Sunny was always quick to help a friend in need, but it always helped when the task was fun. They were only three dresses in, Sunny knew you could never find a good dress after only trying on three. She pawed through a rack near the changing room with no success and walked back over the door. "Any luck with this one?" she asked tentatively.
Bobby couldn't see what was wrong with the first three dresses. Or the dozen shoes AB and Sunny had tried on. Or the tiaras. Or the little handbags. But no, apparently there was something wrong about every item, be it the measurements or the precise shade. He was starting to wonder why he'd been dragged along.
He had started off leaning against the wall next to the changeroom, but after the first ten minutes had started to slump down the wall, and was now sitting on the floor. He could see AB's feet and ankles under the dressing room door, and as she kicked aside another dress he realized that were it not for the door, he'd be seeing her undressed. He blushed furiously, though all he could see were feet, and looked away back to Sunny. "Naw, it's on the floor too."
"Can we try another store?" Abby begged from inside the dressing room. She hated the idea of standing in a little box in her underwear while Bobby was just outside the door. He wasn't like a "real" boy to her, but he was still a boy and that made it weird.
All of the dresses so far had been too girly. She figured if she started off with something a little over the top she could ease into something more her speed, at least talk Sunny out of the bubble gum pink creation she'd just kicked off.
"Of course!" Sunny bounced right back into action, grabbing Bobby's hand and practically pulling him up from the ground. She knew that the first few selections were a bit too much for AB's style but it never hurt to try. She had to admit she found herself admiring Abby's courage to try on some of those dresses.
They met Abby on the other side of the door and walked to the next store together. Without thinking of the consequences Sunny rambled right along about the dance. "So are you guys going to the dance with anyone?"
Bobby found the question odd. Sunny knew that neither of her friends were 'seeing' anyone, nor did either act outwardly inclined to doing so. "I was gonna walk up with Sam," he offered, deliberately misunderstanding the question. "Why? Did that scumbag ask you?" His face darkened. Anastas de Kooning was such a... scumbag. He didn't know why Sunny was so interested in him. And for that matter, why he was interested in her, beyond horribly corrupting her or something.
Abby was still wearing her vintage hippy throwback for spirit week. She couldn't be bothered to change into something else when she'd just be in and out of dresses for most of the afternoon.
When the conversation turned to the subject of dates AB cringed. "I don't know," she replied. "No one's asked."
Then she turned to Bobby. "You know Sunny, she likes a fixer-upper."
Sunny instantly regretted asking. She just thought maybe her friends had found a friend to go with or maybe a group. "You and Sam," he said to Bobby. "Ultimate bromance."
Her face fell a little when he brought up Stas. It was her own fault though, she should have known better than to ask. A little shyly she nodded and did her best to hide behind Abby's comment about fixer-uppers. "He's not a scumbag," she said quietly. "He's just... oh look! Cute dresses!" she said pointing at a window display and turning into the closet store.
AB rolled her eyes at the ultimate bromance. For all she knew Sam and Bobby said "I love you" to each other before hanging up the phone.
"This is your fault." AB accused Bobby quietly as Sunny steered them into the cute dress store. "If I end up looking like a birthday cake I'm going to kill you."
She turned to Sunny with a little shrug. "How did that happen anyway? I kind of thought he was too big of a jerk to ask a girl to a dance."
"How is it my fault! I shouldn't even be here, man, all I tried to do was stop you looking like a big fat lesbian from 1987. Not that you're fat. Or a lesbian." He clamped his mouth shut and regretted saying anything at all.
He snorted at AB's question to Sunny. "Because of the Homecoming 'tradition'," he muttered to nobody in particular.
Sunny turned on Bobby and glared at him when he rambled on to Abby about looking like a fat lesbian from 1987. Her look said one more word Robert Eisley and your head is on a platter.
Sunny shrugged and fussed over a few dresses. "He's not so bad," she said without looking at either of them directly. "I asked him to come to the homecoming game, you know, I just want all my friends there. And he suggested that we make a weekend of it and go to the dance together. Trust me, I was just as shocked," she explained. "Oh! Look at these!" she pulled two dresses off the rack and handed them over to Abby. "What tradition are you mumbling about over there Bobby?"
Bobby turned a fluorescent shade of red; he didn't think Sunny actually heard that part. "You're a muggle, Abby, you know what I'm talking about, right? ... right?"
"Uh... I think that's the prom night tradition," she replied nonchalantly. "Though I bet you there are a few backseat romances during homecoming too."
She perused the dresses Sunny picked out. "Not horrible," she replied. Clearly she had a different sense of style than Abernathy. "Maybe something with a little less sparkle?"
Prom night tradition. Backseat romances? Oh. Oh fffffffff. To say Sunny was mortified when she connected the dots was an understatement. "BOBBY!" she smacked his arm perhaps a bit harder than she normally would when he made an offense. She turned a deep shade of crimson and got back to work on the dresses. "Not that it should matter but Anastas is not getting anywhere near my backseat," she said stubbornly.
"Less sparkle," Sunny nodded. She grabbed another dress, not to plain but not too loud and held it out. "It' a little dark, but maybe worth a go?"
"Ooooww." Bobby rubbed his arm where she smacked him. He couldn't think that she hit hard 'even for a girl' because the facts were she hit hard even for Mike Tyson.
"Yes, that one's nice," he said of the latest dress, gameface on. It looked exactly the same as the last dress to him, although both Sunny and AB insisted that these things looked different on. "Try that one."
"She's got junk in her trunk that she doesn't want him to touch," AB teased and made sure to stay out of Sunny's reach.
Holding the dress out at arm length she gave it a quick examination. "It's still sparkly," she replied with one eyebrow quirked. It was very pretty and kind of posh; AB hated to admit she almost liked it.
She shook her head when Bobby chimed in. "Oh fine."
Taking the dress into the changing room she shrugged out of her hippy couture and into the dress. She gulped loudly, staring into the mirror as if the thing were lying to her.
"Sunny," she called, her throat constricted in a mild panic. "Get in here. I need your help."
Sunny blushed and laughed. "Yeah, no touchy," she folded her arms across her chest. "It's a bit sparkly," she admitted. "But it will look nice with your skin tone."
She waited patiently for AB to change, poking at Bobby every so often, still a little sore about his assumption that Stasi only wanted to get in the backseat of her car. "I'm coming Abby," she left Bobby to his own devices to see to her friend.
She knocked on the door and pushed it open. Her eyes flew open. "Abby! Wow! That dress looks great!"
Bobby rolled his eyes as Sunny went into the changeroom so they could discuss whatever invisible flaw this dress had. One of the sales attendants smiled kindly at him from the rack she was rearranging.
"You're a very patient boyfriend," she said.
Bobby looked over his shoulder to the closed changeroom door. "Huh? Oh, I'm not her boyfriend."
"Oh..." She raised her eyebrows and left it at that.
"But I'm not the gay BFF either!" He added quickly. "Totally into girls."
Abby placed her hand on her chest as if it could stop her heart from beating so frantically. "I'm not supposed to look like this!" Her voice was more panicky than it was before and she was struggling to breathe.
She couldn't figure out why a simple dress was causing her to absolutely lose her shit. "I can't... There's no way I can go to this thing looking like this."
"Why not?" she asked looking worried. "You look amazing! You're supposed to look like that because you look like that," she placed a gentle hand on Abby's shoulder and smiled. "Just breathe," she said gently.
"I don't look like this," AB replied. Her voice wasn't as constricted, but it didn't change the fact that she was in full on freak out mode.
She looked away from Sunny, back to staring at herself in the mirror. She was falling in love with this dress even as it was terrorizing her. "He can't see me like this," she squeaked.
"Him?" she asked. "Sam?" she covered her mouth quickly, realizing this was definitely a sensitive subject. "Bobby?" she tried to cover it up. "The figurative him?" she bit her lip and rushed ahead anyways. "Look, this dress is super cute and it does great things for you but if you're not comfortable then you shouldn't get it."
"I for one think you look stunning, but it's your call."
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