I pause, take a moment to genuinely think about that answer. “Trial and error. Lots of time helping VIP clients at Magdelena.” Having a clear-eyed vision of what I want, I say silently to myself.

“The best way to fit in, to get people to like you? Especially uber-rich, powerful ones?” Page looks up expectantly from her phone, eyes me studiously. “Ask them about themselves. Pretend like they’re the most interesting person in the world. Listen more, speak less. You can’t go in there talking about Odilie, asking direct questions about her. Let her come up organically. My roommate taught me that. He’s a journalist.” Page types this up on her phone and I straighten my spine. My little pupil.

“Now, let’s do your makeup.” I guide her into the bathroom, which is cavernous. Two sinks, a new shower, a Jacuzzi. They really gutted whatever charming interior was here before they made it into this nouveau riche monstrosity.

I pull the stool from the vanity and Page sits down obediently as I perch on the bathroom’s decorative chair. “The key here is to be as simple as possible. You’ll be a laughingstock if you look like you tried. We’re going for the natural look, so wipe everything off you have on now.” And Page does so without protest, smearing a face towel black and beige and red, a mottled bruise of a color.

I start on her. Her brows are a mess—overly shaped and far too long, but I can work with all of it. We sit there in silence as I draw on her. She’s actually kind of pretty, once you take away all the bad makeup. She has good, round eyes, cute freckles, nice cheekbones.

“I wonder if Odilie did this,” she says quietly as I even out the fawn-colored eye shadow I’ve picked for her. “I mean, I know she did. She had that whole makeover that you already know about.” She opens her eyes, meets my gaze, her pupils latching on to mine, brown eyes so like her sister’s, ones I saw pixelated over and over again, that for the briefest moment her face materializes in her irises, like Odilie is coming to life behind her sister’s eyes, grasping for me, for my neck.

I startle and blink and when I open my eyes, Page’s are closed again. I use a Q-tip to wipe away some powder at the top of her lid. “Let’s call this a make-under,” I say. I don’t want to think about Odilie. Even though she’s everywhere, watching from all the little bathroom crannies, haunting the face into which I’m looking, so, so alike.

I pinch my skin. Not right now, brain.