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Sophie grimaced as she recalled the profusion of crinkles the dress had displayed to the seven hundred and fifty million people who’d been watching around the globe.
‘This is, without a doubt, the most beautiful wedding gown I have ever laid eyes on – you know that, Sophie, don’t you?’ said Scarlet, as she stepped forward to help Sophie. ‘It’s definitely going to win the competition, and you’ll see your own design worn by one of the most famous actresses in the world. How exciting is that?’
‘It’s very exciting, and a little nerve-racking, too.’
Despite her natural reluctance to sing her own praises, Sophie allowed herself a tiny nod to her ingenuity with a needle, coupled with her God-given talent, which had produced such dazzling results. It was one of her most adventurous creations to date, but every aspect of the gown had merged to form a true work of art. She had laboured through eighteen-hour days over the last three months, including Saturdays and Sundays, to get the sample ready for the final judging the next day.
The gown’s pale ivory, organic silk flowed like ripples in a summer breeze. The strapless bodice draped exquisitely to enhance Lilac’s pale, swan-like neck and pert breasts. The nipped-in waist would amplify her slender measurements, but it was the A-line skirt that drew the appreciative eye, ruched to the right where a darted panel of inlaid crystals and seed pearls shimmered like a sparkling waterfall whenever the bride moved, especially under the neon lights of Sophie’s workshop.
It was a fantasy dress for a fairy-tale wedding, putting even Cinderella’s to shame.
Of course, if the design won it would have to be custom-altered and remoulded, but she would do anything, work 24/7, if it meant her dress could be displayed to the fashion world on such a famous model. That kind of exposure could jettison the Sophie-Louise name into the order books of every style-conscious celebrity in Britain. It was everything she had been working towards. Every single, painful sacrifice she had made would have been worth it.
Except maybe one.
The two girls gently gathered the gown’s delicate folds and straightened the underskirt and hem. Sophie fought a cauldron of emotions not to shed a tear as she and Scarlet manoeuvred the cardboard wardrobe crate towards the dressmaker’s dummy and carefully inserted the textile sculpture.
They draped sheets of acid-free tissue paper around the dress until it was packed as tightly as possible without scrunching the delicate material, and then stood back to admire their handiwork before they sealed the door, knowing there would be no further tweaking allowed.
As Sophie closed the door and sealed the box with the brown tape, both girls let out a sigh of pleasure and of satisfaction.
‘A true masterpiece, Sophie. Lilac would be crazy not to pick it.’
Sophie couldn’t speak. Her throat had tightened around a lump the size of a golf ball. ‘Oh, God, I nearly forgot! The paperwork for the courier.’
‘Sophie? Sophie?’ Flora’s voice floated down from the floor above. ‘Call for you in the Tumble Room. Said it was urgent!’
‘Okay, Flora, be right there.’
Sophie exchanged a smirk with Scarlet as she slipped on her black ballet pumps, stretched her long, colt-like legs and wiggled out the kinks in her shoulder muscles to her full six-foot height. She flicked the sides of her bob behind each ear and slid the pin cushion from around her wrist. Every call Flora put through was “urgent”. Despite being the salon’s receptionist since its inception, she invariably fell for the caller’s assertive demands.
Rolling her eyes and experiencing a sweep of relief at the conclusion of the most important project of her career, she took the stairs two at a time to their “ideas” room. It had been nicknamed the ‘Tumble Room’ because it was where Sophie hoped their creative juices and ideas would tumble forth from brain to paper. In reality, it was a small conference room they used to receive their clients and listen to their dreams, decorated with wall art ranging from framed photographs of 1950s brassieres to Sophie’s prized Banksy, the celebrated Bristol-born artist, which she’d inherited from her father.
‘Thanks, Flora. Hi, Sophie-Louise Henshaw speaking.’
‘Sophie, at last! It’s Seb,’ announced her cousin with none of his usual comedic preamble.
‘Oh, hi, Seb. What great timing. We’ve just put the finishing touches to—’
‘Sophie, it’s Mum. Delia’s just rung. She collapsed when she was shutting up the shop. She’s been rushed to Cheltenham hospital by ambulance. You’d better get up here. Delia is with her but she’s unconscious. The medics’ early diagnosis is a perforated bowel and she’ll be going straight into surgery. I’m racing across there now.’
‘Oh, my God, Seb, I’m on my way!’
Sophie’s breath caught in her throat and an anvil-heavy weight pressed down on her chest causing her to gasp for air. She tried to move, but her body felt like it was encased in concrete.
‘Sophie? Sophie? What on earth’s happened?’ Scarlet rushed to Sophie’s side, rousing her from her shock and sending her stalled brain into motion.
‘It’s Aunt Claire. She’s collapsed. On her way to the hospital. Having surgery. Got to go. Now!’
‘Oh, Sophie, no!’
Sophie rushed past Scarlet’s blanched face, back down the wooden treads to her workshop and grabbed her handbag and coat. Fear wrenched at her gut. She couldn’t lose her aunt, she just couldn’t. When her parents had died in a head-on crash when she was only ten years old, Aunt Claire had surrounded her with a comfort blanket of love and brought her up alongside her two older cousins, Seb and Dominic, in a home filled with chatter and homely warmth. She adored her. She couldn’t envisage life without her.
‘What about the dress, Sophie?’ cried Scarlet as she darted in Sophie’s wake down the stairs to the workroom. ‘You need to fill out the forms and sign the seal and the courier’s documentations. It’s part of the requirements, as evidence that the entry hasn’t been tampered with.’
‘Oh, erm, you do it, Scarlet,’ Sophie called over her shoulder from the top of the stairs, the helix of panic tightening in her chest and throat, her brain ricocheting off into myriad nightmare scenarios.
Scarlet jogged to keep up with Sophie’s beeline for the exit and the car park at the back of the salon with a visibly upset Flora joining them.
