Secrets, Schemes & Sewing Machines

by Katy Cannon

  “Like you want to play Beatrice?” Connor folded his arms across his chest.

  “Like I want this play to be a success. And I will do whatever I need to in order to make that happen.” Up to and including taking on the lead role.

  Connor stared at me for a long moment, his pale blue eyes steady. Then, finally, he shook his head and sighed. “Fine. So we’re on the same side. But, look, do you even know anything about what they wore in the 1920s? Or about sourcing and hiring costumes?” I didn’t answer. “Well, I do. So if you really want this play to be a success, you’re going to have to accept some help.”

  “From you?” I laughed. “Trust me, I know more about clothes than you do. I’ll be fine.”

  “Certain about that?” Connor asked. “’Cause despite the fighting talk, it still seems to me like you don’t have a clue what you’re doing.”

  “Then I’ll learn.” I looked up at him, meeting his gaze head on. He stared back, studying me, like he was looking for evidence that I was lying.

  “Fine. I’ll leave you to it, then. You can fill me in on how things are going when we meet next week.” He paused in the doorway. “But you better learn quickly, princess. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

  Like I didn’t know that. About as well as he knew I hated that nickname, although that didn’t seem to stop him using it.

  And then he was gone. Somehow, despite the rails and boxes and racks crammed into the cupboard, it felt strangely empty without him. Like he’d crept in and filled up this area of my life that had been perfectly fine without him, thank you very much. But now, when he wasn’t there, things felt … flatter.

  And a lot less irritating.

  Alone in the costume cupboard, I began to look through the hanging rails, my fingers slipping through silk, cotton, satin, linen, lace – a hundred styles of dress from a hundred past productions. Picking up a pale cotton scarf dotted with tiny printed cherries, I ran it through my hands. It was an infinity scarf, a big loop with no beginning or end. Wrapping it around my throat, I studied myself in the mirror behind the door. Cute. And accessorising was a great distraction from the way Connor’s smirk made me clench my teeth. I really didn’t want to think about Connor at all.

  “Grace?” I spun round to find Miss Cotterill standing in the doorway, a small stack of books and magazines in her arms. “Your homework.”

  My heart sunk a little more. What on earth did she expect me to do with all that? But I stretched out my arms to take it from her all the same, and shoved them straight into my school bag. “Thanks.”

  “Club’s over,” she said, tilting her head as she looked at me. “You should be getting home.”

  I nodded. “I will. But … can I come back tomorrow? I think it’s going to take a while to find what I need in here.” And I needed to do it before Izzy and Miss Cotterill started attending rehearsals, to begin costume fittings. At least that would give me something to do in Drama Club beside stand around and watch.

  “I think that’s a very good idea,” Miss Cotterill said approvingly.

  “And … do you think I might be able to learn to sew something like this?” I pulled the scarf back over my head to hold it out to her.

  Miss Cotterill smile. “I think we can arrange that, yes. Why don’t you take it with you and see if you can figure out how it’s made?”

  Faith’s car was in the drive again when I got home. Mum appeared in the hallway when I opened the door, but didn’t yell this time. There was something in her eyes, though. A wary, watching, tense something.

  “Are you hungry?” she asked, instead. “Your dad’s just gone out for Chinese. We ordered you your usual.”

  It was a temporary truce, rather than a peace offering. Nothing had really changed, after all. But I love Chinese. So that, at least, I could smile at. “Brilliant.”

  Of course, the only downside was that with dinner arriving imminently, it was harder to run off and hide in my room. I ditched my shoes and coat in the hallway and lugged my school bag, weighed down with Miss Cotterill’s homework, through to the lounge.

  Faith looked up from her seat on the sofa and smiled at me. “Hi! I love your scarf.”

  I touched the cherry-print cotton at my throat. I’d forgotten I was even still wearing it. I pulled it off and stuffed it in my bag. I’d examine it properly later, when I was alone.

  Faith’s face fell a little, but she carried on talking. “You’re just in time. We’re looking at patterns for bridesmaids’ dresses.”

  “Patterns?” I dropped my bag next to my favourite chair, at the other end of the coffee table from her. “I thought we were going to go shopping for them?” Together. Which, admittedly, I hadn’t really been looking forward to, but still. I was supposed to get to choose my own dress. That was part of the deal.

  “Yeah…” Faith’s smile turned awkward. “Mum offered to make my bridesmaids’ dresses. As a wedding present.”

  I blinked. “Mum?! Mum can’t sew.”

  “Of course I can.” Mum bustled past with another stack of patterns. “Your gran taught me.”

  I might have gaped. Just a little bit. Never mind baking, this was a whole new level of weird. “But … I’ve never seen you.”

  “I did have a life before you were born, you know.” She said it like a joke, with a smile on her face, but I couldn’t help but glance over at Faith as evidence of that very fact, and suddenly the atmosphere in the room grew heavier.

  I looked away, curling up in my armchair with my feet under me. Reaching down, I tugged my bag into my lap and found the books and papers from Miss Cotterill.

  Then I stopped, a thought pressing in on my brain. “Why didn’t you carry on teaching me, then? After Gran died?” I hadn’t wanted to carry on sewing on my own, not without Gran. But if Mum had done it with me, maybe the idea wouldn’t have hurt so much.

  Mum looked up from the bridesmaids’ dress patterns and shrugged. “There didn’t seem much point. People don’t make their own clothes any more. We don’t need to – we just buy them.”

  “But you want to make these dresses.” And I wanted to make my own scarf.

  “It’s Faith’s wedding. It’s special, so it’s nice to make the effort.”

  “Right,” I said, as if I understood. But all I heard was that I hadn’t been worth the effort. She’d never made me a skirt when I was a little girl, or taught me any of the skills her mother had taught her. It was easier to pay someone else to do it, I supposed, just like everything else – food, cleaning, even looking after me.

  But now they had Faith, suddenly they were ready to do everything themselves, to be the perfect parents they’d never bothered trying to be for me.

  As Mum and Faith pored over the patterns, and talked about silks versus satins, I looked down at my homework. Styles and Fashions of the 1920s. Military Uniforms of the First World War. 1920s jewellery. Flapper Style and Accessories.

  Never mind bridesmaids’ dresses. Miss Cotterill knew just what I needed to be interested in right now.

  Settling down, I started to read and waited for my chow mein to arrive. Connor might know everything there was about stage managing, but I was going to be an expert in 1920s clothes by the time we met again to discuss the costumes. One way or another, I was going to convince him I took this play seriously.

  Seriously enough to star in it, for definite.

  What you need:

  Rectangle of medium-weight fabric, 120 x 80cm

  2m of satin rope cord to match

  What to do:

  1. Fold and press your fabric in half along the longest edge, right sides together, to give you your basic bag shape.

  2. Pin in place along the bottom edge and side, leaving 4cm at the top of the side unpinned.

  3. Sew along the bottom and side of the bag, stopping before your 4cm gap.

  4. Continuing up the side of the bag, fold and iron the side edge of your fabric in the 4cm gap to make a very narrow hem, then sew in place individually (don’t
join the back and front pieces of fabric together).

  5. Hem the top edge of your bag with a 0.5cm hem.

  6. Fold over the top of your bag again so the top edge sits in line with the bottom of your 4cm gap, press and pin in place. This will be the channel for your drawstring cord.

  7. Sew in place, leaving the ends open.

  8. Attach a safety pin to one end of your cord and use it to feed the cord through the channel until it comes out of the other end. Knot the ends of cord together at the length you want.

  9. Turn the bag the right way out and it is ready to use.

  Over the course of that week, I spent more time in the textiles classroom than the food tech or drama room. Jasper actually stopped me in the corridor on the Wednesday to check I wasn’t “pulling a Lottie” and secretly seeing the school counsellor without telling the rest of them.

  I laughed, and didn’t mention that my parents had suggested that I should. I’d talked them out of telling the school about Faith. My family wasn’t anyone else’s business – that’s one thing Lottie and I could agree on. Besides, I didn’t even know where to begin trying to explain all the things that felt wrong about this year.

  By Thursday, I had a better idea of the costumes I needed, and I was very, very sick of the costume cupboard. So I dragged Yasmin along with me last period, which we both had free, to help me sort through the last few rails before we went to Bake Club.

  Miss Cotterill had provided me with three laundry bags, as made by her Year Nines, to help with the sorting. One for costumes we wanted to use, ready to get them cleaned. One for anything we spotted that needed repairs, and the last for any costumes we felt were beyond saving. I guess she figured that if I was in there anyway, I might as well be useful to her, too.

  “So, what else do we still need?” Yasmin asked, staring into the place where old costumes went to die.

  Sighing, I scanned over my list again. “Quite a lot. We’ve got some basic dresses for most of the female cast. The cuts aren’t too bad – low waistlines and the right kind of styles – and Miss Cotterill and Izzy say they’ll help us tailor them. With a few 1920s-style accessories, they should do the job. But we’re still short on military uniforms for the guys, and wedding dresses for the girls in the final scene.”

  “Plus some sort of knockout gown for you to wear to win Connor over?” Yasmin suggested.

  I glared at her and didn’t dignify her tease with a response. “I was thinking maybe just simple midi-length dropped-waist dresses in white with short veils? Oh, and I want Beatrice to have something special to wear for the masked ball, to make her stand out. Plus we need actual masks…”

  “Right.” Yasmin sighed. I didn’t blame her one bit. “So, no time for flirting with Connor, then?”

  “No inclination,” I said shortly. Even if I suddenly decided that Connor was the most attractive guy on the planet (unlikely), why on earth would I be interested in someone who so obviously disliked me? “Which leaves me totally free to help you out with Ash…”

  Yasmin blushed and stared down at her hands. But when I bent down to try and meet her eyes, she was smiling.

  “Unless you don’t need my help?” I guessed. “Tell me! Are you two officially together, or what?”

  “Not … officially. In fact, I have no idea.” Yasmin sighed, then grinned again, as if she couldn’t help herself. “But he did hold my hand.”

  “And you’re only telling me now? When was this? Where? What happened? I want to know everything.” After all, if I wasn’t destined to have any sort of love life this year, I had to live through someone else. Hand holding wasn’t much, but for Yasmin it was a start.

  Yasmin laughed. “Come on. I’ll tell you while we sort through these costumes.”

  The work went much quicker with two of us, and Yasmin’s story definitely helped pass the time. Ash had walked her home and they’d talked about their families and school and the play, until they’d reached the corner of her road and he’d reached out to take her hand and…

  “Then my nephew spotted me from the front garden and I had to run in,” Yasmin finished.

  I deflated. “That’s it? I thought this was going to be some epic love story.”

  “It kind of is, for me.” Yasmin smiled shyly. “I think he’d have kissed me, if we hadn’t been interrupted.”

  “So, what happens next? What’s your next move?”

  “I don’t know,” Yasmin admitted. “Any ideas?”

  I grinned. “Plenty. We can work on a plan together.”

  “Once we’ve finished up here,” Yasmin said.

  I looked around. “We’re nearly there, I think. At least with the sorting. That’s the last box.”

  I pointed at the box full of hats Yasmin was currently rooting through. A rose pink cloche hat caught my eye and I pulled it out, dropping it on to Yasmin’s head.

  “One moment,” I said, adjusting it slightly before she could object. Rifling through a box of brooches I’d sorted earlier, I pulled out a sparkling flower pin and fixed it to the side. “Perfect.”

  I spun Yasmin around to look in the mirror and she laughed with surprise. “It actually doesn’t look that bad!”

  “You’ve got a face that suits hats.” And I had an eye for accessories. “You should wear them more often. Say, on your first proper date with Ash…”

  Yasmin reached up and took the hat off. “He has to ask me first.”

  “Oh, he will. Trust me.”

  She gave me a hopeful smile, then placed the hat back into the box. “Come on. We’re supposed to be sorting out costumes, not my love life. What do we do next?” She sat on an ancient suitcase in the corner of the costume cupboard.

  I glanced down at my costume list. Even with everything in the cupboard, we didn’t have enough of the right sort of outfits and accessories. “Find the stuff we’re still missing.”

  “OK, well, how about we take a trip to raid all the charity shops in town over half-term?” Yasmin suggested, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees. “We should find some stuff we can dress up to look the part. Plus they’re great for beads and old costume jewellery and stuff.”

  “That’s a good idea! And I’ll talk to Mr Hughes tomorrow about some of the more complicated items. See if he has any ideas.” This was why I needed Yasmin’s help with the play. The budget Mr Hughes had given me to buy extra costumes and props wasn’t huge, which was why I was hoping we could find most things we needed in the costume cupboard. But charity shops would be a great way to pick up some extras without spending too much. “Plus we can go do some actual shopping. It’s been ages since I’ve had a proper shopping spree.”

  Yasmin beamed. “See! Now we have a plan.”

  “Yes, we do.” And life was always better with a plan, just like Dad said. I glanced down at my watch. “But first we’d better get to Bake Club, before the new kids steal our places.”

  I shoved my costume list back in my school bag and grabbed my Bake Club basket. Time to switch focus for a couple of hours. I’d thought about nothing but the play for days. It would be good to think about something else for a while.

  Bake Club was already in full swing when we arrived, late. Mac wasn’t there this week, so Lottie and Jasper had teamed up and he was already putting her carefully laid-out ingredients out of order. He claimed he was trying to help her break her OCD tendencies, but I knew he just did it to mess with her.

  Yasmin and I grabbed the last workstation, at the back of the class, and pulled out our recipe. We’d decided earlier in the week that we wanted to make something vaguely authentic to the 1920s to take to Drama Club the next day – even though I’d warned her that if we did it once, we’d be expected to bring cake every week. She thought it would be good for morale. I thought it would annoy Connor, proving that I was actually working for the good of the group. We’d settled on an apple-sauce cake Yasmin had found from some vintage site.

  We were halfway through making up the mixture when Jasper appeared
at our counter, clearly bored of Lottie taking over already.

  “What are you guys doing next week?” he asked, bouncing up to sit on one of the counter stools. “For half-term, I mean.”

  He was grinning a little too manically for me to feel comfortable answering that question without asking, “Why?”

  “Ella’s visiting!” Another little bounce at his girlfriend’s name. God, he had it bad. To be honest, I’d assumed that the moment she left town it would all be over between them, but no. Despite the distance, Ella’s mum’s obvious determination to keep them apart, and Jasper’s reliance on Christmas stockings to symbolize romance, they still seemed to be going strong.

  “Brilliant!” Yasmin beamed as she tipped the apple sauce into the mixture. “Are we all going to get together? Like a big Bake Club reunion thing?”

  “That’s what I was thinking,” Jasper said. “I thought we could all meet at the White Hill Bakery, so that Mac and Lottie can be there, even if they’re working. We can try and do it around their breaks or something.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” I said. Anything to get me out of the house, away from more hideous bridesmaids’ dress designs. “Yasmin and I were just planning a shopping trip anyway, so we may as well make a day of it.”

  “Perfect. Tuesday OK?” Jasper asked. “Ella is busy with her dad and visiting her gran and stuff most of the other days.”

  “Tuesday’s fine.” I frowned. “If she’s going to be so busy, are you actually going to get a chance to see her much?”

  Jasper’s grin slipped a little. “I’m sure we’ll manage. I mean, it’s got to be easier than when she’s hundreds of miles away, right?”

  “Of course it will,” Yasmin said, soothingly. I didn’t say anything, because it’s not nice to lie to friends. I’d learned that from Lottie.

  As Jasper wandered back off towards Lottie and her perfectly even scones, I turned to Yasmin. “You should ask Ash along.”