The Grace Kelly Dress Page 24

  “My aunt taught me the value of hard work,” Rose said. “She always told me that hard work paid off. And I think it did here.”

  “Oh, it did,” Diana said. “It truly did. I can see you in every stitch on this gown. Every last detail.”

  “I’m so delighted that you’re pleased with it,” Rose said, and Diana rushed toward her and enveloped her in a hug.

  “I love it,” she replied, hugging Rose even tighter. “I love what you created. It was your design I wanted. Your vision.”

  “I’m sorry about what happened in the park,” Rose whispered in Diana’s ear. She found she only had the courage to say this to Diana as they embraced, and only in a whisper; if she had been facing Diana directly, she wouldn’t have been able to say the words out loud.

  “Sorry?” Diana said, breaking away and looking at Rose with tearstained eyes. “Why on earth would you be sorry?”

  “I’m so filled with shame over how I behaved,” Rose said, tears now stinging her own eyes. “Please forgive how I acted with your brother. I should apologize to Elisabeth as well.”

  “But, Rose,” she said, laughter in her voice. “There’s nothing to forgive.”

  “He is an engaged man.” Rose’s spine straightened as she prepared to own up to what she had done. Her aunt had always told her to look someone in the eye when you wanted to be heard. When you had something important to say. When you admitted that you were wrong. “I should not have been spending time with him the way I had. I should not have let him touch me.”

  “He doesn’t love her the way he does you,” Diana simply stated. “I see it in his eyes, the way he looks at you. Elisabeth and Robert have always been pushed together, since we were kids. It’s not really love. It’s just something familiar. Something expected. Something for our families.”

  “The way he tells it, they’re soul mates. And always have been.”

  “Then you weren’t listening to the story very carefully,” Diana said, focusing her attention on Rose.

  “Wasn’t I?”

  “Why do you think I forced the two of you to spend time together?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand,” Rose said, shaking her head.

  “The futile search for the rose point lace that would match the lace used on Princess Grace’s dress?” Diana said, laughter rising in her voice. “You didn’t think I actually thought I would find it, did you?”

  “Well, of course I did,” Rose replied, furrowing her brow. What was Diana saying to her? “Why else would you have gone off to try?”

  “Silly girl,” Diana said, her smile filled with warmth. “I only did that to distract my dear brother’s fiancée. To give you and my brother time to spend together. Alone.”

  “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Say that you love him, too.” Diana’s face lit up from within. “Tell me that I’m right.”

  “Even if you were,” Rose said. “I could not start a relationship like this. It wouldn’t be right. And what about Elisabeth?”

  “She feels the same way,” Diana said, her voice softening. “They were simply always expected to be together, to get married—and now neither one knows how to extricate themselves. You’d be doing her a favor.”

  “By stealing her fiancé?” Rose’s hands shook and she felt unsure on her feet. She held on to a nearby chair for support. “That hardly seems like a favor. And that is not the sort of woman I am. I could never do a thing like that.”

  “But you love him and he loves you,” Diana said. “Surely that is all that matters.”

  “No. You’re wrong,” Rose said, shaking her head. “I never loved him.”

  Sixty-Four

  The bride

  Brooklyn, 2020

  “My style is a bit different from my mother’s,” Rocky explained, and Greta nodded. Rocky was back at the dress shop, but this time she was by herself. Free to do whatever she wanted to the dress that belonged to her.

  “I understand,” Greta said.

  “Well, the first problem is that I don’t wear dresses,” Rocky said quietly, as if it were a secret she was afraid to reveal. “Or skirts.”

  Greta regarded her for a beat. And then, catching on: “You want to wear pants?”

  “I think so,” Rocky said. Slowly, tentatively, like she wasn’t even sure herself. “Have you ever done that before?”

  “I have not.” Greta let her pencil lazily hit her sketch pad and began to draw as she spoke. “But that doesn’t mean that I couldn’t try.”

  The first rough sketch she drew was a pair of cigarette pants. Slim-cut and cropped to just above the ankle.

  “Those are impossibly chic,” Rocky said. “I’m not sure I could pull those off.”

  Greta didn’t respond; she merely let her eyes travel up and down Rocky’s body. Rocky looked down and remembered that she was wearing cropped skinny jeans, clearly the inspiration for Greta’s design. “That’s not my only idea,” Greta said, and let her pencil do the work once again. The next sketch was just as elegant as the first: a pair of wide-legged palazzo pants that were so long they kissed the ground.

  “Those are beautiful,” Rocky said, pointing at the drawing.

  “Or perhaps we do them cropped,” Greta said, pulling out an eraser and making the pants shorter. “It depends on the shoe. What sort of shoe do you plan to wear?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “I should have guessed.” Greta laughed. She looked at Rocky and smiled warmly. “We could also make the pants wider, more dramatic, and mimic the look of a skirt.”

  Again, her trusty eraser altered one design and let her create something entirely different.

  Rocky’s eyes widened as she looked at what Greta had drawn. “That’s stunning.”

  “We could have it fall to the floor so that you could wear a heel or a flat.”

  “I don’t really wear heels,” Rocky said, fingering the sketch, letting the ball of her finger rest on the lines of the pant leg.

  “If you like the idea of it, I can refine it for the final sketch.”

  “I’d love that.”

  “Then let’s move on to the bodice,” Greta said, picking up her pencil once again. “We have that beautiful cummerbund.” She drew the bodice of the dress and the cummerbund on top of the palazzo pants. “We can make changes to the bodice, of course, too, if you want to show off your tattoos. I saw that mother and daughter did not really agree on the sleeve length.”

  Rocky laughed. “Right. I’m sure you don’t understand, but my tattoos are important to me. They mean something to me.”

  “Why do you think I don’t understand the meaning of having your skin marked?”

  “I don’t exactly think it’s the sort of thing your generation did,” Rocky said, nervously laughing.

  Greta removed her cardigan and rolled up her shirt sleeves. “I understand what it means to have your body marked.”

  Rocky sat breathless. She did not know what to say. She had never seen the tattoo of a Holocaust survivor before, but now here was Greta, laying herself bare, showing Rocky the tattoo she had been given in Auschwitz.

  “Why are you crying?” Greta said. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I meant to share something with you.”

  Rocky hadn’t realized she was crying. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so overwhelmed. I’m so sorry for what you went through. You must think I’m awful, getting all of these tattoos when you yourself—”

  “I don’t think you’re awful at all,” Greta said. “I am not judging you.”

  Greta reached over and grabbed a tissue. She passed it to Rocky. “You have nothing to be sorry about. I’m glad that you came back to me. And I’m honored to be helping you create the wedding dress that will truly belong to you.”

  “But what you’ve been through,” Rocky said, and then she blew her nose
into the tissue. “That tattoo is a terrible reminder.”

  “It is important to remember our past,” Greta said. “Don’t you think? After all, that’s why this dress is important to your mother. We must never forget where we came from. Isn’t that why you get the tattoos? To remember?”

  “Yes,” Rocky said, throwing her tissue in the trash and grabbing for another. “Each one marks something important in my life, something that defines me. I think it’s important to remember.”

  “We need to remember the past so that we can more clearly see where we are going,” Greta said quietly. The room had become silent, as if they were the only ones in the shop. “I see nothing wrong with honoring the past however you see fit. For your mother, it’s this heirloom dress. For you, it’s the tattoos you wear proudly on your body. But they are the same thing, are they not?”

  “You know you don’t have to convince me to wear the dress, right?” Rocky said. “I’ve already decided.”

  Greta smiled widely. She erased the drawing of the bodice and cummerbund and got ready to sketch something new, just as she’d done with the skirt. “So, then, let’s tear this thing up, shall we?”

  Sixty-Five

  The mother of the bride, as a bride herself

  Long Island 1982

  “Are you ready for school to begin?” Birdie asked. She looked down into her food, trying to pretend she wasn’t prying, and even though Joanie knew this trick of her mother’s, she still opened up.

  “I’m excited. And nervous. And a whole host of other things,” Joanie said.

  “A new year,” her mother said, smiling warmly at her daughter. “Another chance to have a fresh start.”

  “Here’s to a fresh start,” Joanie’s father said, raising his wineglass.

  Joanie sighed. If only he knew all of the things that had happened this summer. They clinked their wineglasses for a toast, and then ate their Sunday night dinner.

  Joanie and Birdie had spent the day packing up boxes, returning engagement presents. It was hard work, but sending the gifts back was the easy part, it turned out. There was still another thing they had yet to do.

  Putting the dress away would be the hard part, and they’d saved it for after dinner. It wasn’t that they’d planned it that way, nothing had been said about the dress explicitly, but it had been the task that hung over them the whole day. The thing they both knew they needed to do.

  As they packed up the last of the engagement gifts, Birdie had casually said: “There’s one last thing to box up. Shall I take care of the dress on my own?”

  Joanie hadn’t known what to say. Should she simply ask her mother to bring it to the cleaner’s herself, and then she wouldn’t have to deal with it anymore? Or should she look at it one more time, say goodbye?

  But just then, the kitchen timer for Birdie’s chicken went off, and they rushed downstairs to get dinner on the table.

  When the dishes were cleared, Joanie made a beeline to her childhood bedroom, knowing she needed to say goodbye alone. The dress sat in its box, on top of her old toy chest. The juxtaposition was not lost on Joanie. In some ways, she was still a child. Was that why she wasn’t ready for marriage yet? In other ways, she was very much a woman. But she wasn’t ready for her mother’s life just yet, wasn’t ready to give up this part of her life, this part that straddled both worlds. There was still so much to do, so much to see.

  Joanie opened the box and took one last look at the dress. She couldn’t bring herself to touch it—was it because she wasn’t wearing the cotton gloves her mother insisted on or was it because she knew she would not be wearing it?—and she simply let her eyes trail down the intricate rose point lace. Noticed detailing in the fabric that she’d never noticed before.

  “Do you want to try it on again,” her mother asked, standing at the door frame, “before we take it back to the cleaner’s for preservation?”

  “I don’t think that I do,” Joanie said, carefully putting the lid back on the box.

  “I’ll take care of it for you,” Birdie said, and walked across the room to give her daughter a hug. “I’ll make sure it’s perfect for when you’re ready to wear it for real.”

  “What if I never get the chance to wear it?” Joanie said, tears welling in her eyes.

  “One day, you will find the right man at the right time, and you will wear the dress. The only mistake you could have made was going through with a wedding when you weren’t ready.”

  “I’m sorry for all of the pain I’ve caused you.”

  “Pain you’ve caused me?” Birdie said, wiping a tear from her daughter’s eye. “You haven’t caused me any pain.”

  “I try to be good for you,” Joanie said. “I always try. I know that I’m all that you have left.”

  “Oh, Joanie,” Birdie said. “You shouldn’t feel the weight of the world like that. What happened to your sister isn’t your fault. And it’s not your burden to bear. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I do,” Joanie said carefully. “But I just don’t want you to ever go through that sort of pain again. I have to be good.”

  “The only thing you have to be is yourself,” Birdie said, grabbing her daughter by the shoulders, as if to make sure Joanie heard what she had to say. “You can be whoever you want to be. You belong to me and I belong to you, no matter what. And I will love you no matter what.”

  “I love you, too,” Joanie said.

  “Your sister loved you, too,” Birdie said. “She just didn’t know how to show it. But you meant something to her. That’s why I got you this.”

  Birdie jumped up from the bed and walked over to the closet. She brought back a box. Joanie turned it over in her hands before opening it. Inside was a small canvas. It was painted in shades of pink and red, and Joanie could make out the faint outlines of the map of their street on Long Island. Then, laid over that, was a series of photographs, the type you get out of a photo booth, and Joanie could see that all four pictures were of her parents, her sister, and her. It took Joanie an instant to recall where those pictures came from, but she remembered a family vacation spent in Atlantic City. Lazy days on the boardwalk, eating saltwater taffy and walking from hotel to hotel at night. They stayed at the Golden Nugget, which had a big pool that Joanie would spend hours in. Michele was more drawn to the arcade, where she’d play video games for hours on end. That was where the photo booth was—in the arcade. Joanie could remember taking the picture, Michele in her father’s lap, Joanie in her mother’s, how they all squeezed their faces together to fit in the frame.

  “Your sister made this her freshman year at NYCU. I’ve been saving it for you. Now seems like the perfect time to give it to you,” Birdie said. “I want you to remember that all you have to be is you.”

  Joanie shook her head and closed her eyes, as if to preserve the thought. She took a deep breath in, and considered who that might be.

  Sixty-Six

  The seamstress

  Paris, 1958

  “This is the way to heal a broken heart,” Julien said. “I know it.”

  He took her hand and they rushed off into the dark night. They were meeting Charles for a late supper in town. Julien had promised that keeping busy would take Rose’s mind off Robert, but Rose was unconvinced. Nothing could take her mind off Robert. She saw his face in the clouds, heard his voice in the music they listened to in the atelier all day. Everything reminded her of him.

  He had been sending bouquets of roses to her at the boarding house. Each time, the card asked if he could see her, but Rose never responded. The notes all went directly into the trash. As for the roses, she would give them to the children in the boarding house, and they would bring them back to their rooms, a touch of beauty in an otherwise barren place. Rose couldn’t bear to have them in her own room, in her own space, near her bed. Still, as she drifted off to sleep each night, she could swear that she smelled t
hem, the faint scent of fresh roses entering her dreams.

  “How are we doing?” Charles asked by way of greeting, mostly to Rose, but also to Julien.

  Rose held back tears as she smiled at Charles and he swept her up into a warm embrace. “You deserve someone wonderful,” he whispered in her ear. “If it wasn’t him, there will be another. I’m sure of it.”

  “Thank you, Charles,” Rose said, and she struggled to smile at her friend.

  “I tried to warn you, dear child,” Julien said, and squeezed Rose’s arm. “I only wanted to keep your heart safe.”

  “I know,” Rose said, looking up at Julien.

  “I know you feel heartbroken now,” he said. “But you have me. And I love you. I will never stop loving you. So, when you feel disconsolate, I want you to remember that.”

  “And how are you doing?” Charles asked Julien. He rubbed his arm, but that was as far as their affection would go in public. Never a hug, never a kiss hello.

  “More cancellations each day,” Julien said, matter-of-factly. “We’ll be closing within the month.”

  “My love,” Charles said, his face crumpling, and Julien smiled meekly back in response. His smile said that it was okay, that everything would be all right, but Rose knew that his heart was breaking over the loss of his aunt’s legacy.

  “Perhaps we should skip dinner and go to a picture instead,” Julien suggested. “A movie always cheers my Rose right up.”

  Julien and Charles had tried everything they could think of to brighten her mood—musical performances, dinners, and even the theater, but nothing worked. Rose was utterly inconsolable.

  They walked arm in arm to the theater. Being surrounded by her two friends was the one thing to look forward to in her day. No matter how awful she felt, she at least knew that she was no longer alone in the world.

  “It’s better this way,” Charles said to Rose as they crossed the street. “Men like Julien and me know a thing or two about unrequited love, and it’s better that it’s over now, before you gave that man more of your heart.”