The gardener waved across the low hedges that divided Avonburgh's east-end and west-end garden paths. Saira waved back, watching him hitch his wagon and roll to the next estate on his rounds. She carried the gathering basket away from the faded spring flowers in the east garden, and headed towards the vibrant splashes of reds and yellows on the west side that thrived in the long summer afternoons.
Bright dahlia blooms, transplanted from a foreign land, sprang up waist-high around her, large and loud, promising to last through the fall. Strong. Resilient. Like the women of Avonburgh House, Aunty Rame often said. The brilliant hues usually dispelled any clouds that hung over her head and brought peace, even on her worst days.
Today, Saira felt no strength or resilience. Her insides wilted, the last of her hope dried up like plants gone to seed. After this morning, The Shroud had finished the last of her scheduled appointments for the foreseeable future. Left with an uncomfortable lull in her week, her mind had too much time to circle back through everything she had done in disturbing, disappointing clarity.
What exactly had she hoped for with Five? Was it the possibility of a friendship? Had she wanted an explanation for why her Gift behaved differently around him, or was it something more?
Saira snipped away the wilted blooms, collecting her thoughts along with the dead heads. As The Shroud that morning, she had witnessed a myriad of unconventional courtships through whispered promises and kept secrets, a telling sign that fewer people followed the prescribed rules of Society than Society liked to think.
One of the Sittings was privately sponsored by a worried mother whose daughter had pledged her heart before properly coming out the following Season. Saira immediately Saw that matters had gone much farther during an unsanctioned outing than the mother suspected. She remembered the heat in her face as she Saw a misplaced stocking stuffed in the pocket of the man who had taken it off, along with a small, suspiciously ring-shaped jewler's box. He seemed to be waiting for an opportunity to present the box, as well as put the article of clothing back where it belonged.
Some of the ladies had fallen in with absolute rakes, which she warned against. But she had reassured the girl, and quite a few others that morning, that feelings were returned, that their men had honorable intentions. Their dreams, with their hearts as well as their futures, were on the right path to possibility.
In the middle of it all, Saira caught herself wondering what her mother's hope had been for her. If she were alive today, would Gautami Russell have told her that she had chosen the right path?
That was the difference between their experiences and hers.
When Saira was with Five, she didn't want to blindly trust the invisible force pulling her towards him. Like the ladies in her Sittings that morning, she wanted reasons and assurances, neither of which were forthcoming. It was in these times that she questioned whether her Gift was still with her.
But undoubtedly, it was. When they were together, she sensed the unyielding wall separating her from everything that was inside of him. Surprisingly, he kept asking her to look again, as if he didn't know what lay beyond that gate himself. Regardless of the impropriety, she had wanted to take his hand at the tea shop, to try again like he'd asked, even though she knew it would be no different from before.
Perhaps, this time, her Gift was telling her that she was not meant to See it.
Saira laid a selection of cut flowers carefully in her basket, and then moved further down to the native deep purple asters, whose thick stems would support the heavy-headed dahlias that tended to droop when not supported by a heartier companion.
If it hadn't been for Mrs. Lanchester, Five wouldn't have had the opportunity to reject her so abruptly, and she wouldn't feel so foolhardy, like her Gift had betrayed her. But it was absolutely uncharitable to lay blame on anyone else for Five's behavior. Saira had worn a brave face, thanking Mrs. Lanchester for the tea and biscuits. Only after dinner, when she was alone in her room, had she relaxed enough for the sharp sting of abandonment to knock her off balance. Five's tortured expression haunted her, like the shadow of a flickering candle against the dark.
She didn't need her Gift to understand that he intended to never see her again.
Saira hoped the bright blooms would at least dispel the melancholy from the foyer. But she set her basket down as voices carried from the other room. Rounding the corner, Saira faltered at the sight of an impeccably dressed young lady with carefully arranged curls.
Matilda Burton stood in the parlor of Avonburgh House. Younger than Saira by a year, but ages more polished, she ran a hand along the edge of the faded couch trim that had soaked up too many afternoon summers. She looked everything like the woman Saira had imagined her to be, and nothing like the girl that she had once known.
"Saira!" Matilda exclaimed.
Saira stiffened as arms wrapped around her. Images of a simpler time rushed through her head, teas and trivets, gussets and giggles, followed by accusations and derisions, and a hundred reasons Matilda Burton should not be hugging her in her own home.
Before pulling away, Matilda whispered, "Mother isn't here."
Saira tried to match the expectations of the room, to stow away her heartache, like luggage in a boot. Except the boot seemed two sizes too small for the amount of hurt she felt for being in the same room as Matilda Burton. It was hard to pretend, now that Matilda was standing in front of her. Harder now, than ever before.
She saw her hurt reflected in Matilda's eyes, but Matilda seemed much better at this game, maintaining an unaffected smile. "Allow me to introduce my companion. Lady Simon, this is the friend I told you about, Ms. Saira Russell."
Saira curtsied to the older woman sitting on the couch, who she didn't recognize.
Matilda went on with her introductions, "Lady Simon loves to be entertained, and there are no two more entertaining ladies than your aunties."
"We could not bear having the two of you stay in town!" Bavagna said. "As soon as we saw them, we invited them for a visit, and here they are! Lady Simon, you must tell us all about London!"
Rameswari agreed. "I'll inform the maid to set up the guest rooms." Which actually meant that Aunty Rame would freshen the linens herself, since Miss Emma had been up to her ears in laundry, fretting over a missing pair of jeweled sleeve buttons, and determined to go through Mr. Russell's entire wardrobe to locate them.
Saira moved to follow, intending to help her aunt, but Rameswari's hand stayed her. "You have a guest to entertain."
As Aunty Bava ushered Lady Simon into the sitting room, chatting about grown children and adventures away from her husband, Matilda's bright smile dimmed. There should be words between them, but Matilda kept glancing at the doorway into the sitting room, as if she would rather be silent than be overheard.
"I just came from the garden," Saira said. "Would you like to walk?"
"That would be lovely!" Matilda said, her guarded expression slipping into gratitude.
Saira grabbed the basket, and they walked out to the still warm afternoon.
Beside her, Matilda spoke, almost in a whisper. "I missed you, Saira. So much."
Sincerity wound through the garden space between them, but the words didn't erase the stain of hurt. Saira snipped another wilted flower, intent on making the cut decisive. "Has your mother pardoned me?"
"Mother feels the same as she ever did," Matilda said bitterly. "We have both suffered too long for her short-sightedness."
Saira shut her eyes against the memory of her first clear Vision.
After her mother's passing, Saira spent summers with Matilda in London. On her sixteenth birthday, the Baroness fastened the clasp of a beautiful emerald pendant around her neck, with the promise of the Burton's sponsorship during the upcoming Season. As soon as the jewel settled on her skin, Saira Saw.
It was clear as an ink drawing, lines shifting as if someone were flipping pages in a sketch pad, showing Baroness Burton throwing Saira's things into a trunk and sending her away in disgrace. That night, Saira despaired to Matilda about the disturbing images, while her friend assured her that the Baroness would never do such a thing.
"She didn't have to turn you out for what he did," Matilda said. Saira knew Matilda was talking about that night in London, where her father had caused a drunken scene in front of the opera house, instigating a three-hour brawl that rolled all the way to White's Tavern.
The next morning, six months to the day of Saira's vision, she found herself and her belongings in a carriage back to Bath with the Baroness's sponsorship rescinded.
It hadn't been because she'd Seen. The Baroness had benefited many times from Gautami Russell's truths over candlelight and immediately offered support to Saira's family after the funeral. It wasn't even Mr. Russell's poor choices, who years later, still grappled with his grief in all the wrong ways.
The Society pages had done it. "The Disgrace of George Russell" was plastered all over London, complete with sketches and cartoons. Russell's public humiliation made it impossible for the Baroness to associate herself with Saira in any way. Three and a half years of silence lay between them because of Saira's impulsive father and Matilda's judgmental mother.
"That's all in the past," Matilda said. "I came with my father, who holds no grudge."
"Is your father so unwell?" Saira asked, wondering how long Matilda would be in Bath without her mother to come between them.
"Quite the opposite! He carries on as if he was on holiday! Between his treatments and the Assembly Rooms, we hardly see him! You should have heard him as he declared, 'Yes, yes, go on to Avonburgh House', as if dismissing us like servants! I doubt he will even notice our absence while we are visiting."
Saira knew that feeling well, having received the same dismissal from her own father. "I rarely see my own father," she said, and suddenly got a flash of Matilda's mother and her judgment. She didn't know if she could open herself up to the hurt again. Discomfort crept back into her heart until Matilda took her hand.
"I hope that after everything, we can still be friends."
At Matilda's sincere touch, Saira's tension lessened. "I would love to be your friend again," she whispered.
For the first time Matilda's smile appeared genuine."We have so much to catch up on. It's been years!"
Saira wasn't sure how much she could share with Matilda. Her life was so different from what they'd planned together. But she expected that Matilda had stayed the course in their years apart.
There would have been gentlemen involved.
"How was the Season?" she asked as innocently as she could muster.
"Tedious," Matilda's lips pinched together. "Mother keeps pressuring me, but Father assures that I may take my time. I imagine that he'll be more pressing when he's ready to amend his estate papers. The Barony will pass to me," she said proudly, puffing out her chest a bit. "I may have another year to put off suitors."
Saira never purposefully read the Society pages, but newspapers often lay discarded at the breakfast table, and she had read the ongoing disagreement between the Burtons and another family.
"I saw an article about the Knapps," Saira began, but she didn't want to pry because not everything reported in the Society Pages was the truth.
"If it mentioned the feud, that part is true," Matilda said.
"How did that happen?" Saira asked, shock coloring her question.
"Oh, the usual. Mothers get impressions, take insults as injuries, and that's usually the end of things. But Lord Knapp won't quit me for what he calls an 'old wives' squabble'. I'm grateful for his resolve. It means he's really in love with me, doesn't it? To go through all of the adversity?"
Saira kept quiet, because even as she agreed with Matilda, she didn't know anything about this Lord Knapp or his intentions.
"Can you still see things like your mother did?" Matilda asked suddenly.
Saira took a deep breath and decided to lay it out plainly. If Matilda was going to reject her because of her Gift, she wanted it to be over and done. "I do. I can See things with my eyes closed, when I hold someone's hand, or from objects that hold sentimental value."
She was surprised when Matilda held out her hand eagerly. "Tell me about Lord Knapp. Can you see a future for us?"
The request was so bold, something only a close friend would ask of her. The last thing Matilda probably remembered about Saira's Gift was witnessing her rudimentary guesses at tomorrow's breakfast or when their next outing would be when they were younger. She didn't know that Saira's Gift had become much stronger than a childish parlor game. Pointed questions gave clearer pictures, and Saira was almost afraid of what she might See. Matilda had likely never heard of The Shroud, having been in London all this time.
"I don't know if I should." What if she Saw something about herself in Matilda's mind that she couldn't unsee?
"Please, Saira? If you require a sentimental object," she dug into her skirts and held out a folded piece of paper, "try this."
Saira hesitated, wringing her own hands together. The last time someone had handed her a paper, it had been a list of racing horses.
"It's poetry," Matilda said, shaking the folded paper at her. "He wrote it for me."
Gingerly, Saira took the paper from Matilda's hand and closed her eyes. Immediately, she felt a warm caress, as if someone had reached out and touched her cheek. It was the kind of touch that stilled her, in hopes that another caress would follow.
Saira shook her head. "This Lord Knapp. He feels…" she didn't have a word for the abstract images coalescing around her, but it was clear that they were connected by an unbreakable thread, and that if pushed, he would cross a river of broken glass for her. "Genuine," she finally decided.
"Matilda nodded, holding out her hand. "And what do you see for me?"
This would be the part where Saira asked for another coin, but she hadn't even gotten a first. This wasn't a Sitting. This was her friend. Matilda looked so hopeful, so trusting, that Saira took her hand at last. A burst of images flooded through her, strong, tangible memories mixed with desire and devotion. She tried to view the images in her periphery, a rushed exit from a crowded room, the turning of a lock in the darkness, and hands groping under skirts…
Saira dropped Matilda's hand. "You both seem… very close," she said in a wavering voice, feeling her cheeks flush as bright as the flowers surrounding them. Part of her wanted to ask if Lord Knapp was walking about London with Lady Burton's stockings in his pocket.
"Are you well, Saira?" Matilda asked worriedly.
Saira shook herself. "I'm… you're… how did you meet?"
"Two seasons ago, he managed to make himself entirely unforgettable. Mother hates his family as much as he does, which should have worked to his favor, except she's lumped him in with the rest of them. I am not allowed to entertain him at home. But Mother cannot control all the guests at the London Balls, and the Knapps certainly know how to garner invitations. Speaking of invitations, we were supposed to meet in town when I arrived."
"How did you manage that?" Saira asked, wondering how Lord Knapp's letters would get past the Baroness.
"His letters arrive from the 'Oxford Poetry Guild', and I write back in verse. We hide messages between the couplets. Mother hates poetry, so she rarely reads them!"
Saira nodded, thinking of all the unanswered letters she had sent that had probably ended up in the fireplace, or perhaps not even allowed past the Burton's threshold. There was nothing to do for it now. And then, quite unexpectedly, her mind went somewhere else entirely.
"Is he very good with his hands?"
Matilda snorted, very unladylike, and then slapped a hand over her mouth. Her face blushed bright like the late summer blooms. "Did you see that?"
"I can't control what I See," Saira said. But then… could she? Secretly, she had wanted to experience what those hands were doing, and perhaps she had not ended the vision as quickly as she could have. Her curiosity overrode her propriety, because she had already gone too far.
"Are you missing a pair of garters?"
"Saira!" Matilda exclaimed, followed by an "oh", which sounded a lot like a confession. "Perhaps I might have let him keep them as a gift," she said coyly, fanning herself with her hands. "We were supposed to meet for tea two weeks ago. Imagine my disappointment when a stranger appeared in a ridiculous outfit, insulted my bows, and then stared at me with the greenest eyes I've ever seen. And then…" she said conspiratorially, "before I could get a proper introduction, he replaced himself with the most unremarkable stooge I have ever endured." Her face twisted. "I might have taken a mild interest in the first replacement, if it wasn't for his ridiculous outfit, and, of course, my devotion to Daniel."
Daniel. The way Matilda said his name sounded as intimate as Saira's visions.
"Yes, I can see that," Saira said, thinking to the day that she met Five, and his ridiculous outfit changes as she followed him through the streets.
Matilda kept going, "I didn't even know that eyes could be the color of a summer meadow."
Saira recalled the jolt she'd experienced when she'd brushed past Five in the coffeehouse, and how his eyes had captured her interest. "Oh, yes," she said. "Remarkably green."
Catching herself staring off into space, Saira blinked rapidly and found her friend staring at her.
"Looks like you have seen remarkable eyes yourself," Matilda said pointedly.
"I met someone." Saira surprised herself by the admission.
Matilda's eyes sparkled. "Saira! This could change everything for you!"
"It changes nothing," she said, but her hands itched with idleness, needing a distraction from her distraction. "I suppose it was nice while it lasted."
Matilda's face softened, but curiosity lit up her eyes. "Did the two of you sneak off to do something entirely inappropriate?"
Saira blushed, thinking back to the closet in the back of the Baths, holding hands in the middle of the street, and even the hastily arranged tea appointment. "I imagine my aunties would lecture me on the lot of inappropriate things I've done recently." Her mind hovered over his smile, his swagger… his hasty departure.
"But I'm not meant to see him again." She studied the contents in her basket, avoiding Matilda's face, looking for something to ground her against slipping into self-pity. Through the window, she could see into the sitting room, where Miss Emma was unfolding the serving tray. "Let's go in for tea," she said, although after their words, she would prefer something stronger.
"Agreed," Matilda said. "After, we can walk the garden path, and you can tell me more!"
As much as she wanted to reconnect with her old friend, Saira's stomach soured. When they got to the foyer, she excused herself, telling Matilda she would return to the parlor after she arranged the flowers.
The serpent handled vase had always made Saira feel as if a part of her mother was still with them. That, and the portrait of Gautami Russell in the gilded frame in the parlor. Sometimes when she was alone, she would even talk to it.
She desperately wished her mother was still with her.
Matilda's presence was a welcomed change, but Saira worried that beyond her Gift, they would run out of things to talk about. There were people in her house, people in her head, and still, she felt set apart from them all. She was different. Her Gift made her that way. Even though Matilda embraced Saira's unusual abilities, and even if they found other common ground to talk about, she wouldn't be a constant in Saira's life like she once had been. Lady Burton would soon return to London, get married, and one day be a Baroness and take over for her father.
That was not Saira's path.
With Five, it would have been so easy to forge a friendship based on who she was, and not who she pretended to be. But that opportunity had passed as well.
Saira finished sorting the stems and arranging them in the vase, trying to absorb the brightness from the colors, from Aunty Rame's deep belly laugh, and Aunty Bava's tinkling chuckle coming from the sitting room. Perhaps, for as long as Matilda was visiting, they could mend the rips in their past and regain a sense of sisterhood that they'd once shared. There was a lot to find joy in, Saira tried to tell herself.
But a part of her dared to envision herself years and years into the future, as familiar voices fell quiet. Perhaps she'd find herself in the rooms above Market Street with life bustling in the streets below her. With no one to share her memories and thoughts, no one to share all the things that she'd Seen, because no one would understand.
Maybe her Gift had been Telling Saira all along that she was meant to be alone.
Even if it was temporary, she should accept this time that they had together, enjoy it while it lasted, and be ready to move on.
***Thursday morning, with his conscience still warring between guilt and anger, Five admitted he needed a drink that would put his balls in a vice and set his head on straight. Turkish Coffee came to mind. He sat at his usual table, surrounded by half a dozen papers and the remains of his patience. Daniel sat across from him, twiddling his fingers together and looking at Five like he was a puzzle that needed solving.
"You were rather rough with that bloke," Daniel observed.
"The man needs to learn to read a contract," Five muttered. He took a deep pull of his coffee, ignoring how it scalded his tongue, needing the acidic brew to burn clarity into him. Yesterday's meetings had gone from pre-dawn to late afternoon, each one starting with silent cursing on Five's part when each client showed up promptly, leaving him no opportunity to duck out and look for Saira. His one and only morning meeting for today had just ended, and he was ready to burn a hole into something.
Five drained his mug and stood up. "We need to get out there." He set out for the door, but Daniel pulled him aside, bumping a pair of gentlemen, which required a slew of "beg your pardons" from the two of them.
"What's the play? Are we interrogating the whole of Market Street?" Daniel asked when the gentlemen finally moved on.
Five gave him a severe look, but didn't argue.
"If that's what you think it's gonna take," Daniel said, and followed him out the door.
On all accounts, his day should be sunshine and rainbows. The advance for his next job was secure in the bank, practically singing in harmony with whatever the hell noises the birds were making above him. Even the weather was cheery, but the mid-morning light glinted off the rooftops and straight into his eyes, blinding him to everything good around him.
He should have no interest in Saira.
There was no way that his life could include anyone interesting like that.
What business was it of his if a heel of a man wanted her for her estate? And then what if she wasn't as clever as she seemed? Or worse, what if she was desperate?
Or what if she actually fell for Garfield?
All of those thoughts, specifically the last one, curdled the coffee in his stomach. Five looked up as he and Daniel approached the sign over Sheppard and Trinder's, and he sucked in a hopeful breath.
The haberdasher had not seen the dark-skinned women in some time. The mercer, who had just last week claimed that a lovely dark-skinned lady browsed his wares and lingered often on the fan which Five had purchased from his display, could only confirm that she never bought anything. When asked for a name, both men became defensive that he would dare walk into the shop without intent to purchase. Five selected a fashionable hat, with Daniel's approval, hoping that the haberdasher would be more forthcoming at the register, but the man sang the same tune as the mercer, stating that he neither knew the lady's name, nor her whereabouts.
The baker, still wearing a perpetual dusting of flour on his sleeves, was far too busy calling out and taking orders to stop and talk. Five wove through the chaos of shouted orders and waving hands, but quickly discovered that what he might have gotten away with a few years ago when his body was still boy-sized, earned him adult-appropriate dirty looks when he tried to bypass the queue. He finally left after catching a glimpse of the tally paper full of marks next to pictures of bread, with no names to speak of.
At the book shop, Five couldn't bring himself to go inside.
"Can you check in there for me?" he asked Daniel.
Daniel looked at him askance.
"He doesn't like me much," was all Five said.
Daniel shrugged and went inside. A few beats later, he came back out. "What an unpleasant beast! When I mentioned dark skin, he became downright ugly. 'If the lady didn't reveal her surname, you weren't meant to have it', he said!" Daniel did a fair representation of the bookseller's grump in his mockery.
At the jeweler's, the man with the monocle clamped his mouth as tight as a vice when he realized Five had come in for questions instead of commerce.
Daniel checked his pocket watch, which he'd done several times already that morning. "It seems everyone knows of them, but no one will acknowledge it."
The people of Market Street seemed to be protecting one of their own from unsolicited inquiries, both impressing and frustrating Five to no end. Their wariness blocked his progress in the most inconvenient way. She'd told him that he felt 'safe', but clearly hadn't mentioned his safety to anyone else. A worse thought crossed his mind, one that had him imagining Saira purposefully telling these people that he was completely unsafe, and to keep him from her at all costs. The coffee kept burning a hole through his stomach, as if an ulcer were the natural conclusion to this endeavor.
Daniel nudged him and pointed across the street. "The tea shop keeps appointments listed in a register."
Five figured it was as good a shot as anything he'd tried so far. He walked inside with Daniel on his heels. Apparently, he had offended more than just Saira on Tuesday with his abrupt departure. The serving lady who had smiled at him last time was not smiling now.
"Excuse me," he said over the counter.
"I remember you," the serving lady said with disdain.
With Daniel's nudge at his back, Five continued. "I was here on Tuesday at two o'clock with a lady and her friend." When her expression remained stoic, he cleared his throat. "I made a grave error and need to mend my ways."
Tight-lipped, she looked like she was about to dismiss him just like the rest of the Market Street merchants, but he couldn't let that happen. Five reached into his pocket and slipped her a few coins, which she stuffed into her apron pocket without blinking.
"It's still early," she said. "I can slip you two in at the ten o'clock, but you'll have to sit in the back again," she said, all business and no congeniality.
"You misunderstand," Five said. "I just need a name."
Her eyes lit up at the second handful of coins he held out, but Five's fist clenched around them. "Who set the appointment that I attended?"
She took a bound book from under the counter and opened it to the ribboned bookmark. Her finger ran down the inner spine and then flipped back a page.
"Tuesday appointment at two o'clock for Mrs. Lanchester, Ms. Russell, and I presume the unnamed guest was you." She shut the book and looked at his fist. "Will that be all?"
It wasn't everything, but it was something. He had a full name. Saira Russell. Five gave her the promised coins, which she stuffed into her apron.
"Do you know where Miss Russell is?"
"Bully if I know," she said. "But her family comes regularly. You might catch them again next Tuesday."
Next Tuesday would be too late. Five thanked the lady, and they left, exchanging places with a pair of bonnets.
"Well?" Five asked.
Daniel shrugged. "I don't know any Russells."
Something stopped him short in front of a shop right across the street from the tea shop. The sign offered a spool and thread looping through a needle. Painted lettering that said "The Modern Modiste" greeted him from the glass display window. Five recalled the woman who had accompanied Saira to tea. Looking up, he spied an open window above the sign, the sheer curtains only allowing him a glimpse of a womanly form making use of the morning light and the embroidery hoop she held.
His pulse knocked around in his head. Saira had mentioned seeing him from a window. Had she been this close all this time? Were the market vendors all helping her to keep her location a secret?
The word 'safe' came back to him, and Five hoped against hope that it also applied to Saira.
"Wait here," he said to Daniel. "I have a feeling about this place."
On the outside, the display window had been designed to make a grand impression. The lush flower arrangements in front of artfully draped, patterned fabrics showed the promise of elegance and poise if one ventured inside.
Five wasn't content to linger in the front where several ladies poured over catalogs of the latest drawn fashions. Two of them turned their heads in his direction, whispering to each other behind feathered fans, but they weren't Saira, so he turned away and beelined to a severe-looking man who tended an appointment podium, checking off names with an inked quill.
Five had a name now. He might as well use it.
"Is Saira Russell here?" he asked. Probably too directly, but he was losing both time and patience.
"She is not," the counter tender assured him, "Nor will she be any time soon."
To Five, this was the closest place that had felt like where she might be. He was determined to chase that feeling until he was sure. He nodded to the curtained doorway. "What about back there?"
"Do you have a fitting?" the tender asked.
"Yes," Five said, taking a page from Daniel's playbook just to say whatever the hell he must to get his way. Without waiting for an invitation, he followed the carpet runner down the hall. All the rooms had curtains instead of doors. Five swept one aside and saw women at windows, stitching away. They gasped at his intrusion, but he paid them no mind when he didn't see Saira.
Several rooms contained fabric remnants, racks of half-sewn gowns with wide, copper-colored stitches holding them together, and unopened crates. Then, halfway down the hall, he found a young woman on her knees, pinning gathers on a waistband attached to a headless dress form. Her pale skin contrasted with the deep blues of her apron. Again, not Saira.
But something else captured his attention. It was the form she was pinning the fabric to. He couldn't help but stare at it.
"That is a fine coat, good sir," she said, stopping her pinning to give him an appraising look. "You will need to remove it, if you are here for the fitting."
"Yes." He laid his coat on the arm of the chair to buy himself more time.
"If you'll give me a moment to finish these pins, I'll take your measurements." The lady turned back to her pinning, but Five's impatience broke through.
"I need a minute," Five said, his thoughts running amok at the sight of the wire and wicker. "Can I have the room?"
"I beg your pardon?" the seamstress said.
Five then looked at her firmly, as if he wasn't to be argued with. "The room," he said. "I need you to leave."
Her polite features disappeared, and her hand flew to her mouth, open in shock, leaving the last pin only halfway secured in the gathers of the skirt. "This is highly irregular," she said, but gave no argument as she brushed past him into the hall.
Five was left to his own head and the dress form in front of him. It had been such a long, long time.
This wasn't his long-lost companion, or any of her department store associates. There were no molded plastic forms over thick steel connecting rods that rooted them to standing displays. No, this was something much older, farther removed from his time. It didn't have a face or arms, or even a place in the window.
But he remembered the painted blue eyes, the lean arms with the long fingers. She had even once worn a wig. If there was one person who knew him through and through without question, it would be her.
She would know what to do.
"Hey," he said softly, hoping the seamstress wasn't hovering on the other side of the curtain to overhear him. "You obviously have no idea who I am, or what I'm doing here."
The dressform didn't have anything to say to that, so Five continued.
"I knew someone like you. Several generations removed, probably. She kept my head clear when I got off track. And I'm feeling way off track right now."
The dress form waited for him to continue.
"I don't mean to spring all of this on you, since you don't know me at all, but I need advice. You see, I met someone."
Whatever the dress form was thinking, it kept its opinions to itself.
"I can't tell her who I am or where I come from, but I feel like she knows me. Or at least part of me. Or it feels like she does. Which is a big sticking point. How can someone know someone else, without knowing them?"
The question lingered in the stillness of the room.
"It's puzzling right? If I tell her who I used to be, there's no way for her to believe me, because my time-space jumping ability is long gone, and I'm trying to be… better. Using the abilities I still have to make the world a better place. As one does, I'm sure. You know, I thought that's what I was doing before, but apparently killing people doesn't fit into the prescribed plan for 'doing good'. And then there's my age. God, just imagine her face if I tell her I've lived half a lifetime already. Yet, here I am, growing back into my maturity, ready for round two."
The pin finally lost its grip on the heavy gathers, falling with the skirt fabric, brushing along the floor. The weight of the fabric caused several other pins to come away, revealing wicker curves between the dressform's waist and hip.
"That's quite forward of you," Five said, a wry smile forming."Are you flirting with me?"
Of course he wasn't having a real conversation. But it had been so long since he'd talked things out, openly and honestly with anyone. Or had he ever? Well, of course he had. Even if Delores was metal rod and molded plastic, he missed how he could talk to her without explaining himself, because she knew everything about him. For decades, she'd kept him sane.
She was a pale comparison to Saira, who was honestly… more fascinating to him than anyone he'd ever met. Saira, who didn't know him at all, but had the power to See things. He'd been so tempted to let her See everything about him, so he could have one person that he didn't have to hide from anymore. But when he finally decided to let her try, she wasn't able to See anything about him, specifically, and it was driving both of them crazy.
He couldn't just Tell her things. Because without proof, that'd be crazy, too. Who would believe him?
He hoped the universe was getting its jollies from the predicament it had set before him.
In the end, he'd done the right thing by Delores. He'd taken her back to the department store because she belonged with her own kind. Because he was no longer in the apocalyptic wasteland. Because he needed to be with real people.
Saira was real. He couldn't deny that they had some kind of connection. When she'd been inserted into his life, the variable that was Saira-the-Shroud somehow made him feel like he'd finally balanced a complex equation. But Saira wasn't an imaginary number he could substitute when circumstances became inconvenient. The other half of this equation lived and breathed and was about to get propositioned by a half-ape who only wanted her benefits. Five tried hard not to think about the other benefits Saira may or may not have.
Okay, you're slipping again. Reel it in and focus.
The seamstress came back into the room, followed by the angry man from the bookstore, who glowered. Before he could say a word, Five took his leave. "Looks like I'm done here. I'll see myself out," he said, and headed back down the hall.
Pausing in the main area of the shop, he looked back around the room at the women by the catalogs, the tender, and realized he was no closer to finding Saira than when he'd come in. The bookseller was storming down the hall, and if he stayed any longer, he would risk getting thrown out. Just as he was about to bolt for the door, an older woman came down the stairs.
Five recognized her right away, surprised and pleased that he finally had made a connection. "Mrs. Lanchester?"
Beyond a knowing stare, she made no acknowledgement towards Five that they had met. Instead, she turned to the angry bookseller, who looked ready to apply his meaty fists to the nearest part of Five he could reach, and said, "Thank you, Mr. Cogsworth. That will be all." The gruff man paused his arms from taking a swing, mumbled something under his breath about young bucks, then turned on his heel and stormed out of the shop, no doubt back to his books.
Then the woman turned to Five, who might have ducked out the door if she hadn't strategically placed herself in the way.
"Why are you here?"
This might be his once chance at a clue. "I'm looking for Miss Russell."
"Wait here for a moment," she instructed.
Five didn't know what to expect. Maybe she was going to shank him with one of her needles, but at this point, he felt like he deserved it. Mrs. Lanchester reminded him of his brother, Seven. The quiet ones were always the ones to watch. You never knew what kind of power they were hiding from the world.
She came back into the room and handed him a small package. "Deliver this, and perhaps you will find what you are looking for."
Five looked at the address, and the name, and then up at the woman who might still have pins and needles up her sleeve. Whereas the bookseller had been ready to exchange blows over his inquiry, Mrs. Lanchester had given him both the information and a motive. "Why are you helping me?" he asked.
"Because of the way she looked at you," the woman said. "I expect a prompt delivery, along with a heartfelt apology for your behavior on Tuesday."
How the woman could fill him with so much hope and make him feel like a heel at the same time was beyond his comprehension.
Of course Saira had reason to be upset with him.
Of course he would have to apologize.
Of course he had no way to guarantee that she would see him again.