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“I don’t think I’ve got anything else. This is all I brought that isn’t jeans or t-shirts,” I said despairingly. The last thing I needed was to advertise my ignorance of our family traditions to the whole population of Sedgwick Cove.
Persi rolled her eyes. “Oh for goddess’s sake. Come with me.”
I followed Persi into the house and up the stairs. My mom was sitting at the desk in the living room, her cell phone pressed between her shoulder and her ear as she spoke to someone at work. Her eyes widened in alarm when she saw us ascending together, but I gave her what a hoped was a reassuring smile. “It’s fine,” I mouthed. She nodded, though she didn’t look convinced, and returned to her conversation.
Persi pushed open the door to her bedroom. My first thought was that it looked like a rebellious teenager lived here, rather than a grown woman. She had clothes strewn over all the furniture, as though she’d recently tried on half her closet at once; and yet the closet itself, the doors of which were flung wide, was stuffed to overflowing. The vanity table, topped with three tall, angled mirrors, was cluttered with makeup and perfume bottles and hair products and jewelry boxes. I ran my fingers over a silver-backed hairbrush and a string of pearls.
Persi turned from her closet to stare at me appraisingly, her eyes raking me from head to toe so that I blushed with mortification, arms crossed protectively over my midsection.
“You’re just a little slip of a thing, aren’t you?” she murmured, and she twirled her red-taloned finger in a little circle that meant I was supposed to turn around, which I did grudgingly. “You’re built like Rhi. Most anything of mine will hang off you.”
Well, that much was obvious. Persi had curves for days, and she chose her clothes to accentuate them to their most glorious fullness, making me feel like a twelve-year-old boy by comparison. I wanted to cry when I thought about what her plunging necklines and body-hugging silhouettes would look like on my angular frame. Persi, however, didn’t seem to share my hopeless view of the situation.
“Hmmm,” she said, eyes narrowed, lips pursed, then she clapped her hands together. “Okay. I’ve got some ideas.” And with that she fairly dove into the closet and started flinging out things behind her, heedless of where they landed or what they might knock over in the process. I only just managed to save her lamp from a wayward leopard print pump. At last she turned around, surveyed her newly compounded sartorial chaos with satisfaction, and smiled mischievously at me.
“Right, then. Let’s get started.”
What she did next was very nearly witchcraft—in fact, I wouldn’t have been surprised to find out there was actual magic involved. She unearthed a basket full of sewing supplies and started flinging dresses and scarves and tops over my head, cocking her head to each side as she examined each one. I didn’t dare profess an opinion—I just stood there like a mannequin and let her get on with it. I didn’t even protest when she started literally ripping garments apart at the seams—she appeared to be doing it on purpose and enjoying herself in the process. Soon she was demanding I hold my arms out like a scarecrow in a field while she pinned and tucked and draped and folded. Finally, she pulled all of it off me and tossed me a kimono-style robe to wrap myself in while I sat on the edge of her bed and waited for her to unearth and use an antique sewing machine, singing to herself as she did so. At last, she snipped the thread and flourished her creation with a grin.
“It’s done! Try it on!”
She looked so hopeful that I didn’t bother to inform her that the reason I always wore t-shirts and jeans is because I looked so frumpy in girly clothes. Seriously. It was like when people dress their pets up in human clothes; it just didn’t look right. But as I slid the confection over my head, something happened that had never happened to me in a department store changing room. The skirt dropped down around me and I got the urge to twirl—this impulse was one I felt sure I’d been born without, and yet here it was, practically forcing me to spin in a circle. The colors and patterns were riotous, and yet they all seemed to belong to one another as seamlessly as though they were a single piece of fabric. The sleeves flared out from my arms like bells. The bodice hugged me without making me feel restricted. And best of all, when I turned and looked in the full-length mirror propped in the corner of Persi’s room, I barely recognized the girl staring back at me.
“Oh!” I said, blinking in confusion.
“Oh? That’s it? That’s all you have to say?” Persi asked, frowning in consternation.
“It’s… I barely recognize myself!” I murmured.
“That’s more like it,” Persi said, smiling with satisfaction. I tried to ignore the implied insult. “Now, how about that hair?”
Twenty minutes later, I was officially a stranger in the mirror. Persi had attacked me with a straightening iron, and then a curling iron, working like a mad scientist in a misty haze of aerosol hair products. Then she filed and painted my nails and dug out a little pair of beautiful beaded slippers for me to wear. While nothing else in her closet would fit me without serious alterations, we were at least a similar shoe size. She tried to get me to ditch my glasses, but as I would literally walk into walls without them, she removed them only briefly to use my face like a canvas for her endless supply of makeup. Finally, when I put them back on and looked at myself, I could do nothing but gape.
“See? And to think that lovely creature was in there all along!” Persi sang as she cleaned a makeup brush.
“She wasn’t in here,” I murmured. “You just put her on me, like a costume.”
“Well, you wear her well,” Persi said, giving me a sharp look that said she would not tolerate any self-deprecating remarks after she’d worked so hard. But even if I’d wanted to, I couldn’t have found anything to criticize about the girl standing in front of me. All I could wonder was who she was and how long she’d stay before I woke up with one shoe and a broken heart, like Cinderella, minus the singing mice.
“Thank you. You really didn’t have to do all this,” I said, gesturing broadly to myself.
“Yes, I did,” Persi said bluntly, rolling her eyes. “Did you seriously think I was going to let you represent the Vesper Coven in front of the whole town in that shapeless black clearance rack monstrosity? Ew. Now, shoo. I need to change.”
And just like that, I was dismissed. It looked like it would take more than submitting to a make-over before Aunt Persi and I would really be friends. Well, it was a step in the right direction anyway, I thought, as I closed her door behind me.
13
Ialmost lost my nerve when I saw my mother’s reaction to Persi’s handiwork. She looked for a moment like she might actually burst into tears at the sight of me.
“Is it really that bad? I thought it was… I can go change…” I mumbled, turning on my heel and making to sprint up the stairs in humiliation; but my mom reached out and caught my arm.
“No! I’m sorry, honey, it’s just… my goodness, you look like your grandmother,” my mom choked out.
“Is that… bad?” I asked, squirming under the emotion in her gaze.
“No. It’s… it’s perfect,” my mom said, and planted a kiss on my cheek. “You’re beautiful, Wren.”
I felt the color rise to my cheeks and I smothered a smile. I didn’t think she was lying to me or anything, but it was hard to feel good about a compliment that couldn’t be delivered without tears. Nevertheless, when it was time to go and my mom came downstairs, she too had abandoned the black dress I’d seen in her bag for a long, purple skirt and a blousy white top, her usually pony-tailed hair falling in loose waves over her shoulders. She caught Rhi smiling at her and pointed an accusatory finger.
