Darcy watched the city of Cardiff tootle by outside the minibus window. It was tipping down to the extent cars ploughed through deep pools of water, and plumes gushed into the air and soaked the wide pavement complete with fenced-in trees. The sun had been warm and pleasant, the sky clear until they’d flown over the Severn and thick clouds enveloped them. She hadn’t been to Wales before but was noting not to bring suntan cream. Yes, if in Wales, bring raincoat.
“Mum, aren’t you going to watch the video?” Susannah sounded delighted. She’d been beaming and chattering on the whole journey into Cardiff from the airport. Mostly with Marge, but it was pleasing to hear her appreciating good television.
“Yes. I like to do it outside the residence. It gives me a nice feel before I head in and pick up the patient.” She smiled. Her routine was perfectly timed. She pulled a pencil from her bag and twirled it between thumb and forefinger. It would be one of the live snippets. Every evening, seven p.m., primetime, one hour of fashion dreams would be made.
“What’s that?” Susannah leaned in and frowned at the pencil. “Did you seriously buy something cheap?”
“This is a quality product. The lead is far less prone to breakage, and it has a pleasant red and orange.” She smiled. They’d been the pencils she always used. Her first pack that her mother bought her. The feel of the ridged angles was pleasant to the fingertip.
“It’s cheap.” Susannah sniggered and tucked her hair behind her ears. “They hand those out in school. How do I not know this about you?”
“Because they are more than adequate.” She tapped Susannah on the nose and put her headphones on. “Now go have some make-up applied, and do not chew your lip.” She sighed. Chapped lips on high definition television? Not a good mix. She turned to her tablet, flicked it on, pulled up the video Marge had uploaded, and hit play.
“Kate is cool,” a boy dressed as a sprout yelled, then jumped up and down. Why a sprout? At least it was healthy. “Needs a smile.”
“Mikey,” a woman with very badly dyed hair muttered. She ushered the boy to the side and peered up at the camera. “Oh, it’s on?”
Mikey jumped up and down. “Tell Doctor Darcy Kate smile.”
Oh, he was cute, and he’d had peas for lunch. Should sprouts eat other vegetables? A touch on the violent side.
“Right. Hi, Ms McGregor. My name is Mildred Bonvilston.” The woman now had an odd attempt at a posh accent. Sounded more like she had a cold. “I’m Kate’s mum, and I—”
“We!” Mikey jumped up and down.
“We,” Mildred said with a sigh. “We need your help with Kate. She’s a good girl. A really good kid who has been heartbroken…twice.”
Twice? She frowned. Once was unfortunate, but twice was just careless.
“She was in love with Bennie, her best friend, for a very long time, but Bennie isn’t very nice.” Mildred lit a cigarette.
“Ben slapper,” Mikey said with utter seriousness.
“Mikey!” Mildred covered his mouth. “Sorry, children… Anyway. Then her partner ran off with Bennie, and, well…” She puffed on her cigarette. Hmm, she had crows’ feet and needed a more mature skin care regime. “Kate’s been very quiet since.”
Darcy twirled her pencil. Bennie? If he’d run off with her partner, then Kate fell in love with gay men? How were clothes going to help that? She glanced at Marge, who was studying her as if waiting for a reaction.
“You did say you’d decided on a challenge, but don’t you think Kate is beyond our remit?” Just a gentle suggestion. She could change the clothes and rejuvenate the woman, but she wasn’t going to be able to change who she loved, was she?
“What do you mean?” Susannah snapped from the back of the bus. She tussled with the poor make-up artist, Harold or George or whatever his name was. Marcus? No, no that was the hair stylist.
“I mean that Kate’s case is hopeless. How can I change her…tastes?” Not quite the correct term. Love focus? No that sounded like something Zoë would say.
“See, told you,” Susannah muttered to Marge.
Marge scowled enough that her wild eyebrows covered her sunken eyes and her overly large nostrils flared. “You try, like you do with everybody else.”
Did Marge fall in love with gay men too? Darcy turned back to the screen to ignore the glare. Kate walked into a room, some family function with girls in white tights giggling as boys in waistcoats slid across a dance floor on their knees.
Kate was tall, slim, had a graceful way of walking, yet was not quite feminine. Her body shape was more athletic. Yes. No real shape, or at least none in that disgusting excuse for a dress. Who put a bridesmaid in floral and straight leg to the knee? She looked like she should be in the Women’s Institute, not a function. Then she turned to the camera, strolled over, and beamed. Green eyes, long eyelashes, glossy lips, and a handsome smile—charming, sure, sexy.
Darcy swallowed. “Definitely hopeless.” She clutched her pencil. Had she squeaked? Did Susannah notice? “Can’t do a thing with her.”
“You’ll have to.” Marge nodded to the guys at the back, who rolled open the doors. “We’re here.”
“No…” She flicked her pencil through the air. She couldn’t. No, no, no.
Marge motioned to the doorway. “You can sit and sweat or have a touch up… Or would you prefer Susannah took the lead?”
Susannah scowled at her from the back. “Yeah, I could tell her there’s nothing wrong with her dress sense and to be happy with who she is?”
The video rolled on. Kate was in work as a security guard. Somehow, she looked more feminine, but in that stage-like way when a voluptuous screen siren strolled out in a tux. She snapped her pencil. Oh dear. Oh dear. Shit.
“That a yes?” Susannah went for the door.
“No.” Darcy stood up. Her tablet dropped onto the floor, the headphones yanking at her earlobes. “No, you stay.” She rubbed at her throat. She’d need champers for this…a lot of it. “I’ll—” She rubbed harder, then stopped. Best not to leave marks. “Touch-up.” She stumbled off the bus and straightened out her jacket, only to see lead on her hands. “Wet wipe.”
The make-up artist hurried over—Joe, no, Lionel…no—and dabbed at her neck.
“And rolling…” Marge nodded to her and motioned to the house where the crew were lurking.
Darcy turned on the smile. “Good evening. Self-confidence is all about knowing who you are.” Go with it; the opening spiel was always drivel. “It’s a balance of what you want and what you need. Kate Bonvilston is a young woman who wants the unobtainable…yet needs to love herself first.” She strolled forward, stumbling over the wire. Never did that. Idiot. “Many women are forced to wear a uniform, whether that is physical or emotional, but it’s easy to lose oneself in that corporate battlefield. So in this style surgery, we secure the security guard some style and help her find her inner smile.”
“And roll the opening credits.” Marge barked into her radio, then rolled her eyes and stomped over to the front door. “I want a picture of the door before Darcy treads all over the wires again.”
Darcy wheezed out a breath and looked to Susannah, who studied her.
“Inner smile? So you listen only to super-vegetables, or all of them?” Susannah picked up the discarded tablet with a daft grin. “Do you give peas a chance too?” The screen showed a frozen picture of Kate with that sure, sexy smile on her face. “Maybe I need to dress up as a carrot—no, an onion—so you pay more attention to me?” She motioned around her. “Or, as we’re in Wales, how ‘bout a leek?”
“He wasn’t a pea, and he was right.” She narrowed her eyes. She could Google the national emblems of Wales too. “You’d have to be a daffodil, not a leek. Less pungent.” She smiled and touched her thumb to Susannah’s cheek, wiping a splodge of foundation. “But one must always listen to sprouts. They often make sense…a bit like daughters.”
She held Susannah’s gaze, the twinkle of a smile in her brown eyes. She hadn’t seen that look for so long, too long. A swell of love bubbled up, and she kissed her on the forehead.
Susannah stared at her.
“Darcy, in position,” Marge snapped. Clearly the hormone replacement needed a higher dose. “Credits are nearly finished!”
“Of course,” she chimed, and strolled over on shaky legs. Now to meet Kate…live on camera.
Shit.