Chapter 43
I was flying. Or falling. Almost throwing up from pride, joy, and a million other emotions as I watched Elliot close Daphne’s dress. The moment was so fundamental that I knew I would never forget it.
It was engraved. The way she squealed, the way Camila and Oliver stood in the corner, watching, with no complaints. The way Elliot looked at me across his shoulder, despite everything that had happened, and offered a slight congratulatory nod.
Tentatively smiling back, I tried not to remember that I hadn’t only broken his trust but also ignored him for a whole week afterward. We hadn’t so much as spoken a word since then, and we’d been in the same room for at least half an hour for the fitting.
I should have found the courage to talk to him, but every time I was about to (lie, I don’t think anything could’ve gotten me over there), he was speaking to Ryan, Daphne, their assistant, or publicist, or tying his shoe, or very busy on his phone.
And whenever he did look my way, I promptly looked anywhere else.
Coward. I was being such a chickenshit, it was embarrassing.
After leaving Daphne and Ryan in the very capable hands of their entire team, plus our team, plus Elliot, I went home for the first time in a week. It felt weird, having to rattle the lock to get inside, when for the past few days, all I had to do was gently let Paula’s key slide into the door.
Inside, it smelled like fresh linen and old coffee and Elliot’s cologne, wafting from the jackets hanging in the hallway. It felt like home in the worst way, like I missed him more than I’d care to admit.
I’d fucked up majorly, and I had no idea how to ask for forgiveness because I’d never really fucked up this badly.
My friendships had always been easy. I’d been lucky, somehow formed this little perfect bubble around my platonic relationships where my friends never did anything wrong and I never did, either.
Beyond the arguments over what to have for dinner, we pretty much always got along.
And I got so used to the ease of that, I forgot that doing wrong and apologizing is part of life.
I just didn’t know how to do it anymore.
If Elliot wouldn’t agree to talk to me—which was well within his rights—I’d simply combust. I wouldn’t be able to take it, and so I’d avoided the possibility by avoiding him.
He hadn’t searched me out for a conversation either, though. So maybe that was answer enough. That’s what I thought, at least, until I closed my door, and on the back of it, there was another dress.
Not as subtle as the last one, but not too much either. Just right. I knew what it was for without having to read the note attached to the hanger.
I know. —E
Meanwhile, I didn’t know anything. What he meant with his note; what it meant for us. I didn’t even have a good guess. I couldn’t figure out why he’d get me a dress when I didn’t have the balls to say a quick, simple sorry.
I let my fingers glide across fabric the same shade as that Bahamian sand we’d considered.
I recognized the design immediately because it was straight out of my sketchbook.
Tight around the top, fanning out from the hip.
Stitched, very delicately, with small bows barely visible from more than a few feet away. There was no tag inside the dress.
My hair ended up in an updo, front pieces framing my face, tickling my nose as I walked, very quickly, up the stairs of the back entrance. I didn’t have time for a more elaborate hairstyle.
The crowd had grown denser around the carpet, waiting for their favorite stars to appear at any moment.
I kept telling myself that I wasn’t late.
I had worked all night, through the day, and then taken an hour to get ready.
I checked with Camila, who didn’t want her intern looking a mess at the Ashwood Annual Gala either.
My work for the day was . . . done. I think.
Still, it felt weird, arriving when everyone was already walking the carpet, like I was missing the most important part of the evening.
I made it just in time for Daphne. Thank you, New York City traffic, without which she probably would’ve been long inside that building.
I squeezed past C-list celebrities, interviewers, cameramen, and some employees I faintly recognized, until there was nothing but the emerald-green carpet in front of me. And Daphne, walking across it.
Looking, of course, as beautiful as ever.
The pale-pink base layer she hadn’t found too sheer at all. The three-dimensional body that sat so perfectly on her figure, with pink blossoms, leaves, and branches that appeared embroidered into the dress, and tiny diamonds shining perfectly in a variety of pink shades.
Tears again. I tried my best to blink them away, but they continued shimmering in my eyes at the sight of her.
At the fact that I’d made it, a little bit.
No matter what happened after the internship was over, no matter how long I’d have to live with my grandparents again, I’d always have the image of my dress on an Annual carpet.
No one could take that away from me. Or Mom.
Ryan was a few beats ahead of Daphne, making sure they’d get their own photos first before posing together. And I’d been so caught up in working, avoiding, and ignoring, seeing his look caught me off guard.
Champagne silk. Blossoms and vines embroidered with the same diamonds that appeared on Daphne’s outer layer. One of the flowers from her dress had been turned into a small brooch on his jacket, too.
Perfect. They looked perfect together.
From afar, when they’d both made it to the media zone, I could hear people complimenting her dress, her hair, her makeup.
By their assistant, she was gently nudged toward the first interviewer lined up, camera and mic immediately in her face.
She laughed, she talked, she seemed born to do this.
Then again, Elliot did too, and he’d hate this.
I didn’t mean to look for him, for my eyes to scan the carpet and the various groups around me, and for something settling in my chest when I didn’t spot him. Disappointment, maybe.
I would eventually have to thank him for the dress.
When my gaze drew back to Daphne, she’d moved on to the next outlet, talking to a woman no older than us, damn near giggling as she bent over.
Her blue eyes connected with mine, and she gasped.
I could hear it from here, over the noise of hundreds of other people talking and shutters of cameras clicking.
I blinked, and by the time I opened my eyes again, she was already heading my way. Waving as if I didn’t only have eyes for her, as if I might not even recognize her until she was right in front of me.
She screeched, pulled me into a hug, then dragged me back in front of the camera before I’d even managed to say, “Hi.”
“Hi!” the girl beside it smiled brightly. “Daphne was just talking about you.”
All I could hope was that my makeup hadn’t smudged. My eyes must’ve still been wet.
“Was she?” I squinted against the bright lights behind the camera.
Tried to ignore the nervous flutter at the prospect of someone talking about me during a red-carpet interview at the Ashwood Annual.
The nervous flutter from just being here at all.
Although that was more like a nervous fighter jet, wreaking havoc in my stomach.
“Just look at it!” Daphne turned in place to show off her dress before facing the camera again with the brightest smile in the world. The corners of my lips pulled up; there was nothing I could do about it. “How could I talk about anything other than you all evening, Maeve?”
“It is beautiful,” the interviewer agreed, then nodded to my own dress. “And with a focus on sustainable material, I heard.” She glanced at Daphne as if she’d talked about nothing else so far. Eyes back on me, she asked, “Did you design this one as well?”
“Oh.” I think so, I wanted to add. I hadn’t worked on this dress at all, and a few hours ago, all I knew about it was from my sketches. To take credit when I didn’t even know how it got to my room felt wrong.
The dreaded question followed. “Who are you wearing, then?”
The lights were blinding and hot, and I was fanning my face, letting my gaze, just for a second, wander. So that I’d see something other than the lingering afterimage of the lamp, a bright spot in my vision that was only blurring away slowly.
And then, out of nowhere, Elliot.
Any chance of focusing back on the camera, on Daphne nodding grandly, saying “It is stunning,” and the interviewer agreeing again, was gone. Because he was looking back at me, completely ignoring his brother next to him.
They walked over, taking the spot beside us, and I hated that his eyes were still on mine.
It meant mine were still on him, too. It meant I was spacing out, ignoring an important question that I had no answer to.
And it meant that I didn’t really care about answering at all when I obviously should have.
We hadn’t really looked at each other for a week, so it felt like we were making up for lost time.
I was, at least. My rising panic settled more with every second of eye contact.
I hated it, loved it, wasn’t quite sure how to feel about the fact that he’d had that effect on me. Still, and after everything.
Something bumped my shoulder, and it snapped me out of my trance. I shook my head, apologized. “It’s just a lot. I’m sorry.”
“Happens to the best of us,” Daphne and the interviewer said in unison, laughed like they’d known each other for years when, I think, that was just the effect Daphne had on people. “I was asking about your dress. Who designed it?”
And because I was aware of everything Elliot was doing, I noticed him perk up. I saw him, in my periphery, switching sides with his brother to get closer. To be right next to me, with only that small space between the media stations separating us—and that wasn’t much.
My skin tickled at his proximity, the urge to look back at him so strong I had to physically restrain myself and focus on the question.
“Oh—” Think fast, Maeve. “It’s a collaboration. Ashwood × Peterson.”
Must’ve been. The color was almost identical to Daphne’s, and the design too similar to an earlier draft in my sketchbook we didn’t go with because it wasn’t spectacular enough.
“Adeline Ashwood?” she asked for confirmation, and I recognized the smile on her face. Paula wore it whenever she told me about projects, knowing she’d found something to dig into. “Say, could that have—”
It was probably a stupid idea, bringing up his name. But it felt wrong not to. “Elliot Ashwood.”
Her brows flew up. Most likely because she’d been about to bring him, us, that People cover up and couldn’t believe she’d been lucky enough that I mentioned it first.
One glance at the man beside us, and I knew. The way he wasn’t just ignoring his brother now, but listening to me. Intently.
“I designed it. Elliot had it made.” I think.
My uncertainty didn’t matter to them. Daphne gasped just as loudly as the interviewer. “Girl,” she spluttered. “So can we assume that confirms People’s—”
Elliot was leaving. His strides were smooth, his expression schooled, almost eerily calm as he walked away from his interview, through our frame, and into the building.
“I’m so sorry.” I tried to show I really meant it, but that was tough when I was already halfway gone, chasing Elliot down.