"Welcome back, Arielle!" my aunt said said she wrapped her arms around me as soon as she opened her doors to see me.
"It is good to see you in good health, Lady Bernadette."
"Arielle is so formal... It probably has to do with my sister's teachings."
"I only received the same education as Lady Bernadette and my mother did. It is due to my own personality that I take things a bit too seriously at times."
To appease my aunt, I was to swing by her house at least once every two weeks or so when I am not busy. I already came by her house this week, but had to come again to see my dress get delivered to to her home.
"You came just in time! Your dress was delivered not too long ago," Lady Bernadette said as she grabbed my hand and dragged me inside.
We were to prepare two dresses. One dress was for entering and another dress that would have to be a ball gown would be worn during intermission. The specific requirements were that we needed a dress to make us stand out. In order to avoid color clashing, Charlotte and I and the other girls from the office drew lots for the color of our ball gowns. The color of our first dress was not really as important.
I drew the card for a white dress. White dress does not really mean that it has to be completely white. There can be other things like jewels or ribbons of other colors mixed onto the dress. I opted for plain dresses for both of them.
I looked over at a room filled with flowers without stems.
Did my aunt brutally go out and behead hundreds of flowers?
"...Pruning?" I asked my aunt.
She took a few flowers out and showed it to me.
"No, silly. These are artificial flowers that I made by hand. Beautiful, right? I was going to go around decorating my house with them, but it appears that I have made a bit too much. Now, I am at a loss at what I should do with them."
"They are certainly beautiful..."
I heard Lady Bernadette was a very skilled artistic genius. To think she could recreated something so beautiful even if it was an imitation...
"Would you like some?" Lady Bernadette asked with a large smile on her face.
"I think such flowers would be wasted on me as a home decoration. They would be lovely as an accessory or something similar."
"What a wonderful idea!"
We were soon at the room of where the dresses were being held.
Dressed on two mannequins were two very different dresses. The first dress was a dark navy blue dress with an illusion halter neck, sweetheart neckline, and an asymmetrical skirt. The second dress was a long white ball gown with an A-line tulle skirt and a v-neck tulle ruche off the shoulder bodice. Both the dresses were far from simple.
"Lady Bernadette, I believe there was a mistake."
"There is no mistake. These are your dresses. I received them before and thought that they were too simple for my niece, so I tweaked it just a bit."
I am going to stand out way more than I would like to...
My dress was later transferred to the hall where the other dresses would be held. I had draped over my ball gown with a blanket and kept my other dress at home.
I came back just the day before the dance after rehearsal to check up on my dress because I had a bad feeling.
Sure enough, my dress had a large red paint splatter over the bodice and skirt. Jealousy is such a scary thing. When I was with Erik, I received some opposition as well... To fix this dress, I do not know if it is possible to reverse this anymore.
My aunt came to visit me suddenly.
"Arielle, I forgot to get you your accessories. I came to check up on you..."
It did not faze me as much as I thought it would, but when I saw how heartbroken she was, my heart dropped.
I quickly grabbed her shoulders.
"We can fix this... I just need your help, Auntie."
"If it is anything I can help with!"
I gave her the excuse that I was the one who accidentally did it. I would not want my aunt worrying about the possibility I was being bullied here. She is the type who would raise Hell on earth...
My aunt was heartbroken to see the dress she worked so hard on to get ruined like this.
"Do you think she will show?"
"What a cheeky freshman..."
Cheeky? I will show you what being cheeky is really about.
The music began playing.
All of the other girls along with Charlotte went down first after fixing my makeup along with the gentlemen.
I readjusted my mask as I went down by myself. As I expected, all eyes were on me along with the girls that thought that they had ended me.
I had missed the first half due to me trying to fix my dress with what limited time I had. Charlotte also helped along with my aunt and her servants.
We designed a totally unique dress with the flower appliqués that my aunt made. The red stains never really got out, so we decided on dyeing some parts of the dress a very light pink and creating an ombré effect upon my suggestion. The term ombré was not in use yet at this time period, but with crunch time I had to pull the idea out in order to create a faded effect with the addition of smaller flower appliqués scattered randomly over the skirt and major areas that where the stains were. Around the neckline and off the shoulder sleeves, we used larger flowers.
The flowers for my dress were originally white, but my aunt liked the idea of the ombré effect, so she also used the same concept for the flowers and made the tips red and fade to light pink. My aunt also created my accessories and made a rose choker with dangling pearls.
She lost a lot of sleep yesterday, so I had Charlotte help with my hair and makeup. Charlotte colored the lids of my eyes a slightly pink color and created a gradient effect over my lips with a deep red color and tied up my hair prettily with a large flower ornament. I was rather impressed by Charlotte's work. She even colored the ends of my hair with some red eyeshadow. Charlotte is indeed the epitome of femininity.
I held my head high as I walked down a flight of stairs.
Before me, I could see five very different looking men with hairstyles very different from their usual styles. It finally occurred to me again that this would not end with just showing up. I had to dance as well...