The Hope Dress

by Roz Denny Fox

  “What did the girl have to say about her parents?” Carline asked, levering herself up on one of the stools that ringed the kitchen counter.

  “Nothing much.” Sylvie picked up the platter and prepared to go out to the porch where the men stood talking to her parents, Nan and Rob, as Sylvie’s dad tossed steaks on a built-in barbecue. “She gave their names. You already know her dad’s Joel. I believe she called her mother Lynn. I only saw him briefly, hauling luggage from his vehicle. I never caught sight of the wife.”

  “Maybe she stayed behind to tidy up the house they sold in Atlanta.” Carline helped herself to a small cluster of grapes even as Sylvie tried to lift the plate out of her reach.

  Stopping at the door, Sylvie turned. “That’s something else the girl mentioned. She said her cat’s only ever lived in an apartment.” Sylvie was again reminded of her tumble from the neighbor’s tree as she nudged open the screen with her hip.

  “Oh!” Carline exclaimed, pausing with a grape raised to her mouth. “Maybe there is no Mrs. Mercer. I mean, if they lived in a city high-rise...”

  Sylvie recognized the expression that passed between her sisters. Their dedication in matching her up with some—any—unattached male always shone like a thousand-watt lightbulb. “Stop right there! It’s not too likely that a divorced guy with one kid would buy a home the size of the Whitakers’. Especially not in a backwater like Briarwood. Where’s the future for him?”

  Dory pounced immediately. “Who said Mercer’s divorced? Did his daughter say that?”

  Sylvie noticed the look again, and rolled her eyes. “Get this straight once and for all, you two. Capital N, capital O in foot-high letters. Whether he’s divorced, widowed, never married or openly gay, you will not shove me in his direction, is that patently clear?”

  The sisters chorused with laughter that was cut off when Sylvie banged the screen door.

  Her neighbor’s name didn’t surface again during the meal, for which Sylvie was thankful. But as she and Chet prepared to leave, Nan Shea set a big plate of chocolate-chip cookies on the pan Sylvie had brought a molded Jell-O salad in. “What are the cookies for?” Sylvie turned in surprise.

  “Do you mind running them over to your new neighbors? I can’t because tomorrow and the next are my days to volunteer at the library. Chocolate-chip cookies are so much better eaten fresh.”

  A refusal rose to the tip of Sylvie’s tongue. Knowing her mom, she’d rearrange her entire day to deliver the cookies herself if Sylvie didn’t. Besides, Sylvie recalled Rianne Mercer’s tear-streaked face. If anything would lift a homesick kid’s spirits, it’d be chocolate-chip cookies. “Okay, Mom...if Mercer’s still up unpacking boxes when Chet drops me off, I’ll bring the cookies over tonight.”

  Dory tried unsuccessfully to pull the plate from Sylvie’s hands as she signaled her mom with an eyebrow. “I’ll take them to Mr. Mercer in the morning, and add something from Grant and me. Mother, I’m sure Sylvie was planning to offer Chet a nightcap, weren’t you, Sylvie?”

  “Actually, no,” she shot back, bestowing her most practiced smile on her escort. “I heard Chet tell Daddy he wanted to get an early start tomorrow for his drive back to Asheville. I wouldn’t dream of keeping him up late. Maybe next time he’s in town...” She let the suggestion linger, hoping against hope that she’d also heard Chet say he’d completed his company’s project in Briarwood.

  To the man’s credit, he seemed to catch on to the fact that he hadn’t elevated Sylvie’s heart rate.

  “Sylvie’s right, Dory,” Chet said quickly. “I intend to be on the road by 6:00 a.m.”

  “One drink, you two. How long would that take? Unless...” Dory pouted prettily, her meaning made plenty clear.

  Sylvie opened the door and hurried out, but not before murmuring tightly, “Dory, honestly! Give me a break.” Sylvie knew that few could pout like Dory. She had it down to a science. So much so, her husband, Grant, bless his heart, chuckled and playfully clapped a hand over her mouth.

  Pausing at the gate, Sylvie thought of something she’d forgotten to mention. “Carline,” she called, “Ted Moore’s mom was taken to the hospital today. He and Anita went to Tennessee. They have no idea how long they’ll be gone. I’m boarding Oscar. Did Anita get hold of you about sending their wedding gift directly to Kay and Dave?”

  “She left a garbled message on my store phone. She must’ve been on her cell somewhere in the Smokies. Half the message was cut off. That’s too bad about Mrs. Moore. I hope she recovers.”

  “A small stroke, Anita told me.”

  Nan Shea stepped off the porch. “No stroke is small when you’re eighty, as Ted’s mother is. If they left suddenly, they probably forgot details like watering the plants or having someone collect the mail. I’ll call around tomorrow and see if anyone’s doing it. If not, I’ll get a volunteer from the community club.”

  “Mom, you’re the best,” Sylvie said from the car. “Your organizational ability puts us all to shame. I had Anita standing right in front of me and it never occurred to me to offer that kind of help.”

  Rob slid an arm around his wife’s shoulders. “I recall Nan making a similar comment to her mom forty years ago. I’ll tell you girls what your grandmother said, and I hope you remember, because it left an impression on me. Lou said that what makes Briarwood so livable has to do with each resident practicing what she called ‘good neighbor policies.’”

  Sylvie and her sisters nodded, but Sylvie felt that her dad’s eyes rested the longest on her. As Chet shut her into his coupe, she pondered her reluctance to extend any kind of neighborliness to Joel Mercer. Her father’s admonition left her feeling guilty, and she hated the feeling.

  “Do you get bombarded like that all the time?” Chet asked as he backed out of the drive.

  Sylvie’s still-guilty gaze flashed to her companion. “Pardon?” Could this man read her mind?

  A sheepish expression crept over his face. “Dory simply would not let me wiggle out of coming to dinner tonight. She was even more persistent that I pick you up. I have to admit I expected you to be an ugly duckling.” He flexed his fingers on the wheel. “You’re so...not that...I can’t imagine why she’s selling you so hard. Are you the town’s scarlet woman or something?”

  Sylvie’s jaw dropped, then laughter bubbled up. “To my knowledge, that’s not a label anyone’s attached to me. But if I thought it’d discourage my well-meaning family and friends from setting me up with any Tom, Dick or Harry who still happens to be breathing, I’d start the rumor myself. Oh, sorry.” She covered her mouth. “I didn’t mean to imply that you fell into the geriatric singles group. Some have, though.”

  “No offense taken. I have a mother and four sisters who can’t abide the notion of anyone walking through life except as a couple. Change that to read a male and female couple. I heard your comment earlier. The one about a man being divorced, widowed or openly gay. I am. Gay, but not openly. My family would never accept that, so it’s easier to sidestep their efforts to hook me up with some nice woman. I sort of wondered if you and I were in a similar boat.”

  Sylvie was awfully afraid she probably resembled the large-mouth bass often pulled from Whitaker Lake. “I, ah, no. I’m arrow-straight, really.” She felt her ears burn and studied the pan and the plate of cookies resting unsteadily on her lap.

  He winced. “Too bad from my perspective. I fancied I glimpsed a kindred spirit back there at your parents’. Forgive me for speaking out of turn,” he said stiffly. “No disrespect meant, but I sort of hoped maybe we could do a long-distance appearance-of-romance thing. Maybe string my folks and yours along.”

  Thinking Chet had gone out on a narrow limb, baring his soul to a virtual stranger, Sylvie relented and gave him something in return. “I was badly hurt by a man in New York, whom I loved and trusted, Chet. My family doesn’t understand why I can’t embrace what they want for me, which is marriage. You and I probably do share a similar angst when we’re placed in our families’ cro
sshairs.”

  Chet swung down her lane. He left his seat to open her door, but didn’t turn off the Mercedes’s engine. Assisting Sylvie out, he brushed a limp kiss over her cheek.

  “I wish you the best, Chet. For the record, if you come back to Briarwood, I will serve you that postponed nightcap.”

  “It’s a deal. Shall I walk you to your door, or do you plan to deliver those cookies to your nosy neighbor?”

  “Nosy?” Sylvie darted a quick glance at Mercer’s well-lit window. Maybe a curtain had dropped, or maybe the window was open and the fabric had been stirred by a breeze. She couldn’t tell.

  Chet shrugged. “I know our comings and goings are being observed.”

  “I think I’ll hold off delivering my mother’s offering until after I put on sweats and change back into the real me. Have a safe trip to Asheville.” She ran lightly up her drive. Sylvie didn’t know what made her do something so uncharacteristic then, but she turned and blew Chet a kiss. If Joel Mercer was spying, why not give him an eyeful?

  She set the cookies on top of her fridge and let Oscar out while she pulled on some comfortable sweats. Not five minutes after she’d tied her sneakers, all hell broke loose in her backyard. Tearing outside with flashlight in hand, she discovered her delinquent houseguest had once again treed Fluffy the cat. As if on cue, the back door across the fence banged open, and out charged a fire-breathing Joel Mercer.

  “I understand that beast doesn’t belong to you,” he shouted.

  “That’s right.” Sylvie was able, with difficulty, to hook Oscar’s leash to his collar.

  “How long will he be your guest? I can’t run out here every few hours to rescue our cat. Out of curiosity, do you have a city license to operate a kennel?”

  “Maybe that’s how it works in Atlanta, but for your information this is the country.”

  A deep, clearly irritated masculine voice floated out of the darkness. “Who said anything about Atlanta?”

  “Your daughter. Is there a reason you’d rather that didn’t get out? Oh, for Pete’s sake, Oscar, you won’t catch that cat, so quit barking.”

  The voice in the darkness drawled, “I suppose there’s no noise curfew in Briarwood, either?”

  “Next you’ll demand I run up a red flag whenever I let Oscar into my yard. He has a perfect right to run around and bark if he wants. He’s contained by my fence, after all.” She could sound put-upon, too.

  Her new neighbor might have bought into her self-righteous indignation had Oscar, the big lummox, not torn from her grasp, and in one plunge flattened a six-foot section of their joint wood fence. A fence that already sagged. For some time, Sylvie had meant to have her brother-in-law, the building contractor, check the posts. Since Oscar’s leash remained wrapped around her wrist, Sylvie found herself once again sprawled on her face in the dirt. It was a very unflattering pose. She was sorry she’d gone out of her way to make a point.

  Probably her worst humiliation came when she saw the cat leap from the tree into the dubious protection of her owner’s arms.

  Sylvie hadn’t untangled herself from the leash enough to rise. In a blur, a shadowy man suddenly loomed over her.

  “Are you hurt?”

  “My vanity,” she mumbled. Sylvie couldn’t get a hand under her, because Oscar lunged so hard at his leash. Brushing hair out of her eyes, she saw, among other things, that the dog had switched allegiances and was licking the face of her nemesis.

  “Sit,” Joel roared, and Oscar sat with a surprised little yelp. Then he dropped to his belly and his coal-dark eyes blinked adoringly up from a muff of white fur.

  “How did you manage that?” Sylvie asked as gentle hands assisted her to her feet. “He’s the only dog I groom and board who ignores my commands. But really, in spite of it all, Oscar’s a lovable oaf.”

  “He obviously knows you think so.” Joel recovered the flashlight that still shone across the fallen fence and thrust it into Sylvie’s hand. “I can’t see well enough to shore this up tonight. Can you corral Oscar in the house until daylight?”

  “Uh, sure.” She played the light over her broken fence. “It needed new posts. My fault. I’ll pay,” she said, and was surprised when her neighbor said they’d share the cost.

  * * *

  TOWARD THE END of the week, around 11:00 a.m., Sylvie pinned the bodice of her best friend’s wedding gown. The lace curtains were half-open, and Oscar was safely outside in her yard with its newly repaired fence. Kay Waller, who was there for a fitting, began to fret about her approaching marriage. “Sylvie, I’ve never been this nervous about anything. Do you think it’s wrong to marry David so soon after my ex-husband had the gall to walk his pregnant girlfriend down the same church aisle?”

  “Mmfff.” Sylvie had a mouth full of pins.

  “I simply can’t believe Reverend Paul agreed to perform their service when he already had my wedding date on his calendar. It’s a slap in the face. I suggested postponing our service a month, but Dave says I’m being silly.”

  Sylvie carefully removed the pins and stuck each one in the wrist pincushion she wore. “Hold still, Kay.”

  “You’re not being any help. What’s a best friend for?”

  “Honestly! Why are you worrying over what people will say? Is that what’s caused you to lose so much weight? This dress is inches too big around the middle and I only put in the last stitch yesterday.”

  “I do care how people talk about me. I don’t have your nerves of steel when it comes to pretending I don’t hear their whispers.”

  Sylvie’s fingers stilled on a new dart she’d pinched in the satin fabric. “Me?”

  Kay nodded, her focus shifting to the draped dress form in the corner. She stabbed a finger at it, and the diamond ring circling her third finger glinted in a ray of sunlight. “Don’t pretend I’m the only bride who’s begged you to let her wear that special gown you keep under wraps. You and I have been best friends since the cradle, Sylvie. And if it fits you, I’m sure it’ll fit me. Please, Sylvie. If word traveled about town that I got to wear a bona fide Sylvie Shea design—and not any design, but the dress—my wedding would be the end-of-summer highlight. Not a footnote to the way I’ve been upstaged by Eddy and his...floozy.”

  Sylvie sank back on her heels. She felt both palms go damp. “There are no more Sylvie Shea gowns, you know that, Kay. My ad clearly states that a prospective client must bring me a pattern of her choice. I’ll sew any gown a bride wants. Friend or not, you accepted my terms, Kay. Your dress is gorgeous, and it’s so you.”

  The other woman admired the two-carat solitaire on her slender finger. “It’s the mystery surrounding the dress. There’s not a woman in the valley—well, an engaged woman—who isn’t dying to be the bride who’ll wear your secret gown. Me, most of all.”

  Sylvie scrambled to stand, but was startled all the same by what Kay had said. “The only mystery to me is why people would covet a dress they’ve never seen. That’s just silly, Kay. How often have you heard me preach about bridal gowns needing to fit a bride’s unique personality?”

  “Yeah, but it’s not silly. Anyone who knows you is positive that dress has gotta be spectacular. Your sisters say you’re always working on it, and we’ve all seen your previous designs. Mandi Watson claims you’re keeping this one for your own wedding. Is that true, Sylvie?”

  “Right!” Sylvie shook her head. “So when am I supposed to have time to work on anything for me, let alone find that mythical husband? If and when I ever get married, I’ll probably end up with a dress off the rack. Don’t you know it’s the plumber’s wife who has a clogged sink, and the shoemaker’s kids who go barefoot?”

  Sylvie impulsively gave her friend a hug. “Your wedding will be featured in our weekly society page, Kay. You’ll be the most beautiful bride of this season. Who else will have eight bridesmaids, two candle-lighters and three flower girls? And your patterns came from France. Each one is an original. I’ve sewn all fourteen dresses with my own bleeding fi
ngers over the past three months. I guarantee the guests will weep, you’ll be such a vision,” Sylvie said, laying it on a little thick. But she did have plenty of history with Kay, the drama queen. “If you’d relax, you and Dave will have lots of wonderful memories. People will say Eddy who? if that jerk’s name ever surfaces.”

  Kay compared her soft fingers with Sylvie’s callused fingertips, and had the grace to blush. “I’d have given you more notice, but David wanted that day. And you could’ve cut the dress count by one—” she pouted “—if you’d let me buy the dress.”

  “I guarantee this gown suits you best,” Sylvie said. “Come on, I have something to show you.” Walking away, she looked quickly at the covered dress form in the corner. The unfinished gown beneath the sheet represented all that was left of her hopes and dreams, she thought, opening a cabinet and lifting out an old notebook. “Recognize this? It’s the notebook I kept in high school home ec.” Her eyes misty, Sylvie flipped several pages, then handed the book to Kay. “This was your dream gown in tenth grade. See how closely it resembles this one? I knew your marriage to Eddy Hobart was doomed from the minute his whiny mother insisted you wear the dress she’d worn at her own wedding.”

  Kay snickered. “It was ghastly. And so is Flo Hobart.”

  Sylvie shut the book and returned it to the drawer. “Zero taste. Hold out your arms. I’m going to unbutton you. We need to get you out of this without losing my marker pins—and without sticking you.”

  They had the gown off, and on a padded hanger, when through the side window came the sound of furious barking.

  “Oscar, Anita Moore’s Great Pyrenees,” Sylvie said nonchalantly. “I’m boarding him until Anita and Ted get back from Tennessee. Can you let yourself out, Kay? That’s Oscar’s ‘I treed a cat’ bark. I have to rescue my new neighbor’s cat...again. Sounds like this time she’s gone up my big dogwood.”