Colour Her

Flowers and Keyboards 3

Emmy Engberts

Colour Her (Flowers and Keyboards 3)

Copyright © 2020 Emmy Engberts

All rights reserved. No part of this story may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without express written permission of the copyright holder.

Edition: 20200319

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Blurb

The Rainbow Collection, an LGBTQ+ pride flag themed makeup line, brings two unlikely girls together.

Amber runs a semi-popular makeup channel. It combines the two things she loves best, makeup and sharing her passion. While talking face-to-face with people scares her, talking to a camera is much easier, it feels safer.

That distance between herself and the people who watch her videos has always been right for her, until she meets a girl who makes her rethink that position.

Mya is a girl of many interests, from gaming to anime and manga to makeup and clothes, she loves it all. What she likes even more is to surround herself with people who enjoy similar things.

She’s good at talking to people, she loves it even. That’s why she’s training to become a primary school teacher, but there’s one problem, she hasn’t been able to pass her maths exam yet and if she fails it one more time she’ll have to drop out.

The two very different girls share one passion, makeup, and Mya has been a fan of Amber’s channel for years, a big fan. What starts as an unexpected chat in a store, followed by an anonymous gift from Mya, turns much more complicated when Amber might be the only one able to help Mya pass her maths exam.

Amber has no idea Mya sent her the makeup, and Mya doesn’t know how to tell Amber without ruining everything, breaking the fragile trust between them…

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1

Vlogging = Video logging = A method of keeping a log or a diary through videos. This type of video content is especially popular in gaming, makeup and similar hobbies where you can easily share your interest in front of a camera and where adding video to the audio adds extra to the content you’re making. I’ve been doing makeup vlogging for a few years now. I realised early on that while I find it scary to talk to people face-to-face, talking to a camera is by far not as scary, even when I know that people will watch it later. It’s not the sharing that scares me, it’s the immediate interaction.

“Don’t forget to like, subscribe and leave a comment below. I’ll see you in the next video. Love you all.” I wave at the camera, giving my best smile, before I turn the camera off.

I sigh. This was the third time I had to film the outro of the video, but it can’t be helped. Sometimes… Sometimes things really don’t work out the way I want them to. It took me three tries before I was happy with how everything turned out. Three times is still not that bad, in the grand scheme of things, I’ve done worse.

I take the camera from the tripod and connect it to my computer, starting the process of loading all the separate recordings onto my hard drive as I put away the rest of my filming set up. I sort through all the makeup I’ve used in the video and put them away in their own drawers and baskets. Everything in its place, where they belong. Luckily, I already wrote all the brands and colour names down before I started filming. Too often, I’ve put everything away after a long filming session and then, during editing, I’d have to hunt them all down again when I want to put the ‘items used’ in the video's description.

If I keep everything organised, in its own place, finding things I need when I need them is much, much easier. I open a drawer with eyeshadow palettes, putting the one I used today into it, and I take a closer look at the few at the front, the ones I haven’t tried out yet. A lot of new collections have been released in the last couple of weeks, and I haven’t been able to catch up on reviewing and trying everything out yet. But I know that my viewers don’t mind, they prefer a comprehensive video about what you can do with a palette, how it will fit into their collection, over one that’s about the latest releases simply to be one of the first vloggers to talk about it. Mine is more of a ‘how-to’ and review channel than a ‘haul’ channel in that way.

I pick up two palettes that I’ve been using a lot lately and put them on top of the dresser for the next video. With fall coming up soon, I want to do a fall makeup video, showing off some of my favourite colour combinations and choices for the coming season, combining some old staples with some cool items from new releases.

I take the filming rig from the table, creating space for me to work, since the table I film on is also my desk, and I turn off the bright filming lights. I still live at my parents’ place, so my bedroom is also my filming room and my bedroom is not big enough for a dedicated filming area. I have to build up my ‘studio’ every time I make a new video. It’s a bit of a hassle, but it also helps me to keep everything separate in my head.

While I set up my rig, I go into ‘filming mode’, thinking over what I’ll be doing and what I want the end result to look like. Then I record the video material, making sure I get everything I need, including all the extra insert shots. As I wait for the videos to load onto the computer, I take the whole filming rig down again, mentally going into ‘editing’ mode, before I get behind my computer and make a cohesive video out of the material.

Creating boundaries between planning, creating, editing and finally uploading and sharing the video really helps me to not worry about every last detail of them. This way, the different parts of the process don’t bleed into each other. It helps me in making sensible decisions at every step, which cuts down on time to make each video.

Taking a deep breath, I slide behind my computer. Time for the next step. The videos are now on my hard drive, and I load them into the video editor. While waiting for the video editor to process the recordings, I grab my planner from my bag and cross off ‘filming’ under this week’s video. Well, for the first video of this week’s lot of videos.

I have to keep track of what I do when, or everything will fall apart. There’s only so many things that I can do each week, between university classes and my channel, I don’t have much time left over for doing other things, or for getting off-track on my plans.

It’s all… It can all get a little overwhelming. How much time being active on social media for my channel or keeping on top of my homework takes, and how little time there is in a day or a week. But no matter how difficult and exhausting it sometimes is, I like it. Doing the channel and going to uni at the same time, it makes me feel good about myself and what I can do. So, no matter how hard it can be… I keep going.

Putting the video in the right order isn’t always a straightforward process. I filmed the start of the video near the end, after I’d already done the whole look, so people could see what I was going to do. And then I had to put in all the little shots of the products I used in the right locations, where they made the most sense. But the video is now being rendered, finally. Rendering always takes such a long time, even though my computer is optimised for it, that’s the nature of the process.

Luckily, this video won’t go live until tomorrow afternoon, so it’s not that I’m under a time crunch. The waiting is mostly annoying because I want to do other things and my computer needs all its energy for this one task, slowing everything else down.

I turn to the shelf I’ve filled with makeup I’ll need for the next video. I’m doing three fall looks, a light one, a romantic one and one that would probably best be described as ‘full glam’, ‘full glamourous’, so a very over the top look. The theme of the video will be a ‘buildable’ look. So that you can go from a light makeup style, for during the day at school or at work, to a medium heavy romantic look, for a date or for having dinner with your friends somewhere nice, to the glamourous style, for going out to clubs or a special event. Not that I have much experience with that last one, but, from seeing other videos, I’m pretty sure I understand the idea behind it, even when I don’t wear makeup like that myself.

Generally, I prefer makeup colours in the purple and cool red hues, and during fall that usually comes down to cranberry reds combined with brown and gold. Every season has different colours that are more prominent than others, but I also have my own preferences and I know what looks good on me. I’ve only got so much money, and time, to try out new products, so I tend to go for what works and build from there, instead of reinventing myself all the time just because of a change in season or trends.

Opening the drawer with lipsticks, I grab a few of my favourite light colours, a couple of the more medium toned ones and finally some really bold ones. Every look I’ll be filming will have their own lipstick, their own eyeshadow and a combination of blush and highlight. There’s so much out there to try and match, but these are mostly my tried-and-true favourites. Of course, the basis like foundation or bronzer aren’t changed between looks, but that’s because I’m building from one look to the next, not redoing it. It makes sense in my head, I just hope it makes sense on video too.

I’m pulled from my thoughts, almost dropping two tubes of lipstick, when there’s knocking on my door. “Amber?” Mum quietly calls out.

“Yes?” I put the lipsticks on the table and open the door.

“Are you done filming”? She looks me over, softly smiling, before peeking into the room.

“Yeah, for now. I was hoping to get an extra video in for this week. Get ahead with the recording, you know?” I step back and let her in.

“Okay.” She nods. “I was wondering if you wanted to go into the city together?” She shrugs a little and looks over to the makeup I’ve spread out all over my desk. “Those colours look really nice on you. Great combinations.” I know she’s waiting for my reply, entertaining herself as she lets me think.

“Ehm…” Going into the city will be fun in some ways, like being able to check out the different stores that we don’t have around here, but at the same time... there’ll be a lot of people, so many impressions going on, overloading my brain. I’ll lose a lot of time, not just by being in the city, but also from recovering afterwards, calming my brain down again.

It’s always a combination of it being fun but it also being really tiring, and it’s the second part I need to consider carefully.

Mum looks up at me again. “You don’t have to, you know. Really. I was just wondering if you wanted to tag along since I’m going anyway.”

I nod. I had been wanting to check out a few new releases at the stores and now I don’t have to go by myself tomorrow after classes, when I’ll already be tired. “When would you like to leave?”

“Not yet. I was thinking... in about an hour?” She raises an eyebrow at me.

If I’ve got an hour to prepare, I definitely have enough time to calmly put together a shopping list. Make sure I don’t forget to look for new releases from a few brands and that I don’t forget to stock up on some makeup staples, like a bottle of nail polish remover and a new tube of a lipstick I really love.

“Sure. I’ll come.” I smile at her, my brain going over the recent releases I’ve been wanting to grab and test out for upcoming videos.

So many new ideas, so many well-known brands coming out with new collections and fall style eyeshadow pallets and things like that. And then, of course, there’s the elusive Rainbow Collection from Curious Cosmetics, a brand new Dutch cosmetics company, who had their first release last week. A lot of people want to get their hands on the items, so much so that I’ve barely been able to find a quart of the pallets in stores or online, and I know that many of the local beauty vloggers have had the same problem.

Curious Cosmetics have already become famous, not just because of the amazing range of products they released but also because of how hard it is to find them. They obviously didn’t expect the line to be this popular, as they’ve already sold out just about everywhere. Which makes hunting down the pieces I still want all the more fun.

“I’ll be down in an hour.”

“Okay. Glad to have you with me.” Mum smiles at me and leaves the room again.

Going into the city hadn’t been the plan for today, but if it means Mum will drive me instead of having to go after classes or by public transport, it’ll be worth it even if it wasn’t planned.

Mum holds up a mirror and I quickly check that my makeup still looks fresh. We’re standing next to the Martini tower and there are some people looking at us funnily, but I don’t care. This is a perfect occasion for a quick video.

I swipe the lip gloss over my lips, working up the shine, and then I put everything back into by bag. I’m a beauty vlogger, I can’t be on video with less than perfect makeup, ever.

Mum smiles as she shakes her head a little. “I don’t know if I’d invited you if I knew you were going to do this.” She winks.

I wink back. “Yes, you would. Gotta post something online today, and they love a short video when I’m out and about.” I take my phone and point it at myself at an angle. I take a quick picture to see what it looks like, and, while not perfect, it will have to do.

“I’ll step back a little.” Mum takes my bag and makes sure that she’s out of view of my video.

I raise the phone again, setting it to record, taking a deep breath before I put on my brightest smile.

“Hey, lovelies! I’m in the city right now, trying to find some cool colours to experiment with in the coming weeks. And, of course, hunt down a few more things from the Rainbow Collection. I’ll post a picture of what I’ve managed to find once I get back home, but I’m hoping to add a few cool items to my collection.” I take a short breath, widening my smile more. “Stay tuned for a three-stage fall makeup tutorial next week, and, hopefully, a couple of rainbow-inspired looks! I’m off for some shopping now. Love you all!”

2

Collection = A range of different types of makeup that are collected under a single theme. Most brands bring out a few collections a year. Commonly, spring, summer, fall and winter or Christmas collection. Many brands also do collections together with famous people or around a new product line. Collections are an easy way to buy makeup as the colours within a collection tend to complement each other, so you don’t have to worry about that.

I make my way through the makeup aisles of the drugstore, picking up a couple of lip glosses from Essence to test them on my hand. Sadly, none of them are in colours that interest me, so I put them back. Apparently, the store hasn’t stocked the new Essence collection yet. Which is too bad, as they looked really pretty online.

It’s almost time for fall and many brands have started releasing special fall collections in darker colours. This makes it the perfect moment to check out new products, as it’s been a while since I looked at what’s available. I’m not heavily up to date on what’s going on in makeup-land, even though I follow a lot of Youtube vloggers who are, but I do like picking up a new shade of eyeshadow or a new nail polish from time to time, especially when the seasons change. And I adore the fall releases since most brands will come out with great red or gold-tinted products, which look good on me.

I play with a sort-of-shimmery lip gloss from Catrice in my hands, testing it out on the side of my thumb. It’s got some gold tones in it, but it’s not really bright enough to my liking, and I’ve kind of already got enough lip glosses that are very similar. I don’t need another almost-the-same colour, when I’ve got better ones at home. Plus, this colour, this bright gold, I can’t paw it off at Elliot, since he’s got the wrong skin tones to wear it. Also, too much glitter for him.

Bummer.

I put it back on the display, instead picking up a few nail polishes in a range of reds, all darker toned now the weather is getting colder soon. In the winter, most makeup is either dark, like the colours of the leaves or really good hot chocolate, or on the silver/white side of things, like what you’d expect in a Christmas tree or in winter decorations. I hold the dark red bottle up to the light, the colour looks nice, almost a dark red rose, but it hasn’t got any shimmer or sparkle in it at all, which is boring. I want shimmery bits in my nail polishes, it makes me happy. So this is a no-go.

Going back to the Essence display, I let my eyes wander over the rows of nail polishes when I hear a voice I recognise. I start listening, just to figure out who it is, but it takes me a while to place the voice.

“I’m sorry, could you help me?” The speaker’s voice is quiet, and a little soft, as if she doesn’t want to disturb the person she’s talking to. It comes from the next aisle over.

“Yes?” I hear another person answer her.

“Do you have any more colours from the Rainbow Collection? I can only find four of the lipsticks, but they had twelve on the website. Also, would you have any of their eyeshadow palettes in the back?”

I look around. They have the Rainbow Collection here? I hadn’t seen a stand for that those. I’ve been looking for them, unsuccessfully.

“I’m sorry, these are the only ones we got in the delivery. We don’t always get all the colours. You may have to try it the website.” I get why the store employee directs her to the website, because the Rainbow Collection gets sold out every time a store stocks them. It’s been like that all week.

“Oh.” The girl’s voice is dejected and I feel for her. “Thank you very much anyway.” Then her footsteps move away, before turning and rounding the corner of the makeup aisle.

I keep glancing in her direction, not sure why she sounds so familiar. I can’t place her voice, no matter how much I try.

A beautiful girl comes around the corner, and I do a double take. It’s Amber from Amber’s Makeup Tips Youtube channel! No wonder I recognised her voice, she’s been my go-to for good tutorials and reviews for years and I love listening to her rambling about the makeup she’s found or the style she’s working on. Her voice is very comforting to listen to, and I really like her general excitement when it comes to makeup. But she’s usually much more straightforward, she doesn’t tend to have a soft voice like she had just now. No wonder I didn’t recognise her.

I quickly look down at the nail polishes in my hands, not wanting her to catch me staring. She probably gets that enough as it is. I distract myself by trying to figure out if I really want to buy any of the nail polishes I’m holding, but my thoughts keep straying to the girl walking up to the display next to mine.

I hold the colours to the light, turning the bottles, really trying to not let her closeness affect me. I’m in the presence of someone relatively famous, for me anyway… My cheeks heat up, my thoughts mostly yelling at me not to stare at her or do anything weird… Act cool!

Amber steps closer and I feel her gaze on me. As I glance to the side, she’s looking at the nail polishes too, a studious look in her eyes.

Then she looks at me and flashes me a blinding smile. “I like the dark purple one. How much of a shimmer does it have?”

I turn the bottle a few times, trying to catch the light on it. “Some, not a lot.” I try to keep my voice normal. She’s talking to me! Me! Not what I was expecting.

“Oh.” She sounds disappointed. “More glitter is better, especially with dark colours. Makes the colour look more dynamic, not as flat.”

I nod. “I think I’m going for the chestnut one.” I hold up the bottle. It has a darker chestnut for the base colour, but then a little gold shimmer in it, making it look lighter from certain angles. Like the colour of fallen leaves, but only in dreams, as they would be too drab in real life.

“Yeah, that one’s pretty. Especially with your coat.” She’s so kind, making me blush furiously. Even though she sounded hesitant to talk to the store clerk, she seems pretty happy to talk about makeup with a stranger. “I got that one last year. I wore it a lot.”

Now that she mentions it, I think I may have seen her wear it in her videos. But, of course, I can’t say that, it would be weird now… “It looks very wearable, yeah.” I put the other colours back, keeping the chestnut nail polish in my hand, my heart beating faster.

Amber reaches out, picking up the chestnut colour too, plus a deep red one and one that’s almost orange, but in a fall type of orange, not safety warning type of orange. “Now that you remind me, I really need to get a new bottle of that one, and I hadn’t seen these yet. They’re pretty.”

“And they all combine well too. A perfect range of fall tones.” All the colours she grabbed have gold shimmer in them, and I’m pretty sure I’m starting to get into ‘rambling’ area about now, letting slip whatever my brain comes up with. I’m so nervous. “Very fitting.”

“I agree.” She flashes me another grin. “At least this trip wasn’t a total bust. Thank you.” Then she walks away, to the register, and I stay where I am, staring at the display in front of me but not seeing it, not entirely sure how to breathe anymore.

Not only did she talk to me, she smiled at me too, and thanked me! You don’t randomly run into a Youtuber, or more like a Youtube makeup star, every day, especially not when you’re simply wasting time waiting for a friend to show up… Talk about unexpected.

And right at that moment, the guy I was waiting for, my best friend Elliot, steps into the store and his eyes find me immediately. He flashes me an easy smile as he saunters over. “Hey.” He grins, then he frowns a little when I don’t reply immediately. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing wrong.” But my voice is breathy, and that only makes him look at me stranger. “I thought I saw someone like... internet famous. Maybe. Probably.” That was Amber, definitely, but I don’t want him to think that this is more than it is.

He nods, raising an eyebrow, but when I don’t give him more information, he shrugs. “Okay. Keep it to yourself then.” He shakes his head, smiling easily again. “Is that the only thing you’re buying today?” He looks at the nail polish in my hand.

“Yeah.” I nod, trying to pull myself together. “I think it is.”

“Okay.” He grins. “We’ve gotta get going. Izzy’s train will be here soon and we need to keep this as efficient as possible if we don’t want to miss the movie.”

“Yeah. Sure.” I go over to the register, but Amber is already gone. I blink, fully coming to myself.

Today has really been a day of surprises. I knew that Amber lived in the area, but I had no idea it was this close, or that she came to this store…

I coat my nails with the chestnut nail polish as I read over my notes for class. It’s not the easiest subject to read, but I still have to do it before tomorrow. Luckily, reading and doing my nails are two things I can definitely multitask, from years of practice and many books with nail polish spots in them. Oops.

My thoughts keep going back to what happened last Friday, back to meeting Amber. She has no idea who I am and I hope that I didn’t make a total fool out of myself. It left a pretty big impression on me even though me going all fluttery on her probably is one of those things that vloggers will laugh and joke about to each other. Friday will just be another story for her about ‘one of those fans’ who get all weird when they meet them. I don’t want to be that... I don’t want her to remember me like that, in a negative way.

I let out a deep breath, closing my eyes. I could use something fun and interesting again. It’s been weeks since I did something fun, weeks since I broke up with my summer boyfriend, and most of the time since then has been spent on homework or hanging out with Elliot and his girlfriend Izzy, when they have time. It’s been… It’s been boring and depressing how bland my life has become.

Sure, I’ve spent time with other people too, other friends. But most days or evenings when I’m not busy with homework, I’ve been in my room, not doing much apart from reading manga or playing videogames. I feel like I lost the ‘spark’ of wanting to do exiting things after the breakup.

Not that it was a bad breakup. We both knew that what we had was a convention fling that accidentally lasted until the end of summer break. We weren’t that heavily involved, not like the way Elliot and Izzy are totally in love, but it was still nice to spend time together. But with Elliot having a girlfriend who lives a couple of hours away, and him being gone so often, I’ve felt a little lonely.

I should do something silly again. Something stupid and silly… Something that may not lead to anything more than making another person smile for a while.

My Instagram stream reloads and a picture from Amber pops up, showing off the handful of things she has been able to find from the Rainbow Collection.

No…

That would be…

A bad idea…

Really bad idea…

Right?

I open a browser and search for the Curious Cosmetics makeup website and the list of all the stores that sell their line.

This would be a silly and slightly foolish idea, right?

Right.

Right.

3

Niche = Media about a specific area of interest. In vlogging this means the topic of most of your videos, for example, are they about videogames or beauty or crafting or do you do DIY videos. It’s like book genres, is the book a fantasy or a romance or a thriller. That’s the niche. My niche? Beauty and makeup vlogging which includes how-to guides on recreating a specific makeup look.

I like watching the comments come in on my Instragram post, sharing their own struggles to get their hands on some items and the lengths they’ve gone through to find what they want. A couple of people have contacted Curious Cosmetics themselves and were told that their stock is running really low. They have no idea when they’ll be getting new stock in, as the demand for the collection was much higher than expected. They’re apparently trying to negotiate with their suppliers to have them make a new batch as soon as possible, but they didn’t have a timeline for that yet.

Normally, I’m not part of the ‘first to have the full collection’ crowd, but I can’t seem to help myself this time. I want every piece of it, even if they’re something I wouldn’t normally wear, just because I want to have everything. Like, to collect, more than to use. It’s strange, but I’m way too excited about it.

The theme of the Rainbow Collection is LGBTQ+ pride. Every part of the collection is based around a single LGBTQ+ pride flag. Their first run of the collection is based around eight different flags. Starting with the six colour rainbow flag which consists of red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple and branching out from there. Then every flag collection has an eyeshadow palette, a lipstick for each colour, a matching lip gloss and finally eyeliners and matching mascaras.

For the standard rainbow, I’ve been able to get my hands on the eyeshadow palette, the orange lipstick and the green and blue mascaras. Quite a scattered collection and it took me three stores to even get this much.

But the sub-collections are the ones I’m really looking forward to. They’ve got an asexual flag sub-collection, with the purple, white, grey/silver and black, and a pansexual pride sub-collection, in pink, yellow and blue. I have no idea how they’ve managed to make the pansexual pride colours look this good, but they actually really seem to work, what I could see in their pictures. There are a host of other pride flags too, and they all look just as good and just as impressive.

It’s a bold move for a brand new company, to so openly target a whole collection for LGBTQ+ pride, but, at the same time, it makes such a statement about who they want to be as a company. It definitely shows what they stand for and it has made the collection a hot item, even just to collect. This could turn out really well for them, or really poorly, depending on if they manage to follow this up with even more flag sub-collections or if this is going to be one of those one-hit-wonder things. A flash and then they’re gone. I hope not, but you never know.

I run my fingers over the rainbow eyeshadow palette’s packaging. The rainbow on the outside is so bright that it almost looks like it’s shining from within. It makes the Curious Cosmetics matte black name really stand out. It’s stunning packaging design, very unique and easy to recognise.

A message pops up, pulling my attention. It’s from one of the other makeup vloggers, Isabelle. ‘The colours are so pretty. How’s the formula? It looks good, but if I can’t use it… It would be kind of pricey, especially to match everything, and then never use it.’

I nod, reaching for my keyboard. ‘Formula on the eyeshadow and the lipsticks are really good. Mascaras are fine and have very good colour payoff. Haven’t tried much else yet.’ Since I’ve not been able to get my hands on them…

I was surprised when I first tried the makeup out and everything seemed to work so well. I don’t know why, but when I originally saw the collection, I expected it to be this jokey or silly stunt, like the stuff you can get around Halloween, but I was pleasantly surprised when the quality was actually really good.

‘I may try to get some myself, then,’ Isabelle messages back. Isabelle is sweet, she was a vlogger who I used to look up to back when I started out, and by now, our channels are the same size, and she’s still just as kind to me.

‘Do try. They’re worth it.’ I smile, leaning back in my chair, looking around my room.

I need to pack my bag for tomorrow and prepare for bed, but I don’t really feel like it yet. The two sides of my life, my vlogging and my university degree, have started to feel so far apart that switching between the two has been getting harder and harder lately.

I’m studying maths at university. I like numbers and I enjoy the way that I can make numbers work for me. But it’s so far removed from what I do with my makeup channel. Some people find it hard to believe that I can do both, that I can be a maths-nerd and a makeup-queen, but I am, and have been combining both for years. But, in the last year, my studies and the channel have both become more demanding, and it’s nearing the point where I don’t know if I can do this much longer, give both the attention that they deserve.

Sighing, I get up, grabbing my notebooks and pens and putting them in my bag. I don’t have an early class, but I do have a few people that I meet up with every Monday morning to work on our assignments together. We all realised that studying on our own didn’t work so well, and Monday mornings in the university library are always nice and quiet. It’s a great way to stay on track and not work on my channel when I should be working on my classes, as I sometimes tend to do when I study at home.

I post a final update to my social media. ‘Off to bed. See you when the sun comes back up! Love you all!’

I immediately get sweet replies to it and like a couple of them before I turn my computer off. This weekend was pretty fun and productive. I got another video done for next week, and the one I posted yesterday about my current favourites went over really well.

Time for sleep and then for a new week to start…

I try not to breathe too harshly as I set my foundation with powder. I don’t want to get it all up in my nose and sneeze and get my mascara running.

When I go to university, I don’t wear a lot of makeup, but I always make sure to at least look put together, and that means making my skin look nice and smooth. I slide the blushes around in their basket. Today I’m going for a natural look for most of my face, so I need a blush that’s more on the softer side, to combine it with an understated highlight.

My eyeshadow look is the closest I’d come to a ‘minimal’ look. I start with a base of almost a pale golden-brown, then some dark brown on the outside of my eyes, an almost golden pop of colour in the middle and a lighter gold on the inner corner of my eye. It sounds like a lot of shimmering and shine, but the colours are all fairly muted, only the pop of gold in the middle of my eyelids really shines. The best is that this takes only a minute or two to put on, the eyeshadow part anyway.

I grab a lipstick that’s between a nude and a dark rose, it’s red, but not too bright. I’m not putting it on yet, because I still have to eat breakfast and I don’t want to have to put it on again later, or clean up any smears from my chin or something.

Checking the time, it’s almost seven thirty. I need to get a move on.

The bus from here to the city takes half an hour and only goes twice per hour. If I take the eight thirty, I’ll be at the main Groningen train station at nine, which is right on time for meeting the guys for the study session.

So, I have about forty-five minutes for breakfast and to get ready to leave. As I still need to make sure I have enough time to to walk to the bus stop.

I grab my bag, putting the lipstick in the front pocket, and finally turn the computer off. It feels like I’ve already got half my day behind me, even though I’ve only been up for an hour or so.

After I woke up, but before my shower, I checked the comments I’d got while I was asleep, liking them and replying to some of them. It always makes me smile when I get nice comments, and while it took me a while to really understand how to respond to the messages, I’ve gotten pretty good at it by now. Interactions, online or offline, aren’t my strong suit. It still scares me sometimes, that I’ll say the wrong thing, share too much, or too little. But that’s life…

Mum greets me with a smile as I walk into the kitchen. “Morning. Ready for a new week?”

I shrug, putting my bag down and going over to the cupboards. I grab a shaker and fill it with water. Then I measure out the shake powder and pour that in too. I start shaking as I walk around the kitchen, grabbing things to take with me for lunch and for snacks during the day.

“You’re meeting the guys?” Mum still tries to make conversation. She’s always more awake than me in the early morning and she hasn’t just spent forty-five minutes having small-talk with people online.

“Yeah.” I grab a lunch bar, chocolate flavour. “Some of us were not getting through the work from last Friday. It’s just…” I sigh. “Sometimes we need to put five heads together to understand a question instead of trying to figure it all out on our own.”

I sit down at the table, tapping on my tablet and making it come to life, navigating to my Instagram. I check my social media throughout the day, since there is so much going on at all times, and I’ve got people from all over the world replying to what I post.

Scrolling through the stream, I see that Isabelle has also woken up, and she’s posted a picture of her look of the day. She’s wearing such a pretty purple eyeshadow, and it matches really well with the shirt she’s wearing. I smile, some people make everything they do look good.

I finish up the shake and cut the fruit and veggies into a size that’s easier to take with me.

I’ve got the study group in the morning and then I’ve got class in the afternoon, algebra. After I get back home, I’m hoping to write a couple of ideas and scripts for new videos for the coming weeks. See what I can come up with. I should probably do a video that uses the nail polishes I picked up this weekend. I think I can do something with the gold and the oranges and something in light brown or something. The girl in the store was right, they do combine really nicely.

I look down at my fingers, at how bare my nails are, but I can’t do anything about it right now as I don’t have the time to wait for it to dry anymore. I’m not going to put on new nail polish in a rush, that will have to wait until I get back home.

It’s always about waiting… Always waiting to get back home to work on my channel, or waiting for classes. So much waiting…

4

Colour Matching = Not everyone has the same undertones in their skin colour. It’s not only about how light or dark your skin is, how much pigmentation you have, but also if the tone of your skin is more pink or yellow or another undertone leaning. Colour matching your makeup helps with making sure that your makeup doesn’t look ‘off’, that it looks ‘natural’ on you, no matter how ‘unnatural’ the colours you use are.

“You did what!?” Elliot obviously isn’t that impressed with my impulse buys from last night.

It’s Monday morning and we’re hanging out in the voice chat, together with Izzy, since none of us have to be in class early today. I like lazy Monday mornings like this, makes waking up and getting ready for the week so much easier.

“I bought a couple of the items from the Rainbow Collection for Amber.” I repeat, my voice a little slower this time, like he didn’t hear me correctly the first time, even though he definitely did. For extra flair, I shrug, even though nobody can see it.

“Why?” Elliot isn’t going to let this go, is he?

“Because she’s star-struck, after last Friday. Obviously.” That’s Izzy and she’s laughing, even though she’s trying to hide it. Of course, she’d be the one enjoying this, she’s all for doing slightly irresponsible things on impulse.

“I’m… I’m not.” I let out a long breath. Izzy isn’t wrong, probably.

“You are.” Izzy openly laughs now. “I thought you were going to buy the new manga that’s coming out? I thought Emma was going to put a copy aside for you?”

Emma was going to… “I can read manga any day, and she can get me a copy with her next order. But this collection is getting sold out seriously fast. It’s weird how hard it is to find it anywhere, only a week after release.”

That distracts Izzy. “I know, right? And the colours are so nice!” She laughs again, her voice all bright and she’s already distracted from what we’re talking about. “I’m not faulting you for buying them. If I thought Elliot would appreciate it, I would have bought him the base collection.”

“Hey! No sudden gift buying, we have to save up for cosplays.” Elliot doesn’t sound surprised. “And you know I’m not that into the bright colours as much.”

“We know.” I laugh too. “I just… I wanted to do something nice for her.”

“And your ‘something nice’ is kind of a pretty big expense. That’s all I’m trying to say.” Elliot doesn’t sound so annoyed anymore.

“I know. I just wanted to splurge. I also bought a couple of things I wanted for myself. It’s not all for Amber.” Which is my only defence of my splurge.

“Right.” Elliot sighs. “And are you going to give it to her yourself? Or are you going to sign the box with your name?”

My cheeks heat up. I had thought about the next step, getting it to Amber, but hadn’t decided on anything yet. “I don’t know. I may just sign it as M or something… I don’t want to look like a stalker, or something. And I know that other people send her makeup all the time. By the time this arrives, like… ten people could have sent her the exact same things. It’s not that special to do. I’m not doing something super special.”

“It is special to you.” Izzy’s right. She’s way too good at reading me.

“Maybe. But that doesn’t matter. I wanted to do this for her. After I’ve sent this off, it’s not about me anymore.”

Amber’s a student, just like me, and I know that getting makeup for free like this means that she doesn’t have to spend all the money on it herself. Which makes it cheaper for her to run her channel. Which means that she can show more makeup on the channel. And the final result is that I get to watch and listen to her videos more often. It’s totally selfish in the end, I promise.

What I’m doing doesn’t have anything to do with the kind way she talked to me when I met her in the store or the way that we chatted about makeup or the way she really listened to me and made me feel like she cared, even though I’m a nobody and she’s this big makeup vlogger…

“What did you get her? Or yourself?” Izzy’s always very interested in things that are colourful.

“I got us both a couple of the bisexual pride items, the blue and purple and pink looked really cool. The pansexual colours didn’t really do it for me. And I got her some things that she was still missing from the basic Rainbow Collection itself. It’s not that much.” Probably…

“Cool. I was looking at maybe trying to get the transgender eyeshadow palette. I think the colours would probably work for me in daily life and would be a great base for some of the magical girl cosplays. The pink and light blue looks super sweet, like candy, and the white/silver will make a great base or a pop of colour.” It makes sense for Izzy to get all excited about that one. She often dresses in candy colours. “I’ve not decided yet.”

“You should get it.” I hear the smile in Elliot’s voice. “And wear it with that pastel pink dress you made a few weeks back. It would definitely look cute on you.”

“But you know that I’m not cute.” Izzy’s teasing now, and I laugh. Izzy’s the sweetest and cutest person I know, and a total perv. She may look adorable, but behind that cute look hides a very pervy personality who loves her mangas XXX rated.

“I’m not going to mix myself into this discussion.” I laugh, checking the time. It’s almost ten in the morning. My delivery should be here soon. I went for the next-day delivery for the makeup, so I can send the box to Amber today, hopefully getting it to her as soon as possible.

“Hey!” Izzy laughs. “Fine. Be like that.” She huffs.

I can’t stop my smile, then take a deep breath. “I’m off. I’ve got a few things to do before class.” I close the windows with clothing websites. I was looking at cute clothes, since the seasons will change soon and I wanted something new to wear. But I’ve not found much to my liking.

“Later.” Then Elliot lets out a quick sound. “Oh, are you staying over for dinner tonight? Mum wants to know.” I often meet up with Elliot after classes, and this afternoon we’re going into the city together before hanging out at his place. The weather is great and we’ve not been able to hang out much lately.

“Yeah. Probably.” My parents don’t care if I’m eating at home or at Elliot’s. They’re used to me staying over at Elliot’s place, or for him to stay over here. We used to be much closer, before going to uni and before he met Izzy, but he’s still like a brother to me, and I don’t think that’ll ever change.

“Cool, will let her know. See you later!”

“Bye!” Izzy puts on her cutest anime voice and I laugh as I disconnect the chat.

They’re so silly sometimes. So, so silly. Even though I miss Elliot a lot, because we’re no longer in the same classes and he’s over at Izzy’s place a lot, I also really like having Izzy with us. People have often been suspicious of how close Elliot and I are, and we’ve had our fair share of dates who couldn’t imagine being friends with someone of a different gender and not wanting to date or have sex with that person, but Izzy doesn’t even blink at it. It probably helps that her best friend is a guy too, so it’s not strange for her. She fit right right in with us and simply became part of our silly antics almost from the moment we met.

And now I’m thinking of Amber, the girl I used to only see in videos, but now I’ve met her in real life and I want to get to know her better, a lot better. She seems so sweet and kind, and it’s totally not because she made my heart flutter with her smile when she stood right next to me.

I carefully wrap the makeup in cute paper, hoping to keep it safe during transport. I know that eyeshadow palettes can get a little iffy if they’re not packed well, and can get brittle from bouncing around too much. I don’t want that to happen. But I also want it to look cute for her, give her something fun to unwrap when it arrives.

The delivery arrived only minutes after I’d disconnected the chat with Elliot and Izzy, so that was lucky. The box was a lot bigger than I expected, but most of it had been packing material.

I’d ordered around three hundred euros worth of makeup, in under half an hour. I’d been happily clicking away, trying to get as many different pieces of the Rainbow Collection as I could get my hands on, not really thinking about how much it would be in actual items.

I put a squishy layer of packing material in the box with makeup for Amber, to fill it up and to keep it as safe as possible, hopefully. I haven’t even opened the eyeshadows and lipsticks I’ve ordered for myself, too scared that I’ll get too distracted by them and forget to pack Amber’s box before I leave for class. I don’t have a lot of time before I have to leave anyway, and I still want to drop by the post office to send the box off.

If Amber gets it tomorrow or the day after, she can make a video with it soon. Plus, I wasn’t joking about Amber getting sent a lot of makeup because of her channel and I kind of want to be the first one to help fill out her collection, just because I want her to keep mine… I don’t want mine to be the doubles, I want them to be the first ones.

Ego much, right? I can’t seem to help myself imagining how happy she’ll be to receive them, it’s giving me butterflies in my stomach.

This is the first time I’m sending something to a vlogger, or anyone I don’t really know personally, but I’ve been following Amber for a long time, it almost feels like I do know her. I’ve watched her channel grow so fast and I’ve seen the way she’s developed her style and the quality of her videos. I just really wanted to do something nice for her. I also know that her birthday is coming up soon, and these are all great excuses to send her a few things.

I’m trying not to be creepy and I know that nothing will come from this. She has no idea who I am anyway. But I guess Izzy’s right, I did get a little star struck when I met her at the store. I guess that might happen when you meet someone you’ve looked up to for such a long time.

Checking the letter I wrote for her one last time, congratulating her with her recent successes with the channel and her upcoming birthday, I fold it carefully and put it into an envelope. Then I put it in the box, on top of all the other things, I don’t want it to get lost. After one last inspection, I close the box and seal it.

Done.

Her address is already on the outside, I did that earlier this morning, and it’s now ready to be dropped off at the post office.

Now I only have to get myself ready for class.

I pick up the rest of the makeup I ordered and take them with me upstairs, to my room. There, I spread it out in front of the mirror and I open the eyeshadow palette. The blue, purple and dark pink eyeshadows of the bisexual pride sub-collection have been filled out with a really dark blue, that’s almost black, and a red that’s a great shade between the dark pink and the purple. I love it.

Grinning, I swatch each of the colours on my arm, trying to decide what look to go for today. I’m thinking blue with a little bit of the purple and then… I check the lipsticks I bought. Blue lipstick isn’t really for daily wear, but the dark pink lipstick is actually super pretty. I still get to wear all the colours of the bisexual pride flag, even if I’m not wearing all of them on my eyes.

Mix and match, that’s what makeup is all about. That, and experimentation. Lots of experimentation.

I never thought I’d be this excited over something as simple as makeup, but I’ve also never had palettes like this before either. They make me want to experiment with interesting colour combinations, just because I can.

Because I can.