‘I’m bored of talking about this,’ Phoebe said with a sniff. ‘Anyway, that isexquisitetop-stitching, Cress.’
Then she tucked her arm into Cress’s and led her away. ‘I’m so glad you’re here. We have a bride coming in today and I can already tell that she’s going to be very high-maintenance and will want loads of alterations to whatever dress she eventually picks.You’ll have to come and rescue me, Cressy, if you can hear her giving me a hard time.’
Sophy shared an incredulous look with Beatrice at the notion that Phoebe might need rescuing from a customer. More like the other way round. And yes, it was official; Cress was going to be of absolutely no use.
As Cress and Phoebe had decamped to the atelier and Beatrice was busy updating the website with pictures of new stock and Anita was going to be late because she had a dentist’s appointment, Sophy was left on her own to relive the torment of those two minutes on Friday night when she’d told Charles that he was gay and then, oh God, intimated that she might be falling in love with him. She really wasn’t sure which was worse. It was probably a photo finish. Sophy had to stop thinking about it while also coming up with a bulletproof excuse to get her out of lunch on Wednesday because she could never face Charles ever again.
If he came into the shop, she’d have to lock herself in the back office and not come out until he’d gone. In fact, it might be a good idea to find some other employment altogether. It wasn’t like working in a vintage dress shop was Sophy’s vocation in life. Not like it was for Cress or Phoebe.
Sophy was vocation-free. Always had been. She’d drifted into working for Belle Girl after Johnno had extricated her from her bar job. They were taking on extra staff for Christmas and Sophy had just never left. Now she tried to contemplate what sort of job would make her happy. What was her passion in life? What was she truly good at?
These weren’t hard questions, but Sophy couldn’t find an answer to a single one. It was another reason why she was going to Australia: so she could have an opportunity to reinvent herself. Maybe it would turn out that she’d be really good at surfing or discover a passion for sheep farming. Stranger things had happened.
The door opened and a young woman with a clenched jaw and an older woman with a harried expression entered the shop. It was Phoebe’s high-maintenance bride and her mother, so Sophy directed them upstairs. Then, having worked in retail for such a long time, she deployed her impeccable skills at looking busy even when she wasn’t. She pretended to rearrange the dresses, because God help her if she mucked up the colour coding. She gave the jewellery display cases a quick wipe down and when, finally, some browsers arrived, she helped them pull some clothes to try on for a fancy golden wedding anniversary.
‘Because they’ve been married fifty years, our grandparents have gone with a fifties theme. Where are your fifties dresses?’
‘They’re actually arranged by colour,’ Sophy said. ‘Why don’t you tell me if you want fifties foofy dresses with the big skirts or something tighter and sexier.’
She asked them their sizes and their preferred shades and didn’t mind fetching and carrying frocks to and from the changing rooms, though Anita, who’d eventually turned up, whispered that they weren’t there to wait on the clients hand and foot. But the busier Sophy was, the quicker time went, and an hour later she’d made three successful sales. For the first time in the two weeks since she’d started working in The Vintage Dress Shop, and actually even before that, Sophy felt the warm glow of a job well done.
If there was one thing she was good at, it was customer service. It wasn’t even about the sales, though the sales were nice. It was about someone leaving the shop having bought a dress that made them happy. All three women had looked gorgeous in their chosen dresses and who didn’t feel better about themselves when they actually liked the reflection staring back at them in a mirror?
Maybe it wasn’t the passion that Phoebe and Cress had for vintage clothes, but if Sophy was looking for her own niche atThe Vintage Dress Shop, then it would be providing a positive customer experience, because goodness knows none of the other staff were. It was also worth remembering that when she got to Australia, Sophy would have no trouble finding a job with her superior retail skills and the glowing reference that she was sure Freddy would write for her if the Belle Girl HR department were still locked out of their computers.
In Australia, Sophy could work to live rather than live to work and hope she could afford the rent on a London shoebox. After a day charming customers and giving them a good retail experience, Sophy would be straight down to Bondi to feel the sand beneath her toes; her hair would settle into permanently tousled beachy waves, her skin flushed an attractive colour by the sun. It would be easy to drop a dress size if she was swimming all the time. Radha said that she lived in shorts and strappy little tops and flip-flops and maybe Sophy would too.
Flip-flopping back to the little house with sea views that she’d share with some laid-back Australians to fire up the barbie…
Sophy’s Bondi reverie was interrupted by the harried-looking woman who’d accompanied the difficult bride coming listlessly down the stairs.
‘Everything all right up there?’ Sophy asked in her perkiest voice. She’d missed her perkiest voice!
‘Not really. I’m just making things worse. Apparently, I’m not allowed to have any opinions on a dress that I’m paying for,’ the woman said glumly. She was a statuesque blonde with the kind of bone structure that Sophy longed for, but she looked close to tears. ‘I thought we were going to have a lovely day together, we’ve booked in for afternoon tea after this, but now she says she won’t be able to fit into anything if she keeps scoffing cakes.’
It was a problem. Phoebe’s problem, thankfully, but Sophy could teach Phoebe a thing or two about how to interface with customers.‘I was just about to put the kettle on, if you fancy a cuppa?’
The drizzly greyness of the weeks before had given way to blue skies and the sun glinting off the water of the canal. Sophy and Hege (she was originally from Norway) sat on the little patio at the back and Sophy made soothing noises as Hege went into some detail about how her previously delightful daughter, Ingrid, had become increasingly impossible since she got engaged.
‘I’m sure she doesn’t mean to. But getting married is a lot, isn’t it? Not just having to make decisions about table settings but you’re deciding to spend the rest of your life with one person.’
Sophy sighed. Had she made a conscious decision to spend the rest of her life with Egan or had they just drifted into togetherness in the same way that they then drifted apart? At least emigrating to Australia was Sophy grabbing life by the throat, instead of just drifting through it. ‘That would make anyone a little bit challenging.’
‘When I married Ingrid’s father, it was a quick trip to the registry office with our best friends as witnesses, then we went down the pub,’ Hege remembered with a wistful smile. ‘Yesterday we had a heated debate about whether to swathe the chairs at the reception in tulle with a big bow at the back.’
‘I suppose times have changed,’ Sophy murmured. ‘But it’s nice that you and your daughter get to plan the wedding together. My friend is getting married but she’s emigrated to Sydney, so her mum can only help with the wedding planning via FaceTime.’
Sophy was saved from having to think up any more platitudes by the chime of Hege’s phone. ‘I’ve been summoned back upstairs.’ She sighed. ‘Will you come with me? You have a very calming presence.’
Phoebe clearly didn’t think so because she glared atSophy when she saw her trailing Hege up the spiral stairs.
‘I’m only here under duress,’ Sophy wanted to say, but she didn’t get a chance because within a minute Ingrid and Hege had launched into an argument about the merits of an oyster satin dress versus a blush pink one.
‘Why? Why do you want me to look so hideous on the most special day of my entire life?’ Ingrid demanded.
‘Of course I don’t want you to look hideous. You’re being absolutely ridiculous, Inge. I’ve a good mind to make you pay for the wedding yourself and then maybe you’d remember that you’re not actually one of those Kardashians.’
‘I will pay for it myself and then you’ll have it on your conscience when I have to feed our guests fish fingers and oven chips!’
