The room was thick with the scent of chemicals and faded iron. A faint humming echoed from the ceiling fan as it turned lazily, its joints worn with time. Beneath his polished boots, the marble floor held traces of past procedures—subtle stains of iodine and powder.

The last client, a tightly-laced widow, had endured her chin refinement without complaint. She left paler than she arrived—but alive.

Dr. Esthétique carefully wiped his tweezers with a cloth speckled in old ash. His white coat, crisp but open, revealed a fine shirt monogrammed in gold. Under the flickering gaslight, his blue eyes gleamed like cold silver. And there she was—the girl.

Young. Far too young to belong in this place of mirrors and scalpels. Her dress was modest, lacking silk or lace. Her hands were ungloved. Her skin, pale as old parchment. She had been brought by her mother—a returning client with an impressive list of completed enhancements, now out of credit and full of vanity. This time, she offered no coin.

“I leave her with you,” the woman had said, her voice casual, almost smug. “In exchange for what I still require.”

He had not answered. Only watched. As one might examine raw marble, unsure whether to carve or discard. The girl stood still. Silent.

Dr. Esthétique stepped forward slowly, voice quiet and ceremonial. “How generous,” he murmured. “To offer me the one thing you haven’t yet reshaped.”

A pause, then: “But I won’t touch her. Not like that. What could I possibly sculpt from something not yet worthy of being covered in plaster?”

He didn’t want comfort. He wanted order. Precision. Wealth.

And if he could not be paid in coin, then labor would have to do. Let the daughter bear the cost of the mother’s indulgence.

Her mother left without looking back, more concerned with her next injection than her child.

He turned toward the girl and struck a match. The smoke from his cigarette curled lazily to the dark ceiling. Then, with a snap of his fingers:

“You. Boil the instruments.”

She blinked.

“Don’t know how long to soak silk thread before it’s fit for skin? No matter. You’ll learn.”

He led her to the washbasin beside a tray of tools. Steam hissed from the kettle. The air was warm, dense with scent.

“That jar—phenol. That one—something stronger. And that one… don’t open it without gloves. Not unless you want your skin to remember.”

The girl said nothing. Her head bowed, as if the floor was safer to look at than him.

“No crying here,” he added. “You may feel overwhelmed. But tears? We don’t entertain those.”

He handed her a tray of dull needles. “Boil them. Use vinegar. And mind the gloves—they're imported.”

He returned to his desk, scribbling into a black notebook, still watching her. The tremble of her hands. The way her braid was coming undone.

“Maybe, in time, you’ll earn something more. A procedure. A reward. But only if you don’t trouble me.”

He stood again and approached. Gently, he lifted her chin with two fingers.

“And if you become useless… well. We have other uses for ornaments.”

His voice carried no anger—only cold certainty. He stepped back and gestured toward the padded stool near the tray.

“Clean the chin brace. The Countess is due in twenty minutes. She wants a new shape—something regal. You’ll find out what that means soon enough.”

And so, the girl entered the house of transformations. Not as a muse. Not as a client.

But as part of the machinery behind beauty.

Under the hand of a man who saw faces not as identities—but as opportunities.