Skin Deep

"Come on, Reimu! Please?"

"No."

"Pleeease?"

"No, Sanae." Reimu said, a little more sternly than before.

"But you promised you would!" Sanae pouted and quickly Reimu tilted her head slightly to one side, knowing she'd crumble easily if she continued to look at Sanae.

"Because I didn't think you'd actually be able to do it! I still can't believe you found this at Kourindou."

With a scowl, Reimu lazily sat back in her chair, grumbling over how stupid the odds were. Of all the things Sanae would at that shop, she really found that?

It was a warm day in Gensokyo — summer had just begun, which had always been one of Reimu's preferred seasons. There was less leaves to sweep and the warmer weather made people slightly more willing to make the journey out to the shrine to donate.

And so, it was with a surprising amount of happiness that Reimu woke up today, ready to partake in her favourite activity... lazing around on the porch of the shrine.

Even Sanae coming to visit hadn't ruined her mood at first — it had been a while since she'd last seen the shrine maiden, so it was genuinely nice to see her. Sanae had even helped her sweep the porch, so Reimu was more than happy to make some tea for her in return.

That is, until she saw what Sanae had brought with her.

"You shouldn't make promises you don't intend on keeping." Sanae said, lightly chiding Reimu while waving a strange brush around.

It looked like a paintbrush to Reimu, but the handle was narrower and the brushes shorter. Then again, it would be hard for her to tell the difference — it had been a while since she'd bothered to fix any of the many areas around the shrine where the paint had peeled off.

Sanae put the strange brush down next to a box — at first, Reimu thought it was a kind of donation box, but horror had creeped when Sanae had opened it, revealing an assortment of these brushes, small sponges, strange palettes full of weird pigmented substances and countless tubes full of liquid.

Reimu may have been completely clueless as to what each of these things individually, but instinct told her what they were collectively — a make up kit.

It had all started a few weeks ago, when Sanae was showing Reimu some pictures she had in the Outside World — one which Reimu found hilarious was a photo of her two gods where Suwako had covered Kanako's eyes with her hat just as the photo was taken.

But in some of the photos, Reimu had noticed something... odd about them.

"Sanae... what's happened to your face in this picture?" she'd asked. "It looks weird."

"Weird?! Reimu, you can be mean sometimes..."

"No, not in a bad way. It's just you look... different. Your eyes look brighter."

"Brighter?"

"Yeah. Your lips look more red, and your face seems smoother too."

For some reason Reimu still didn't get now, Sanae had started laughing. "That's what you're talking about? It's because I'm wearing make up, silly!"

"... make up?"

"You don't know what it is?! Well, I guess you wouldn't in Gensokyo... how do I explain it? Erm... it's like a bunch of things you can put on your face to make you look prettier."