Page 56 of The Big Easy & Other Lies
I didn’t know if I’d need any of them, but an idea for a cool headband rattled around in my brain, and I returned each button back to the jar with a sense of victory. Icouldmake something beautiful from piles of nothing. My mom would be proud.
An ivory button slipped through my fingers and rolled between two boxes before I could catch it. Dang. Its mellow glow meant it was probably real ivory. I shifted two columns of boxes out of the way to find it, and halfway through the second stack, awesomeness struck—in muslin. A whole bolt of it.
I jerked it out of the pile, my palms itching for the gauziness. I wanted to spread it out on the floor and roll around in it. I settled for unwinding it a few turns. It was in good condition. Hallelujah. Sometimes I found super cheap material on clearance at Notion to Sew, the closest fabric store to me. And when I’d gotten yards and yards of it, even if it was ugly, it made me happy because I could stress so much less about making the pattern.
Pattern-making was hard. Pattern-making was the kind of thing you took a whole semester-long class (or three) to learn. Pattern-making was more of a talent than a skill, really. But if you hadmuslin...that changed things. The lightweight properties of muslin, its blank-canvas state, made it ideal for doing practice patterns, for seeing if what you’ve made was going to work. But it was also a luxury for someone like me.
Yanking the next box out of the way revealed that my precious bolt was only the tip of the dusty iceberg. More bolts! Of muslin! Of fabric that would give me the freedom to make mistakes before attempting anything permanent with the fabric I ultimately picked for my vignette.
This stash would have made the whole day’s search worth it, but it got even better. Under the muslin lay two full bolts of another damask, this one black-on-white. I loved the fleur-de-lis feel of it; it was so New Orleans, but they wouldn’t work in my designs at all. Next came bolts and bolts of vintage cottons in half a dozen different prints, plus a red-striped seersucker. At the very least, I could make some funky retro dresses for extra cash. Sometimes my favorite consignment shop, Gigi’s Closet, let me sell them there. The owner would love the vintage prints.
The seersucker made my fingertips happy. For the first time since Mrs. Broussard’s announcement about the Smoki Branson show, hope bubbled up inside me. I could do this. None of these so far would work with the line I envisioned, but they proved that if I could stick out the search, I had a shot at finding the fabric I needed to pull this concept together.
In my mind’s eye, I pictured Aidan Helm looking over my three pieces, his eyebrows drawn together, which always foreshadowed a dramatic pronouncement. “Stunning,” he would drawl, his forehead smoothing. “Who is the genius behind this design?”
I grinned and hugged a rose-toned floral calico. This whole stupid mess, this epic, disgusting pile of rotting, moldering,everything, earned its first glance of affection. It was still so gross, but gross with potential.
I hauled all the fabric upstairs and stacked it against the wall. Since I had two hours before work, I streamed aFashion Faux Paspodcast and waded right back into the spare room. I was on the scent now. Not the garbage-y one. The scent of possibility and more fabrics. Even the space I had picked clean cooperated and offered up the missing ivory button.
Time to tackle more bulging industrial-sized Trash Bags of Mystery. Cotton quilt batting filled the first half dozen. Not helpful, but it was a product of Pawpaw Landry’s cotton mill, which meant that I was still on the trail. Underneath the fetid notes of damp rot, victory smelled sweet.
Chapter 21
Sunday night, I collapsed onto my bed cash rich, but boy-poor.
Rhett hadn’t called.
I wasn’t surprised, exactly. I’d told him I wouldn’t be available. But I kind of missed him, so I did the emotionally stable thing and Instagram stalked him to see if I could figure out what he’d done over the weekend. He had only posted a link to a band. Feeling twitchy, I texted Livvie.
Me:Help. No Rhett. Should I text him?
Livvie sent an eyeroll emoji, then:Go to bed. You’ll get a good read on him tomorrow morning.
And even though I didn’t believe it could happen, I woke up to my alarm informing me that I had less than two hours before I could casually bump into Rhett and ask him about lunch. I pulled on high-waisted flared jeans and an orange and turquoise batik blouse, topping it off with plastic bangles. Stacked in the right order, inside they spelled out “listen.” I had carved the letters with a pin one night while I sat next to Delphine for a reality show marathon about storage lockers.
Livvie’s onceover when she picked me up made me feel self-conscious about straying from my plain-tee-and-jeans routine. “I like it,” she said. “But are you ready for people to point and stare?”
I shrugged. “They do it all the time now anyway.”
“I still can’t believe you saw those jeans first. I am cursing you even as I smile.” She bared her teeth in a scary grin, and I laughed.
“You can borrow them. You’ll need heels.” I had two inches on her.
“Sweet.”
Rhett wasn’t at my locker or his, either. I lurked outside of homeroom so I could watch for him on his way to calculus, trying to ignore the sidelong glances as people checked out my outfit. Visibility was itchy. I slunk into Mrs. Hebert’s class when it got too uncomfortable and took my seat.
“Nice outfit,” Lainie Aiten said. I couldn’t tell if she meant it or not, but I said “Thanks” anyway. She nodded and turned back to her friends.
I whipped out my cell phone and texted Rhett.Do you still want to grab lunch later?Then I dropped my phone in my bag and pulled out my class notes while I waited for Bran to show up.
“Yes.”
I jumped at the voice in my ear and turned to find Rhett sitting in the desk behind me. He grinned. “I like your shirt.”
“Thanks.”
“I’ll see you for lunch later,” he said before standing and heading out the door.
