Page 52 of Glitterland
Just don’t think about it.
I shed my bespoke suit and stuffed it into a Tesco’s carrier bag I found lying on the floor (oh, how the mighty have fallen), and then slithered into a pair of artfully distressed waxed denim jeans that fit so tightly they came perilously close to being leggings. There was no way my wallet wouldn’t ruin the line, so I dug out my Oyster card and my door key and slid them into the back pocket as though I were a sixteen-year-old on the pull.
Oh God. Oh God.
I hadn’t worn anything like this since…well. Before hospital at least.
And then I shook out the top, which turned out to be a very low-cut V-neck in Jersey cotton, also distressed, with ripped sleeves and a pattern of holes and tears about the neckline and across the front.
I clutched it to my naked chest like an assaulted Victorian virgin.
“Chloe,” I whispered. “Chloe. I can’t wear this.”
“Course you can, honey. What’s the problem?”
Before I could stop her, she swept behind the racks and—in sheer fright—I dropped the T-shirt.
“Fuck.” I scrabbled after it, an operation rendered both difficult and intimately painful by the jeans. And then Chloe gently caught my wrist, and I froze.
The pad of her index finger traced the long, jagged scar that ran up my forearm. I normally wouldn’t have allowed anyone to do that, but it was as if she held me bewitched with the warmth of her painted eyes.
“Oh, honey,” she said softly. “You was really going for it.”
I shuddered, then nodded.
She let me go, leaving the rest untouched. I think I was relieved. The ruined skin on my arms burned and shivered like a waking monster.
The next moment, she was all business again, casting an appraising look over the rest of me.
“You look lovely,” she said. “It really suits you, that look.”
“Scarred and shirtless?”
“But,” she continued, ignoring me, “you’ll need a belt wif those.” She pointed helpfully in the direction of my hips. “Put the top on and I’ll get you like a coat or summin. And some boots.”
She was back in what felt like seconds, with a studded belt and some heeled, snakeskin-patterned boots that I was still dazed enough to put on without protest.
“I was going to ’ave Darian modlin this wif nuffin else.” She smirked and passed me what appeared to be a loose-knit octopus.
Good lord, a dwelkin.
“Wait, just this?” I said. “It’s a cardigan.”
She gave a horrified shriek. Suicide and self-harm were something this girl could take in her stride. But cardigans were beyond the pale. “It’s not a cardigan,” she squeaked. “Well. It is a cardigan but it’s like…a real glamour cardigan, janarwhatamean?”
“I think, my dear, that’s what they call an oxymoron.”
“A what?”
“A contradiction in terms.”
“Well, they ’aven’t seen my cardigans, ’ave they? Put it on.”
I stuck my arms through the sleeves. It was basically a cross between a cardigan and a shawl, with waterfall lapels at the front and a pair of asymmetric tails at the back that flowed down past my knees. There was also a sort of scarf, which turned out to be very long and growing like a set of tentacles from the collar.
“I feel like I’m in hentai,” I muttered as I got tangled up.
“What’s that, honey?”
