I nodded, ignoring the depressing sensation in my gut.
“We’ll have some time to chill afterward. To be clear, after you get some.”
“Mm-hm…What’s all this?” I asked as the other woman ended her call and walked inside.
“Remember my good friend, Leilani? She owns a hair salon that also specializes in special day hair and makeup.”
I waved off Diya and hugged Leilani. “I know this woman! How are you, girl?”
Kimo’s cousin laughed. “Good! So glad I got to see you. It’s been so busy, and I wanted to stop by sooner.”
Leilani always looked perfect, tall and curvy, wearing an off-the-shoulder pink top and skinny ankle pants. Her hair flowed over one shoulder in dark waves with bronze highlights. Her makeup was done professionally down to the eyelash extensions. If I recalled, because she owned her own beauty salon, she went in a little early every day and fixed her hair and makeup there. She’d once said she had to look the part so her customers could see that their stylist knew what she was doing.
I told her, “No worries! Not when you’re hustling and your business is booming! Glad to see you now, though. Are you here for a wedding?”
Leilani looked puzzled before Diya swooped in, ushering me to the counter. “She’s here to help you.”
“What? That’s too much effort. Diya, this isn’t my wedding. I barely know these people.”
“So you’re going to go looking like how you always look?”
“First of all, this isn’t a mainland wedding. It’s going to be relaxed if it’s partly outside. I think.” Despite the guys wearing suits. “And second, it’s not like I’m going to be in any of the pictures. I’m really and truly a last-minute guest because I happened to be here.”
Diya set down the box on the counter, plopped me down onto a barstool, and said, “But you might. The point is, doesn’t matter about knowing the couple. You got a man who’s going to be there.”
I grunted, “So I need to look fancy, is that it? He’s lucky I shaved.”
Leilani stifled a giggle as she opened her own box. The box to the left was full of hair tools from blow dryer to curler. The box on the right was full of makeup and brushes.
“What is my sister paying you? I’ll double it for your time,” I told Leilani.
She waved me off. “If I could get some pics of you for my business social?”
“Of course,” I said. Even if I’d never consider putting in this much effort for a stranger’s wedding, the idea of getting made up by a highly sought-after professional didn’t totally suck.
“Yes!” Diya said, jerking her fist down like she’d won a battle.
“Diya, don’t be that Indian. You should compensate her,” I said even as I reached for my purse.
“Don’t throw around stereotypes. Of course I paid! Don’t touch your wallet!”
I flinched. “Oh my god. Okay. Chill. Can I at least tip?”
“Fine.”
“What are you wearing?” Leilani asked.
I brought out the dress Diya had gifted me.
Leilani gasped.
“I know, right? It’s so pretty!”
“Can I add a purple orchid to your hair?”
“I don’t need an excuse to wear flowers in my hair. Of course!” I said, suddenly very into attending a wedding.
“I know exactly which color palette to use.”
Leilani worked her magic on these slightly frizzy waves so by the time she was done, my black, purple, and lavender hair had texture, definition, and oh so much shine. I was practically taking notes on a style that looked so easy to obtain but I knew there was no way I’d be able to replicate this on my own.
She then went to work on my face, when I reminded her, “You know that I haven’t mastered winged eyeliner, much less contouring.”
“I got you,” she replied and talked through every step, every layer, and the techniques she was using and why. Talk coding to me or research, and we would be fine. Talk makeup application, and I was totally lost. This was an art I’d never wrap my head around.
“Leilani!” I squealed when she’d finished, oohing over my reflection as Diya oohed alongside me. “I look like a freaking princess. Thank you!”
“Thank you for letting me play with your style!”
I fluttered my lashes. Oh, they were so long and thick and dark. And yes to every chance at wearing glitter, like the gold and pink shimmer on my eyelids. But the lipstick stole the entire show: a soft, floral-oil, pinkish-purple shade that matched the belt and the orchid in my hair.
“You look, and smell, like paradise,” Diya said.
“That’s so cheesy!”
“But true! Ugh, that man is going to take one look at you and tell the groom he needs to get out of there the second the wedding is over!”
My cheeks flushed. I could only dream for a man to see me that way. Sure, I’d had boyfriends and sexy encounters—and Sunny gave looks so scorching that my knees went weak—but none of them ever gave off the particular vibes of them falling to their knees with one look at me. Maybe that was an unobtainable fantasy, only happened in movies and in books, taught to us by poetry and impressed into our minds by raunchy TV scenes. But I’d seen the way Kimo looked at Diya like she was a fabled queen who’d mesmerized him with her presence. So I knew that kind of attraction existed. But I was also aware that it didn’t exist for most.
