Page 8 of Falling for You

Annie

I grip the pin between my teeth as I reposition the material against my sewing machine. It’s a thick fabric, almost too thick for my machine, but the brief was a ghost costume that could survive an outdoor Halloween party set in the grounds of a castle.

In my eyes, anyone who is cool enough to go to that level of commitment for Halloween deserves a good costume, so I’m going all out. All the bells and whistles, pockets and thermal linings. I’m nothing if not practical.

I reposition the fabric so it’s perfectly aligned, adding another pin so it stays firmly in place.

Once I have received the brief from the client along with their measurements, I design the costume.

This usually involves hours of sketching and scribbling, stitching my favourite parts from each design together until I come up with the perfect outfit.

Then, using the measurements the client sent through, I adjust the pattern to make sure it’ll fit correctly and set about sourcing the fabrics.

I go to a fantastic shop in Camden. There are a million fabric shops in London, half of which are far closer to me.

But they don’t have Jade, the shop owner.

Jade is around thirty, with electric-pink hair and big, glittery earrings. Her shop is like an Aladdin’s cave: streams upon streams of glistening, beautiful fabrics, every colour under the rainbow. I could spend hours in there, admiring each roll and imagining what I could make with them.

‘Are you all right, love?’

I narrow my eyes before sticking the final pin into the fabric to tack up the hem.

I nod at Mum, who is balanced against my copy of Pride and Prejudice , on FaceTime.

She’s in her kitchen, half bent over a bubbling stove as she peers into the camera.

My mum is a wiry woman with thin, wild hair and an extensive collection of pashminas.

You can find them coiled round her neck like fabulous snakes all year round.

She gets away with it, as whenever someone notices how enormous her collection is, she proudly tells them that she made them all herself.

Then, instead of being slightly deranged for being so obsessed with cashmere scarves, she’s suddenly very impressive.

It makes me want to learn how to make wine.

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘That hem was just a bit tricky. The fabric is so thick.’

‘Let’s see it?’

I hold an offcut up to the camera and Mum nods knowingly. ‘Gone are the days that you’d wear a simple bedsheet.’

‘Gone are the days where you’re expected to freeze to death in order to look good,’ I say, grinning at Mum as she laughs.

‘Aren’t you supposed to be the young one living it up in London?’ she says. ‘You shouldn’t be worried about being cold.’

I glance around my bedroom, my blanket firmly draped over my legs.

The first year we moved in, the three of us were still a bit na?ve after spending three years living in ‘bills included’ accommodation at university.

We went wild with the thermostat. I remember walking around the flat in December in a T-shirt .

We were all, ‘we deserve a warm home’ and ‘we work hard for our money, we’ve earnt this’, and blah blah idiotic blah.

Well, we had the shock of our lives when our bill came through in the spring. We made a solemn oath to each other that we’d keep ourselves accountable and not turn the heating on until the twentieth of November at the very earliest, unless it snows.

We have thin, rattly windows and an attic that puffs all our heat away like a cheerful steam train. We haven’t had snow, but I’m pretty sure there are icicles forming in my nostrils.

‘I’m always worried about being cold.’

Mum still lives in our family home, an old farmhouse in the Cotswolds. It has wooden beams and sage cabinets, and an enormous reclaimed-wood dining table that stretches across the conservatory and sits our entire extended family every Christmas. All fifteen of us.

Growing up it was just us three, but our house was always full of friends from school, relatives and pals of my parents popping round for a cup of tea or a steaming Sunday roast.

On the odd occasion that I take Tanya and Penny back home to ‘escape to the country’ (as Penny likes to call it), they cannot understand why I ever wanted to leave.

Once, I caught Tanya ‘joking’ with my mum about lodging in my old bedroom (she swore it was a joke when I questioned her, but I saw her face when she bit into Mum’s apple crumble.

The intention was real). Don’t get me wrong, I loved living there.

But I love living in London too. Even if it does mean that the only person making me an apple crumble on a Sunday for under ￡11. 50 is Mr Kipling.

‘What are you making?’ I ask Mum, as she picks up a wooden spoon and starts stirring an enormous pot.

She frowns, her glasses momentarily steaming up. ‘I’m batch-cooking some bolognese,’ she says thoughtfully. ‘It’s the best way to live these days.’

I go back to my sewing machine. This order came through on our site on Friday, with a desperate note that they need it by Wednesday at the latest to give them enough time to find an alternative in case it isn’t right.

Some people might see this as an insult, but I see it as a personal challenge to make this girl a costume so incredible that she’d feel silly for even thinking that she’d need another option. She came to the Stitching Witches, and we are the best.

This month so far, I’ve made two Little ‘dead’ Riding Hoods, four evil cats, one pixie, and now one thermal ghost. I could have made double that if I didn’t work full-time.

Halloween is this weekend, and we’re bound to get more desperate orders as the week goes on.

Mum always tells me that after the twenty-first of the month, I should say that the deadline has passed and I can’t make any more.

But I can’t resist – all I have to do is look at the weird and wonderful requests and I’m hooked.

I get a bit possessive over it, as if it’s already my project.

Nobody can make this outfit as good as I can, even if it means I stay up all night for an entire week cooped up in my bedroom and develop a hump in my back like Igor from Despicable Me .

Actually, he’d be quite a good Halloween costume.

It’s all worth it when I receive a photo of the person in my costume, looking confident and excited.

I know they’ll spend the night batting off compliments about how great they look.

They’ll have a cloak of power draped over their body for the night, and I’ll have been the one to give it to them. How can I say no to that?

‘What are you dressing up as for Halloween, then?’ I ask, taking the fabric out of the machine as I get ready to sew the hem.

Halloween was always a huge deal in our house.

In fact, we were ‘the’ house in the area.

You know the one. People would travel there to trick or treat and have their photos taken outside.

My parents would go nuts for it. Dad would spend hours decorating the outside of the house, sticking severed hands into the soil that stretched up, ready to snatch the ankles of any passing children.

He’d drape fake cobwebs over the front of the house and drop a giant spider from my bedroom window that would glisten when the light of a passing car hit its back.

Even though I haven’t lived at home for over ten years, they still go full throttle.

Everyone in the village loves it – so much so that in my dad’s home office there are twenty-five framed pages from the Cotswolds Herald of Mum and Dad, grinning proudly in front of their terrifying house.

I’m featured in almost all the pictures too, up until I moved out to go to university.

‘Well,’ Mum’s eyes light up, ‘I think I’ll go as a witch. I found this amazing YouTube video on how to reconstruct your face with make-up, so I’m going to give myself these huge eyes and I got this fabulous wig online.’

By fabulous, she means grotesque.

‘And I think Dad wants to go as a clown.’ She picks up a pepper grinder and twists it into the pot. ‘He’s been quite inspired by Stephen King’s It . I said I’d help him out, I think we have some bits and pieces lying around. Did you finish your costume?’

I press my foot on the pedal and hold the fabric tight as the sewing machine whizzes over the hem of the dress.

‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Although I’m not sure if I can wear it.’

‘Why?’ Mum asks. ‘Does it not fit right?’

I try not to scoff. As if I’d make a costume for myself that didn’t fit properly.

‘No,’ I say. ‘Tanya and Penny want to go to a ball on Halloween.’

Mum’s mouth drops open. ‘ A ball? On Halloween ?’

I smile to myself. Mum is the only person who would share my reaction. One of utter disgust. Really, I should have called her and put her on loudspeaker as soon as Tanya suggested the ball, just so I had some reinforcement.

‘Yeah,’ I sigh. ‘For Tanya’s work.’

‘A Halloween ball?’ Mum says wonderingly, and I can tell that she’s trying to find the silver lining to spin. ‘That could be fun?’

I push my fingers through my hair. ‘Well, it’s more of a masquerade ball. Like, it is a Halloween theme, but I think people are more likely to be wearing fancy dresses and suits.’

‘Well, that’s not Halloween at all!’

‘I know.’

‘It would be such a shame if you didn’t get to wear your costume,’ Mum says, putting her bolognese to the side and looking straight down the camera earnestly.

I shrug, feeling like a teenager.

‘Why don’t you come home and spend Halloween with us?’ she says, her eyes lighting up. ‘Dad’s talking about doing something creative with popping candy and balloons or something.’

I smile. ‘No, it’s okay. I’m sure it’ll be fun.’

I can’t run home to my parents just so I can dress up in the outfit I want. A ball is far more sophisticated and ‘cool’ than a house party. Penny and Tanya are really excited.

I’m thirty-two. I guess it’s just time for me to grow up a bit.

Or, you know, find a way to wear the bat costume anyway.

‘Argh! I hate this stupid, bloody oven!’

I peer up from my notebook at Penny, who is bent over double and peering into the little glass square door of the oven, her face gradually turning a deeper shade of red.

The kitchen is the oldest room in the house.

It’s still that weird shade of brown that was fashionable in the sixties, and has an oven so white and prominent that it looks like a toy one you’d buy in Aldi.

It has four gas rings, three of which don’t work, and a temperamental oven which only has two options: scalding hot or ice-cold.

Which – as a woman who wrestles with an aggressive period every thirty days – I can relate to.

When we first moved in, we wrote a strongly worded email to the landlord.

Or Tanya did. Penny and I stomped around the house cursing wildly as Tanya tapped out a neat, well-composed message that wasn’t going to get us kicked onto the streets the moment she hit ‘send’.

The landlord sent us a brief, non-committal reply and we soon realised that – from his skyline penthouse in Dubai – he really couldn’t care less.

He’s actually like the bad boyfriend that we’ve all just grown to accept.

We expect so little of him that when he does show any kindness or humanity, we practically build a shrine to him in the hallway and praise him like Jesus Christ.

Last Christmas he sent us a little plastic Christmas tree that sang carols and danced, and we all lost our minds. One night we got so drunk on mulled wine that I caught myself almost crying with gratitude over it. I had a strong word with myself the next morning.

Thou shall not get drunk and cry over terrible landlords with tacky, dancing Christmas trees.

‘What’s it doing?’ I ask, looking up from my notebook.

I’ve been making a list of all my finances for the month.

I know. I’m super organised. With the business being busy this month, I’m constantly running to the Camden fabric shop to stock up on supplies, paying for postage and thread and whatever else I need.

So, every now and then I need to make sure I am actually making money from it all.

If I was a baroness with lots of money, then I’d spend my life making these costumes and give them out for free, but unfortunately, I’m not quite there yet.

I don’t think E.ON Energy would appreciate a custom-made witch costume instead of the ￡58 I owe each month for our electricity bill.

‘It’s what it’s not doing,’ Penny mutters, still glaring at the oven door. ‘It’s ruining my bread.’

I look back down at my notebook. It was only a matter of time until Penny, the scientist, decided to tackle sourdough.

‘Something smells good!’ Tanya says happily, bouncing into the kitchen. I swallow a smile as Penny snaps up to standing, a look of anguish painted on her face.

‘The oven is screwed!’ she wails. ‘It’s ruining my bread! I’ve spent weeks working on that dough.’

Tanya’s face falls. ‘Oh no, are you okay? I’m sure it’ll still taste great.’

I smile to myself. I quite enjoy sitting back and watching Tanya fall into her role of mother around Penny.

Penny and I act more like sisters – we bicker about what to watch on TV and laugh at stupid jokes that make absolutely no sense – but Tanya is the one we go to when we need help.

She seems to always know how to fix everything.

Penny slumps onto the plastic dining table opposite me as Tanya flicks the kettle on.

‘I was coming in to say I have some good news,’ she grins. ‘I’ve had some more information about the ball.’ She plucks three mugs out of the cupboard, correctly assuming that we all want a cup of tea.

‘I think it’s going to be pretty spectacular,’ she says. ‘It’s a proper PR event.’

‘What does that mean?’ Penny shuffles her seat round so she’s facing Tanya.

‘Basically, it means that we’ll get loads of free stuff!’ She beams. ‘There will be free drinks and food and they always have little goodie bags to give out.’

I lean my head on my hand. ‘Are you sure we’re allowed to go? We’re nothing to do with fashion.’

‘Your costume will beg to differ,’ Penny quips and I puff my chest out in pride.

‘It’s fine,’ Tanya flaps her hand. ‘You might just have to pretend to be influencers or something.’

Penny scoffs. ‘Oh God, what does that mean?’

‘Just take the odd selfie,’ Tanya shrugs, and I laugh at Penny’s horrified expression as Tanya sets the mugs down on our polka-dot tablecloth and sits on the third chair.

‘People will be taking pictures of you anyway,’ Penny says, nodding to me.

‘Well, I don’t know if I’m allowed to wear my costume yet.’

Tanya’s head snaps round to face me. ‘What? Of course you’re allowed to wear it! You must wear it!’

‘It’s not a ball gown. Isn’t it a masquerade ball?’

Tanya bats me away. ‘Just add a mask and you’ll be fine. We’re on the guest list, baby, we’re golden.’