I finished with the eyeliner, and stepped back to admire the work. A white line along the lower lid, to make the eyes appear larger, and black mascara, because her eyelashes were apparently white without. Erin had handled the careful application of fine veins of black eyeliner that fanned out from the eyes in parallel with the eyelashes. They had been drawn in waves with each wave washed out with pats of the white cover-up, so the lines appeared to fade out and have dimension. At each corner of each eye, I’d drawn a hooked triangle, with the hook pointing down at the inner corners and up at the outer ones.

Erin had a bit of the softer, artistic touch for the lines and fading-out, I had the steadier hand for the line work.

The only mirror was a compact mirror, too small to show everything, so I took a picture instead. I showed Ashley.

“Good,” she said. She smiled.

“Stay put,” Kenzie said. “Eye camera. Here we go, and I can’t touch your face because I don’t want to smudge the nice makeup.”

“Camera first next time, then,” Ashley said.

Erin clearly had the heebie jeebies, as Kenzie held the needle within a few inches of Ashley’s eye, swinging it within half of an inch of the eye as she rotated one part to get it tighter.

“Okay,” Kenzie said. “Here we go. Same as before, but don’t flinch and keep your eye fixed on one point. Making contact on three, ready?”

“Ready.”

“Zero, one, two, thre—wait.”

Ashley stayed stock still, waiting.

“Haha,” Kenzie said. “I should turn it on first, or it won’t phase in. That would’ve been a mess.”

“Would’ve ruined my makeup.”

“On three, this time. Zero, one, two, three. Can you feel it this time?”

Erin shook her arms, as if she couldn’t shake off the goosebumps, and walked away, her back to the scene.

“I feel like it’s there, but it doesn’t feel five percent there.”

“And…” Kenzie held up another, shorter needle. “For the effect. On three. Zero, one, two, three.”

Kenzie stepped back. Ashley’s pupils were gone.

“Ta da!”

“Projection?”

“Super low tech,” Kenzie said. “I put liquid eraser on the projection caps, which aren’t phased in. It’s not perfectly matched to the rest of her eyes, but it works if you aren’t looking super close.”

I took a photo and showed Ashley.

She stood from her seat, and bent over, hand on Kenzie’s shoulder, planting a kiss on the very top of Kenzie’s head.

“You like it?”

“It’s good.” Ashley looked at Sveta, Erin, Kenzie and I, and then said, “Thank you.”

With that, she put her mask on carefully, eyes still decorated behind the eyeholes, and walked briskly on her way.

“I feel pretty good about how we did there,” Erin said. “Can you send me the picture?”