The morning sunlight shone through the cracks in the shutters and found its way onto the bed; Cora was slowly woken by the sounds of horse's hooves pounding the pavement and birds chirping in the trees. She raised her head, wiped her eyes and slowly sat up pushing the covers away from her. Thoughts of tonight were starting to fill her head once again. How would people react to her? Would anyone talk to her? How would people make of her being American? She was petrified. There was a quite knock at the door, Cora's head shot round to face the dark brown door wondering if she had imagined the whole thing or if there was in fact someone wanting her.
"Come in" Cora said, with a tone of nervousness in her voice. She was always a little anxious around new people, and her mother had refused to bring their maids with them, she didn't really see the point. Cora was worried, it was an intimate business being dressed and undressed, especially by a stranger in a strange house, miles away from the comfort of home.
"It's just me milady, do you mind if I come in?" Alice asked politely, wondering if Cora even remembered which maid she was, with there being so many in one house, "It's Alice milady." She added, just to make herself clear.
"Of course, come in"
The door opened and a petite blonde girl entered into Cora's room, carrying what appeared to be a beautiful scarlet ball gown. She lay down the dress on the foot of the bed and proceeded to open the shutters on the tall windows, letting the light fill the once dull room. Cora stepped out of bed, still a little asleep, and walked towards the foot of her bed inspecting the dress as she went.
"This isn't mine," she said, looking towards Alice who was starting to seem worried about getting told off for doing something wrong, "Is it?" she questioned the poor young girl. Cora whisked up the dress and flung it against her body; she twirled towards the mirror in the corner of the room and stood admiring herself in the ball gown. The dress was a deep scarlet red colour, with intricate detailing on the bust and in her opinion made her look and feel amazing. Slowly but surely Alice began to help Cora into her amazing new dress, fastening the buttons and buckling her shoes. Before long Cora was looking quite the young woman ready to be escorted to a fabulous ball, which after all she was going to. But this wasn't just any ball; she was to be presented to the Queen at Buckingham Palace as this was Cora's debutante ball.
Author note: just adding this now in case any of you notice my huge flaw that I have in this chapter. I really should have researched debutante balls a lot more before I wrote this chapter, the dress should really be white (ivory and light shades of pink were also acceptable) so by Cora having a red dress is historically wrong. Although I don't like being historically wrong, I do like my description of the dress so I'm going to keep it. Sorry if this annoys any of you guys. By the way, thanks for the lovely reviews and kind words. Xxx