The Way I Look At You

'How do I look?'

'Oh fine, just fine.'

'Claire!' The Operations Manager looked up from her phone just in time to catch her assistant rolling her eyes at her angrily. 'I don't want to look fine. This is my wedding day, I want to look gorgeous.' Zara turned around to examine her back in the dress, frowning slightly. 'So how do I look?'

'Erm…' Claire tilted her head. 'You look nice. Really nice.' At the exasperated sigh from her assistant, she shrugged. 'To be honest, Zara, I don't know what I'm supposed to be looking for. I didn't even go wedding dress shopping with my sister, and she begged me.'

'If I'd known you were going to be this useless…' she muttered as she continued to stand in front of the mirror, hands on her hips, examining herself thoroughly.

Zara Young had expected her employer to be slightly more helpful than she was turning out to be. Masrani had sent Claire to New York for the weekend to attend a conference on 'Management in Genetics Engineering'…or some crap, Zara hadn't really paid a great deal of attention. All she'd heard was 'weekend break in New York'. It wasn't that she disliked working on an island in the middle of nowhere, of course, she'd actually rather warmed to Jurassic World over the course of her employment. But she missed the city: the bars, the noise, the people. And, of course, wedding planning was incredibly difficult when the only clothes sold by the island shop all had pictures of tyrannosaurs on them. So, seeing as Claire's conference didn't begin until the afternoon, Zara had thought she could take her wedding dress shopping. Claire had good style, no reason that wouldn't transfer to wedding dresses, right?

How naïve.

'Ok, erm…face forward, stand still.' Claire directed, ignoring the smirk on Zara's face as she followed instruction. 'I mean, the colour really suits you so you should stick with that…'

'It's white, Claire, I'm hardly going to pick any other colour for my wedding dress.'

'I just don't know. I'm sorry, Zara, but I've never been interested in any of this. I've never considered the whole wedding thing, work's just always come first.'

'This could be you one day. That is if you ever actually left your office and met anyone…'

Claire thought she was saved as the shop assistant entered the room, smiling in the way all shop assistants do when they think they have a definite sale ahead of them, and interrupted Zara before she had chance to start another dating speech. Since her most recent disastrous attempts at dating (honestly, who wears board shorts and orders tequila on a first date?) she'd resigned herself to being single permanently, something she couldn't really say she was thrilled about, but something her sister and now assistant definitely weren't happy about.

'I assume you'll be trying on, as well?'

Claire frowned at the assistant, who seemed to be speaking to her, aware that she seemed to have missed a rather large and important part of the conversation. Zara was now back in her own clothes, dress out of sight. 'I'm sorry?'

'A dress? You'll want to try one on too? Unless you already have one?'

'No, I don't already have one…'

'That's wonderful, what sort of style were you thinking of? Or maybe we should start with colour. White? Cream? Ivory?' The assistant was still smiling as she turned to the rack of dresses on one wall and began to look through them. 'I'm not sure I'd really advise cream, giving your skin tone, but you would look lovely in white…'

Claire felt her eyes widen in horror as her brain finally caught up with the conversation. 'Oh no. No. I don't think…'

'If you're concerned about the whole 'not seeing the bride before the wedding' thing, you don't need to be. We get a lot of couples in here. Easiest way to make sure the dresses don't clash.'

'Now, that was one of Claire's biggest worries when we started planning this wedding. See, darling, now we can check we don't clash.' Zara walked over to her boss and lightly squeezed her arm, an amused smirk on her face. Claire felt herself blush.

'Zara, what are you...? We have a really tight schedule.'

'Wedding planning can be stressful, can't it?' The assistant asked. 'I know when I arranged mine, I was running around so much I ended up needing the dress taking in because I just wasn't finding the time to eat! But you can't plan anything else without having your dress first, surely?'

'You are absolutely right. Isn't she, darling?' Zara put her arm around her employer's waist tightly. Claire felt herself blush harder at the touch. 'Now, you go get undressed and we'll pass some through. I can tell the assistant what you want.' She gave the other woman a gentle push towards the changing room.

'Zara…' Claire's eyes seemed to be pleading with her assistant to drop the charade, let her off, but Zara just smiled and sat down on the leather sofa opposite the changing cubicles.

With Claire out of earshot, Zara turned to the shop assistant. 'Now, I know it sounds crazy, but she's always loved the idea of a big dress. Meringue style. Do you have any of those?' The assistant nodded eagerly and practically ran to find a couple to take to Claire. Once she was gone, Zara leant back on the sofa with a wicked grin. She wouldn't make Claire try many on, maybe just one or two ridiculous ones, just enough to punish her for being so unhelpful. Just see how uncomfortable she could make her boss. Maybe even give her a kiss, just to watch her blush even further. On Isla Nublar, Claire Dearing was undoubtedly the boss. But out here, this was Zara's turn.

She suddenly felt a buzzing in her pocket and she pulled out her phone. Her fiancé. She rejected the call almost instantly with a roll of her eyes. Zara would call him back at some point. Maybe sometime in the week, maybe next weekend if she got busy. She really hoped she'd get busy. It wasn't that she didn't care, she just...didn't care. Besides, seeing Claire in the dress was going to be far more important.

It was a few more minutes before the curtains of the changing cubicle rippled and then opened. The shop assistant exited first, having needed to have been in to help Claire with the ridiculous dress her assistant had picked out for her. It was white, and huge, with more bows than she ever wanted to see on any item of clothing designed for anyone over the age of 5. The top was tightly corseted and, even just a couple of minutes in, it was beginning to cause bruising, she felt. But she wasn't going to let Zara win by refusing to try it on. Still, she prepared herself for laughter as she stepped into the shop and stood in front of the raven haired woman on the couch.

'Oh, Claire…'

'Yes?'

This was not what she'd expected. Zara had expected to be speechless, but through laughter, not through…this. 'The dress looks…you look…'

'Doesn't she just look lovely?' The assistant was beaming now, certain that this was the dress that would give her a sale today.

'Quite.' This was not right. Zara felt her whole body almost pulsing, desperate to stand up, to close the gap between herself and the woman before her. Her fingers were itching to feel Claire's waist in the dress, her mouth dry with the thought of placing kisses across her collar bones. She was beautiful.

'We really do have a tight schedule. I have a meeting in an hour,' Claire said aloud, to no-one in particular, unnerved by Zara's silence. The sales assistant nodded and led her back into the changing room, Claire's skin burning with the feel of Zara's eyes on her back.

'Did you see your fiancée's face as you walked out in this dress?' The assistant asked as she began untying the corset, finally allowing Claire to breathe again.

'Fiancée? Oh yes…Zara.' The Operations Manager shook her head. 'Not quite what I expected.' Laughter would have been fine. The silent judgement not quite so forgivable.

'She not usually that emotional?'

'I'm sorry?'

'You're very lucky.'

'Lucky?' Claire almost scoffed, the look on Zara's face almost burnt into her mind. 'I'm not so sure...'

'You know, like I said, we get a lot of couples in this shop. A lot more than you'd think. A range as well, not just women. We get men and women too.' She nodded, as if it was important Claire didn't leave the shop thinking its only clientele were lesbians. 'But I have never seen anyone look at their fiancée the way yours looks at you. You're very lucky. I mean, she's beautiful as well. But the way she looks at you, that's what most people spend their whole lives looking for, you know?'

'Really?' Claire felt her heart begin to pound a little, her head slightly spinning. 'You think that's how she looked at me?'

'If my husband had ever looked at me like that, we'd still be married. No, trust me, the way she looked at you, she'd walk to the ends of the Earth for you, all you'd need do is ask.'

Claire couldn't stop herself from smiling.

Zara was already stood by the store doors, bag over her arm, when Claire finally exited the changing room. 'Your meeting starts in 25 minutes. I've already flagged down a taxi, he's waiting outside.'

'Thank you.' Claire was trying to study her assistant's face, but she couldn't see anything different in it, she seemed to look at her the way she always did.

'What about the dress?' The sales assistant called out hopefully.

'We'll be back at some point. She has a sister who'll want to see it first,' Zara explained dismissively, before holding the door open for Claire, and walking her over to the waiting cab. 'Come on, can't have you falling behind in your itinerary for the day, you'd never recover.'

'There is nothing wrong with having a daily schedule.' Claire rolled her eyes as she climbed in.

'You've yet to find a date to agree with you there.' She smirked before catching Claire's angry glare. 'Oh, don't worry, I know. I love your itineraries.' Zara shrugged as she slammed the door and sat back. 'Just a shame I'm taken.'