“Don’t be an idiot,” she said to herself as she slung her “schlumpy work suit” over the back of the chair and worked the first cocktail dress off the hanger. “He’s seen you naked now. There’s no reason to be embarrassed.”
That’s what she told herself when she walked out of the room in a simple black sheath with red marks around her calves from her trouser socks. Jamie looked up from his phone; Taylor peered out from the back room where she was searching through the most recent arrivals for more gowns.
“Nice,” Jamie said, his gaze warm, appreciative.
She turned to face the three-way mirror. “This is good,” she said. “I can pair it with a blazer and wear it on recruiting trips.”
“I didn’t pick that out for you, and don’t tell me you don’t have a basic black sheath already. You played for how many years in France and left without an LBD? What were you doing in Europe?”
“Playing basketball,” she retorted, not even asking what an LBD was. “Winning championships. Not shopping.”
“Europe was wasted on you,” Taylor said. She twitched at the side seam, pulling it tight across Charlie’s backside. “It’s too loose.”
“It’s fine.”
“Actually,” Jamie said, eying her backside in a very possessive way.
She shot him a glare. He held up his hands in surrender.
“Try on something else. Anything else.”
“Not the floral thing,” Charlie said. “I don’t do floral. At my height, I put on anything with flowers and I look like a Venus flytrap on steroids.”
“You do not. The fuchsia dress, then.”
“It’ll be too short,” Charlie warned.
“It’ll be perfect,” Taylor said.
Which is how she found herself in the dressing room, zipping herself into a bright, deep pink raw silk dress with a fitted strapless bodice and a flared skirt that would be way too short and she would hate because it was gaudy and would make her stand out in the crowd even more than her height did. So she didn’t even look at herself in the mirror, just shouldered open the swinging door and stormed over to the chair where Jamie was sprawled, gaze focused on his phone.
“The zipper’s stuck,” she said, looming over Jamie.
He looked up to where she held the bodice closed with clutching hands, then rose to his feet, crowding close to tug the zipper the rest of the way up.
Charlie stared down at her breasts. “Where did those come from?”
“Heaven,” Jamie said, peering over her shoulder.
“It’s too tight. I can’t go to a school event like this. It’s—”
Jamie set his hands on her waist and turned her to face the mirror, cutting her off mid-protest. The woman staring back looked like her, with smudged makeup and glowing skin. Her eyes seemed huge in her face, and while she knew objectively that her lips weren’t swollen, hadn’t been kissed in hours and hours, they were fuller, pinker. Jamie reached up and gently tugged her hair elastic loose so her bright gold and wheat strands tumbled around her shoulders.
“Damn, Charlie,” he whispered.
“Uh-huh,” Taylor said, popping out from behind a rack. “That’s what I’m talking about. Look. At. Your. Legs.”
“They’re just my legs,” Charlie said, studying her legs in the three-way. The skirt was probably knee-length on a normal-sized human, but on Charlie the hem stopped closer to mid-thigh.
Taylor turned for the shoe section. “Heels.”
“I don’t wear heels.”
“Size ten?”
“And a half,” Charlie finished, “but I’m not wearing heels.”
A minute later she was standing in front of the mirror in three-inch heels in a shiny patent leather a couple of shades darker than her pale skin. “You’ll need to get a mani-pedi.”
“Where the hell am I going to find time to get a mani-pedi?”
“Saturday morning. I’ll book you an appointment with my girl. Give me the rest of the cocktail dresses. You’re done.”
“Taylor,” she said a bit desperately. “This dress is totally impractical. And if I wear heels, I’ll be taller than most of the men in the room.”
“They can suck it up,” Taylor said heartlessly. “I don’t give a damn about male egos. That dress requires heels.”
“Taylor.”
“You can wear it to the banquet, too,” Taylor wheedled. “It’ll work for both. Flats and a little shrug to make it demure for the garden party. Oh!” She lunged for a rack sandwiched between purses and jewelry and came up with a handful of pewter gray that turned out to be a sweater that covered nothing but Charlie’s shoulders and arms to just below her elbows.
She looked at Jamie. “-Help me out here.”
“Hate to break this to you, sweetheart, but she’s right. Damn,” he said, but his eyes were heavy-lidded, unabashedly looking her over.
“Of course I’m right.” Taylor rummaged in the shoe area and then dropped silver ballet flats on the floor at Charlie’s feet. Charlie opened her mouth, closed it, then slid her feet into the shoes. She risked a glance in the mirror, and almost didn’t recognize herself.
“Perfect,” Taylor said with a fist pump. “Now you don’t have to buy a gown. This dress is practical.”
“It’s practically purple.”