Unclaimed Treasures by Patricia MacLachlan
Author:Patricia MacLachlan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
8
The white dress was beautiful. It made Willa feel beautiful. She tried it on while the Unclaimed Treasures whispered and oohed and threw up their hands in excitement. The material was stiff against her bare legs. The high lace neck made her feel tall and stately.
“She looks like—”
“Never mind now.” Aunt Crystal’s voice was sharp.
“The spitting image of—”
“So,” interrupted Aunt Crystal, glaring at Aunt Lulu, who might, thought Willa, be going into a decline, “the hat does not have to fit, dear.” Dear again, thought Willa. Two times she was dear in two days. “You hold it in your hand, like so.” Aunt Crystal posed, holding the hat by her side, trailing the ribbons, looking like a plump old woman in love.
“Beautiful,” murmured Aunt Lulu.
And then Horace’s father came, looking distracted. He stopped and stared at Willa for one moment, opening his mouth as if he might say something. But then he shook his head and took her hand, leading her up the stairs to his attic studio, talking all the while. Willa looked at her hand in his. Though his hand felt cool, her own hand was hot.
“You look fine, Willa. Fine. Now I’ll put you over here by the window.” And he placed her where a slight breeze came in the window, rustling the ribbons of the hat and lifting her hair. She had never been in his studio before, and she was surprised to see that the limbs of the apple tree outside crawled up onto the roof.
The room was filled with canvases and cloths and the smell of paint. Along one wall there were paintings neatly stacked, the painted sides facing the wall. But as Willa slowly scanned the room, she saw that some of the paintings had fallen over. Some leaned against each other, precariously, like a set of dominoes. One painting lay on the floor, ignored. Another on a large easel facing Willa—the only one she could see from where she stood—was gray and beige with a blurred figure in the middle. Willa narrowed her eyes, trying to bring the painting into focus. The breeze pushed her hair across her cheek, and Willa felt a chill. A sudden sadness. She shook her head and pushed her hair back, trying to push the feeling away, too. It was a feeling coming much too often lately. Hard to chase away. “And you’ll be sad,” Nicholas had warned her when he had first learned that Matthew was her true love. And Willa was sad.
She watched Matthew, his brow furrowed, mixing paint and whistling softly to himself. And then, across the room, Willa saw a girl in a long white dress, standing still as stone. Willa held her breath as she stared at herself in the mirror. The dress made her look taller, older, even though she knew that the Unclaimed Treasures had taken up the hem, carefully cutting off the lace edges and sewing them back for her. Slowly, she straightened and lifted her chin. The dress was beautiful.
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