Ageless Beauty

You could say I developed a crush on Christian De Luca within freshman year. I hadn't actually spoken to him, or even seen him anywhere outside of school, but there was just something about him. All the other girls saw it, too. I always heard them gushing every time he passed by, or I'd see the way all the pretty girls in school would surround him at his table every lunch. I had never seen him with a girlfriend, though, which I found quite odd. You'd think he'd take advantage of the fact that he had dozens of girls at his disposal, but he never did. Not publicly, at least. As for his personal life--His life beyond the halls of our school, he could be taking advantage of it. He could be getting with all the girls, but I didn't like to think about that. I really wanted to be that girl, you know? The girl he wanted.

I wasn't so okay with me anymore. I know I shouldn't doubt myself, but I couldn't help it. I had never liked a boy before--Especially not a boy on Christian's level. So, I started hating myself, my clothes and the way I carried myself. I was invisible and completely unappealing to any[/i[ boy, so I had to change that. It took a while for me to finally take the initiative to do so, but when I did, I requested the help of my sister. Sarah had always loved fashion, and knew a lot about boys from the magazines that she read. She knew exactly what to do when I asked her to help me after I finished my finals.

It felt weird, asking my little sister to help me, her older sister. I felt like I should be the one guiding her, but I wasn't. Sarah was perfectly capable on her own, and didn't need guidance from her older sister. That sort of made me sad, in a way. Like, I was happy that she was getting along just fine. That she was independent and could function very well on her own, but I wanted to be there for her. I wanted to help her through the tough things that may happen in her life. But I was also glad that she could help me.

The first thing I wanted to change was my body. I wasn't exactly overweight, but my thighs and love handles were larger than I'd like. In an article in one of the women's magazines Sarah read, it listed a variety of different stretches and exercises I could do to lose fat in those areas. So, I went for runs every morning at five o'clock, and I started watching what I'd eat. No more sweets after dinner, unless it was Friday, because Friday was the annual McGrath movie night. And what would a movie be without candy?

Come August, I was close to where I wanted to be. Eventually, I cut down my candy intake to every two weeks, and sometimes ran twice a day. My hard work really showed; both physically and internally. My metabolism had seemingly sped up, so I didn't have to worry so much about burning every single calorie I took in. So, it was time for the second stage of my transformation.

I had been saving my money since the summer of eighth grade graduation, so I had more than enough to buy a new wardrobe. Sarah also pitched in some money, claiming that she had been waiting for me to become a real girl as long as she could remember. She took me shopping at the local mall, and brought along a list of stores we were to go into and snippets of outfits from various fashion magazines. We had spent nearly all our money, and could barely carry all of our bags as we waited for the bus to come.

When we finally arrived home, our Mother was already waiting by the kitchen table with a variety of different tools laid out over the surface. She worked with hair and cosmetics in a salon downtown, and had been just itching to finally cut my hair and show me how to use make-up.

"Are you ready?" She had asked me, holding up a pair of her scissors.

I looked down at my hair, lifting a piece of it off my shoulder and twisting it between my fingertips. I hadn't cut my hair, besides trims, since I was twelve years old. I had grown to really love every single inch of it--Even the split and dead ends. But I nodded to her, and sat down in the chair she had pulled out for me. She wrapped me in a smock, and wet my hair with a squirt bottle full of water before going straight to work. I could hear and feel the scissors gnawing away at the dark, brown strands of my hair. It made me cringe each time the scissors snipped, as if she were cutting my skin. I thanked God that the process was as quick as it was, because I wasn't sure I could take another minute of it.

My Mother blow-dried my hair, and scrunched the ends so that my natural waves were more prominent before grabbing the hand-held mirror. She held it in front of my face, watching me with a hopeful expression. I smiled weakly at her before reluctantly turning my gaze to the mirror. My hair was much shorter now--Much wavier now that it had been cut and layered. I had bangs that swept across my forehead, just above my eyebrows. It was a style I thought that I would never suit, but it worked for me. My Mother told me it was manageable--That all I had to do was brush it every morning. I liked that, because I wasn't a fan of spending a lot of time on doing my hair.

"You don't like it, do you?" She frowned.

I turned to her with a furrowed brow, and shook my head from side to side. I insisted that it was really, really pretty, but it was going to take some getting used to. It was nearly seven inches shorter than it had been but twenty minutes ago, and now it was all gone. It wasn't something I was going to take lightly, especially since my hair seemingly didn't grow. It would take a great deal of time to get it where it used to be.

She had smiled weakly at me, and said that the haircut was enough for today. That tomorrow, after dinner, she would teach me the basics of make-up application. And then she sent me upstairs to take a nap, claiming that I looked absolutely exhausted. So, I made my way upstairs to my bedroom and lowered myself onto the pink, floral sheets of my bed. I wondered if anyone would notice me when I arrived back at school. I wondered if they would tell me I looked nice, or that I at least looked different than I did last year.

Would the even notice at all?

I was invisible, I suppose. Not many people noticed me in the halls, and no one ever spoke to me. Maybe they didn't even realized I existed. Maybe Christian didn't really realize I existed. Perhaps it was just an illusion of the mind when Christian and I made eye contact in the halls, or when he smiled. Maybe he was seeing past me, but I just convinced myself that he was looking at me. Maybe it was just my brain playing cruel tricks on me.

But if he had noticed me, would he notice that I've changed? Would he like what I've become? I wasn't exactly sure if I liked what I had become, because it all seemed very shallow. I was changing my appearance to get a boy to like me. I didn't like the sound of that at all. My Mother always told me that I should never, ever change myself to make someone like me. That if I was myself, I would find someone even better that liked me for my flaws. But I couldn't help it. I just wanted Christian so badly. I wanted to speak to him, at least. I wanted to get to know him. So, I guess I just assumed that I would get there by becoming a better version of me.

But this isn't really me at all.