Imogen ordered French mani-pedis for both of us. I wasn’t going to lie, it was probably the most relaxing thing I had ever done in my entire life. I closed my eyes and nearly fell asleep, I was so in my Zen. It was only when we were finished that I discovered my fingernails had gained a centimeter or two. I tried to open Imogen’s car door, and they clicked uncomfortably against the exterior.

“Is it supposed to be this impossible to use my hands?” I asked.

“I know, right?!” Imogen exclaimed, like she had been holding her cynicism in. “Isn’t it maddening?”

“Then why did we—”

Imogen balled her hands as much as her nails would allow, smooshed them into her cheeks, and squealed, “BECAUSE WE LOOK SO DARN FREAKING CUTE.”

We drove straight to Imogen’s house and burrowed ourselves in her bedroom. Her bedroom was pink and frilly—like she hadn’t attempted to redecorate since fifth grade—and featured bookshelves filled with old box sets like Anne of Green Gables and Little House on the Prairie. There was also an assortment of posters, ranging from The Sound of Music to Pride and Prejudice to Josh Groban. Imogen pulled out her desk chair, faced it away from her armoire mirror, and made me sit. I was instructed that I wasn’t allowed to look until she was finished.

“I’ve been watching a ton of makeup tutorials lately for therapeutic reasons,” she said. “Here’s hoping I learned a thing or two in the process!”

Imogen went to town on my face. I closed and opened my eyes when she told me to, puckered my lips, and was instructed on a second-to-second basis to be very, very, very still. I mostly succeeded.

Finally, Imogen took a step back. Her eyes grew large and soft, and her mouth opened, on the fringe of breathless.

“What?” I said. “Is everything okay?”

“Huh?” said Imogen. She snapped out of her daze. “No, it’s…you’re just perfect is all.” She nodded at the mirror. “Go. Look at yourself.”

I stood up and turned around. What I saw reached into my lungs and stole the air right out of me.

The true mastery of Imogen’s art was that it only served to draw attention to Wynonna’s natural features. The eyeliner was laid in thin, perfect lines, the mascara turning her already full lashes into an obsidian picture frame. Her eye shadow was a natural color, but there were possibly three or four different shades blended together in different parts, giving a surreal dimension to the shape of Wynonna’s already uniquely proportioned eyes.

The contouring beneath her cheekbones drew attention to their broadness and strength.