The Hidden (21 page)

“What thing?”

“Shopping? For the Hollow Ball? Today’s Wednesday.”

“Um, yeah.” I wasn’t crazy about the idea of not going home to be with Caspian, but Sophie still hadn’t called my cell. Which meant that he hadn’t woken up yet. “Sure. Just let me dump my
books off at my locker. I don’t have any homework that can’t wait until tomorrow.”

She came over and waited beside me.

“Any ideas where we should go?” I asked.

“There’s this specialty dress store in Jersey,” she said, giving me an arched look. “I know. Jersey, right? But I have a friend who swears by it. Says they have the best designer stuff for half the price. They probably get it after it falls off a truck, but, hey. I’m not going to complain.”

“We’ll probably be gone all afternoon, right?”

“Uh, yeah. Why? Do you have an afternoon curfew?” Beth laughed.

I smiled weakly at her. “No, no. Just want to make sure my mom doesn’t call and bug me about it, like, a million times. No big.”

“Okay. Let’s go, then.” She clapped her hands together.

I crammed my books into my locker and then followed her outside. A dusty blue Chevy was sitting by the curb, and we got in. Beth turned up the heat as we drove away from the school, and she started talking about Lewis right away.

We headed away from Sleepy Hollow and across the Tappan Zee Bridge. I stretched my legs out in front of me and shifted in my seat. Already I was wondering if Caspian was
okay. What if he was asleep for too long? What if this time he didn’t wake up?

“… and then he said that I should just go with Grant if that made me happy. Ugh. Boys.”

Beth glanced over at me, waiting for me to say something.

But I’d zoned out completely.

“Are you daydreaming, Abbey?” she said with a little smile. “You know, there’s a cure for that. … A hot boy. I mean, a hot guy. Forget boys. Who needs ’em?”

I smiled back.

“Do we need to go cruising for some hotties?” she asked. “We can still crash the beach house for a weekend. Granted, it’s the off-season, but you never know when a cute lifeguard in training might show up or something.”

I laughed. “No. We don’t need to go pick up a lifeguard hottie. Although, I appreciate your willingness to help me out on that one.”

“It’s the thought that counts.”

I remembered those words coming from someone else. Caspian had said them to me once. I glanced away, out the window. A pickup truck passed us on the right, with two guys in the front seat. They were keeping pace with us, and Beth noticed.

“That driver is kind of cute,” she said. Leaning over, she
smiled flirtatiously at them. The driver honked his horn, and his passenger did some sort of hand motion that either meant
Call me
or
Give me more
. I couldn’t tell which.

“Keep us on the road, Beth,” I said with a grin when she kept looking at them.

“You never know. Those could be our Hollow Ball dates.”

The truck edged forward, the driver holding up a sheet of paper next to his window with a phone number scribbled on it.
Hey, hotie, textt me
, it said.

I burst out laughing as Beth made a face. “At least we know they can spell,” I said to her. She stepped on the gas, blowing past them with a smile, and her laughter filled the car.

“Oh, well. Guess neither one of them was Prince Charming after all.”

We came to a ramp and slowed down, pulling off at exit twenty-four. The road went through a little town with a speed limit of thirty-five, which Beth had a hard time staying at, and we bumped along the way. The town was one giant pothole.

“We’re looking for Denim Street,” Beth said, keeping an eye on street signs. “How fitting.”

It came up on our left, and she made the turn. A bright orange cement building with a pink and green striped awning sat surrounded by vacant storefronts. The parking lot was filled
to capacity. “Guess the secret’s out,” I mused. “Looks like everyone else knows about this place too.”

“Great,” Beth said. “I hope there’s still some good stuff left.”

We parked two blocks away and walked down to the store. Two girls were struggling with a giant puffy garment bag that was snagged on the exit door, with another girl pushing behind them, trying to make her way out.

“I hope we don’t get trampled or anything,” I whispered as we ducked under the garment bag and slipped in.

“Stampede!” Beth said, mimicking a cowboy.

We walked into the main showroom, and immediately I saw why it was so busy. Rack upon rack filled the massive place, all sorted by designer, color, or occasion. It was a free-for-all. Girls everywhere were pulling out handfuls of dresses at a time.

“How are we supposed to find what we want?” I asked, taking it all in.

“Start at one end and pull what you want. Pull what you’re unsure of too, in case I want it, and I’ll do the same. But be careful. I heard about this brawl that started over in the Betsey Johnson section, and it took the cops to pull everyone apart. Assault and battery charges were filed.”

“Jeez, Beth.” I looked at her. “What did you bring us into?”

“Don’t worry,” she said. “Just stick with me. All my years of
running track will come in handy when I book it from one end of the room to the other to beat out the girl who is grabbing the perfect gown.”

“Oh, I’m definitely sticking with you. No doubt about it.”

We headed into the fray, and divvied up sections. I found myself on one end of a metal rack, thumbing through dresses and shouting back to her when I found something.

“There’s a pink dress with one shoulder strap and some sequins on the hem here,” I called out. “You want it?”

“Light pink or hot pink?” she asked.

“Hot pink.”

“If it’s in my size, pull it.”

I yanked the dress off the hanger and draped it over my shoulder, then continued flipping through the plastic dress coverings. I wasn’t sure what I wanted yet. Purple? Blue? Or maybe something pink? To match Beth.

A little voice in the back of my head started whispering,
What color would Caspian like? Something green to match his eyes? Or black? To match the stripe in his hair?

I tried to push those thoughts away. I tried
not
to think about the pang that hurt my heart.

“Yo, Abbey!” Beth suddenly called. “What about this?”

She held up a deep red sleeveless satin dress that looked
like something a flamenco dancer would wear to do the tango in. It had a plunging neckline, a thigh-high slit, and black roses embroidered along the bottom.

I walked over and gave her the pink dress. Then I took the red one. It was daring. Something I’d never pictured myself wearing, but it fit Ben’s crazy personality to a T. “I kind of like it,” I said. “I’m gonna try it on.”

Draping it over my arm, I went to go find a fitting room. There was a line a mile long, but eventually a room opened up, and I went in. I had to wiggle my way into the dress, and it fit me like a glove. I stood back and took in my reflection.

The slit was high, the top low, but it looked damn good. I piled my hair on top of my head and held it up with one hand. A few wispy curls straggled down around my ears, and I turned to check out the back. It was a sexy dress, and for a moment I wondered if it was
too
sexy to wear for a friend date with Ben. But the longer I looked at it, the more I had to have it.

It was perfect.

A knock came on the door, and I opened it a crack, sticking my head out to see who it was. Beth stood there, shifting a huge pile of dresses from one arm to the other. “I thought I saw you grab this dressing room,” she said. “Can I come in? This line is atrocious.”

“Yeah, sure. But I’m going to go with this dress, so I’m done.”

She nudged the door open wider, and her eyes grew large. “Yup. That’s the one. Ben is totally going to want to do you.”

I could feel my face get warm. “That’s
not
the look I’m going for. Maybe I should get a different—”

“If you don’t get
this
one, Browning, I will kill you.
Slowly
.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes!” She shuffled into the small space, and piled the heap of dresses onto the changing bench nearby. “That’s the one.
Get it
.”

“Okay, okay,” I said. “I’ll get it.”

Beth turned away and bent over to pick out a dress. Loosening the plastic, she pulled one out and hung it up on the hook by the mirror. As I changed back into my regular clothes, all I could hear was the whooshing of voluminous fabric as she struggled to find the arm and neck holes.

“Do you need help?” I asked.

“Nope.” Her head popped through. “I got it.” She glanced at herself in the mirror and made a face. The bottom of the white dress she was trying on stood out from her body in a huge ball of bunched-up fabric.

“It’s … poofy,” I said.

“‘Poofy’ isn’t quite the word I’d use. More like ‘fugly.’ Next.”

She bumped into me as she pulled her arms free, and I tried to move out of her way, but there wasn’t enough room. We did a little dance back and forth, but I was trapped up against the wall. “I think I’m going to just leave,” I said. “That okay with you?”

“Yeah.”

I cracked the door again, and then stood waiting outside. “Are you having any luck?” I called after a while.

There was a muffled curse, and then she said, “Nope. Just tried on the third one. I have about twelve more to go.”

Twelve? Good Lord.
“Since you still have so many, do you mind if I go take a walk? I’m bored out of my skull.”

“Go ahead.”

I started to walk away, then came back. “Oh, hey. I left my dress in there. Do you want me to get it?”

“Nah. It’s fine where it is.”

“Okay. Call me when you find the one.”

I quickly left the dressing room behind, and went outside. The cool air was a blast of relief on my skin, and I didn’t even realize how hot it must have been in there.

Most of the nearby storefronts were empty, but I walked up to each one anyway, peering into dirty windows to see what had been left behind. One store still had a bunch of racks and display
shelves with what looked like old pharmacy bottles stacked high against the wall. I could only imagine what the old labels would say.

Tearing myself away from the window, I walked farther up the street and found the antiques store we had passed on the way in. It was small, and looked like it was crammed with junk, but with the way Beth was going, it looked like I was going to have plenty of time to kill. Why not give it a shot?

So I went in.

The gallant Ichabod now spent at least an extra half hour at his toilet, brushing and furbishing up his best, and indeed only suit of rusty black …

—“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”

O
ld toys and busted-up junk filled the shelves of Clutter and Cobwebs Antiques, a cross between a really bad estate sale and a going-out-of-business dollar store. As I looked closer, I could see remnants of yard sale stickers here and there. “Nice,” I muttered.

It seemed like a waste of space, and I was just about to leave when a steamer trunk caught my eye. It was pushed out of the way, half buried under a pile of moth-eaten fur coats in the back of the clothing section. But there was something about it that drew my attention. …

The trunk looked old. A lot older than any of the other stuff
surrounding it, and it was covered in faded stickers. Shoving the coats out of my way, I knelt in front of it. The stickers were from everywhere—Madrid, Ireland, France, Turkey, Indonesia, Brazil.

A white piece of fabric hung out of the corner, trailing forlornly down the side. It looked really fragile.

I had the briefest notion that it was a wedding dress. That I’d just found someone’s long-forgotten wedding dress, but as I lifted the lid and removed an old wooden tray filled with handkerchiefs and gloves, I saw that I was wrong. It was a gown. A ball gown.

Digging deeper, gently pushing my way past petticoats and nightgowns, I pulled at the edge of the silvery-white fabric. It felt like gossamer in my hands.

Slowly, ever so slowly, it came free, and I lifted it up from the trunk. It was the most beautiful dress I had ever seen.

A full, flowing skirt fell away from the front in a graceful V shape, the color of a fresh pearl. Little silvery capped sleeves looked dainty and ethereal, while a black lace overlay ran from the corseted bodice down to the floor. It almost looked like someone had taken two dresses and put one on top of the other, then taken scissors and cut away the front so that the bottom dress could peek through. It was stunning.

I pulled it close, and a faint wave of rose scent drifted up to me. Closing my eyes, I was suddenly lost in a flood of hazy images.

Waving good-bye as your beloved goes to sea … Waiting for him, handkerchief in hand, stained with fresh tears … Red roses, given at a Christmas dance, now dried and pressed for all eternity … A watchful bride, walking the shore as she prays for her sailor to find the bottle she’s tossed into the waves … A stolen kiss …