Chapter fifteen: dress shopping

I sighed and stood up.

"Have a good evening, Leah."

"Yeah, you too" I went to take the broken cinematic record when his hand moved it out of the way.

"I suggest not worrying about this too much." He said. "I'll finish it myself. You've already done half the work. I'll do the other half. After all, it's rude to force someone to do all this work by themselves."

"Oh… thank you." I smiled and waved as I walked out the door. William had brightened my mood significantly… that is until I saw Grell waiting for me with his red Harley parked on the curb. He ruffled my hair as I walked to him. He did it usually to annoy me. He always did it when I was younger and I hated it, but he would do it anyway. I put on the spare red helmet and we rode out into the outskirts of the blue city where all the shops were.

"I don't understand why all of this is necessary." I grumbled as we parked on the pavement.

"It's most definitely necessary. You need to look stunning." Grell said. We walked into the shop. Let the nightmare begin. Everywhere I looked everything was fancy. Every dress I saw, I didn't like. All were too frilly, too fancy, too revealing or just plain weird.

"How about this one?" Grell asked as he pulled out a very short light pink dress with a v-neck.

"Hell no! You of all people should know that I hate pink."

"Why are you such a disagreeable shopper? I've never met anyone harder to shop for than you."

"Oh gee thanks." I said. "Listen, that's something Ashlyn would wear. I really don't have the urge to dress like a hooker. If you want me to wear a dress, it has to be something that works for me, that looks nice. That does not work."

"Eugh… don't even mention that one."Grell said in disgust.

Ashlyn was a grim reaper girl who lived next door. She was one hundred percent full blood grim reaper, and she was as proud as hell for it. There were only roughly ten full blooded grim reaper families. The Redwood family, the Sutcliff family, the Hayes family, the Whitewood family, the Black family, the Spears family, the Knight family and a few others I didn't remember. She treated us like she was so far above us though our peerage rank was exactly the same.

She constantly made nasty comments about Grell as we got older, and called me names and telling me I was so retarded for hanging out with a loser like him. 'Well, losers attract' She had said. I wanted to rip her throat out. I am happy to say that I had used my telekinesis and thrown her into a wall.

She dressed in really revealing stuff and had the attitude of a hooker. Not only was she spoiled rotten but she had a dirty mouth and could make anyone feel bad. Anything from names to your appearance, she would find some way to make you look bad. I had always loved my middle name. My middle name was Ariadne, like the princess from the Greek legends. She had made me hate my middle name.

I shook my head and went back to digging through the dress racks. Thinking about Ashlyn was really not improving my mood. If only shinigami could appear on the to-die list. I hadn't found anything that was to my liking. Everything was just plain weird.

"What about this one?"

"Um… its okay but I wouldn't really wear that one…" I guessed it was pretty, but the back was far too low. It made me self conscious.

"This one?"

"It's hideous!"

"You're impossible."

"I know, but seriously, it looks like someone cut three holes in a pillowcase. I'm never wearing something like that."

"What about this one?"

"Look at the size. It's ten times too big for me."

"Oh… right, sorry!"

Let me tell you right away, shopping is very tiring, even for a shinigami. We spent roughly an hour in one store, two hours in another and half an hour in the third until we finally walked into the last dress store. I instantly saw a few dresses I liked and began rummaging around to find something more like what I wanted. I gave Grell a good description of the perfect dress I was looking for so that he could help me look.

"Hey, look at this one! Lee-lee, come over here!"

I walked over to see Grell holding up a pastel purple dress.

"Wow… it's really nice. Great find…" I walked into the fitting room to try it on. I took a closer look at it. It was really pretty, that was all I had to say. It was practically my perfect dress. The light pastel purple wasn't faded, but it wasn't bright either, like a soft amethyst color. Not only was it perfectly plain without any stupid decorations, it was also shapeless, something I really liked. Not like pillowcase shapeless, but form hugging shapeless.

It wasn't so uptight that I felt like a hooker in it, but it hugged my form and made me feel nice. It spread out just a tiny bit at the hem and was around ankle length, maybe just a bit higher once I put it on. It had a wide neckline with pleated wide t-shirt sleeves made out of a fluttery amethyst color. It was so pretty. It fit me like it had been made just for me.

I stepped out.

"Well, what do you think?" I did an experimental twirl.

"It looks amazing. That's definitely what we're looking for."

"Okay, I'm taking it."

I ended up buying the dress, along with a pair of matching high heeled shoes, some pastel violet flower clips and a ribbon like necklace with an amethyst in the center of the bow.

"Whew, glad that's over with." I said as I got on the Harley.

"Come on, it wasn't so bad"

"Yes it was. I'm never going dress shopping again."

"Oh yes you are. What about next year? You're not going to wear the same boring dress over and over again, are you? I'm just waiting for the right moment to drag you in again."

"Of course…" I sighed.

One of my worries was over. Now the bigger part of my concern was the actual ball and the fact that I would have to go back to the human world tomorrow to reap the soul of an assassin. Scared much? You bet…