Caridad Ferrer - Prom Ever After - Haute Date / Save the Last Dance / Prom and Circumstance

* * *

“Wow. What on earth is that?” Laila Montague pointed at the 3D dress creation that was sitting on the counter. She was home early that evening as Sebastian and Ash sat in their usual places in the kitchen.

Ash was on her Surface, trying to make their school sketch look more school-like. Mr. Watkins hadn’t been impressed by their work so far—he said it was too “literal” and needed to jibe with the rest of the students’ work for their final project. Ash had promised to take over the project. Sebastian had done enough. She welcomed the distraction after their serious talk at Molly Moon’s. She didn’t want to even think of a time when she wouldn’t see Sebastian every day.

Sebastian was searching sewing websites for ideas on how to make their dress sculpture a reality, with minimal sewing to the lehenga since neither of them knew how.

Sebastian glanced over at where Laila was pointing. “Oh, that’s for my doll collection.”

“Sebastian, really.” Even stoic Laila looked amused.

Seb was grinning. He was one of the few people who could make Laila loosen up after her long workdays. “Actually, Ash said she would love to wear your lehenga to the prom.”

Laila’s smile was contagious. Ash suddenly realized how beautiful her mother was when her whole face opened up and relaxed. Those were the moments when she hoped everyone was right when they said she was a copy of Laila when her mother was her age.

“Really? I knew she’d change her mind.”

“Again. People. I’m right here.” Ash looked up from her work. “Talk at me, please.”

“I knew you’d change your mind,” Laila said smugly.

Ash did an eye roll. “I didn’t. Seb came up with the idea of modifying the lehenga into something less...Mogul-esque, and that is what we, well he, came up with.”

Laila picked up the tiny dress sculpture. “It’s lovely.”

“I love it,” Ash said. “We just need to find instructions for how to modify the real one. It can’t be that hard.”

“What?” Laila almost dropped the sculpture. “You want to modify my dress? Into this?”

“Mom!” Ash could tell by the tone of her voice that she was about to quash their great idea. “Can you not be negative for once?”

“Ashmita Montague, do not ‘Mom’ me!”

“Seb, talk to her!”

“Here we go again...” Sebastian nearly flipped his chair over as he leaned back. He shook his head at the ceiling in despair. “The women in my life are going to drive me crazy.”

* * *

“What’s going on?” Josh Montague came in from the garage, where he’d just finished up with the band.

“Ash is eavesdropping,” Sonali said helpfully, looking up from her chalk sketch of a lifelike tiger.

“Shh!” Ash shushed her father, who was talking loudly by the loud refrigerator. She was standing at the edge of the kitchen, trying to listen in on the hushed conversation in the living room.

He poured himself an iced tea. “What are we eavesdropping on?”

“Shh!”

“It’s like I need a Twitter feed to keep up with what goes on in this house.”

“Dad. Please. Let’s play the quiet game.” Ash strained to hear what her mother and Seb were saying. Of course, her mother chose this moment to speak quietly.

“Wow. I just got treated like a six-year-old by my kid. They say it happens to everyone.”

“She told me the same thing,” Sonali reassured him.

“Shh!”

“Shh!” Josh mimicked Ash with an exaggerated finger to his lips.

Ash waited for a break in conversation.

“Seb’s talking to Mom,” she explained. “We want to make this—” she pointed at the tiny dress sculpture “—out of that.” She pointed at the real lehenga, which was still hanging in the kitchen.

“How’re you going to do that?”

“They don’t know,” Sonali filled in. “It’s a harebrained scheme with no execution plan.”

“Have you been reading your mother’s law journals again?” Josh laughed. “God, I love being at home with you guys.”

“Have some faith. We’ll figure it out.” Ash waved her hand. “But first, Seb has to convince Mom.”

“Is she really going to let a bunch of teenagers who know nothing about sewing hack apart one of her favorite dresses?”

“No,” Sonali said.

“Does no one have faith in the system?” Ash gave them both a look.

“What system?” Josh asked.

“My system!” Ash whispered back loudly. They’d started talking again in the other room.

“Then, no.”

Ash did an eye roll. “I know Mom doesn’t. That’s why Seb has to convince her.”

And he was doing a fine job.

“Mrs. M, remember when you were, say, apprehensive about letting me build that computer for Ash? You were convinced it would overheat and burn the house down.” Sebastian’s voice wafted in from the living room. “She sulked for weeks and finally you gave in? Think of this project as that computer but not as useful.”

Ash almost wanted to object, but knew better than to interrupt or let on that she was eavesdropping.

“And now look, that computer—” Ash could practically see him gesturing toward the den where the Franken-computer existed “—still stands. Safe and sound. Six years of abuse by that destructive daughter of yours and it hasn’t exploded. You, yourself, have admitted you have used it for research for your cases on weekends.”

Laila was quiet. The defense lawyer had no defense.

“...and I’m hardly an engineer, Mrs. M. But I was able to do the right research to build that computer. I would never let anything bad happen to something that belonged to you. Not your daughter. Not your dress.”

Ash started to feel her hope returning.

“He’s good,” Ash’s dad whispered. “He should be a lawyer. Taking down your mother is...”

“One condition, and I mean it, Sebastian.”

Ash’s fists squeezed together in excitement.

“Anything.”

Ash could practically see Sebastian opening his hands in that way he did that got anyone to completely trust him. He just had a way of doing that.

“You find a professional to do the work. For the set budget of one hundred dollars. You do not try any stunts of your own. And I want to speak to whoever you find on the phone first to understand their credentials. And you stay in the budget.”

“Mrs. M., I promise you that you will love the lehenga so much you’ll steal it right back from your daughter and wear it to every holiday party this year.”

“Sebastian?”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Don’t sell past the close.”

“No, ma’am.”

Both Ash and Josh Montague expelled sighs of relief.

“The defense rests,” Josh murmured, hugging Ash close.

Sonali continued to not look convinced as she sketched in the tiger’s whiskers.

Seven

“Are you sure it’s around here?” Sebastian glanced at the GPS on his phone and the surrounding buildings. “I don’t see anything that looks big enough to be it.”

Ash ignored him as she surveyed the line of eccentric windowed storefronts dotting Pike Street off Broadway.

“There! I’ve passed by it a hundred times.” Ash gestured toward a familiar-looking window. “Park! Park!”

“Yes, ma’am.” Sebastian expertly parallel parked his Mazda in front of the colorful doorway with a Some Like It Haute sign over it.

Ash had decided to act before her mother changed her mind. She remembered passing the cute little Capitol Hill storefront that boasted “Designer fabrics for those who can... Couture dressmaking for those who can’t!” on the front window many times on her little scooter. She was sure that with the promises of couture dressmaking the storefront made, a little alteration to the lehenga would be easy-breezy.