Dolly All the Time(22)
Busy wants me to try the white one first, and I do. It feels more like a princess costume than a dress. The top is fitted and flattering, but the skirt is miles of gauzy fabric cascading to the ground like I’m the Good Witch of the North. I suspect I could do the splits in this dress, if I could do the splits. I am not light and airy enough to pull it off.
I walk out into the sitting room and Busy shouts, “Perfect!”
I’m about to push back, but they’ve just brought in multiple options for Providence, and I have to sit down. I really wish Naomi was here. I pop a cheese puff into my mouth and carefully wipe my hands. “Busy, you pick.”
“I want to see you in the green,” she says.
I haven’t worn a strapless dress since my prom, and let me tell you the technology has improved significantly. Once I’m zipped into this long celery-green column of satin with a sweetheart neckline, there is absolutely no fidgeting or boob shoving to be done. I am locked and loaded. Octavia arranges the bottom of the dress and smiles at me in the dressing room mirror. “This is the one, dear. I refuse to sell you a different dress.”
It’s the most beautiful dress I’ve ever seen, I’ll admit that. But it’s way too much. It screams for attention. Look at me and my shoulders and my boobs—behold and judge!
Octavia walks out ahead of me. “Green it is,” she announces.
Busy gasps. “I love it.”
I say, “It’s kind of a lot.”
She steps closer to me. “The other dresses are sequins, I think this is your best bet. Also, you’re absolutely gorgeous in it.”
I look at myself in the mirror behind her. I squint and I see Stewart Whitfield’s girlfriend. That’s the shape and form I’ve agreed to take on. “I don’t feel like myself,” I say.
Busy reaches out and squeezes my arm. “Of course you’re yourself. But it’s kind of fun to try to feel like someone else for a bit, right? You’re you, but sprinkled in pixie dust.”
I have never been sprinkled in anything but regular dust.
“Is there jewelry?” Octavia asks. “We can bring in a few things.”
“Damion had a few things sent over from Kingsmouth.” Busy reaches into her tote bag and pulls out three velvet boxes. The first is a thick braided gold chain with diamonds inset throughout. I don’t know what my face does as I look at it, but Busy says, “There are more, don’t worry.”
The next is a thinner platinum chain that cannot be expected to support the dime-sized diamond that hangs off it. The third is a thin gold chain with a flower pendant, a dahlia, fashioned out of yellow and rose gold. The flower is the size of a nickel, elegant enough that you’d wear it with a dress like this, but subtle enough that you might just put it on and never take it off. I want to be as casual as a Whitfield with this precious necklace. I want to wear it with my fish house T-shirt. I want to put it on and never take it off.
“Do you have a preference, Busy? Does it matter to you which one I wear?”
“Of course not, pick what you like. And honestly, in that dress, no one’s going to notice your necklace.”
I pick up the dahlia and let Octavia put it on me. One day in, and I’ve already forgotten how to do things for myself. “I won’t take it off,” I say, lowering my voice. “Like until this is over, I’m just going to wear it all the time so I don’t lose it. Okay?”
I look up and see Naomi standing in the dressing room doorway, stunned. I greet her by demurely raising my glass of champagne, and we both start to laugh. “I honestly don’t know what’s happening here,” I say. “But I’m wearing this dress to Providence on Wednesday, and I have so much stuff in that dressing room you’re going to freak. Busy, this is my friend Naomi.”
Busy takes Naomi’s hand in both of hers like she’s precious, which she is. “I’m so glad you’re here,” Busy says. “I think we have everything we need, but I wonder if you have thoughts on her hair?” The diplomacy is impressive.
Naomi laughs. “Do I? It’s almost all I think about.”
They turn to me, and Busy moves my hair behind my shoulders. “I would literally die to see your hair cut. Your jawline is so Olivia Wilde, you know?” I do not know. “Can we?”
Naomi smiles her most radiant smile. “We must,” she says.
* * *
Lee, Busy’s favorite hairstylist at the Willa Bernard Salon, does not crack a smile as she stands behind my chair and surveys me in the mirror. “You shouldn’t even be allowed to have hair,” she says.
“Lee!” Busy swats her arm.
“I totally agree,” says Naomi.
“It’s all too much,” Lee says. She starts to brush out the ends of my hair, working from the bottom until it’s all smooth. I relax into the chair and try to enjoy the strangeness of it. I don’t even remember my mother doing this for me. I did it for Patsy, brushing and braiding and curling and straightening, and I washed Christopher’s hair forever. “What I really want to do is give you a bob. A straight line right across your jaw.” She folds my hair up to demonstrate, and I see what she means. It’s like she opened a curtain and now you can see my eyes.
“I need to be able to put it in a ponytail,” I say.