Waterproof

“ARRGGHHH!!!” She laughs into the mirror, “I guess that mascara wasn’t waterproof!”

PP nods, smiling. She’d noticed this while sharing a lane with Mascara Smear Woman. Why someone would wear mascara in the first place, let alone in the pool, was beyond her. Nevertheless, PP realized that many women (and some men?) do decorate their eyes with this black stuff.

Yet it wasn’t waterproof. Or pool proof. PP observed this whenever MSW turned her head to breathe. The black smudges were getting bigger and blacker with each lap.

It was kinda funny. But also kinda alarming. After all where was all that black stuff going?

In the water. In PP's lane. Granted the pool at Hilltopia was chlorinated to the max, but still….

PP didn’t like the idea of swimming in diluted make-up.

So later, back in front of the mirror, PP asks, “Was it supposed to be water proof?”

“I don’t know,” MSW answers. “Obviously it’s not. Wow!”

She bends over the sink, starts to splash water on her face, making the black gunk run even more. Down her cheeks. Surrounding her eyes in big black circles. Like someone had slugged her in both eyes and these ‘black eyes’ were the resulting wounds.







“It won’t come off,” MSW laughs.

She’s very good natured about it. If it had been PP with such a situation, well. Those of you who know her know that she would not be good natured about it. She’d be swearing. And scrubbing and crying and generally just making matters worse.

Which is often her want.

This is why make up should be avoided at all costs. Especially while swimming.

Unless you’re Esther Williams.
Somehow she was able to keep that perfect made up smile and face smear free while swimming.





But she was magic. From another swimming sphere than mere mortal swimmers like MSW.

Who continued to laugh while she pats her face dry. The black spots still stubbornly evident.

"Guess I better remember to take it off before I swim next time," she muses to the air.

Nodding, PP finishes wringing out her suit. Glad that her aversion to make up all of these years has at least saved her face in and out of the pool.