The Author and Her Bodyguard

Chapter 7

Some people love getting dressed up. They enjoy putting on that glitzy dress that weighs ten pounds, makes you itch in a thousand places, causes you to sweat all while forcing you to walk properly if you want to look like a princess instead of a fluff ball of material. Add a pair of deathtrap heels and you've finished your glam up. 

The dress is just the final touch of the fancy filter process. You have to do makeup that emphasizes your beauty without looking like your eyes are rubbed in a pile of ash after you destroyed an entire kingdom in a war. It's a fine line between looking like a hooker and looking like a clown. You have to land somewhere in between. Somewhere that says, "I totally dress up every day" and not "I don't have a clue what I am doing." It was a balance that I hadn't quite figured out yet.

Then you have to add jewelry and an elaborate hairstyle that matches your overall look and doesn't look like a toddler was in charge of doing it. Some people work VERY hard to pull off that glamorous look, transforming themselves like those anime transformation sequences where they go from a normal everyday girl into a glittery goddess of power and beauty. If it was as simple to turn into the sparkle version of yourself as pushing a button or saying a catchphrase, I think I'd like getting dressed up too.

But it isn't easy. It takes FOREVER and halfway through I tend to lose motivation. But you can't stop halfway through or else your hair is half curled and you only have makeup on half of your face. And unless it's crazy makeup and hair day somewhere, that won't fly.

So after angry cleaning my entire apartment for obvious reasons named Aiden, I began operation "transformation into a fancy version of myself." One of Sander's other writers had their books made into a movie and I was given a ticket to the red carpet event. SQUEE.

If it wasn't such a big deal, I would have tried to get away with showing up in a nice pair of dress pants and a blouse paired with a pair of cute flats. But my token book tour outfit wasn't going to cut it. Sanders had to tell me that three times before I finally agreed to wear a dress. And three more times before I agreed to her outfit suggestion. A long yellow flowy Grecian style dress that would probably take a team to put me in. BOO. 

I curled my long blond hair and did my best to make my makeup look smokey instead of terrifying, (which depending on what lighting I stood in, probably made me look like an ash princess one moment and a deranged clown the next).

I was struggling into my dress, the long tangled-up material, causing my arms to get trapped halfway through the opening when three knocks came from my front door. "Hold on!" I shouted through the dress material, my arms feeling like they belonged to a T-Rex as I tried to shimmy inside.

After several unflattering poses, and grunts of determination, I got the material over my head. Reaching over my shoulder, I stretched down to tug the zipper closed, but came to a shocking revelation. I couldn't reach the zipper. Crap!

I ran in a circle like a puppy trying to catch his tail as panic set in. The lady at the store had helped me with the dress the first time I had tried it on, which meant... 

I turned towards the door and groaned. I swear... the universe hates me on a Mean Girls level.

After several more tries, I relented and walked to the door. Opening it a crack, with the chain still on, I peeked my head through. "Ready?" Aiden asked, glancing down at his watch.

"Um... almost," I replied with feigned confidence. "I need help."

Aiden looked past me into my apartment, eyes scanning what little he could see. "Are you alright? Is someone inside?"

I shook my head, amused. "No. I think if someone was in here, I'd be screaming and you'd be bad at your job."

"Then what—."