Accusations d'amour
A/N: I am loving Heroes and Ugly Betty right now.
Hair & Makeup
"There's a ball tomorrow?" Betty said.
"Yeah," Daniel said. "It should be pretty fun. I mean, yeah, it could be a bit old-fashioned, but -"
"Daniel," Betty interrupted. "There is a ball tomorrow."
He looked puzzled. "Yeah."
"There is a ball tomorrow, and I'm not going."
Looking completely bewildered, he asked, "Why?"
"Because I hate balls!" she wailed. "I boycotted my prom, Daniel. I wouldn't go for my life."
"If you've never been to one, you can't hate it," he said, but his tone was pleading.
It was ridiculous how much his puppy eyes could affect her, Betty thought, and she relented slightly, switching to a different tack. "Well, it's too bad. I don't have a dress."
"That's easy," Daniel said, looking relieved. "We'll buy you one tonight."
"No," Betty said, shaking her head firmly.
The three of them, the boss, the assistant and Carole from the Mode team, stopped abruptly outside Prada, Daniel gesturing helplessly. "Betty..."
"No way." She seemed to dig her heels in, crossing her arms.
He turned, despairingly, to Carole. "I can't get her to go in any of these shops."
"We should just bundle her in," the young redhead said, grimly.
"Carole," Betty said, shocked. "You can't just do that."
The Mode girl grinned. "You have to get over your outer contempt and innate fear of fashion sometime."
Betty turned to Daniel; he looked helpless still, and seemed on the verge of backing down.
"Honestly," Carole scoffed. "You have such a huge soft spot for your wonderful assistant, Daniel. So go away and let me work her round."
Somehow, after several more dismissals, each getting sterner, she managed to shoo the Editor-in-Chief away. Then she gave Betty an (so Betty thought) evil grin of triumph.
"So," she said, dripping poisonous honey. "How about a dress for our prom princess?"
"Ooh, I love this one," Carole said, holding out a little black dress. Betty brushed past without a word, and she put it back, huffing. "Just a suggestion. You got any?"
With a hopeful look, Betty pointed at a high-backed, high-topped, long light blue affair. Her companion wrinkled her nose. "Ew."
She rolled her eyes.
They went through about five more dresses before Carole began accumulating several over her arm. "You're gonna need to try these on," she announced somberly.
Betty hesitated after trying four on, consecutively; black, blue, green, and a lovely dark shiny red.
"I don't like the black on you," Carole said, decisively. "Not lively enough. But then that leaves blue, green and red. Which do you like, then?"
Flushing slightly, Betty considered. She liked the red one the most; however, it was also the most revealing of the three. Not that any of them were particularly revealing at all. But to her...
Heck, she decided. She'd worn far worse (like that horrible leather affair in her first days at Mode).
"The red one," she said, and it was done.
"Betty!" Carole grinned. "You look awesome. Now we're halfway there."
They were in the hotel the next day, six hours before the ball was to start at eight.
"Halfway there?" Betty repeated, apprehensively.
"Well, yeah," Carole said. "I mean, we obviously still need hair and makeup." She turned to the mirror and adjusted her own ball dress.
"Oh, I don't think that's nec-"
"So the people are coming in a few minutes," Carole continued, smoothly. "Sit back, Betty! Enjoy this stuff. It's not torture."
"But - I don't do hair and makeup," Betty broke in, finally.
The girl frowned. "What d'you mean?"
"Like - I don't do them. I'm not that type of - girl."
"Well today you are," Carole snorted. "It's a ball, for God's sake. You can't go there like that -" gesturing at Betty's face "-heck, I can't go there like this." She gestured now to her immaculate cover girl complexion.
Betty settled forlornly on a chair, and waited.
At six, she rose from the chair and made her way out the door to the lobby to meet Daniel and the rest for dinner before the dance, studiously ignoring Carole.
"Come on, Betty," she cajoled. "You look good. Different, yeah, but good. Why are you so against that?"
"Because," Betty said, surprising Carole by speaking to her, "it's not me. It makes me a person I'm not. Like I'm trying too hard. Pretending. I don't fit in in places like this, never have, never will, can't just start now."
They paused in their progress. "You're bigger than your past," Carole said, finally. "Things change. People change. Cliches both but cliched because they're true, Betty."
"Now come on," she said, amiably, without waiting for a response. "We got some places to go."
She hadn't seen Daniel since he left at Prada the other day, Betty thought, and then realised that she felt slightly nervous, her stomach the way it had been before interviews and exams.
What would Daniel think?