“I’m Sal. I’ll be helping you with your identity for tomorrow.” A short man with small eyes and skin three shades darker than mine leads me into a room filled with clothing and makeup. His voice is all gravel, like he’s lived a hard life and earned every one of his gray hairs. “You’re an inch taller than the girl you’re supposed to be. Any guests who might notice will chalk it up to growth. You’re both young.”
“Who am I supposed to be?” I ask. Korwin, David, and Laura are with their own stylists, each specializing in recreating a persona in record time.
“Anastasia Baltik.” He opens a folder on his dressing table and shows me a picture of a girl who looks nothing like me. Her hair is white as freshly fallen snow, and her eyes are a strange violet color I’ve never seen on a human being. “We will bleach and cut your hair to look like hers. The eyes, we will have to accomplish with lenses you’ll wear over your natural eye.”
“Did she have surgery or does she always where the contacts?” I ask, assuming the violet color is artificial.
“Natural. A rare mutation unique to her and her brother. They are technically blue, but her specific genetic makeup gives them that unique violet quality at the right angle. They’re going to be a bitch to reproduce, but we’ve got the best people working on it. They’ll be custom made for you with pigment programmed to react to the light the way hers do.”
He pulls a dress from the rack. It’s sterling gray with a violet sheen when the cloth bends and a high stiff neck that I suspect will reach past my earlobes. Long bell sleeves are cut to hang to the knuckle. The front of the skirt is short but the back extends all the way to the floor. He reaches under the table to produce a pair of silver fur-lined boots with buckles from ankle to knee. “Please tell me you’re smaller than a size eight. These are her actual shoes. One of a kind. We’d be hard pressed to reproduce them. Handmade and lined with white tiger that’s been illegal for five generations. They do not adjust to the wearer.”
I shrug and lift the boots from his grip. Kicking off my shoe, I shove one foot into the unbuckled boot. It’s a tight, uncomfortable fit and I can hear Sal inhale as I try my best to force it.
“Oh wait,” I say, removing my foot from the boot. I pull off my thick wool sock and stick my bare foot inside. This time, I get it all the way on. I pull the buckles together to demonstrate that it will work. “It’s tight, but I’ll be able to walk.”
He lets out the breath he’s holding. “Amen.” He pulls the boot off my foot. “Now, with this dress, we will need to pad your figure. You’re much thinner and harder than Anastasia. We’ll use rubber to add some fat to your cheeks, reshape your nose, and fill out your neck. A thick layer of makeup and you should be a ringer. I can’t do anything about the muscles in your arms.”
“Good enough to fool those closest to her?”
“As far as we know, there is no one close to her aside from her parents, and they will be played by Laura and David.”
“Then why are we worried about accuracy?”
“No one is close to her, but most of the country is familiar with her from the social networks and reality TV. You must learn to imitate her mannerisms and language. Come.”
Sal leads me into a room with a large computer monitor and fires it up. A few selections and I’m staring at a video of Anastasia.
“You must not vear dat. You vill embarrass Rayle and I. Vhy must you be zuch a rube?”
“This was taken yesterday, just before we abducted the family. Notice the inflection, and how she selects a fruit from the basket with only her thumb and forefinger. It’s fashionable to hold the hands thusly.”
He demonstrates, copying the girl on the screen. I try it but don’t look nearly as graceful.
“She carries her elbows away from her body,” I say, copying what I observe.
“To make herself look bigger.” He nods. “In Northern Province, they pronounce their consonants differently, and watch your inflections. Try it.”
“You must not vear dat,” I imitate. Her accent is almost Pennsylvania German, and I come close.
“Again.”
I square my back and select an apple from the bowl with my thumb and forefinger, careful to hold my elbow away from my body. “Vhy must you be zuch a rube?”
“Very good,” Sal says.
“My voice is higher than hers. I’m not sure I can match it.”
“Don’t worry about that. You’ll have a voice simulator implanted under your mask.”
“She doesn’t appear overly friendly.”
“She’s not. Keep to yourself unless someone approaches you first, and pretend like they have to earn every word from you.” He replays the clip. “Watch how she pops one hip out. She’s all attitude and entitlement.”
I pop my hip out and look him in the eye. “Do not vhine to me about your problems,” I say.
“Perfect.” Sal smiles. “I almost feel guilty ruining a nice girl like you, even for one mission. Come on. I want to get the bleach on your hair.”
I run fingers through my honey-brown layers. “Can’t I wear a wig?”
He shakes his head. “Sorry, no. The style is flat and straight to the shoulders, very hard to achieve with artificial hair.”
I sit down pensively in the chair he indicates, and he wraps a plastic cape around my shoulders. He dons a pair of gloves and pours a few liquids into a measuring cup. The content is lavender in color and smells toxic. I shift nervously as he pins up sections of my hair.
He meets my eyes in the mirror in front of me. “I’m not a professional stylist. I owned a theater back in the glory days before the Greens put me out of business. Had to learn this for the new role. I don’t mind, though. You know why I love working with hair?”
“No. Why?”
He grabs a strand and brushes the purple goo from root to tip. “Because if you hate it, you can always grow it back the way it was.”