“Sebastian, don’t fall prey to my daughter’s manipulation. You’re smarter than that.”
“Oh, Mrs. M. I’m staying neutral. Just showing a potential defense.”
Ash’s mother, a defense lawyer, raised an eyebrow at him.
He held up his hands in surrender. “Your dad. Smart man for staying home, that’s all I’ll say.”
Ash exhaled, her blunt-cut bangs blowing straight up in the air. This was not going well.
“No matter,” Laila continued. “I’m sure this shop is quite expensive. How much is this dress?” She attempted to reach for the price tag.
“Does perfection really have a price?” Ash twirled around again, trying to keep her voice low and herself out of her mother’s clutches. Everyone didn’t need to know they couldn’t afford anything. Plus, she hadn’t had a chance to check, she’d been so blown away at its beauty. “Just look at how amazing it is. How one of a kind. No one else will have this.”
“That’s for sure. You couldn’t pay me thirty-five dollars to wear that in public,” her mother said. “How much is it?”
Ash grabbed the price tag. “Perfection at the low price of...$799.”
Yikes. That was a lot more expensive than she’d thought it would be. This was about to get worse.
Her mother’s eyes widened. “For this dress? This unfinished, cutout spectacle?”
Even Sebastian looked surprised, but thankfully said nothing.
“I’ll help pay for it! I promise!” Though she had no idea how that was going to happen. The prom was less than a month away and she hadn’t had the forethought of having a paying job during the school year. She knew she should have charged for her tae-kwon-do instruction to the younger students!
“Ash, you’re not leaving this dressing room in this dress. It’s...vulgar.”
“Mumsie, please!” Ash tried the name she’d used to call her mother when she was younger. “I’ll pay you back every cent of the dress by the time the prom arrives. I’ll even put a down payment today!” She recalled having six dollars in her purse.
“Please change and let’s go straightaway. We won’t be able to afford anything in here. I’ve told you this before. Don’t look at me with that hurt-puppy expression, love!” And with that, Laila left the dressing room. Sebastian gave Ash a sorry look before trailing her mother out.
No. Ash stood hopelessly in the corridor. This was not happening.
“Harsh,” said a familiar voice. The dressing-room door next to Ash’s opened. Two girls from the soccer team came out, each with armloads of dresses.
There went the “no one knew about this store” theory.
“Wow.” Jessica Moriarty, the taller but less-pretty one pointed at the Dreamsicle. “I’d love to try that on if you’re not going to get it. That’s amazing.”
Ash’s cheeks burned. “I am going to get it.”
“Yeah, okay.” Jessica shrugged and giggled in her friend’s direction. “Maybe you can find something like it at a thrift shop or something. You know...vintage.”
Jessica didn’t mean it in a helpful way. The Montague family’s lifestyle had changed dramatically in the past year and, instead of shopping at Lululemon or Nordstrom like most of her friends, Ash had to resort to vintage scrounging at secondhand shops such as Crossroads Trading Co. and Red Light in Capitol Hill. She’d tried to do her best to make the full-skirted halter dresses, petticoats and sneakers look as deliberate as possible. At least they looked cute with her dad’s vintage scooter when she pulled into the school’s parking lot and always was able to park directly in front.
Though most people complimented her funky, offbeat style, Ash worried people were talking about her behind her back. Like Jessica, but actually discreetly.
Melanie appeared by Ash’s side as the two girls left, still giggling between them. “I’ll hide it for you. In the back. No one will know. Can you buy it by next weekend?” she whispered.
Ash shook her head and slammed the door before she started crying in front of Melanie. The Dreamsicle was the last one in her size... There was no way it would be there past the weekend, even if Melanie did her damn best to keep it safe for her.
Two
“Ash!”
Ash raised her head as she heard her mother’s voice from downstairs.
“Your ladyship, please come down here.”
She lay back down. She was never talking to Laila again. How could she have humiliated her in the store like that? In front of Jessica and that other girl. She was sure word of her mother yelling at her about being poor would get around school before lunchtime.
“Ashmitha, it’s a surprise. You will like it. It’s for your prom.”
Ash was out of her bed in three seconds. Her mother had gone back to Rebel and bought the dress. She knew it. She knew her mother couldn’t be so cruel as to deny her oldest daughter her only wish for her senior prom.
Ash flew down the stairs and came to a landing in the front hall, where her mother stood holding...not the Dreamsicle.
“What’s this? Where’s the dress?”
“This is.”
Ash looked over the boxy, beaded two-piece tunic and skirt. It was about the furthest thing from the dress possible. “What are you talking about?”
“I’d like you to wear this to your prom.”
Ash almost fell over. “What do you mean?”
“I told you you could go to the prom if you could keep within the hundred-dollar budget. Now you can. You will have extra money now for that nice dinner before.” Laila genuinely looked pleased with herself.
“Mom, that’s like some Indian costume. I can’t wear that out of the house, much less to the prom!”
Laila’s eyes narrowed. “This is not a costume. This is what I wore on the last day of my wedding. It was a gift from your Glamma.”
Ash’s heart hurt at the mention of her Glamma. She was the one who related to Ash the best and understood her desire for pretty, fun things. Ash still missed her every day.
“This lehenga is what you call a ‘vintage’ garment. It’s better than anything you’ll find at the store,” Laila added.
Oh, God, her mother was going to get all 1950s Indian on her. “Mom, I’m pretty sure even girls in India don’t wear these things to the prom.”
“There is no prom in India. Or in England where I was a girl.”
“No wonder you don’t understand. You really do want me to be a freak,” Ash muttered, hoping her mother wouldn’t hear, but also hoping she would.
“I’m telling you, at this rate and with your remarks, you are not going to your prom, either.” Her mother hung the dress on the coatrack in the front hallway and stalked past Ash. “I’m feeling quite regretful I’m even allowing you to spend money on a dress that you’ll wear exactly once!”
Ash knew she’d hurt her mother’s feelings, but she wasn’t going to be the laughingstock at school with some garish costume. It was bad enough that she wore someone’s old clothes every single day. Not for prom. She wouldn’t be a hand-me-down girl for the prom, too.
She heard the faint sounds of the television and a keyboard clicking.
“Dad!” Ash spun around into the living room.
“I heard nothing. I saw nothing.” Josh Montague was in his usual position, laptop on his lap, parked in front of the television, which played another rerun of Project Runway.
Her parents were polar opposites, and Ash thought it was a miracle that they’d even met, much less had been crazy-in-love married for twenty years. Ash loved telling her friends the story of charismatic Josh Montague, who had won a scholarship to study music abroad at the beautiful University of Granada in Spain. He had been in awe of his beautiful orientation leader on the first day: the no-nonsense Laila Ray.
Apparently, Laila ha
d been a lifesaver for non-Spanish-speaking Josh, and he had promptly fallen in love with her and convinced her to take a train to Madrid with him for the weekend, and they had eloped before the semester was up. They’d spent a few years in London while Laila had gotten her law degree, and Josh had pursued computer science when he realized a music degree wasn’t going to take him too far in supporting his new bride.
Ash still couldn’t believe her practical lawyer of a mother had left England behind to follow Josh to Seattle so he could make his software dreams a reality. Till this day, he was the one who could charm her into anything.
“Dad, seriously. You need to talk to her. Where am I going to get a prom dress for a hundred dollars? And I’m not wearing that lehenga thingie.”
“I think it’s important for you to learn some negotiation strategies that don’t involve yelling,” a voice piped up knowingly from the corner of the room.
Ash shot a “get lost” look to Sonali, her little sister, who was in her usual position, hiding behind an easel that was bigger than her entire body. Ash caught a glimpse of Sonali’s face.
“What did you do to your hair?” she demanded. Her sister had some sort of tangled bird’s nest-looking hairdo on top of her head, very different from the satin sheet of black hair she’d left home with that morning.
Sona ducked back behind the easel out of Ash’s line of sight.
“You better tell me, Sona. Right now.”
Ash marched back to where Sona was hiding and grabbed her arm to make her stand. Gods. All of her hair was in a tangled, knotted mess. Ash couldn’t even get her fingers through a lock of it. It was like someone had superglued it into a knot.
“Ow, stop!”
“Who did this to you?”
“Let go!” Sona pulled away her arm and sat back down. “I did it myself.”
Ash glanced at her dad with an are-you-hearing-this look.
Josh shrugged. “She wouldn’t tell me, either.”
“Tell me what happened.” Ash lowered her voice. “Did something happen at school?”
“I just wanted to do something different with my hair.” Sona was the worst liar in the world. “That’s not illegal.”
Bad enough that the eleven-year-old was some sort of artistic genius, but was also in the progress of becoming a bully’s target, apparently. The only person who was allowed to mess with her sister was her. Ash vowed to figure out who and why, and would resort to spying on her sister to do so.
“Let it go,” Josh murmured. “She’ll tell us when she’s ready.”
Ash disagreed. Sona was like a timid baby deer outside the house... That was one of the main reasons their parents sent Sona to a very small private school for gifted artists.
“Why don’t you come to the mall with me? You’ll see what I’m talking about.” Ash turned her attention back to her father. “Please? Please, please, please? I’ll write the band’s next song.”
“Your mother’s the decision maker on this one, love. I’m sorry.”
“Next two songs.”
“No.”
“Daaaaaaaaaaad.”
“Some cheese with that whine?”
“Dad! Come on. Why don’t we have a gig and charge cover this weekend? We can play the new stuff. I swear I’ll learn it fast. We’ll earn enough for the dress in a night.”
The best thing about having Josh Montague home full-time was that there was more music in the house than ever before. He and Ash had started a band with a few other neighbors and were in the process of working on their first real set to play at the next neighborhood barbecue.
“I can pretty much assure you that giving people opportunities is more important than any dress. Ever.” Josh had that stern note in his voice, signifying that he was no longer playing.
Ash sighed. Of course that was true. She’d even come up with the idea to donate any gig money they made to the inner-city school Josh had grown up in.
Josh always said he owed his life to the music program at his high school. Many of his friends had ended up in juvie...or worse. Josh had spent his teenage years learning every instrument from piano to guitar to the French horn. He vowed to always give back whatever he could, whether it was a little or a lot.
It had been very little the past year due to the family’s financial situation. Josh had left his small tech company the previous year when it had started to go under. He’d been actively job hunting, but the opportunities were slim in an industry that was obsessed with kids out of college, not “people old enough to have kids in college.”
He’d spent the last year writing apps for phones to earn some income, while her mother’s law firm had been cutting out billable hours for the attorneys. Money had been tight on just her mother’s salary, especially considering Ash’s Seattle Academy tuition and Sonali’s specialized art school. The family’s lifestyle was far different from what Ash was used to...or from what all of her friends at school had.
Ash had heard her parents fighting—actually fighting—for the first time in her life over their financial worries. She understood their reasons for not wanting to spend a lot on the prom...but she knew she could find a way to pay her mother back for the dress if she only had a chance.
“Prom is a night when women are objectified. I think I’ll boycott mine,” the know-it-all piped up again, as if someone had asked for her opinion. “I’d rather give that money to an education program for young artists.”
“Quiet, or I’ll beat you, too,” Ash ordered.
“Don’t maul your sister. House rule number two,” Josh said automatically, without looking up from his laptop screen.
“You actually went to the prom, Dad.” Ash directed her tantrum at her father. “How much did your date’s dress cost? I bet it was over a hundred dollars even in the ’70s!”
“Hey, hey, hey. My prom was in the ’80s, thank you very much. And Jeannie made her dress with her older sister’s help. It was a big puffy yellow thing. Like one of those marshmallow-chicken things you get at Easter. Do you want me to call her and ask if you can borrow it?”
Ash shot eye daggers at her father.
“Just being helpful.” Her father shrugged. “You’ve got to get with the program before the program gets you.”
God, her parents were dorky.
“You people are seriously going to drive me crazy,” Ash muttered as she grabbed her coat. “I’m going to Sebastian’s!”
Three
Ash glared at Sebastian in the middle of their drafting class the next day. He was still completely unconcerned about the prom situation, as he’d been the previous evening.
“I should just tell Armstrong I can’t go with him. I mean, why drag it out? I should call it off now so he can find someone else. Someone with a dress instead of some belly dancer–looking costume.”
Sebastian was focusing a little too hard on their drafting project still. No answer.
She knew she was being kind of a brat, but couldn’t help herself.
“I should just call it off right now.”
Still no answer.
“Like today.”
She sighed loudly.
Sebastian finally glanced up from the giant sheet of paper he’d been leaning over.
“Oh, is it time for drama? Is it my turn? Noooo, Ash, you can’t. You and Armie-boy belong together. Like forevvvvver.”
Did no one have sympathy for her plight? Did no one understand that she was actually not going to be able to go to the prom this year—her senior year? She wouldn’t have prom pictures, she wouldn’t have the first dance, she wouldn’t have that magical night she’d be talking about for years to come with her own kids and grandkids. And most importantly, she wouldn’t have another chance with Armstrong.
“I don’t like you,” was all she could thin
k of to say to Sebastian.
“You love me. Now, we need to do our assignment. What do you think? How many watchtowers, if any?”
“I don’t care.”
“Hey, you wanted the front of the school. You at least have to choose if you want a watchtower or not.”
“I want a moat.” Ash stuck out her lower lip. “And alligators. And that dress!”
Sebastian sighed. “Just have the tantrum and let me know when you’re done.”
Ash glared at him.
Sebastian ignored her and went back to sketching pointy roofs. He wrinkled his forehead and chomped down hard on the corner of his mouth as he worked expertly with the protractor. He looked cute today, in a dark blue University of Michigan T-shirt that clung well to his arms, a fact every girl, freshman through senior, had clearly noticed.
He was easily one of the cutest guys in the senior class. He knew it, but he also knew he was smart. He’d already gotten accepted into Michigan’s honors program and amazingly, was still invested in keeping his GPA a 4.0.
“You can fail and repeat senior year and have another shot at the prom.” Sebastian could tell she was not working without even looking up. “Get to work.”
The small, twelve-person drafting class had a joint assignment. Each team of two was to choose a section of Seattle Academy to redesign into whatever style they wanted. The second part of class would be to take the flat sketches, make them into 3-D models and actually build a miniature version of the school redesign. The redesign would be displayed in the front entryway of the school to show off their skills.
Other teams had predictably chosen the gym or the cafeteria, which would’ve been much easier. Ash had insisted on choosing the front of the school—saying it needed to look majestic and haunting all at once. Plus she wanted her work to be the thing people saw first when they looked at the miniature. So far, Sebastian had done all the actual drawing work, while Ash had tossed out opinions every once in a while when things looked off. She was the creative force. Every team needed one.
Prom Ever After Page 2