the chair next to him for Steph to sit in.
"How do they know my prescription and everything?" she asked after a few minutes. "My eye doctor’s in Orlando."
"I called your doctor and asked ‘em to send your records over here. Hope that’s OK."
"How the hell did you find out my eye doctor’s name?"
Nick shrugged. "I saw the name on your glasses case. Why?"
"No reason," Stephanie said sulkily, angry at the invasion of her privacy. Before she could say anything else, the eye doctor came out and told her to follow him to the back room. Once there, he whipped out her contact case and began to instruct her on putting them in.
"Just hold the top of your eye with your left hand and the bottom of your eye with your middle finger. Put your contact on your index finger and just smoosh it in," he said. Stephanie looked at him doubtfully and tried it. It took her almost 10 minutes just to get the first one in, and another 15 minutes to get her left contact in. She was pleased with herself, though, until he told her, "OK, now take them out."
She looked at him in horror. "But I just got them in!" He just gave her an impatient look, until she gave in. "Fine, fine." He then instructed her on taking them out, which took another 10 minutes. Her eyes were watery and running by this time, as was her nose.
"Don’t worry about your nose running. It’s normal when you’re dealing with your eyes," he said while she blew her nose. She didn’t seem comforted by the fact. "Now put ‘em back in again and we’ll be done," he said cheerfully. She obeyed. This time it didn’t take quite as long, but it still wasn’t as easy as just ‘smooshing them in,’ the way he said. Steph knew that she was going to have to start getting up earlier just to allow for contact time. When they were finally back in, she looked at herself in the mirror again. She was about to get up and go when she realized with a shock that her eyes had changed from their dark, shrewd brown to an insipid bright blue.
She turned to the doctor and said, "I think there’s been some mistake. I didn’t order colored contacts."
He glanced at his sheet briefly, squinting at it. Great, Steph thought. Nick hooked me up with an eye doctor who can’t even correct his own vision. "It says right here that you’re supposed to get aqua blue contacts," he said. "I guess your boyfriend ordered them for you."
"Boyfriend?" she echoed, confused. He stared at her blankly for a minute. "Oh! You mean Nick! He’s not my boyfriend. He’s just my manager."
"Well, he ordered you the blue contacts. I have another patient to see now, but if you have any problems or questions with the contacts please feel free to call my office." With that, he walked out quickly. Stephanie stalked into the waiting room.
"Nick! What the hell do you think you’re doing ordering me blue contacts?"
He shrugged. "I thought they would look nice. They do, too."
"Nick!" she said, on the verge of crying. She wasn’t sure if it was from the emotion or from the foreign bodies now resting on her eyeballs. "I don’t want colored contacts! I want my old eyes back!" She sniffled a little. Nick was taken aback by her tears. He stood up and began rubbing her shoulder lightly.
"Don’t worry, Steph," he consoled her. "You look beautiful. Just wear them for a few more days and if you don’t like them, we’ll get you a clear pair. Or you can just wear these for stage performances and your glasses all other times. OK?"
Stephanie glared at him and sniffled again, but didn’t contradict him. "I’m going to go wait in the car," she announced, walking out of the office before he could object. Nick was about to walk after her, but the secretary reminded him to pay. He shook his head in confusion at his new charge and paid for her contacts before following her out to his car. BJ had fallen asleep while waiting for them; the radio was blasting Sugar Ray when Nick entered the car. Stephanie was sitting in the back seat again, and he could hear her sniffle every now and then as he drove them home. It was getting dark out, and Nick suddenly realized that it was already 7:00. They had just spent 4 hours getting Stephanie ready for her interview. He glanced at her in the rearview mirror while he drove, and he was shocked at the transformation. Reflecting on it, he realized that they had gone a little overboard, but she really did look nice. She would get used to it soon enough.
When the car reached Nick’s house, he gently woke his sister up. Stephanie quietly got out of the car and followed them into the home. Nick had decided to leave all of her new clothes in the trunk of the car, because he would be driving Stephanie home tomorrow after her audition. He did, however, take one outfit for her to wear to Jive. He threw it into the guestroom where she would be sleeping that night, and returned to the kitchen where BJ and Stephanie were sitting, quietly discussing the day.
"Do you guys want pizza?" he asked, going to the drawer by the phone and extracting the yellow pages. He began flipping it to Pizza while he waited for their response.
"Yeah, order me a small extra cheese with mushrooms, okay?" BJ asked. Nick nodded and turned to Stephanie.
"Do you want anything?"
She shrugged. "I’ll just eat a slice or two of BJ’s pizza, if that’s okay," she said, turning to BJ. BJ nodded, and Stephanie gave her a weak smile. "I’m gonna go to the bathroom." She quickly left the room, and BJ gave her brother a puzzled look. He was about to reply, but then someone at the pizza place picked up the phone. He gave them the order for delivery and was about to talk to his sister when he realized that she had left the room. He sighed to himself and went to watch TV while he waited for the pizza to come. He was just sitting down to watch the Simpsons when he realized that he hadn’t thought about Kirsten at all that day.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
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