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Biting her lip, Flora’s eyes skimmed over the elegant script.

Flora,

I would be honored if you would do me the favor of coming to my home, the Nottingham Estate, for a private consultation.  Your skills as a seamstress have impressed me, and I have a very important project I’d like to discuss with you.  Are you able to meet me tomorrow evening at 8 o’clock?   Please RSVP with my butler, Mr. Stanley.  I look forward to your reply.

Mrs. Eleanor Nottingham

“Nottingham,” Flora breathed, scarcely able to believe the words swimming before her eyes.  Nate’s grandmother and her grandmother’s old client.  How had she heard of Flora?  How did she know where Flora was?

A tiny voice in the back of her mind screamed, “And does she know I live in the servant’s cottage at the back of her property?”

Grabbing the studio table edge with one hand to steady herself, Flora continued to stare at the delicate card in her thick fingers.  It was only when the front door flew open with a merry jingling from the silver bells tied on the metal handle (“So I can see how much work you really do!” Heather had sneered) that she leaped up, clutching the invitation to her breast.

“Easy, Flora!”  Astrid’s brilliant white teeth gleamed brighter than the morning sun behind her.  “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

Flora blinked dumbly.  “I’m sorry.  Did we have an appointment?”  Running her fingers through her hair, she patted at her desk.  “I know my appointment book is somewhere…”

“No, we didn’t.  I just had an idea and wanted to swing by and ask…”  Astrid’s eyes zeroed in on the card.  “What is that?”

Flora froze.  “What?  What is what?”

Her tounge ran over the edge of her lips as Astrid stepped slowly towards Flora.  Raising her finger in the air, she pointed at the creamy paper now hidden behind Flora’s back.  “That paper.  I recognize that stationary.”

“What paper?”  Beads of sweat trembled on Flora’s upper lip.

“The one behind your back.”  Astrid crept closer, a cat stalking its prey.  Pressing the paper to her dress, Flora turned towards Astrid, backing towards the table.

“It’s nothing.  Nothing.  What were your ideas?”

“Let me see it,” Astrid cooed, her normally jovial blue eyes suddenly icy.  “I just want to see if I’m right…”

Flora’s stomach twisted in knots that she couldn’t understand.  Pressing her teeth harder into her lower lip, she took another step backward, her rear nearly knocking over the table.  “Listen, I have an appointment.  So I really must get back to work…”

“Oh Flora, so diligent and careful.”  Flashing more of a snarl than a smile, Astrid’s delicate porcelain claw whipped around Flora, snatching the paper out of her fingers.  Before Flora could even register her hand was empty, Astrid was pouring over the invitation, running her fingers over the delicate calligraphy.

“I was right!” she crowed, waving the invitation triumphantly.  She beamed at Flora.  “I knew it was the Nottingham seal.  It’s what our Coronation invitations were on.”   With a smug smile, she tossed the invitation at Flora.  Flora grasped for it and missed, watching in dismay as it tumbled to the ground.  Under Astrid’s watchful gaze, she bent over and picked it up, her cheeks blazing.  Most women could make fetching an object off the floor a graceful and even sensual action.  Flora looked more like a cow lurching towards it’s trough.

“You’re so lucky, Flora.”  Astrid sighed as Flora tucked the invitation securely in her sewing apron.  “I would give anything to have a private consult with Mrs. Nottingham.  After all, it is her garden that inspired everything and her husband that started the ball.”  Tossing her long blond curls over her shoulder, Astrid grinned.  “If I had the shoes, I would win for sure.”

Flora froze.  “Shoes?” she asked carefully.  “What shoes?”

“The butterfly shoes, of course.”  Astrid snorted.  “All the girls know about them.  They’re these silver butterfly shoes studded with diamonds… supposedly, the girl that wore them was the most beautiful contestant ever seen.  Everyone, even old Nottingham himself, fell in love with her.”

Flora sucked in her breath.  “What happened?”

Astrid shrugged.  “No one knows.  There’s all sorts of rumors, like one of the judges had her disqualified or she was having an affair with Nottingham and Eleanor got mad or she wasn’t really a contestant, she was a maid…it’s like any story, there’s a million different versions.  All I care about is the shoes.”

Flora rolled her eyes.  The only shoes she found comfortable were tennis shoes.  “Why?”

Astrid rolled her eyes.  “Because they’re covered in diamonds!  Real diamonds!  And they said she had a dress to match!  Can you imagine, a dress of diamonds?”  Looking longingly at her own designer jeans, her icy blue eyes melted back into luminous laughing pools of turquoise.   “So, let me tell you my ideas.  I was thinking about wearing my hair down, so I need to know what kind of neckline…”

A knock on the front door silenced her.  Peeking around Astrid’s lithe frame, Flora glanced at the man glaring at her from the doorway.  Hurrying over to the door, Flora pulled it open and peeked down at him.

“What is your reply?”  For someone with only three hairs, every inch of the butler reeked of presumption.

Flora hesitated.

“Well?” the butler snapped.  “I don’t have all day, you know.  The Mistress is quite busy.”

Flora grit her teeth, but nodded.  “Tell her I’ll be there.”

“Excellent.  We shall send a carriage here for you at 7:30.  Be waiting.”  Without another word, the butler crisply turned and marched away.

Bewildered, Flora stared after him.  She reached down and felt the invitation hidden in her sewing apron pocket.

The paper slid across her curious fingers.  It was real.  It wasn’t a dream.

Stay tuned, Invisible Friends!  We have a week’s worth of whimsy coming up!

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