Lori stared at her lap. They hadn’t even gotten on the plane yet, and already her sundress was a mass of wrinkles.
She’d been warned.
“Oh, that won’t travel well,” her mom had said when Lori came downstairs for breakfast that morning.
Gram had barely glanced up from flipping pancakes to add, “Why don’t you wear one of those outfits your mother bought you?”
That was all Lori needed to hear.
“No,” she said. “I want to wear this.”
She hated the way she sounded saying that—like she was four, not fourteen. Gram only made it worse.
“She’s so proud of making that dress in 4-H last year. Won an Outstanding of the Day ribbon, you know?” she said to Mom, as if Lori weren’t right there listening—and perfectly able to speak for herself.
Lori wasn’t proud of the dress. She knew the right side seam was just the tiniest bit wobbly, and the facing in the bodice never had lain right, no matter how many times Lori smashed it down with the iron. Plus, she was totally sick of the red-and-white flowered pattern of the material. She’d spent so much of last June and July cutting it, pinning it, sewing it, ripping out bad stitches in it. . . . Her hands went sweaty just looking at it. But, with both Mom and Gram suggesting she change, she absolutely had to wear the dress.
Now, sitting in a contoured plastic seat at the airport, waiting to fly to Chicago, she wished she’d just put on one of her new outfits to begin with. Even though they came from Mom, those outfits were cool, in style, right. Already, Lori had seen six other girls wearing shirts and shorts just like the ones folded up in her suitcase. (For the record: No one else was wearing a squashed-up, homemade cotton sundress.) Mom had shopped at the Gap, Old Navy, even Abercrombie & Fitch. Some of Lori’s friends would practically kill for the clothes Lori was refusing to wear.
What had she been thinking?
It was too bright in the airport. In the half-light of dawn that morning, as she’d tiptoed down the hall at home to peer in the full-length mirror without waking everyone up, Lori had had everything figured out. Her reflection had been perfect in that mirror. Her light brown hair arced just right, flowing to her shoulders. Her gray eyes sparkled. None of her stress-zits showed. Half in shadow, the dress was beautiful, perfectly fitted, maybe even the tiniest bit sultry. She’d watched a little fantasy in her mind: Lori walks into the airport with an air of confidence, striding as casually as if she’d been flying all her life. The crowd parts to make way for her. Everyone is in awe of her beauty, her style, her je ne sais quoi. Then someone steps forward. It is an incredibly handsome man—TV-star handsome, movie-star handsome, better looking than any guy in all of Pickford County. His fingers brush Lori’s arm, and the mere touch sends a thrill through her body. (Did that ever really happen outside of romance novels? Lori decided it could.)
“Excuse me,” he whispers. “I am a fashion designer. I must know—where did you get that incredible creation?”
“This old dress?” In her fantasies, Lori is humble as well as gorgeous. “I made it. It’s a Butterick pattern.”
“Oh, but you have transformed it,” the man says. “You have genius as well as beauty. Will you—”
And then Lori was stuck. Did she really want this fantasy man admiring her sewing skills? She didn’t even like to sew that much. And what was he going to offer her? A job? Not very romantic. A date? Come on, how old would this fantasy man have to be to be a successful fashion designer? She was only fourteen. It was kind of gross if he was too much older than that.
This was a problem Lori often had with fantasies. After a certain point, they just weren’t very practical.
Lori might have changed her clothes right then, before she went downstairs. But there was already another fantasy playing in her head: Lori walks into the kitchen. Mom takes one look at her and stops short.
“You are not wearing that,” she says. “Go change.”
“What’s wrong?” Lori taunts her. “Are you ashamed of me? Scared someone will find out you’ve kept your kids locked up in dinky old Pickford County while you’re out traveling the world?”
Maybe Lori really would have had the nerve to say something like that, if Mom had out-and-out ordered her to change.
Maybe not.
Lori and her mother didn’t really talk. Oh, they spoke in each other’s presence—”Please pass the orange juice,” “Can I see your report card?” “Do you want me to do the dishes?”—but it had been years, probably, since they’d exchanged any words that actually meant anything. Mom was never around long enough for Lori to move from “Please pass the orange juice” to anything she really wanted to say.