He'd asked her to this stupid prom, and now she had to search through rack after rack of the same dresses trying to find something that would both look decent on her, and wouldn't cost her mom's whole paycheck.
Mrs. Crock had listened to none of Artemis's insistence that she could use her part-time job money, far too excited to see her teenaged daughter doing normal teenage things. All the things she'd missed with Jade, and for a long time had been convinced she wouldn't be able to experience with Artemis either. Back when she and Crusher were priming the girls to take up their mantel. Before Paula realized there was more to life than crime and blind devotion. But this was a new day. A day when Artemis would come out of the dressing room to show her mother how that damned blue gown looked.
"Artemis, you have to come out at some point, just let me see what it looks like!"
"This is so stupid, I don't know why I said I'd go." She sounded distressed and Paula heard a shuffling before the door creaked open. "I look stupid." She stepped out and Paula smiled wide.
The full skirt was perfect, the slim sleeves showing Artemis's toned arms, and the bodice hugging in all the appropriate ways. It reminded Paula so much of her own wedding dress over twenty years ago. But then she heard snickering and Artemis jerked her head up, a fearsome look in her eyes. Paula turned slowly to see two girls, one in a hot pink frock covered in keyholes and the other in a gold floor-length form-fitting gown with a slit nearly to heaven. Turning back to her red-cheeked daughter Paula realized twenty-two years was a long time. "Well this is still a perfect shade of blue for you. Change out of it and I'll find something else. Try on the rest while I'm gone." It was going to take a while to maneuver around the store, and they both knew Artemis wasn't going to like any of the remaining dresses, but her daughter just smiled that special smile reserved for her mother before locking herself back in the changing room.
When Paula knocked on the door again, Artemis was only able to stick out her head, "No one is seeing me in this." She whispered in a tone that could have been mistaken for deadly, but Paula recognized as desperate.
"Here, I thought you might like these." In her arms were a small handful of blue dresses, all she was clearly uncomfortable with her daughter wearing.
Artemis smiled at her mother's attempt to get her daughter something similar to the snickering girls'. This was Gotham, the big city. The dresses in her mother's arms were ones she would see at her old high school, and maybe even at G.A.'s own prom in two weeks - not that she was buying a second dress for it. "Mom, it's in Missouri, I need something a little more old school." The smirk on her daughter's face had Paula let out a sigh of relief.
"Oh thank goodness. Because I also got you this," She shifted the dresses around to show a very different type of dress. Cerulean, pleats, floor length, very promising. Artemis smiled at her mom, before grabbing the dress and pulling it into the changing room with her.
After rustling and a lot of grunting, Paula heard a small gasp, "Oh mom." She opened the door and stood in front of her mother, "it's perfect." It wasn't the 80's poof of the previous dresses, but there was enough volume in the skirt to make it still homegrown, Midwest appropriate. Even with the strapless bodice and accentuating bust.
Paula chuckled at her daughter's ecstatic smile, "Wally is not going to know what hit him."
AN:
Artemis's prom dress:
dreamingweddingdress (.com) crushed-yarn-cheap-attractive-blue-prom-dress-a-line-strapless-floor-train-p028-p-894 . html
(remove spaces, sorry, it won't post otherwise)