Jun was shaken by the latest changes. Just a few minutes talking to a stranger had transformed her entire life, including what part of the world she had grown up in. Two different cultures clashed in her fragmented childhood memories, with the ones she knew to be fake winning more often than not every time she reached for a piece.
"I have to tell him," she resolved to herself. With every change he unwit-- he uncons-- he made that he didn't realize he was making, Jun was drifting farther away from who she really was. She tried to calm herself with the reassurance that she could take off the costume and it would all be undone. But when was she going to be able to actually do that?
Until then... "I have to tell him." She was nervous about admitting to Kelan that he had this power over her. Would he abuse it? No, a thought said. He was trustworthy. But wait, didn't she only trust him because he had told her to? Had he actually told her? When exactly would he have told her something like that? They'd talked so much already, and her changes were so distracting...
Jun realized Kelan had stopped walking right before she collided with his backside. She jumped back and gave a start, then blushed and straightened out her dress. "Gom... Sorry."
He had already turned to look at her. "Uh, no, I'm sorry. I stopped because I heard you talking. What do you have to tell me?"
Jun blinked and her eyes went wide. "Eeehhh..." She must have talked to herself out loud without realizing! "I... err..." She turned her head, trying to think, and her eyes fell on an endcap full of temporary tattoos and fake nails and eyelashes. An idea came to her.
"I... I found something!" She said nervously, turning back to him with a forced smile. "For you to buy me." This worked on both levels: she could avoid telling him about her costume, and it fulfilled her obligation to point out something for him to get. Plus, it wasn't anything super expensive, so she didn't feel that guilty.
Kelan stepped up to the endcap and looked through the items. Most of them were garish colors, and had exaggerated measurements, but that was kind of the point as costume pieces. Still, a few might have worked on her dark ensemble.
He looked back at her, skepticism clouding his face. "I don't know... are you sure this is all you want?"
Jun nodded.
Kelan re-examined the selection of nails. "I'm no expert on fashion or anything, but these are all really colorful. And you have such great nails already. Even this set would just be redundant," he said, pointing to a kit holding 10 press-on black nails, each more than an inch long. "And your own eyelashes are more ex... than any of these fakes." Jun couldn't catch the long word he used. It sounded kind of like "extinguish," but she knew what that word meant and it didn't work in that sentence. Kelan straightened back up and turned to her, smiling warmly. "A goth like you has those kind of details down pat. And you must have at least a few real tattoos, right?"
Jun felt a faint tingle across her face, concentrated mostly around her eyes. Then it spread down her neck and arms to concentrate on the tips of her fingers. Then it spread out across her whole body, growing fainter and fainter until it was gone.
"What...," she whispered in surprise. She lifted the backs of her hands to look at them. Each powdery-white finger was crowned in exquisitely thick, polished-black nails, which stuck out from the ends of her fingers by quite a ways. She tugged and tried to twist one to see if it would come off. With their sheer length, it was difficult to maneuver her fingers to pinch one nail without snagging on any others. When she finally did get a hold of the nail on her right index finger, she could feel the tugging all the way into its root. These weren't press-ons! And judging by the way her eyelids felt a little heavier each time she blinked, Jun guessed her eyelashes had grown as well. "What did you do to me?" she asked breathlessly.
"What?" Kelan asked. "Sorry, you have a very soft voice. It's hard to hear you."
"Eeto...," Jun stammered. She "corrected" herself. "I said... what did you want to get me?" Her volume dropped slightly with every word, as if she couldn't muster up the lung power she needed to speak clearly.
A twinkle appeared in Kelan's eye. "Honestly, I'm not totally sure, but if you're okay with me picking something out, I'd be honored to. You're a really cool woman. You seem like the kind of person who enjoys dressing fancy but also lets her hair down a lot." He looked around at the shop's wares, tapping his chin. "I'll try to pick out something that will do you justice. Please be honest about what you think when you see it, though."
"Hai... I mean... okay," Jun nodded. Kelan resumed course through the store and Jun shuffled daintily alongside him, her pigtails slapping the front of her skirt. She absentmindedly reached for her hair bands. She plucked and pried at them clumsily with her nails until they finally pulled free. She slipped them all the way out of her hair and discarded them on a passing shelf. Then she flung her long, dark locks behind her shoulders and swayed her head a few times to fan them out into a luscious, silky curtain. Somehow, doing that made her feel a lot better.