Semi-Permanent

The lights were much hotter than Betty had expected. It seemed everyone but she knew exactly what to do. She stood in the middle of a fake living room. Slap a straw hat on her and she'd be an uncanny match for a scarecrow.

"Right, where's the new one?" A voice commanded everyone's attention. It belonged to a tall, broad woman in a leather coat.

That must be the Director, Betty thought. That terrifying woman could only be a Director.

Betty tried to make herself known but all that escaped from her mouth was a pathetic squeak. A man, a crew member of some sort on a ladder rolled his eyes and called back to the agitated director.

"She's there, Miss. That one!” He mumbled something after it and gave Betty a sharp look that said ‘don't make me speak for you again’. 

You’ve gone and done it now, Bets. She already felt out of place, and now the Director was approaching.

Betty was thoroughly examined.

Everyone watched. She tried to conjure up some imaginary confidence as the director and her assistant performed their inspection. They lingered on her face for a long

time, murmuring things in perhaps a secret language only they could understand. Betty’s toes curled in her smart blue shoes. It was all she could do not to erupt in nervous tears. 

"Okay!" the Director clapped, Betty jumped. “Let's begin,” she said to nobody in particular.

Each person began their tasks, their delicate work-dance, as one fluid entity. The assistant, a lanky fellow with long straight hair, gestured to the couch. Betty hoped that meant "sit'' because she did, gracious for the break. A woman swooped in to dab at her forehead with a powder puff, looking like she’d rather be anywhere else.

“Sorry,” Betty said. “Hot lights. I'm not used to- " 

The makeup lady scurried away without a word.

A camera moved closer to Betty and a big man with a microphone set up near her, smelling of dirty socks and Axe body spray. 

Keep your wits, Betty thought with a deep breath. This wasn't the glamorous shoot she'd been promised.

“Quiet on the set!" the Director boomed. She had taken a seat by the camera, where Betty could just barely see her. "Roll sound."

"Rolling!"

"Picture.”

"Picture lock.”

"Roll camera.”

"Rolling.”

"Action."

...Was something supposed to happen?

Betty’s breath hitched. Oh, Lordy. Her mind raced. She must have been mistaken for someone else, or brought to the wrong set. Her mouth dried up.

"Please introduce yourself, to the camera.” the Director said it as if Betty should have known.

"Oh. Sorry, um. My... my n.. I'm sorry, l'm a little nervous, may I have some water?"

"Cut."

Betty's face went hot, hotter than she thought it could. A hand materialized to the right of her, holding a glass of water. The lanky assistant's hand. Betty grabbed it and gulped it back. Makeup Lady rushed back, murmuring to herself. The forehead patting was more aggressive, as though she was trying to kill a spider on Betty’s face. The assistant took her empty glass and it was back to places, back to quiet, back to ‘Action’.

“Whenever you're ready."

She looked at the camera, the big round black eye. "Well... my name is Elizabeth Shepherd. I'm... sixty-five years old. I'm a mother of four and... I'm from London."

"Keep looking at the camera... And Elizabeth, why do you deserve a Second Chance?"

There it was, the question she'd been preparing for. Everything rehearsed in the previous weeks, though, vanished instantly from memory.

"Well. I... I lost my husband, last year. Not like I thought I would. He left me after thirty-five years of marriage. He had another family, you see, that none of us knew about. And he chose them. So, my boys, my sons thought... this just might lift my spirits--"

"Cut." The Director's voice nearly came in just as Betty wrapped up.

"That was nice, Liz," the Director said through her teeth. Nobody ever called Betty Liz. “That was nice, but let's just get another take with something different, just in case, okay."

Betty knew then that she'd gotten far too personal. She knew it from the Director's pitiful smile and the awkward shuffling and whispering of the crew. Someone tapped her on the shoulder; the assistant, this time offering a tissue. Betty took it even though she didn’t need it. She was past crying.

“You've seen the show before, Liz?"

Betty squinted at the Director. “Y-yes, I've seen it."

In truth, she'd seen about five minutes’ worth of YouTube clips from the show, eagerly shown to her by her sons.

"Okay, so maybe let's try to match the... the energy of what you've seen, yeah."

Betty nodded. She understood. She'd gotten too personal. She adjusted in her seat as the crew went through the spiel and closed her eyes, imagining the ladies on her son's phone. She could play pretend. 

"Action".

She opened her eyes and smiled. “Hi, my name is Betty Shepherd, I’m from London, and I'm sixty-five years young," she said. God only knew where the enthusiasm had come from. She silently thanked Him. 

"Betty. Why do you deserve a Second Chance?"

She pictured her boys standing in the kitchen, slack-jawed and uncertain, passing around the note their father left.

"Well, it's my sons. I have four sons and they think it's time I changed up my look to match how I feel on the inside. Since me and my husband split up last year, I've been waiting for a chance to feel beautiful again."

She could tell the crew members were more satisfied with this without even looking at them. The air changed. But inside, Betty felt rotten.

You’re a rotten apple hidden in the orchard, Bets.

"Cut. That was perfect, let's get her Befores.”

— 

The shoot wiled on and Betty stayed cooped up inside her head. Her dreams of this day didn't match up with the truth — nobody talked to her unless it was to ask her to ‘please move her head’ or ‘close her eyes’. The makeup chair was uncomfortable, the lights still too hot. She gave them what they wanted each time a camera turned on in her direction, only smiling because she knew her boys would see it later. Chunks of her long silver hair fell to the ground, her scalp burned when they painted it with something foul-smelling. She nearly suffocated under the thick layer of powder on her face. What’s more, the free lunch she had been promised never appeared, and instead, she was tossed a squashed croissant and a cup of lukewarm coffee. A makeup artist dripped liquid foundation on her smart blue shoes.

Hungry and uncomfortable, Betty watched the crew mobilize in front of her. for some reason, they'd doused her in a fruity perfume that was the furthest thing from her taste. Come to think of it, she realized, they didn't ask for my opinion on anything.

"And action!... Betty, are you ready to see your Second Chance transformation?” The Director called out the stock phrase.

She recognized the line. This was the part of the show where she'd be handed a mirror. Are all the ladies in those YouTube clips faking their excitement too? She could barely move her lips under all the makeup. 

The assistant handed her the mirror. She raised it, expecting.. -what? A troll? The reanimated corpse of Rita Hayworth? But the mirror showed something more familiar. She looked like all of the neighbours that had given her fake sympathetic looks after Mike left. She looked like the kind of lady that would start a book club. No, a bridge club. And her hair was red. She'd always been Blonde Betty and now it was rust-coloured and short. It made her look old.

Her eyebrows had been darkened and plucked thin, her skin was too orange, her lips too pink. Someone might find me beautiful, she thought. She didn’t want to think Mike but she did anyway. 

She wanted to vomit, but maybe that was just the stale croissant. 

Betty must have made the right faces and noises because soon the camera cut and soon she was saying goodbye and soon she was in a cab heading home. Her boys were waiting out front when the cab pulled up, all of them smiling. For a moment, Betty stared at them, hoping (like she had many times before) that they would be honest with her, at least. She thanked the driver and got out of the car.

"Mum, gosh, I barely recognized you!" her youngest yelped, pulling her into a hug. Her stomach twisted. Just the croissant, she thought, knowing it was a lie. 

They went inside for dinner and for the rest of the night, she caught the flashes of confusion and bewilderment on their faces when they thought she wasn't looking. It must have been a shock, a big one, after years of being plain ol’ Betty. Her oldest son brought out a beautiful cake at the end of the meal, to Betty’s surprise. She tried to hide her discomfort, that they were making such a fuss over her. 

"Harriet did it, but hey, I took it out of the oven." Everyone chuckled, knowing it was rare for his wife to let him help with her baking. "Tell us about the filming, Mom."

"Yeah, what happened?"

Betty relayed the facts between bites of cake, keeping everyone entertained.

"And... you like the new look, right?" One of them asked. 

The table went quiet. She stared at each of their faces, the fear, the hope, the embarrassment running under all of them. A year earlier, she'd promised never to lie to these boys. 

"...God, no. I look like a circus clown."

From the silence came a bubbling of laughter, a great big sigh of relief.

"Mum, you're gonna be on YouTube!"

The room felt cozier, the cake tasted sweeter, and the smiles lasted longer that night.