Midlife Blues - Victoria Danann Page 0,1
I’d be able to help you with this?”
“Because…” I waved my hand in the air. “You make things happen.”
She threw back her head and laughed. I tried to remember if I’d ever seen her laugh like that and decided that I hadn’t.
“Can I get a referral then?” I wiggled my eyebrows. “You know, of the magic sort?”
She drew in a big breath through her nose. “I didn’t say I wouldn’t do it.”
I brightened instantly. “That’s right! You didn’t!” I tracked the twinkle in her eye. “So, will you?” I hurriedly added. “I’ll pay premium. For the record, it’s not a bribe because there’s absolutely no corruption here. No indeedy.” When she gave no response, I mumbled. “Move along. Nothing to see here.”
“You waste far too much energy with your very human concern over being a good person, Rita Hayworth.”
I opened my mouth to say something, but couldn’t figure out what that might be. So, I finally settled on changing the subject.
“What are you wearing? Inner wear and outer wear.”
“Inner wear?”
“Yeah. What does your dress look like? And what are you wearing to keep warm and dry until you get inside?
She smiled her cat at the canary smile. “That information is under wraps.”
I gaped. “Esme. You made a joke.”
“I don’t joke. You know that.”
With an insistent shake of my head, I said, “Nope. Now the best you can do is say you rarely joke.”
“What’s that other photo you’re carrying?”
I looked down, “Oh. I had a plan. If you said yes to making this dress happen, somehow, my next stop was going to be Braden at The Braid.” I showed her the photo of the gold, elven ear cuffs bejeweled with black stones to match the dress.
“Hmmm.”
“Hmmm” should be forbidden as a thing one woman can say to another woman when discussing what the first woman is wearing to a party. It’s just all kinds of wrong.
“You know you can’t leave that hanging in the air.” I looked at my printed photo again. “Is there a problem with the cuffs?”
“Well, Lochlan and Ivy will be there.”
“Yeesssss?”
“They have pointed ears.”
I swallowed my scoff. It’s not politic to challenge the person charged with making the dress that might very well be my spirit animal.
“I’ve noticed that.” I did my best to keep my voice even and not sounding as sarcastic as the duh I was thinking.
“Well.” She paused. I waited. “You wouldn’t want to offend them.”
I would’ve bet my guest cottage that only appears when I need it that neither Lochlan nor Ivy would be offended. They might even be complimented.
“Okay then. Just to be sure, I’ll ask Lochlan.”
With a single jerk of a nod, she pinched a corner of the paper between two fingers and pulled the dress photo from my grasp. “I can give you the look of this dress, but instead of beads and sequins, I’ll use black silk shantung for the background and weave the pattern with gold metallic thread.”
I almost gasped out loud. “OMGs, Esme! That sounds incredible!”
“Unlike this…” she glanced at the photo with a hint of disgust, “it will be comfortable and lightweight. The dress in this photo would weigh so much you wouldn’t be able to climb the stairs without assistance.”
“You’re a genius.”
On impulse, I grabbed Esmerelda and gave her a kiss on the cheek. She froze, wide-eyed, looking so stunned that my evil twin made a mental note to do it often.
“And it will fit me like it was made for me.”
Her surprised expression instantly transformed into her usual surliness that warned of snark incoming. I braced.
“No. It won’t fit like it was made for you. It will be made for you.”
“Well, you know what I mean.” I was elated and excited and choosing to focus on that. “So how long do you need?”
“When do you want it?”
I gasped out loud. “Shoes!” I tried to slow my breathing so that I wouldn’t hyperventilate. “Good golly, Miss Molly. I thought of everything else. Gloves. Shawl. Long crystal beads. You know, like they wore back then. I even ordered a glamorous, long cigarette holder and some of those little thin black cigarettes.”
Esmerelda cocked her head. “You smoke?”
“What? No. It’s pretend, to complete the look. The point is, HOW COULD I POSSIBLY FORGET SHOES?”
“I don’t know,” she said, as if that was not a rhetorical question. “But I do know I’m not Molly.”
“What?”
“You called me Molly.”
“No, I…” Pause. Slow down. Gather composure. There are still shoes for sale in the world and, even if there weren’t, there’s a