The Price of Beauty

Chapter Two: Decisions

“Easy there,” Faith said as she supported Nina on her shoulder. One trembling foot after another as Nina slowly made her way through the door of her home, after two long months spent recuperating in the hospital.

“Take me to the dresser,” Nina breathed heavily, the walk talking its toll on her.

“Nina!” Faith’s eyes widened, “You don’t have to!”

“Please, Faith,” Nina gulped. I saw how your eyes dilated when you saw me. I see how everyone looks at me. She had not had to opportunity to look into any mirror at the hospital. Her face had been bandaged until yesterday anyway. The cab driver had died on impact but Nina had managed to survive. The glass shards had pierced her face and cut her skin open and the impact had broken her wrist and left a long scar on her thigh, but for the most part, she had eluded death.

It was her face which worried Nina the most. The doctor had made clear that she would be left with a twisted nose, scars and patches, that she would not look in the least what she used to look like – and Nina’s first thought had been, “Will Adrian stay with me?” He had visited her several times over the course of two months but was currently attending some workshop at New York. Her muscles had atrophied from lying in bed for so long and the stitch on her thigh made movements painful. In the two months she had been trapped there, she had undergone around 6 operations – to remove the glass shards, to graft skin, to set her nose again, but none of the terrifying hospital lingo had prepared Nina for what she was about to see. Her room had been banned of mirrors because the nurses were afraid patients undergoing major body scarring could be triggered if they scrutinized the process too much. All she knew was that everyone struggled to maintain a straight face once they saw her unbandaged face.

As she came face-to-face with the mirror, all she could manage was an inaudible gasp. Her nose bridge was bent towards the right, her eyes were out of place and around 2 centimeters to the right of where they should be. A scar ran down the side of her face from the forehead to her chin, her chin too was deflected to the right, there was a bald patch on her head, where fuzzy hair was slowly growing, her skin was a patchwork of pale ivory and cream and her eyebrows were absolutely non-existent. She raised a hand and ran it through her cheek but they felt rough and smelt of putrid medicine.

“It’s unreal,” Nina whispered slowly, “To see myself…and not recognize it.” Shock, anger, resignation, she was still coming to terms with them, still unable to grasp or accept that this was it. She saw in her mind all the images of herself and realized she’ll never look like that again.

Faith placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder, “The doctor did say that with some rectification surgeries –“

“Monster!” someone yelled. Nina’s face snapped to the left to see her mother standing in the doorway, gawking at her.

“Mom!” Faith yelled, “Why aren’t you in your room?”

“There’s a monster in the house, housekeeping!” Mrs. Thornton yelled even as Faith tried to take her hand and lead her back into her room. “There’s a monster!”

“Security! We need to call security!” She frantically fought against Faith who was holding her in an arm grip and leading her away. Nina watched silently, rooted to the spot. She looked back into the mirror as a tear formed in one of the squinty eyes and travelled downwards in a curved path, across a jagged terrain.

***

It came earlier than expected. Nina had been expecting it, and yet the finality of those black words printed on a stark white sheet somehow made the food harder to swallow. Sitting at the table, with a plate of steaming hot toast before her, she read aloud the letter from Elliot Ballet Company, who had had to fire her due to the extended leave and also as she could no longer be considered for the post of a prima ballerina.

“They didn’t really give a clear reason,” Nina said aloud to Faith, sitting on the opposite end of the table. Their mother was still sleeping in her room due to sleeping pills Faith had had to give her last night. She had been too hysterical to sleep ‘with that monster next door’.

“Well...” Faith began, “Two months is a long time in ballet years. They were bound to find someone else for your part in Nutcracker.” It had taken Faith a long time to steel herself when the doctor had first removed the bandage from Nina’s face. She tried her best to keep her breath steady around her, but the patched skin and squinty eyes that peered from a mound of melted skin made her skin crawl. She is still Nina, she is still the sister you love and hate so much, she had chanted to herself the entire night.

“They completely avoided mentioning that the reason I can no longer be a prima ballerina is because I look like a pig!” Nina yelled. Every time she spoke, her thin lips curled in like an old woman’s. Avoiding her eyes and without refuting the truth, Faith simply added, “You need to start looking up clinic brochures then. Moping around won’t help. I’m leaving for college next week and Mom will be picked up by the Bareton Old Age Home people. Time is running away.”

Nina mentioned nothing as she saw Faith avoid looking at her face. “Will you get the groceries today?” Faith asked, as she cleared the table, “I have to visit Bareton to sign some final papers.”

“Me?” Nina looked up, “No way! I’m not stepping out anywhere with this face!”

“Nina, you can’t sit around just because of that,” Faith said, “Adrian is coming to visit you in the evening, you can’t hide forever.”

“What?” Nina felt her feet go cold, as if she had opened the door and been hit by a blast of wind. “A-Adrian? Today?”

“Yes,” Faith recalled, “He called to let me know that he came back a day early to see you.” No sooner had to words left her mouth that she saw Nina’s grotesque face take on a shade of gray.

“Are you okay?” she asked, afraid to touch her face but worried all the same.

“I-I can’t,” Nina said shakily, her eyes drooping into the folds underneath, “I can’t meet him…”

“Should I tell him to come tomorrow then?” Faith asked, placing a hand on Nina’s shoulder.

“No!” Nina said. “I can’t meet him, ever! Faith, how can I? Look at me! I’m a monster. I’m an ugly, old, hag. I – This is just…I hate myself! I don’t want Adrian to see me like this! He’ll hate me forever.”

“I’m sure…” Faith began but stopped herself. She took a deep breath as she placed her hands on Nina’s and bent down to be at par with her face. It was red and splotchy with eyes far apart like a chameleon’s. Swallowing her disgust, Faith kept a hand on her cheek. It came in contact with skin that felt soft and mushy, like rotted cheese. Running her hand down her check, she said slowly, “It’s alright if you don’t want to meet him, Nina. But you won’t be like this forever. We’ll find you a nice plastic surgery clinic and set everything straight. It’s just a phase and you’re strong enough to make through it. If Adrian is put off enough to hate you, perhaps he never deserved you anyway.”

“B-But,” Nina began as she choked on her tears, “We already spent so much on my medical bills! We don’t have enough for plastic surgery! We’ll have to pay the monthly bill for Bareton’s too including the down payment. You’ll have to take care of your college funds. And now I’ve lost my job and nobody’s ever going to hire with this face. I don’t want to lose Adrian too.”

“Oh, there’s enough money. I’m working two jobs part-time, we still have the nest egg dad left us, all untouched,” Faith encouraged her. “You and I, we’ll make it through, Nina.”

Nina looked at her little sister, all grown up and taking charge. Wiping her tears, she managed a light smile. Faith looked at the thin lips stretch themselves into an unusual shape which she assumed to be a smile. She bit her cheek to keep herself from wincing and patted Nina’s head lightly.