by Kendra Mase
The ashes? Katherine asked.
What else do you rise from?
Katherine peeled off her clothes as she trailed through the one-bedroom apartment. Stepping inside the avocado green tub and shower combo, the water ran only lukewarm, yet Katherine hadn’t complained. Its refreshing quality was now a godsend as it beat down on her. She scrubbed with homemade soap Emilie purchased from the farmer’s market each week, causing the street to smell of lilacs and sandalwood.
The towels were rough, yet clean, as she dried herself off and reached into the medicine cabinet. She rubbed away the dewy bits of steam that clung to the mirror with the back of her hand. On the bottom shelf, toothpaste only had the lid half twisted on and a dozen different trial-sized moisturizers were tested and forgotten about. Squinting without her glasses, Katherine read the labels of at least a dozen orange canisters of pills left behind from when Emilie fought her battle with cancer two years back.
Little reminders blocked the way to the aspirin that Katherine knocked back, dipping her head under the faucet to wash them down.
Almost all of Emilie’s home was that way, filled with things and photos, even though she spent more time down in the shop than she ever did upstairs. Depression glass littered cabinets and different kettles and teapots lined the yellow stove, which Katherine hesitantly noticed looked like it was hooked up to a gas line circa 1950s. Wallpaper painted everywhere in the small space from floral to stripes, including in the bathroom where it started to peel from years of long steam-filled showers.
Piles of pink quilts were draped over the pull-out couch in the back corner living room that most recently was reorganized into Katherine’s bedroom. Shoving away the sheets to find her things lined up along the edges, she hadn’t brought much when she came to stay with Emilie, everything still folded in the open-faced suitcase.
A simple cotton dress fell over her shoulders, along with a sweater. Though the air was getting cold, she didn’t bother with tights. Padding over to the kitchen barefoot, Katherine filled the kettle up with water along with a glass for herself. The stove clicked twice before bursting with a familiar blue flame.
Hair drying and the second glass of water down, her head no longer felt as if it was going to fall off her shoulders. Katherine grabbed a tray, putting two mugs on top along with a few pieces of overdone toast she popped whenever she smelled burning—whether it be the toast or the appliance itself. Either way, she slathered each slice with butter. Only when she poured the water over Emilie’s preferred oolong to Katherine’s earl gray did she stop moving.
She braced her hands on the table and breathed a cool breath up through her bangs.
Her glasses fogged.
What she wouldn’t do to install one of those little food elevator things to send all this down to Emilie so she could collapse on the couch for another few hours. Instead, Katherine slipped on Emilie’s gifted pair of slippers left by the door, and carefully maneuvered down the metal steps one at a time.
“And here I thought I was the old woman,” Emilie commented when she finally saw her. “No time to lose.”
Dropping the tray on one side of the table, Katherine didn’t respond to that. Instead, she shoved a large bite of toast into her mouth. The crust had gone soggy from the butter and she swallowed it down with an even larger gulp of tea, refilling by the time Emilie waited for hers to cool.
She took her first sip, looking across the room good-humoredly. “Whenever you are ready, you know where to begin. I’ll help.”
“No, you won’t.”
“But it sounds nicer if I say I will,” Emilie countered. “Come on, I showed you everything I know by now.”
Then the real question was why Katherine couldn’t make a corset by now?
Katherine gathered all the supplies she needed. The last and the time before last, she produced the world’s least decorative corset, let alone suitable for any body type. So now, Katherine glared at the tracing sheets Emilie gave her for a basic frame. Fabric was cut, boning was laid out in the exact places it was supposed to be. She had followed everything she needed to do perfectly before she looked up from the table.
Emilie had gotten up at some point and disappeared from her spot in the corner, likely to take a nap or get something to eat. Katherine ate all the floppy slices of toast.
The store was stagnant as she took a deep breath, knowing what she had to do next. It was the point of the process most times where everything went wrong.
Putting it together.
Though they were closed, it wasn’t often they had a packed shop any day, so most of Katherine’s sad attempts at this point were never seen by anyone, thank god, but her. She tortured herself enough about each, knowing they were what brought Emilie in the most per purchase.
Katherine had been trying to convince Emilie that her time would be better spent elsewhere at this point, but still, nope. They—Emilie’s shop needed a better online storefront for the past month. When she told her aunt this, she was only given “the look.”
Emilie’s eyes would widen slightly, in between shock and the oddest glare Katherine had ever been witness to.
She didn’t test what might’ve come next if she went on pestering her aunt about it.
Instead, she continued to work on her own late at night when she wasn’t forced to pinch her fingers in the corset that belonged in the scrap bin. She’d pull out the laptop after she heard Emilie set a radio clock alarm in her room. The static of Barry Manalo pulsed before silence cracked through the floorboards, adjusting to the cold fall temperatures.
So far, the website was coming along. The biggest issue Katherine kept having was the fact the shop had no name, and Emilie didn’t appear to care to give it one anytime soon.
“You realize you have to do more than stare at the pieces of a corset to make it one, correct? I thought I taught you better.” Emilie moseyed back down the final stair back onto the first level, foot hovering over the floor before settling down.
“I had no idea,” Katherine said dryly.
“Now I know why you don’t drink,” Emilie murmured, not looking up from where she went back to work, ripping seams out of a pair of bikini-style panties. “You’re mean when you’re hungover.”
Katherine’s forehead wrinkled. “I’m not mean.”
“Whiny then. Is that better?”
Somehow, it was.
Katherine, nonetheless, did not answer, instead she began to assemble her corset for the umpteenth time. It wasn’t as if she’d completely given up all hope that with one of these efforts she would look at it and it would resemble a corset, it was just well. It was better to not be disappointed.
Instead of crying, she only groaned, looking at her failed attempt, again. She didn’t understand what she was doing wrong. Emilie didn’t understand what she was doing wrong. She classified Katherine from the start as a quick study. A lingerie prodigy of a sort that made Katherine smile for days as she made her way down the stairs before the sun was up. But this.
This.
“It’s not as bad as your last one, lovely. Progress.” Emilie’s attempt to sound encouraging did nothing to soothe the look on Katherine’s face. She might as well have murdered the corset. At least then she could hide the carcass. “It takes time, and this one looks salvageable.”
Katherine shut her eyes and took a deep breath, feeling the frustration build up the back of her throat.
“I know you. You’ll get the hang of it.”
“You know me? You were barely around my whole life until I came knocking on your door.”
Emilie’s eyebrows rose.
Maybe Katherine was a mean hungover person.
“And who let you in?”
“I’m sorry.”
“I know.” Emilie didn’t look the least bit upset about Katherine’s rash words. If anything, a little shocked. “It’s challenging. But you are doing well—don’t give that face. You are. You have years to master this. You will most likely end up being ev
en better of a designer and seamstress than I am and ever was.”
“You’re amazing, Emilie.”
“Eh.” She raised her hands, wiggling her fingers. “Eventually, I know the arthritis sets in. The tea helps.”
“I’ll make us some more.”
Emilie only shrugged, thinking as she looked over Katherine’s work. “You’ll get it.”
“Wow, that is one ugly corset.”
Twisting toward the front door, it shut before hitting the bell, not that it mattered. Their visitor already made their way across the shop floor to them. Expecting to see one of their regulars popping in for pick up, instead, Katherine was met with the five-foot-tall vixen wearing heels just as high.
“Hello, Avril.”
“Long time no see, Ems,” Avril said, hopping up on the table and looking at Katherine’s aunt. “Aren’t you a hard-ass, putting your dear niece to work after she slammed a game of P&P last night.”
Emilie looked at Katherine with raised eyebrows. Her disappointment turned back into impressed. “You know how I do business.”
Avril only hummed in assent, kicking her legs back and forth as she turned her attention toward Katherine. “Hey, darling, glad to still see you around. I didn’t scare you off last night, did I?” Avril tossed her one shoulder forward.
Taking a deep breath, Katherine gave the smallest of smiles. “Not in the least.”
“Fantastic.”
“Anything we can do for you, Avril?” Emilie asked again, peeking up from behind her tiny spectacles as she pulled out tiny slices of string she pulled apart to start over.
“Your new apprentice here is actually exactly who I was looking for. I have a bit of a task today to complete and I need some help.”
Help. From her?
“I’m…” Katherine looked back and forth between her and Emilie, who stared at Avril for a long moment. “I am working.”
Avril raised a groomed eyebrow.
“Go,” Emilie said.
“But—”
“You already ruined one attempt at a corset today, and I doubt you want to make it two. Take her, Queen. Take her away right now.”
“Fabulous,” Avril said. Her hair, pulled back into a curly ponytail ready for a heist, tossed over her shoulder as she led the way for Katherine to follow.
Emilie, however, spoke up by the time she made it halfway across the floor. “Avril?”
Avril twisted over her shoulder.
“Be careful.”
She smiled at Em. “When am I not?”
“I mean it.”
“So do I,” Avril replied with a shake of her head. “See you later.”
Katherine snuck through the crystalized front door before it slammed behind Avril. Her strange new friend appeared to already be hauling herself up into a familiar army green Jeep, only it looked like the owner was not already inside.
Coming around to the passenger side, Katherine looked at Avril as she slid on a pair of black cat-eye sunglasses, engulfing half of her face. “Jack let you borrow his car?”
“Jeep,” Avril corrected, turning the key in the ignition. “He is very sensitive about the word car, don’t ask me why. And borrow? I wouldn’t quite say that.”
That didn’t make Katherine feel at all assured of what was going to come next, but she climbed in the passenger seat much more gracefully than she did the other night. With a small laugh, Avril reached for the stereo and blared the music as they sped through traffic with alarming speed and dexterity. Katherine held on to either side of the seat as her heart raced, trying to keep her foot from pressing the imaginary pedal under the dashboard.
By the time they swung into a spot behind a tall building, all silver and windows, Avril unbuckled her seat belt.
“Where are we?”
“A quick pit stop before we head back to my place and figure out what is happening with you and all that.” She waved a hand at Katherine’s outfit. “An old friend is having a small get-together tonight and I’m inviting you. Consider it being my plus-one.”
Another party? Katherine threw the car door shut to a beep behind her as she jogged to catch up with Avril. For a petite girl in heels, the vixen could move.
Nodding at the doorman, Avril walked across the entry like she had been here dozens of times before. She hit the button for the elevator and waited for it to ring, and suddenly the two of them were up nine floors.
Avril inserted a key into the lock and twisted open the door to reveal a spacious apartment with wide light-filled windows even as the sun already began to set on the day, earlier and earlier.
“Whose apartment is this?”
“My boyfriend’s.”
“Where is he?”
“Out of town. For another week at least, so he says.”
“And he just lets you hang out here?” Katherine asked, looking around. It was all so clean, especially compared to Emilie’s space, cluttered with color and knickknacks. Everything here was so… contemporary.
Wandering over to the living space, even the white shag rug looked like it had never been stepped on, let alone had wine accidentally spilled.
Avril paused as she assessed Katherine. Whatever she saw seemed to be okay. “Technically, I live with him,” she slowly explained, punctuating the statement with a sigh.
Katherine balked. “You live here?”
“So he thinks,” she sighed, moving back toward the bedroom. The bed was made, pillows perfectly arranged on both sides. “When he is in town, I live here. When he isn’t, well, I live how I want to live.”
Katherine remembered the night before when she said how Avril’s friends and her parties were all his scene. Her eyebrow furrowed at the thought.
“He loves me, so basically wants me here all the time anyway so we can be together,” she said though she looked away from Katherine as she said it, shifting through different sets of jewelry Katherine couldn’t imagine her wearing left on the dresser. Dainty and delicate strings of bracelets and pearls. “Territorial type, you know?”
“That nice?”
“He has really good arms.”
“How do you know if someone has good arms?” Katherine wasn’t sure if she ever noticed arms before on a man.
“Oh, you know,” Avril assured her.
Katherine still couldn’t manage to put a face to the man Avril was with. Perhaps even loved enough to move with him to the monochrome apartment without a coffeepot.
“Ah-ha!” Avril shouted.
She’d since moved to the closet while Katherine quietly opened drawers at random, as if waiting to find something out of the ordinary besides too much cashmere. Something about being here in the quiet was almost unsettling.
She was starting to sound like Emilie.
Avril shoved shoes to either side of the floor. “Found it.”
“What?”
“The final piece of what I’m wearing for my show next weekend. I already looked at the townhouse and Rosin. I was almost positive one of those bitches snatched it.” Avril looked at the scarlet shimmers of the panties before glancing back around the room. “But no, it has already had its grand night since it ended up here, likely after a show.”
“Isn’t that the one Emilie made? On the poster?”
Avril grinned. “With my ass on a throne? The very one. Maybe I should wear something else. I have a few things that haven’t had their chance to shine.”
Her smile slowly faded.
“What is it?”
“Nothing. Just, I think I’ll be taking an extended break.”
“From your boyfriend?” This perhaps was the first thing Katherine wasn’t surprised by in this place.
“Dancing.”
That, on the other hand— “Why would you do that?”
“We all need breaks sometimes, Kit.”
Even things that made them shine like the brightest star in the world?
“Be happy for me.”
Katherine blinked.
“All right.�
��
“That’s it, all right?” Avril asked. For a second, Avril almost looked disappointed.
Katherine only nodded.
“Fine then. We better go and get you fixed up so we can celebrate. Yeah?”
Avril flung Jack his keys from where he lounged on the living room sofa. It moved since she was at the townhouse this morning. Now, the long velvet couch turned toward the fireplace.
Jack caught the bundle in one hand. “Did you really think I wouldn’t notice that you stole my Jeep?”
“You let me take it in the first place, didn’t you?”
Tossing his head side to side, Jack didn’t answer, only stuffed his keys into his back pocket. It looked like he must’ve been asleep when the incident occurred.
“Kit.” He nodded toward her.
“Hi.”
“We are going to get Kit here cleaned up.”
“Oh, so you know—”
“Not another word!” Gripping her wrist, Avril pulled Katherine up the townhouse steps toward her room.
Katherine let herself be dragged, trudging up the red oriental runner her Keds sunk into with each step.
She turned to the left over the railing again, just to see if she could spot Jack. Instead, her eyes caught on a framed photo they were talking about before of a girl who was unmistakably Avril in the lower hall. In low light, red and shadows, she posed with her legs over the arm of a chair—no, a throne. Her head fell back as if in ecstasy, yet still managed to hold on to a coronation crown only outshone by a radiating grin.
Queen.
How could she just let it all fall behind?
“Keep up!”
Avril’s room looked like Rosin on steroids. Plush carpet creased under each step and silk sheets scattered on an unmade bed. Deep rose-colored curtains fanned down from the corners of the windows and collected in a pool on the carpet where even more boxes sat, yanked out from the closet, sealed.
Avril ripped open one of them before pushing it off to the side with the rest.
“Who has this much shit?” She snaked her gaze around her shoulder to look at Katherine.
She still looked around the place in awe, cautiously entering in case she accidentally stumbled upon a different dimension.