Around-Sixty Rouge

The shop was located on the largest shopping street in town. Enticed by the scent of perfume, I peeked inside to see glittering compacts and lipstick samples lined up. Suppressing the urge to dive into that glamour, I went home and put the small change left in my wallet into my piggy bank.

When I was a high school student, makeup was still considered something that "delinquents do." Sometimes I would wear tinted lip balm, apply light-colored nail polish, or secretly borrow my mother's cosmetics to dab on some face powder, but I had decided that I would only start collecting my own proper makeup after graduating from high school. While studying for entrance exams, I would gaze at makeup features in teen magazines with a racing heart, listing the cosmetics I was interested in.
The spring break of my eighteenth year arrived after I passed my university entrance exam. I moved all the money from my piggy bank into my wallet and headed to the shopping street. Now that the moment had finally come, I felt a little embarrassed. After making sure there was no one I knew around, I stepped into the cosmetics shop I had longed for for the first time.
It was just as I had dreamed. Beautiful young women welcomed me with beaming smiles and kindly gave me advice on how to apply blush and draw my eyebrows, as I was a complete beginner. After buying a full set of cosmetics and returning home, I immediately faced the mirror.
I lined my eyes with black and curled my eyelashes with an eyelash curler.
The lipstick was a palette with several colors. At that time, Seiko-chan's "Rock'n Rouge" was popular.

Pure, pure lips♪
My feelings are yes♪

Humming along, I chose the reddest shade and traced my lips with a lip brush.
My face kept changing. And when my finished, made-up face was reflected in the mirror, I felt brand-new blood beginning to flow through my entire body. That was the moment I felt confident in myself for the first time in my life.

Since then, I started waking up early every morning to stare at myself in the mirror. No matter how sleep-deprived I was, or on mornings after I had cried over a broken heart, putting on makeup always cheered me up. I felt hundreds of times prouder of myself than when I was bare-faced. Makeup was like a close friend who gave me courage.

Perhaps it was about ten years after I started working that makeup became boring. It was just one of those morning routines, no different from brushing my teeth or combing my hair. It had become a mere habit, neither troublesome nor exciting.
I stopped wearing foundation and stopped drawing my eyes. How many years have passed since I stopped wearing makeup almost entirely, except for weddings and funerals?
Before I knew it, I felt more embarrassed to show a face with makeup on.

The COVID-19 pandemic led to my job becoming fully remote. And then, a turning point arrived suddenly one day.
It happened during a web conference.
I was astonished when I saw my own face reflected on the LCD screen.
There was an elderly woman I didn't recognize. Caught off guard, I was so shocked that I immediately turned off the camera.
Before I knew it, I was in my late fifties. Actresses and celebrities of my generation are still young and beautiful, so I had let my guard down completely. But surely, those women, whose careers depend on attracting people's attention, must be making tireless efforts every day to maintain their beauty.
I faced my own face in the mirror for the first time in a while. Before I knew it, spots had increased and my cheeks had sagged. Will I just keep getting older like this and become an ugly old woman?
I don't want that.
I must take proper care of my skin. At the very least, I must wear makeup when I meet people.
There is no time like the present. I grabbed my wallet and rushed to the local drugstore.

When I lined up the newly bought cosmetics on the living room table, my heart fluttered just a little. I knew without looking in the mirror that bright red lipstick no longer suited me. The color I chose that day was a pale pink lipstick. As I colored my lips, I remembered.
That spring when I was eighteen. That day when I was so proud and happy with my made-up face. My heart wouldn't stop racing, and I stared at myself in the mirror without ever getting tired of it. I never imagined that decades later, I would be applying lipstick while hiding spots, masking sagging skin, and sighing.
And so, my finished around-sixty makeup face. It is better than the shocking aged face reflected on the LCD screen, but no matter how much I paint it on, it is still a face appropriate for my age. The me in the mirror can only manage a tearful smile. It is empty, but this is what it means to grow old. As we live, we gradually drift away from all the various moving moments we once encountered.
I have no intention of fighting against aging. While accepting it, women face the mirror and apply rouge to live this day—the youngest day of the rest of our lives—with our heads held high.

Before I knew it, cosmetics shops in town had disappeared one after another. Young girls are picking up cosmetics casually at 100-yen shops.
Even so, when they see their own made-up faces in the mirror for the first time, their hearts must be overflowing with an indescribable sense of exhilaration. Just like that spring day when I was eighteen, which will never return.