Well Matched (Well Met #3)(71)

“Well, I’m sick of it. I want . . .” I wasn’t sure how to articulate what exactly I wanted, or how to get it. But I wanted to belong. I wanted to be on the other side of that chasm, with the people I loved. I wanted to have fun. Hell, I wanted to be fun.

I took a deep breath. “Stacey, will you help me?” I wasn’t even sure what I was asking for. But I trusted her. I wanted to put myself into her hands and let her transform me. Make me not mundane anymore.

Stacey’s smile got wider and wider as though she was going to levitate. She gripped my hands with hers, squeezing tight.

“April,” she said. “It would be my absolute pleasure. Let’s go shopping.”





Eighteen





Stacey didn’t give me a chance to change my mind, which proved how well she knew me. Before I knew it, she’d practically dragged me bodily to a costume vendor’s tent, and I was wrestled and tugged and laced into a dress.

“Oooh boy.” I tried to take a deep breath but quickly discovered that wasn’t something I’d be doing for the rest of the day. “I don’t know about this.”

“I do.” Stacey walked behind me, examining the back of my outfit while I turned this way and that in the mirror. “You look amazing. Red is your color.”

“I doubt that.” I ran my hands down the tightly laced brocade bodice, over the unfamiliar shape that this corset had made of my body. All I could see was red. Lipstick red. Pick-you-out-in-a-crowd red. Not a color I wore ever. Not by choice. I looked like a stoplight, albeit a fancy one with a long swishy skirt.

I ran a mental tab on all the layers I was currently wearing: A white off-the-shoulder nightgown of my very own that fell to my knees, with a petticoat under that to give the outfit some fullness. Over that was a forest-green underskirt, followed by the red brocade, which was both bodice and overskirt in one, cinched in at my waist and laced up my torso.

“Yeah, but what about this green?” I tilted my head and scowled at my reflection in the mirror. “You don’t think I look like Christmas?”

“Here we are! Accessories!” Emily’s voice sang out, still in her Faire accent. She’d shown up not long into this whole makeover event, serving as Stacey’s assistant. Now she appeared from the other side of the tent, her arms full. First she tied a length of blue-and-green-tartan fabric around my waist like a sash. Over that she buckled a brown leather belt, on which she’d threaded multiple things, so it took a little finessing to get everything in the right place.

“Okay, so I got you a little bag, that’s here . . .” She patted the leather drawstring pouch that rested against my right hip. “You can put your phone, keys, cards, and whatever else in there. Then you don’t have to worry about a purse, see?” She barely waited for my nod before she continued. “Now, these are skirt hikes, there’s one on each side. You can pull up the sides of the overskirt, and then the skirt underneath shows too. Plus it gives everything some fullness. See?”

“I do see.” Because while Emily was talking she and Stacey were working, drawing up the sides of the overskirt and running them through the skirt hikes, like hooking curtains out of the way in a window. But they weren’t done yet. I stood still, letting them move me around like a giant doll they were playing dress-up with, while they adjusted fabric, pulled a little harder at my bodice strings until I thought I might fall over at a badly timed tug.

“Hold up! I’m going to need to breathe at some point, right?”

Emily waved a hand. “Eh, that’s what nighttime is for.”

Stacey giggled. “You say that now.” She caught my eye and shook her head. “You should have heard her complain the first time I put her in her outfit.”

I remembered those days, and I laughed at the memory. “Oh, she complained plenty at home too.”

“It just takes some getting used to, that’s all.” Emily tugged at the neckline of my underdress, making it fall in a pretty, ruffled line across my suddenly enhanced cleavage. Wow. This was not a Monday–Friday look.

“Am I done yet?” I was already weeping internally on behalf of my credit card, but screw it. It had been a long, long time since I’d indulged myself, and I was due. Part of being not mundane, I decided, was spending an irresponsible amount of money and enjoying every second of it. And, lack of breathing and slight squashing of internal organs aside, I was enjoying the hell out of this. I turned back to the mirror; from the neck down I didn’t recognize myself. My body wasn’t shaped like this. My breasts were pushed together and up, mounding nicely over the white ruffle of my underdress. My waist was nipped in, and hadn’t looked this small since I’d given birth. With the red skirts pulled up and the plaid sash around my waist, the stoplight effect had been muted nicely. The blue in the plaid had made me look a lot less like Christmas and a lot more like . . .

“Wait a second.” I narrowed my eyes in the mirror, my focus on the two behind me. “Why are you trying to make me match?”

“Match what?” Emily’s eyes were wide blue innocence, but when I shook the plaid sash at her she melted into a grin. “Okay, look, that was a complete accident. I was trying to tone down the red some and punch up the green. And it looks good, so hush up.”

Stacey nodded. “She did a good job, so I agree.”