“Your shirt makes me sad!” exclaimed Clove, looking disapprovingly at Thyme’s shirt. Thyme looked down. Today she was wearing a blue t-shirt that advertised the Girls on the Run 5k she had done some time ago. An event shirt, as Clove called it, and one of many of its kind.The collar had a slit in it to keep Thyme from feeling like she was being choked, and the shirt itself had probably seen better days, but it was immensely comfortable.

“I like It!” Thyme said defensively.

“That’s it!” Clove exclaimed, looking beat,”You are my new project, like it or not.”

“What??” asked, Thyme,”How am I your ‘project?’”

“I am going to change your ways, and, no offense, your fashion sense.”

“Hey!” shouted Thyme, but knew it was true.

If anyone was fit to fix her nonexistent style, it was Clove. This morning, Thyme had reached into her closet, still half asleep, and successfully found a t-shirt and a pair of jeans. In fact, she was rather proud because they even matched. Clove, on the other hand, had on a cute flowing tank top over a fitted long-sleeved shirt and some very nice jeans. They were polar opposites, and thats how Thyme liked it. She loved being comfortable, not fashionable, and considering she was a fairly enclosed person, attention wasn’t something Thyme found completely necessary, and attracting any was an unappealing idea for her. So, she dressed boringly.

However,Clove was a whirlwind, sweeping along anything that intercepted her path. She knew how to dress to gain attention, and had an ever orbiting group of people with comments on her clothes, or her latest charity event, or her latest A on the ever daunting algebra tests. Clove lived on energy, positive and negative.Thyme may look like the least important groupie in the bunch,but she knew that Clove could be herself when they were together, and that was good enough for her. Thyme had been swept up a year or so ago by that whirlwind. She had been hanging on for dear life and doing a bit of damage control ever since.

“Calm down. It’s just a little re-making, a little attitude adjusting, and some burning of your event shirts. Oh. And a shopping trip.”

“What? No! No shopping trip!” Thyme was horrified. She hated shopping, unless it was on her own terms. The places Thyme shopped had names like Ragstock and Savers, whereas the places Clove shopped had names like JC Penney and The Mall.

“Oh, please Thyme? Please be my project?” Clove said, using her puppy dog eyes in full force. “It won’t be painful, I promise. Just life-altering. That’s all. Please?”

“Okay.” Thyme sighed, hating herself for giving in, but she loved Clove too much not to.

A few days later, Thyme and Clove ventured into the mall, a four-winged beast that was loud, bright, and demanding with signs saying things like, “Buy now!” and, “Don’t miss this sale!” Clove was right at home in the boisterous noise of the mall, but Thyme shrank back a little, only to be pulled forward by Clove and into the first store. Thyme craned her neck to see the sign outside the mirrored walls.

“Claire’s? What the heck? I am not getting my ears pierced again.”

“No, silly, but you are going to get something useful into them,” Clove said with a laugh. “Look at all the earrings!”

And look Clove did. She saw the many types of earrings. Long, short, animal-themed, sparkly, fancy, and even some ones that had no place in a normal person’s wardrobe. Her head started spinning a bit. She circled the racks, looking for anything normal and acceptable for someone who hadn’t changed her earrings for over a month, except to clean them. Her eyes landed on a pair of blue studs.

“Those look cool,” she said, picking up the pair and inconspicuously checking the price: $4.95. Not too bad.

“Of course,” Clove said, glaring at the earrings in Thyme’s hand, “You pick the most boring ones on the rack. Try these.” She was holding out a set of maybe a dozen neon animal print earrings.

“I don't have clothes to match those things, Clo. And besides, you know I think animal print is odd.”

“Ah, ah, ah. You don’t have anything to match it now. However, after this trip, you will have an outfit beyond your wildest dreams! Jewelry is just a start. Take these to the register. Quickly now, we don’t have all day. The next stop is your choice: Gordman’s or JCPenney? You need a new outfit.”

And so, Thyme grudgingly shelled out the $15 to pay for the monstrous earrings and marched to the least threatening sounding store- JCPenney. There she found the racks and escalators intimidating, and in a whirlwind of seasonal styles, she walked out of the store with an outfit that both fit and, if Clove was telling the truth, looked “much better than anything you’ve worn lately.” Plus, it cost her less than $30. After she cleared her head a bit from the bright lights, she looked into the bag, and thankfully discovered that the clothes were neither neon nor pink. She examined them, and they looked pretty good. Jeans a little tighter than what she’d usually wear, and a shirt that at least looked comfortable, paired with a versatile camisole. She might actually wear this outfit.

“Next up is Payless Shoe Store! I’m gonna get you into some flats-it won’t kill you, I promise.” Clove chirped, excited at the prospect of getting Thyme into something besides beat-up Converse. They walked Into Payless and Clove walked directly into the section for size nine.

“Hey, how did you know my shoe size?” asked Thyme, jogging to keep up with Clove’s fervent selection process.

‘I just do. Here, try these.” Clove shoved a hefty assortment of boxes into Thyme’s arms. Thyme looked down at the boxes. There was a pair of black heels that looked like they would snap if they ever encountered so much as a crack in the sidewalk, let alone a stumble on the grass. Also in the boxes were a pair of blue wedge heels, a decent assortment of flats, and a pair of gladiator sandals.

Thyme sat down and tried them on one by one. The ones they both agreed not to get were the fairly dangerous black heels. They eventually walked out with the blue wedges (“You have to have at least one pair of heels!”) and black flats (“Come on, those will match anything!”).

When Thyme got home that night, she was exhausted but glad that round one was over. After Thyme had practically fallen out of the car, Clove said, “I expect you on my front steps tomorrow at 11am sharp with your new clothes, to do some trying on and attitude adjustment. See ya!”

Now, Thyme was at Clove’s front steps, bags in hand, and more nervous than a turkey on Thanksgiving day. She had always been fairly afraid of Clove’s large assortment of makeup and she knew, as soon as that door opened, she would look it straight in the face.

The door swung open and she was pulled into a makeup artist’s paradise. Nine kinds of makeup littered Clove’s bedroom. Thyme stumbled in the heels and new outfit, then fell into the chair with a promise not to open her eyes until Clove was done.
It seemed like hours before Clove was done with her nails, hair, and face, but eventually she was lead to a full-length mirror.

“Okay...open!”

Thyme looked in the mirror. Her complexion was clearer than it has been since she was nine, and her eyes were magnified by eye liner, eyeshadow, and some other lotion or potion that was smeared on her face. Her nails didn’t look like they belonged to an obsessive nail chewer, but a beauty queen.The outfit was great, too. She looked taller than her normal, shoe-less, five-foot-three. The pants looked great on her, and the shirt worked perfectly to bring out her newly-magnified eyes.

“Wow,” Thyme said in a low voice.

“Told ya so!” Clove said, beaming. She looked exceedingly happy that her makeover plot had worked.

“Yeah. Wow. I can’t believe this actually worked,” Thyme said, and as Clove’s face fell a bit, she stumbled on: “Not that I didn’t think you could do it, I just didn’t think anyone could. But it’s nice. Really.” Clove didn’t look quite convinced, so Thyme gave her a hug.

“Thanks.”

“Anytime. Clove replied, happily. “Now, for the lesson.”

The next hour was spent teaching Thyme how to apply the nine different types of makeup that were currently all over her face. The hour after that was used to walk the dog, or in other words, to teach Thyme how to walk in heels, and how to walk in general. After she fell the third time, Clove had her change into the clothes she came in so she wouldn’t ruin her new ones. She fell several more times after that, but she had the hang of it by the time she arrived back at Clove’s place. She was also quite exhausted.

“Okay,” Clove said, sounding a bit like a drill sergeant. “You have all the materials you need to look amazing tomorrow. I expect you to utilize them to the best of your abilities. School starts tomorrow, and I will see you there, 7 a.m. sharp.”

“Seven? What? Why?”

“Yes, seven. That way I can fix all the mistakes you made on your face.”

Thyme sighed, “See you tomorrow, abilities utilized, at 7.”

“See ya!”

At school the next morning, 7 a.m. sharp, she met Clove. She looked her over for at least a full minute before nodding in approval.

“Good job. One thing, though.” She remarked, whipping a nail file out of her bag, ”File those nails! And stop chewing them!”
Thyme accepted the file, glad she had passed the Clove test, once again.