“Okay, okay,” Moose said. “You want to come help dress up Bony Girl? Even if you're not getting married, you probably know more about how to put on a wedding dress than we do.”
Sarah stared at him blankly for a moment, then grinned. “Yeah, probably,” she said. “I doubt any of you have ever been near one before now.” She walked over to the table and began looking it over. “Remember, this is just a costume, it doesn't even fasten like a real wedding gown. It's got these three little hooks in the back instead of a zipper or buttons. Set the skeleton down on the floor, please?”
Moose did as she asked, and Sarah slid the dress down over its head, fumbling to get the bony arms into the sleeves without ripping the lace. It took her only a couple of minutes, and then she stood back and looked at it.
“Okay, let's get the jewelry on her.” She began picking through the pile they had made the day before, adding different ornaments to the figure as she went along.
“We missed something,” Neil said, “actually a couple of things. Santa Muerte is supposed to be holding a couple of objects, mainly a scythe—she's Death, right?—and a globe, like of the world. I guess that's supposed to mean she has the power of life and death over everything.” He looked at Noah. “I can make them, with the printer. They should look okay that way.”
Noah nodded. “Yes, go ahead. We need this to look as real as possible.”
Neil nodded once and went to the printer. He couldn’t find a scythe in the image database, but it took him only a few minutes to create one with the CAD software that was built into it, and the printer began working at its normal rapid pace.
Sarah was actually enjoying herself, and Noah cocked his head to one side as he watched her work. It took a moment, but she saw him.
“What?” Sarah asked.
Noah shook his head. “Just watching you,” he said. “You were smiling, and it caught my attention.”
Sarah blushed and looked away. “I was just remembering when I was a little girl, before my mom died. She used to buy me dolls, and we'd play dress up with them. I hadn't thought about that in a long time, but this reminded me of it.”
Noah nodded. “I knew it was just you and your dad when you got busted and recruited, but I never knew what happened to your mother. How old were you when she died?”
“I was eleven,” Sarah said. “It wasn't sudden. She got cancer, and we knew for a couple of years that it was coming, but it still hurt when she was gone.”
Noah said nothing, and a moment later she went on. “After that, it was just me and my dad. I don't think he ever got over it, to be honest. He never dated or anything, always said he didn't have time for that kind of thing, but he was always ready to take me to the movies, or out to play putt-putt. If he hadn't taught me how to steal cars before I turned eleven, it would've been a pretty decent childhood.”
She added a couple more pieces and stood back to look at her handiwork. “Not bad,” she said. “Neil, what do you think?”
Neil walked over and looked at the figure, nodding his head. “Looks like the pictures I found online,” he said. “When the scythe and globe get done, I'd say she's ready, Boss.”
“Scythe looks like it's ready,” Moose said. He reached into the printer and picked it up.
Neil had done a good job on it. The handle, properly curved, looked like wood, while the blade appeared to be made of steel. Only the weight made it clear that it was plastic. Moose carried it over and carefully bent the fingers of the skeletal right hand around it, but the arm wouldn't stay in position. Sarah rolled up the sleeve while Moose applied superglue to the elbow joint to lock it in place.
Neil started the printer on the globe. This time, he was able to find one in the database, one that showed all of the continents engraved into what appeared to be a silver ball. He turned the printer loose and it began working. Fifteen minutes later, the shiny four-inch globe was ready.
Moose and Sarah had gone ahead and prepared the left hand, bending and locking the elbow so that the hand was positioned just in front of where the skeleton's heart would be, if it had one. Another drop of superglue attached a silver chain from a necklace to the globe, and that was draped over the hand.
The four of them stood back and looked at their creation, and Neil let out a low whistle. “I gotta say, that looks pretty awesome to me. Don't get me wrong, I'm not ready to start praying to a bony bitch, but if I was one of her followers, I think I'd want one of these in my living room.”
“We didn't think about a box,” Noah said. “I don't think anybody would expect one of these to be delivered without being in some kind of a box.”
Neil shrugged. “I wouldn't even know where to look for a box this size,” he said. “Anybody got any ideas?”