ANCHESTER, N.H. - She has looked into their eyes. Run her fingers through their hair. And touched their cheeks. In fact, she believes she is the only woman to regularly have such intimate contact with the seven presidential candidates.
And when she votes on Tuesday, it will be with her heart.
As the most sought after makeup artist here, Kriss Soterion has an unusual perspective on the men who would lead the free world. She knows a side of them the public never will.
Steve Forbes is shy. Al Gore is homey. Alan Keyes is placid, nothing like the wired moralist he becomes in front of a camera. John McCain is a cutup. George W. Bush is charismatic. Gary Bauer, what you see is what you get. And Bill Bradley, well, he's always being briefed when his nose is being powdered.
Under the near-constant glare of TV lights, the candidates are running to Soterion to have their faces done. The 35-year-old mother of three from Bedford has been so busy over the last week that she went 46 hours without any sleep.
On Monday, she worked all day - her other clients include CNN, NBC, and WMUR-TV - where she hosts and produces her own beauty show - and then met Bush at 2:30 a.m. at the Manchester airport. Soterion had to work on Gore two hours later after he flew in from the Iowa caucuses. Then she went straight to CNN's studio, set up in the Amoskeag mill, and powdered pundits until 11 p.m.
That's where she was Thursday, dabbing foundation on political analyst Jeff Greenfield.
''It's like a coronary bypass, unpleasant but necessary,'' Greenfield said about the experience while sitting in a high chair with a plastic smock draped over his dark suit. ''The lights and the camera so exaggerate what's there. ... This will be vaguely beige instead of death pallor.''
In a couple of minutes Soterion was done. She whisked off the smock, and de-linted his suit, sending him into the studio before seizing the chair for herself.
''Oh my God, I'm so tired,'' Soterion said, adding that she sleeps with her cell phone. In her spare time, she is writing a book, getting a master's degree, setting up a Web site, and selling her own line of makeup.
Her break into the business came in 1992 from Patrick J. Buchanan, whose campaign headquarters was next door to her husband's business. Working with him led her to other candidates, including Bill Clinton.
Here is her Clinton story: ''He had me booked to do his makeup. He didn't show. There's a no-show fee that never got paid.''
Soterion, a former Miss New Hampshire, has a degree in international marketing from a college in London, where she became interested in cosmetology while modeling. She expects to make about $30,000 during the last 10 days before the primary and has been nominated for businesswoman of the year by the Business Professional Women's Association of New Hampshire.
''I'm not voting on the issues,'' she added. ''It has more to do with the spirit of the man.''
However, she is changing her registration from Republican to independent to give her more flexibility, and said she will judge the candidates on ''how they handle stress, how they manage people around them, and how they treat me.''
There is one candidate who has never looked her in the eye, although she declined to name him.
She has not worked with Bradley much, so she does not have much to say about him. Forbes, she says, is underestimated by the media.
''He is the most humble person I think I have ever met in my entire life,'' she said.
Gore is more relaxed than he appears in public.
Before Wednesday night's debate with Bradley, Gore looked at Soterion and said, ''Oh, Kriss, I'm so nervous.''
As for McCain, ''I think he's hysterical ... behind the scenes, he's exactly what you see. He's fun-loving.''
Bauer is ''very, very level,'' and Keyes, she said lowering her voice, ''exudes peace.''
