“Oh, it’s so beautiful.” Smiling at herself in Branna’s long mirror, Iona brushed fingertips over the lace bodice, down the tiered column of skirt.
“There! That’s the lot,’ Meara said as she did up the last buttons at the base of Iona’s neck. “You look a picture, Iona.”
“I do. I really do.”
“The skirt’s perfect, I think.” Nodding, Branna walked around Iona as her cousin swayed this way and that to make the skirt sweep. “Soft, romantic, just enough fuss but not too much. But I’m thinking the bodice could use some altering. It’s far too old-fashioned and far too modest. Vintage is one thing, covering you to the chin’s another.”
“Oh, but we can’t change it. You’ve kept it all these years.”
“What can be changed can be changed back again. Turn around here once.” She turned Iona herself, putting her back to the mirror. “These should go.” Branna swept her hands down the sleeves, vanishing them, glanced at Meara.
“Altogether better already. And the back here? Don’t you think . . .”
Branna pursed her lips as Meara traced a low vee, then with a nod, traced it herself to open the back to just above the waist. “Yes, she’s a lovely strong back and should show it off. Now the bodice.”
Head angling this way, that way, Branna walked a circle around Iona. “Perhaps this . . .” She changed the bodice to a straight line just above the breasts with thin straps.
Meara folded her arms. “I like it!”
“Mmm, but it’s not quite right.” Thinking, imagining, Branna tried an off-the-shoulder style, with a hint of cap sleeves. Stepped back to study with Meara.
They both shook their heads.
“Can I just—”
“No!” And both of them snapped out the denial as Iona started to peek over her shoulder.
“The first you did was better by far.”
“It was, but . . .” Branna closed her eyes a moment until the image formed. Then opening them, she waved her hands slowly over the bodice.
“That!” Meara laid a hand on Branna’s shoulder. “Don’t touch it. Let her look now.”
“All right. If you don’t like it, you’ve only to say. Turn around, have a look.”
And the look said it all. Not just a contented smile now, but a stunned gasp followed by a luminous glow.
Bride-white lace formed a strapless bodice with the curve of a sweetheart neckline. From the nipped waist, the lace-edged tulle fell in soft, romantic tiers.
“She likes it,” Meara said with a laugh.
“No, no, no. I love it more than I can say. Oh, Branna.” Tears glimmered now as she met her cousin’s eyes in the glass.
“The back was my notion,” Meara reminded her, and had Iona angling to look. “Oh! Oh, Meara. It’s fabulous. It’s wonderful. It’s the most beautiful dress in the world.”
She spun around in it, laughed through the tears. “I’m a bride.”
“Almost. Let’s play a bit more.”
“Oh please.” As if to protect, Iona crossed her arms over the bodice. “Branna, I love it exactly as it is.”
“Not with the dress, for it couldn’t be more perfect for you. No veil you said, and I agree. What about something like this?”
She ran a finger over Iona’s cap of sunny hair so Iona wore a rainbow of tiny rosebuds on a sparkling band. “That suits the dress, and you, I think—and something for your ears. Your Nan might have just the thing, but for now . . .” She added tiny diamond stars.
“That works well.”
A dress, Branna thought, suited to the shower of sunlight and the glimmer of the moon. Suited for a day of love and promises, and a night of rejoicing.