To Win the Prince's Hand

Chapter 15

 15.

When the girls showed up in my room, I argued with every ounce of my will to stay in bed. Although, from the moment they stepped foot in the door, I knew it was hopeless. They’d been planning a girls day for weeks ever since I’d suggested the idea six months ago.

I simply did not want to go dress shopping. I was tired after spending a long night with Serena, talking about Gabriel mostly since he wasn’t there for once. He’d been coming almost every night for a while.

Mark was closer to me since my birthday, although he still wouldn’t listen to my advice to ask Abigail to go somewhere with him. He was being absolutely ridiculous.

Ethan was surprisingly relaxed about the whole thing. I think Sophia might have had something to do with that, though. I hadn’t seen her much, but she was apparently very busy most of the time.

But we all were for that matter. Jasmine and I had been kept busy with social events, which had picked up about four months ago. They were beginning the real judging now. She was great at it, but I insisted I was terrible no matter how many times she told me otherwise.

And no matter how much I protested, an hour later, I was dressed in day clothes and at the palace door.

“You’ll meet us at home around five, right?” Ethan confirmed and Abigail rolled her eyes.

“Yes, father,” she replied sarcastically before running over to catch up with us as we walked out of the gates.

“I see you’ve been picking up some tips from that book he gave Danielle,” Jasmine teased as we wandered around in the warm summer air. It was almost fall now, and I relished the last warm days before the leaves turned.

“I’m related to Ethan, obviously I’m decent at sarcasm,” she pointed out and we all laughed.

“Why do we even need to get dresses today?” I whined.

“You never know with all these social events,” Jasmine reminded. “We might be invited to something formal.”

“I have plenty of unused evening gowns,” I argued with a sigh.

“Then get more day gowns. I believe I’ve seen you in this one before,” she commented with a gesture to my dress.

“And since when are you guys fashion queens? I’ve never heard you mention dresses even once before,” I tried in one last feeble attempt.

“Oh, come on! Every girl does it at some point!” Abigail whined and I sighed dramatically.

“Oh, all right,” I agreed before being drug into the first store. The lady came in and greeted us, pleased to see wealthy customers. She quickly handed us each multiple styles to try on after taking our measurements.

“The styles are so much different than my home,” Jasmine called out from behind the curtain next to me as we both dressed.

“Really? I guess I can believe that, but the only one that really stood out as different was the dress you wore the first night,” I commented.

“I don’t remember that,” Abigail piped up from my other side.

“It wasn’t even really a ball gown, was it? It didn’t have the bottom of one for sure. It was much more flow-y and a bright red,” I described.

“Really? I bet you looked great,” she complimented Jasmine.

“Well, thank you,” she meekly said, brushing off the kind remark. “Is everyone ready?”

I shrugged before realizing she couldn’t see me and opened my mouth to speak, but Abigail spoke first. “How do you wear these corsets all the time? They’re so uncomfortable!”