The Complete Where Dreams - Volume 2 of 2

Chapter 1-2

“Wilson. Please tell me this is one of your crazy jokes.” Except the Director of the Emerald City Opera was not given to jokes, at least not practical ones. Bill Cullen glared at the display window of the fashion designer’s storefront that Wilson had led him to. The stuff in the window was cute, urban. He guessed it would draw a woman passing by into the shop, just as well as a dozen other places that he seemed to pass every day. They cropped up, more dreams than solid basis in either business acumen or common sense. Then they went away and someone else moved in the next day with their hopes and dreams clutched tight.

He turned away and studied the neighborhood.

Wilson Jervis had dragged him into the heart of the Belltown area to meet a designer. The old brick building did nothing to inspire his confidence. After Pioneer Square, this was one of the oldest portions of downtown Seattle, just north of the business core. Most of the area had been rebuilt, turned into condos and ad-agency-slick small business fronts. She was on a block that had somehow been bypassed by the neighborhood’s recent rejuvenation and gentrification.

Its age showed in many ways, darkened brickwork, cracks in the sidewalk. An abandoned tattoo parlor across the street with a “Half-off for Two” sign that might have once lured customers, but was now superseded by the “Out of Business” sign across the glass. Next to it, a small bike shop looked to be doing okay. Belltown wasn’t dangerous the way Pioneer Square had been before its restoration, this part of it was just old.

“My wife found her. Trust me,” was all the reassurance the rotund icon of the Seattle theater scene offered. He’d been leading the Opera with a confident and mostly unquestioned hand for decades. He’d taken a small company on the verge of insolvency and turned it into one of the five largest opera houses in the U.S., and one of the most respected in the world.

All that still didn’t make Bill trust Wilson about this. They were mounting a new opera and it was up to Bill as stage manager to see that it happened perfectly, or at least on schedule and near budget. It was his job to make sure that every piece from set design to costumes to lighting came together by opening night, only six weeks away. What they were doing in Belltown, too early on a Monday morning, was beyond him. Well, not totally beyond him.

Carlotta Gianelli had thrown one of her world-famous tantrums and stalked out yesterday to fly back to Milan and now they needed a costume designer who could perform a six-month miracle in only six weeks. Gianelli had burned up over four months and achieved nothing except some sketches that no one liked or could interpret.

He glared back at the shop as Wilson knocked again.

The glass door bore bold-colored lettering so close to graffiti that he could barely read it. Except he could. The “P” and “G” were actually oversized, ornate letters in the Victorian style. Perrin’s Glorious Garb, the second two words attached to the same “G” were actually artful slashes that he recognized as a variety of fashion styles ranging over the last fifty years, somehow done so that they made a unified whole. What he’d almost dismissed as tacky was actually a deeply nuanced understanding of design.

He peered into the window. The shop was dark, but a light shone in back. He spotted a waif coming through the store toward them, silhouetted by the light behind and pulling on a hat despite the warm day.

“We’re not open yet,” she called through the glass but was already unlocking the door.

She was dressed like some teenager that had been thrown bodily into a closet and crawled forth wearing whatever she fell against. She wore a form-fitting silk turtleneck of new-grass green, an unlikely mauve skirt that evoked autumn swirled in pleats about her calves, and a filmy batik scarf the red-orange of a summer sunset that looked as if it had attempted to throttle her. All mismatched and crazy, the unlikely ensemble somehow looked good on her in a way he didn’t care enough about to attempt to fathom. She’d topped it off with a knit winter hat with earflaps and a ridiculous pom-pom pulled down over pale-blond hair that brushed her narrow shoulders.

Wilson introduced them and talked his way into the shop as easily as he’d talked Bill away from the San Francisco Opera four years before.

Adira’s death had made Bill a single dad at thirty-three years old. His need to escape “their” city and the needs of their two children had been the biggest factor by far. But Wilson had not played that card. Instead, he’d offered a new and interesting job in a different city, leaving it to be Bill’s own realization that such a change was exactly what he needed to do for both himself and his kids. Tricky s.o.b. To this day he still didn’t know quite how that had happened.

Bill followed Wilson into the shop, letting the Director deal with the sloppily dressed clerk. The shop had been set up like a 1950s diner, all chromed metal and red leatherette. Mannequins sat in booths in a quirky mash-up of eras. A ‘20s flapper cozied up with a ‘50s greaser and a ‘40s housewife. Yet that wasn’t what they were. The housewife’s wide, white collar wasn’t on the housewife dress, it was on the flapper’s, and it distinctly accented the cleavage. The greaser actually sported the classic lines of a ‘20s linen suit, but sewn in denim and flannel.

He could hear the girl bubbling away at Wilson about something. Sounded like a chickadee mixed up with one of those small singing birds. Disconnected flighty bits that, even if gathered together, wouldn’t really communicate much.

The next booth included Victorian brocade set in a modern blazer, and a gown design that would be formal enough for an opera opening night yet remained racy enough for the hottest club. Even studying the piece didn’t reveal how the two distinct messages had been combined in a single garment.

He glanced over at the shop girl, wondering when the owner was coming in.

This girl was all arms and legs and nerves. Her slender build was only emphasized by her height. Fingers flashed out to emphasize points, her gestures were twice life size. She made a grand sweeping gesture which suggested she might be a dancer as well.

She had rolled out a short rack which bore a set of dresses, wedding and two bridesmaids, and was showing them to Wilson as he slouched next to a particularly voluptuous mannequin in a Wall Street business suit. Cutting a suit to a full-figured woman was hard, and she’d made the outfit pop; that it was in hot ‘50s poodle-pink wool only made it more so. Then he focused on the wedding and bridesmaid dresses. Exceptionally fine work, yet wholly inappropriate for the stage, as it was a masterpiece of subtlety. He’d bet that the clerk would look good in the gold one.

The Director had really lost it this time. All of these clothes were studies of craftsmanship and nuance. But they weren’t costumes, especially not ones that would play to the vast three-thousand seat expanse of the ECO Opera House at Seattle Center.

“Where’s the designer?”

“Why?” The woman pulled down her winter cap as if to shield herself.

“We’re here to see her for reasons that wholly escape me.” Up close the girl wasn’t so much of a girl. She was a woman, long and sleek. Her hair a long, thick, pale blond that looked too substantial for so elegant a neck. She looked him nearly in the eye despite, he checked, bare feet.

The hat of garish orange wool, with ridiculous ear flaps, had been pulled down almost far enough to hide her eyes, but they shone brilliant blue past pale lashes.

“Why?” Her voice was soft.

“Why what?”

“Why do the reasons escape you?” There was a real “duh” tone to her voice as if he were the one being exceedingly dense and not the other way around.

“Wilson wants to hire her and I want to tell the woman to her face that there’s no way in hell I’ll work with her.”

She regarded him with those bright blues for so long that he had to fight to not look away. There was a mind behind those eyes. And a force of personality all out of balance with the crazed attire and flighty first, second, and third impression.

“Boy, it’s going to really suck being you.”

“Why?”

“Because Director Wilson Jervis of the Emerald City Opera has just offered me the contract to design the costumes for Ascension, your next opera. And because it sounds like fun, I,” she turned briefly to Wilson, “thank you Mr. Jervis, yes” then she turned back to him, “have as of this moment decided to accept. Perrin Williams at your service.”

She held out a hand and shook his numb fingers strongly when he held them out in shock like a trained puppy.

She was right, it was going to really suck being him.