“Falling in love with Becca didnʼt make him love Jennifer less. And loving Jennifer doesnʼt change the fact that heʼs head over heels for Becca.” Talley made a left onto her street. “There is no such thing as one true love. Thatʼs just fairy tale stuff.”

#

Actually dead mermaids and unconscious girls impregnated by already married princes were fairy tale stuff , but I doubted Talley would want me pointing that out.

“So youʼre trying to say that I could be in love with Charlie and Alex?”

“Iʼm saying that you do love Charlie and Alex.”

“Then Iʼm an idiot,” I mumbled. She was right, of course. Talley was pretty much always right. Maybe I had known it all along, but talking about it made it more real somehow.

“How does falling in love make you an idiot?”

“Falling in love always makes people idiots. I just have the distinction of being a double-idiot.” We were rapidly approaching Talleyʼs house, for which I was grateful. I was ready for this conversation to be over. “On one hand, Iʼm in love with someone who I have to lie about and sneak around to be with because, if anyone ever found out that weʼre together, it could cause some sort of crazy Shape Shifter epic battle. On the other hand, Iʼm in love with my brotherʼs cousin who thinks of me as the little sister he never had. And letʼs not ignore the fact that theyʼre both classic B-movie monsters. If thatʼs not idiotic, then I really donʼt know what is.”

“Youʼre not an idiot.”

“What am I then?”

Talley threw the car in park. “Youʼre a human, Scout. Congratulations on finally joining us.” She placed a consoling hand on my arm. “Now, as a human you may experience a wide range of emotions in addition to the annoyance you are used to feeling. Do not be alarmed. While somewhat baffling and occasionally painful, these emotions are normal.” I narrowed my eyes. “You are turning into such a smart ass.”

“I learned it from the best,” she said with a wink.

“Iʼm going to pretend youʼre referring to Jase.”

“If it makes you feel better.” She started to open the car door, but stopped and faced me.

“We have to go see my mother.”

I re-clicked my seatbelt. “Never mind. Take me home.” I would much rather face an irate Charlie than a disappointed Mrs. Matthews.

Talley reached over and undid my seatbelt. “Too late. Anyway, sheʼll be happy to see you.

Sheʼs spent half the day certain you had been kidnapped by an online predator.” I reluctantly got out of the car. “What does your mom See?” Hopefully it wasnʼt whether or not you were lying, although that seemed like the most Mrs. Matthews appropriate power in the world.

“Colors and patterns,” Talley said, opening the door to the garage her mother had converted into a workshop. “Not as flashy as some other powers, but infinitely more profitable.” Mrs. Matthews looked up from her sewing machine. If she suspected anything, it was masked by the tiny prisms of multi-colored light dancing across her face.

Mrs. Matthews was a seamstress who specialized in shiny. She received orders from all over the world to make outfits for gymnast, ice skaters, and drum majors. If it required sequins, Delia Matthews was the seamstress to hire.

“Scout, good.” She stood and managed to look much taller than her five feet and four inches. “There is something I need you to try on.”

She clomped over to one of the creepy mannequins that sat in the middle of the room. The workshop was strictly off limits when we were kids and I had very few reasons to visit her private sanctuary since then. It was a shock on the senses. Bright reams of fabric lined the walls in every imaginable color. An aisle of shelves held bins filled with millions of beads and sequins in various sizes and shapes. The smell of the dyes burned my nose and my ears took offense to the Bluegrass music she had blaring.

“Here, put this on,” she said, handing me a strange corset looking contraption made out of a light bronze satin.

I wasnʼt really in the mood to disrobe and figure out all the wired hooks on the bizarre Victorian torture device, but it was preferable to arguing with Mrs. Matthews.

“Hmmm...your breasts have grown again, so Iʼll have to let out the top, but other than that itʼs fine.” She reached up and, in less than ten seconds, undid the hooks I had wrestled with for five minutes. “Youʼll need to come over and let me do another fitting in a couple of weeks.”

“A fitting for what?”

“Your prom dress,” she said as she reattached the thing to a faceless mannequin.

“My what?” I looked to Talley for an explanation, but she was sorting through a Mason jar full of buttons. “Thatʼs very nice of you, Mrs. Matthews, but Iʼm not going to prom.”

“Yes, you are.”

“No, really. Iʼm not. I donʼt do school dances.”

Mrs. Matthews leveled me with her eyes. “Youʼre doing this one. Talley has a date and youʼre going to go along to look after her.”

Talley had a date? To prom? With who? Did she tell me anything?

“Okay, weʼve got to leave now,” Talley suddenly said, abandoning her buttons. “Miles to go and all that. Weʼll be in my room if you need us.”

Talley was ushering me out the door as Mrs. Matthews called out to tell me I should come by next week to make sure the bodice was right before she moved on to the skirt. In my state of confusion I heard myself agreeing to do so.

***

I was on the second repeat of Talleyʼs lather, rinse, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat, and repeat instructions and still wasnʼt believing what she was saying to me. “James Kiplinger?
Seriously? Youʼre going to prom with James Kiplinger? Youʼre dragging me to prom for James Kiplinger?”

“And this is the reason I didnʼt tell you sooner. I knew you would freak.” Of course I was freaking. I was a good friend. Good friends freak when you decide to commit social suicide and damn yourself to a night of awkward date hell.

“James is a really good guy. I mean, like a really good person. Trust me, I know people better than the average girl. He just needs some self-esteem.”

“And youʼre the person to give it to him?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

I could hear Talleyʼs sigh over the rush of water from the shower and the clanging of bottles as she scavenged through the cabinet. “Because only I can See what he needs, and what he needs is for someone to go to prom with him and treat him like a real person. I can do that. Iʼm going to do that. Iʼm sorry that you have to be inconvenienced, but I promise Iʼll make it up to you.”