Chapter 3 - The Woman Who Tried to Erase Her
Gary stood beneath the stage lights with one hand around the microphone.
Shirley stood beside him, smiling so broadly that I almost couldn't recognize her.
She loved attention.
That was something I had learned during the months she'd lived with us.
Shirley could transform any conversation into a story about herself. If someone complimented dinner, she'd explain how complicated the recipe had been. If Dad received good news at work, she'd describe the sacrifices she'd made to support him. If another woman received praise, Shirley found some subtle way to compete.
Now she had an entire gymnasium looking at her.
She thought she'd won.
I stood near the dance floor, frozen.
"What is Gary doing?" my friend Natalie whispered.
"I don't know."
"Did he plan this?"
"I don't know."
My hands were trembling so badly that I clasped them together.
Gary tapped the microphone.
The speakers crackled.
"Sorry to interrupt everybody."
A few people laughed.
Teachers glanced toward the stage.
Gary continued.
"We have something unusual tonight."
Shirley's smile grew.
Gary gestured toward her.
"As you can probably see, Mrs. Bennett is wearing a pretty memorable dress."
Applause began.
Shirley placed one hand against her chest like an actress accepting an award.
Then Gary looked directly at me.
"And so is Emma."
The room shifted.
Heads turned.
Suddenly everyone was looking back and forth between us.
Two dusty pink dresses.
Almost identical.
Some students laughed at first, assuming it was intentional.
Gary waited.
When the room settled, he continued.
"Most people probably think this is some kind of matching-family thing."
Shirley's smile faltered.
She turned slightly toward him.
Gary's voice remained calm.
"It isn't."
Dad took one step toward the stage.
"Gary," I whispered.
He couldn't hear me.
But he didn't need to.
Gary had once asked why I never let anyone touch the inside hem of my dress during a fitting at school.
I had shown him.
Mom had sewn a tiny piece of white fabric into the lining.
Three words were embroidered there in faded rose-colored thread.
For my Emma.
Gary remembered.
He turned toward Shirley.
"Would you mind showing everyone the inside hem?"
Her smile vanished.
"What?"
"The label."
"What label?"
"The one inside the dress."
Shirley's eyes darted toward me.
That was the moment I understood what Gary was doing.
My breath caught.
He hadn't planned some humiliating prank.
He wasn't going to insult her.
He was going to make the truth visible.
Shirley laughed too loudly.
"I don't think anyone cares about a label."
Gary shrugged.
"You're probably right."
He stepped away.
"But Emma's dress has one."
Then he looked toward me.
"Can I tell them?"
My throat tightened.
I nodded.
Gary faced the room.
"Emma's mom handmade her dress before she passed away last year."
Silence.
Not awkward silence.
Real silence.
The kind that seems to absorb every sound in a room.
Gary continued more softly.
"She finished it eight days before she died."
My hand flew to my mouth.
I hadn't known he remembered that detail.
Around me, expressions changed.
Kids who had been whispering stopped.
Parents lowered their phones.
One of the teachers near the punch table stared at Shirley.
Gary pointed gently toward my dress.
"Inside the lining, Emma's mom embroidered a message."
He paused.
"'For my Emma.'"
Somebody near the stage whispered, "Oh my God."
Shirley's face had gone pale.
Gary looked at her.
"So I guess I was wondering..."
His tone remained polite.
"If Emma's mother made that dress especially for her, how did you end up wearing the same one?"
A hundred eyes turned toward Shirley.
Her mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
Gary didn't accuse her.
Didn't raise his voice.
Didn't call her cruel.
He simply asked the question.
That was worse.
Because Shirley had to answer it herself.
"This is ridiculous," she said.
Gary tilted his head.
"You said it was your dress."
"It is."
"Then where did the design come from?"
Shirley glanced toward Dad.
He stood motionless below the stage.
She expected him to rescue her.
He didn't.
Her breathing changed.
"This is a high school dance. I don't have to explain my clothing choices to some teenage boy."
Gary handed her the microphone.
"Okay."
She stared at it.
The microphone might as well have been a courtroom oath.
Then Natalie, standing beside me, said loudly enough for several people to hear:
"Why are you wearing Emma's dead mom's dress?"
The words spread across the room.
Not because Natalie repeated them.
Because everyone else did.
"Her mom made it?"
"She copied it?"
"That's her stepmother?"
"No way."
Shirley's face flushed dark red.
She stepped toward Gary.
"You set me up."
Gary remained calm.
"No, ma'am."
"You tricked me onto this stage!"
"I complimented your dress."
"You knew exactly what you were doing."
Gary nodded.
"Yeah."
Then he said the line that would be repeated around school for weeks.
"I just figured if you wanted everybody looking at you, they should know what they're looking at."
A gasp traveled through the room.
Shirley's face changed instantly.
"ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?!"
Her scream echoed through the gymnasium.
The music had stopped completely.
Two hundred people watched.
Shirley reached for the microphone.
Gary moved it behind his back.
A teacher hurried toward the stairs.
"Mrs. Bennett, perhaps we should—"
"No!"
Shirley pointed at me.
"This is her fault!"
For a second, I thought I'd misheard.
"My fault?"
"You've been making me look like some villain since I moved into that house!"
I stared at her.
"You copied the dress my mother made while she was dying."
"Because it's a dress!"
Her words struck me harder than if she'd slapped me.
A dress.
That's all she thought it was.
My mother's shaking hands.
Her final weeks.
The nights we sat together pinning fabric.
The message hidden inside the lining.
A dress.
Something inside me changed.
The tears stopped.
I walked toward the stage.
Dad finally stepped forward.
"Emma, maybe we should go home."
I looked at him.
"No."
"Please."
"No, Dad."
He flinched.
"For once, you're going to stand here."
Shirley folded her arms.
"See? This is exactly what I deal with."
I climbed the steps.
Gary immediately moved beside me.
Not in front.
Beside.
That mattered.
I faced Shirley.
"How did you get the pattern?"
"I didn't."
"Then how did somebody recreate every seam?"
"I saw the dress."
"Where?"
Silence.
"My closet?"
She looked away.
"Is that why you kept cleaning my room?"
Dad's head snapped toward her.
"What?"
Shirley stiffened.
I kept going.
"Is that why you made me stay out of the house?"
"Don't be dramatic."
"Did you photograph it?"
She said nothing.
And that was enough.
Dad looked genuinely stunned.
"Shirley?"
She turned on him.
"Don't start."
"You told me you found the dress online."
My stomach dropped.
So Dad knew she was planning to wear something similar.
Maybe he hadn't known how she'd obtained the design.
But he'd known enough.
"You knew?"
Dad looked at me.
"Emma, she told me it was inspired by yours."
I laughed once.
It sounded nothing like laughter.
"And you thought that was okay?"
"I told her it might upset you."
"Might?"
His face crumpled.
"I should've stopped it."
For months, I'd waited for him to admit something that simple.
But standing there under the lights, it didn't feel like enough.
"You should've stopped a lot of things."
He lowered his eyes.
Behind him, parents were watching.
People he'd known for years.
People who had known Mom.
Mrs. Reynolds, my sophomore English teacher, suddenly spoke from near the stage.
"I remember Caroline making that dress."
Shirley looked toward her.
Mrs. Reynolds continued.
"She showed me the fabric during parent-teacher conferences."
Another mother raised her voice.
"So do I."
Then another.
Slowly, the room stopped being an audience.
It became witnesses.
Shirley looked trapped.
She stepped off the stage abruptly.
"I'm leaving."
Dad followed.
"Shirley."
"Don't."
She pushed through the side doors.
Dad hesitated.
For once, he didn't immediately follow her.
He looked up at me.
"I'm sorry."
I stared at him.
"Mom spent the last weeks of her life making this because she knew she wouldn't be here tonight."
His eyes filled.
"And you let your new wife turn it into a competition."
"Emma—"
"I don't want to hear sorry tonight."
I stepped away.
Gary touched my elbow.
"Do you want to leave?"
I looked around the gym.
Everyone was still staring.
Three minutes earlier, I'd wanted nothing more than to disappear.
Then I remembered Mom's words.
Wear it because you're alive.
I took a slow breath.
"No."
Gary waited.
I wiped my cheeks.
"I'm staying."
A small smile appeared on his face.
"Good."
The DJ, who had apparently understood far more than adults often assume teenagers understand, leaned toward his microphone.
"Okay, everybody. I think we have a prom to get back to."
The music restarted.
At first, nobody moved.
Then Natalie walked onto the dance floor.
"Emma?"
She held out her hands.
I laughed.
Gary joined us.
Then two more friends.
Within a minute, the dance floor filled.
The strangest thing happened.
People stopped looking at my dress like it was part of a scandal.
They started looking at me.
Not Shirley.
Me.
I danced until my feet hurt.
I laughed.
I cried once in the bathroom when Natalie hugged me.
Then I returned.
At 11:43 that night, Gary drove me home.
Dad's car was already in the driveway.
Shirley's wasn't.
Gary turned off the engine.
"You okay?"
"No."
He nodded.
"Fair."
I looked at him.
"Why did you do that?"
"Because you were leaving."
"That doesn't answer the question."
He thought for a second.
"My grandfather died when I was twelve."
I waited.
"He gave me a watch before he died. It's not expensive. It barely works."
Gary looked down at his wrist.
I realized he was wearing it.
"If somebody copied it, I wouldn't care."
He looked back at me.
"But if somebody copied it just to make me feel like what he gave me didn't matter?"
His jaw tightened.
"I'd care."
My eyes burned.
"Thank you."
He gave me a small smile.
"Go inside."
I reached for the door.
Then he added, "Emma?"
"Yeah?"
"Your mom was right about the color."
I stared.
"You told me she picked it."
I laughed softly.
Then I went inside.
Dad was sitting alone at the kitchen table.
His face looked ten years older.
I almost walked past him.
Then I saw something on the table.
A cardboard storage box.
My mother's handwriting was visible across the top.
CAROLINE — SEWING.
I froze.
"Where did you get that?"
Dad looked toward the box.
"Garage."
My heart began pounding.
"Why?"
He didn't answer immediately.
Then he slid something across the table.
A receipt.
From a local tailor.
Dated two months earlier.
Customer: Shirley Bennett.
Item: Custom gown replication.
Reference photos supplied by customer.
My hands went cold.
Dad's voice cracked.
"I found it in Shirley's purse after we got home."
I stared at him.
He swallowed.
"Emma... I think you were right."
I looked up.
"About what?"
His face collapsed.
"She hasn't just been removing your mother's things."
He touched the box.
"I think she's been lying to both of us about what happened to them."
May you like
And suddenly prom wasn't the biggest betrayal anymore.
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