2022-05-04 - Little Black Dress

Jules has been hard at work, these past couple days, trying to make up for her week off from classes by studying double-time. While usually she’d be found in the living room or at the kitchen table when working in the evenings, those are both locations prone to too many distractions—the TV, the ease with which one falls into conversation. So she’s been out a good deal at cafes and the library, trying to be a good student.

Tonight, she comes home around the dinner hour with bags in hand: a Safeway grocery bag with her frozen pizza, along with her usual backpack. But curiouser and curiouser, there’s a brown paper bag stamped with the name of a downtown boutique. These bags are all dumped on a chair at the kitchen table as she goes about warming the oven to heat up her dinner.

Now, Jules is not a shopper. For one, she has very little in the way of spare cash, and it tends to go towards eating out. Two, she’s more likely to come back with something from an outdoors store than anywhere else. Three, she’s more a Target girl than someone who browses clothing stores for fun.

Della's been in the living room all afternoon, and she doesn't get up when the door opens and closes: mostly because she too has been trying to get work done, but also lest Jules feel pounced upon. So she sits, and works, and....

Maybe it's the beep of the oven, once it's done with preheating, that summons her: drifting over with mug and bowl -- with denuded grape stems, because eating fruit out of season, yes -- in hand and the hems of her raw silk palazzo pants sweeping just above the floor. "Welcome back," she half-teases Jules, who hasn't been gone nearly as long this time. She has the dishes to put away, but before she gets to that, she's slowed by that so-interesting package.

Jules rolls her eyes in response as she straightens from putting the pizza in the oven. “Dammit, Della, how are you always so stylish?” she asks as she checks out those pants. Jules is not usually one to comment on clothes, but here we are. When she sees the direction of her housemate’s gaze, Jules informs, “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I actually bought a dress. It’s all Ariadne’s fault.”

"By avoiding dry-clean-only like the plague," Della pertly replies. Her dark eyes laugh Jules' way even before the dress explanation, and with it... now she's taking that as an invitation.

"My hands are clean," she assures distractedly as she deposits the dishes right there on the table so she can go rummaging in the bag, unfolding the fabric as she holds it up, almost all in one move. Revelation!

Jules doesn’t leap to defend her purchase. Dresses are meant to be shown, after all. This one is short and black with a flared waist—a sundress that can either be dressed up or dressed down.

“I literally have no dresses in my closet, so I figured what the hell,” Jules says with a shrug. “Everyone needs a little black dress, right? Even me.”

The dress is fascinating -- but Jules, even more so. No dresses? No dresses at all? Jules might even be able to hear it, if she's 'listening,' Della all round eyes over the drape of black fabric that happens to veil her mouth. She rallies; "Exciting!" Secret mischief passes through her expression, but in the end all she says, holding the dress higher again so she can better assess it, "I like it."

Which is before she's checked out the tags for fabric content -- that's next on the list -- or seen it on Jules or any of the other things that might potentially keep that compliment from being anything other than sincere. Speaking of: "I can't wait to see it on you. How did it happen? Were you innocently walking down the sidewalk when the dress leapt from behind you?" Ariadne does TK, after all.

Jules doesn’t quite realize that not all of those comments aren’t voiced aloud and responds to them as if they were, laughing a little. “I think I have a couple dresses back at my grandparents’ house, but I haven’t worn them in forever. Didn’t really have a reason to, and who knows if they fit anymore. I basically just spend the summer in tank tops and jeans anyway.”

As for how? “We were just talking, and I saw it in the window on the mannequin, and she convinced me to try it on. And then convinced me to buy it.” She glances at the oven, checking the timer, then reaches out to pull Della along with her out of the kitchen. “Come on, I’ll show you.”

And Della certainly doesn't notice; as she's swept along, her amused, "That's a lot of convincing!" has a wiggle of brows to go with it. Did Ariadne spike your coffee? "Next time you visit your grandparents, pick up the dresses? If they do fit and you like them, you can consider wearing them," this is Della not pushing, "and if they just need a little adjusting, Una might know what to do. And if not, well." Unless your grandmother's likely to every now and again visit your closet, sniff your clothes and sigh wistfully about how much she misses you~~

Jules makes a face at that suggestion. “Or maybe I can consign them,” she adds to the list. “But sure, maybe there’s a keeper in there.”

She heads up the stairs to her room, where she immediately starts pulling off her shirt and wiggling out of her jeans. Della’s presence doesn’t seem to bother her in the least, though she does wait to take off her bra until she’s pulled the dress over her head and her front is decently covered.

The dress fits well. The sweetheart neckline shows off Jules’ cleavage, while the off-the shoulder sleeves add an extra touch of sex appeal. The flare at the waist makes it the kind of dress that begs for a twirl, which Jules does without even needing to be prompted. Yes, it may look a bit funny when she’s still got a bandaged arm, but on the whole Jules looks pleased with her find.

“So what do you think?”

"Consign, perfect," Della agrees. While Jules is changing, she's leaning against the doorframe, eyes politely averted without being missish about it; that twirl, though, it catches her eye, catches her into a laugh. Perfect, said simultaneously out loud and not.

"Turn again?" This time, Della assesses the outfit more critically, looking, looking -- and not finding anything that shouldn't be there, or that should. "Seriously, Jules, that looks as though it could've been made for you. It's a good versatile style, and the fit's just right. What would you wear it with?" She half-turns to look about the room as though she might find options hanging about, off a lampshade perhaps... only to pause on a very different black garment. But not for long. No, she's looking right back at Jules again, smiling. Never mind that hint of mischief.

"My dresses are all really old, like from when I was in high school or just after. I wanted to look cute, you know, attract the older guys' attention."

Jules obliges, turning slower to let Della get a look at her find from all angles. "You like it?" As she comes back to face Della, she has a pleased smile to show for it. "I was thinking a jean jacket. Or maybe Ravn will let me steal his leather jacket." The one he's rarely seen without? Hardly. "I don't suppose you have one I could borrow." As she goes through the options, Jules sees where her roommate's gaze lands. Della says nothing, and neither does Jules. Just presses her lips together like she's holding a secret in, her own expression rife with good humor.

"Cut down to here, up to there?" Della imagines with a laugh, though it's only mostly humor; lighter again, "I do. And... a jean jacket would certainly make it more casual. I might have something, yes, if you took very good care." Her smile grows, the more so as Jules presses her lips in. "If you can get Ravn to let you steal that jacket for a night, without letting him know what's up... I will take you out to dinner anywhere in town." Yes, the fanciest around. Yes, the most divey of dive bars Jules might like to see Della in.

“Pretty much,” Jules answers. Her nose wrinkles as she thinks back. “I gave my grandparents hell. They were thrilled that their high school kid was making excuses to go drink beer on boats with twenty-year-old guys. At least now when I drink beer on boats with older men, I know what I’m getting into. And I carry bear spray.”

The dare has that twinkle back in Jules’ eye. “Challenge accepted. But when you say, ‘without letting him know what’s going on,’ do you just mean that it’s a dare? Because the best excuses are those that have some truth to it.” Jules apparently has experience in this dating back to her precocious teenage years. “So for instance can I say, ‘Hey Ravn, I’m gonna run into my ex and I want him to think I’m dating someone in a biker gang so he doesn’t mess with me?’”

Bear spray makes Della laugh, yes it does, and offer a high five to the air.

"I suppose this could be classified as a dare." Twinkle for twinkle, Della's leaning into impish. "Totally fine with the ex line -- though Ravn would probably actually worry and maybe ask if you've practiced your ka-pow powers and all that, possibly talk about different ways you can handle it, except maybe not because he wouldn't want to assume you couldn't handle it because that way lies danger, Will Robinson. But if you say, hey, this anonymous person dared me, or something like that, that doesn't count."

Pause.

"Bonus points if you can get him to wear that shirt over there," she points, "in public. Like the coffee shop. With nothing concealing it. And the lettering facing out." Does she smirk, eyes bright on Jules? Yes, yes she does. "It is black."

Jules steps forward to slap her palm against Della’s for one fierce and resounding high-five. “It’s on.”

Oh Raaaavn....

She glances in the direction Della’s pointing, then. “I mean, it’s his shirt, why wouldn’t he wear it? Or do you mean switch clothes with Ravn and get him to wear the shirt?” The New Zealand All Blacks shirt, that is.

"What?!" Della marvels histrionically, those opulent eyelashes a-flutter. "Jules, what are you doing with Ravn's shirt on your floor?!"

Even if it's not on the floor. Purposeful misunderstandings cannot be contravened by pesky truthy details!

Jules just looks at Della for a moment. And then, taking it all in, she erupts in laughter. “Oh God, this is how rumors get started.” She shakes her head, still laughing, and turns around. “Unzip me, will you? The pizza’s about done, and I’m not getting grease on my new dress.” She looks over her shoulder at Della, adding, “I can’t believe I actually bought a dress.”

"What?" Della protests, even as she duly unzips, extra careful not to catch the fabric to either side. "It's not as though the neighbors could hear us." Pause. "Unless they could."

Della steps back, then, as from the very thought; conveniently, it also brings her closer to the door and the pizza beyond. "Well, I hope you have a good time, wherever you wear it. And it sounds like a nice outing with Ariadne. Any other news?"

Jules shimmies of the dress and carefully lays it on her bed, then re-dresses in her day-to-day attire. "The neighbors being Ravn, his roommate, and all our friends," she answers back. Jules takes enough care with her new clothes to put the dress on a hanger and transfer it to the closet before she starts heading for the kitchen again. "I don't think so," is her reply to Della's question. "Just the part where I'm gonna make you take me out to dinner." With a cheeky grin, she swoops past Della to claim her pizza from the oven. It might be pizza tonight -- but not long from now, Jules plans to make Della pay up.