Baltimore, Thursday Afternoon

[soniaroadsqueen]

With no classes on Thursdays, Ringo had decided to take her morning AT run in the city, so she'd left early. And it had been a great run, even if she'd had to be careful not to do anything too visible. No need to draw any official attention, after all. In fact, she'd gotten so caught up in the joy of riding in an actual city that she'd lost track of time and almost forgotten about her deal with Kathy.

Ringo and Kathy had been talking about a shopping trip for quite a while, but just this week they'd handwavily made plans to actually do one. A flurry of text messages had them agreeing to meet up at one of the stores Kathy knew in Baltimore.

She probably still could have made it on time if she hadn't gotten turned around once or twice trying to find the right address. American addresses didn't really make any sense, and she didn't know Baltimore that well, and thank goodness for GPS in phones.

So she arrived a couple of minutes late, face flushed from the rush, with a ripped pair of jeans and a tshirt that were a lot better suited for an AT ride than convincing anyone that she had a real fashion sense.

"Sorry, sorry," she said, already apologizing for making Kathy wait.

[NFB for distance]

Comments

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy turned around from where she'd been talking to Letty, the Salesgirl With Opinions who had single-handedly overseen Kathy's own sartorial transformation and gave Ringo a smile. "No worries," she said. "I haven't been here long myself."

Okay, she had been, but no reason to make Ringo feel worse about being late! "And Letty was happy to take the time to try and convince me that the addition of leggings makes my short skirts still an acceptable autumn attire."

[soniaroadsqueen]

Ringo laughed, "That sounds very helpful of her."

Then she frowned, looking Kathy up and down. "Did something happen to you?"

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy gave Ringo a sheepish smile. Most of the damage had been healed by Anders the other day, but there were still several lingering traces, especially on her hands. Letty looked over with interest; her professional sales demeanor hadn't allowed her to ask, but she was curious as well.

"I, uhh, there was some trouble," she said. "Dante and I ended up playing with fire?"

"That reminds me!" Letty said. "Did you guys hear about the giant fire the other night? In the apartment building? People would have died except they all inexplicably ended up on the street!"

Kathy snuck a glance at Ringo, giving a small cough.

[soniaroadsqueen]

Kathy got a long, thoughtful look, then Ringo nodded slowly. She might have to ask some questions about that later.

"Oh," she said, turning to Letty. "I didn't hear about that. I'm glad everyone's okay, though." Hear that Kathy? Glad everyone's okay.

[spin_kick_snap]

Kathy wholeheartedly agreed! She was very happy that everyone was okay!

"Do they know how the fire started?" Kathy asked. You know, for no reason at all.

"Oooh, yeah," Letty said, eagerly leaning forward over the counter. "Turns out that the guys on the tenth floor were trying to run some kind of homemade meth lab out of a bedroom or something. One of them died in the fire, but the other guy's in custody. He was one of the people who was brought down to street level. People are saying it's a miracle!"

Kathy snorted at that. She wondered how much of a kick Dante would get out of being called 'miraculous.'

[soniaroadsqueen]

Ringo just barely managed to not look over at Kathy again. "Well, whatever happened, I'm glad people are okay."

Details would be demanded later, Kathy. Prepare yourself!

[spin_kick_snap]

"Me too," Kathy agreed, well-aware that she was not on borrowed time against an interrogation. "But it sounds like lives were save and that's what's important."

Just remember that, Ringo! Lives were saved!

"Anyway, Letty, this is my friend Ringo, Ringo, this is Letty, who makes it possible for me to dress myself. Ringo's looking to update her style, so of course I brought her here to you."

"Thank God," Letty said, eying Ringo with professional interest. "Don't worry, there's a ton of great potential here to work with. So, tell me about your current style, Ringo. What do you like to wear?"

[soniaroadsqueen]

It turned out that a direct question like that was a pretty good distraction from worrying about Kathy and fires.

"Well," Ringo said slowly, considering her answer. "I'm pretty active? I, um, roller blade a lot?" Sort of, anyway. "So one thing that's really important to me is being able to move easily. But, um, beyond that, I haven't thought about it much? I guess I like cute things?"

Great guidance there, Ringo. Real specific.

[spin_kick_snap]

Letty gave a tragic sigh. "I can't believe there are more of you," she told Kathy with a reproachful look.

Kathy just laughed. "I said pretty much the exact same thing," she explained to Ringo. "Only I mentioned that I ran and did gymnastics and that I liked bright colors."

"You wouldn't believe some of our earlier battles," Letty agreed, shaking her head. "If it was an eye-searing color or giant pattern, this girl wanted it." She went back to eying Ringo. "So, first question--how blunt can I be here? Kathy told me to speak my mind sometime after the third bright yellow dress with a hemline to the floor, but not everyone wants their shopgirls telling them like it is. Where do you fall?"

[soniaroadsqueen]

Ringo actually giggled at that question. "I've got pretty thick skin. You tell me what you think. I'll probably even listen." She grinned. "You're the expert, after all, right?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"Thank god, people with common sense if not fashion sense," Letty said, causing Kathy to laugh again. "All right, let's head into the back. I need to see what I have to work with here. I mean, so far it looks like you'd got a decent chest and good legs, but I need to know more."

She pulled out a tape measure and waggled it at Ringo. "You wearing underthings? Cause I'm going to need you to strip when we get into the back. Kathy, you coming?"

"Only if Ringo's okay with it," Kathy said, giving Ringo another smile. "Otherwise, I can hang out here until it's time for us to start looking at clothes."

[soniaroadsqueen]

Well, now Ringo was pretty obviously blushing, but she nodded her head. "I'm wearing underthings," she answered. They were plain, but she did have them.

She blushed a little brighter and glanced over at Kathy out of the corner of her eye. "And you can come along if you want, Kathy, but you don't have to."

[spin_kick_snap]

"I'll come along then," Kathy said, snagging a magazine to bring with her. "Someone has to bar the door if you decide to run away mid-measurements or something."

"Oh great," Letty said, rolling her eyes as she led both girls into the back room. "Freak her out before we even get started."

The back room had a full-body mirror, several stuffed chairs, and a rack for clothing, more like a sitting room than anything else. Kathy claimed a chair for herself, while Letty gestured for Ringo to stand in front of the mirror and begin to strip. "First, I'm going to take your measurements," she explained, tone professional, movements methodical. "We don't have any bullshit, arbitrary sizes here--what the hell does a size 2, or 5 or 9 even mean? Here, our clothing is sorted by measurements and we offer on-site tailoring and hemming, so that everything you wear fits you perfectly. You want yours in metric or Imperial, babe?"

[soniaroadsqueen]

Despite Kathy's joking tone, Ringo did look a little worried. "This sounds complicated," she said a bit hesitantly as she looked around the room. At least it didn't seem scary or anything? So far?

She was still blushing a bit as she peeled off her tshirt, then she folded it and set it aside, toed off her shoes, and took a deep breath before peeling sliding her jeans down her hips. Despite the fact that she was wearing a serviceable, and mostly modest, set of bra and panties it was awkward. It wasn't like Letty was one of her sisters, and Kathy. Well. Kathy.

"And, um, metric, please." She still hadn't fully absorbed the weird American system.

[spin_kick_snap]

"It's simpler than it sounds," Kathy assured her, glancing over the magazine to give Ringo an encouraging smile. "Like, my waist is about 61 centimeters and my hips are 94, so if I'm looking for pants--"

"Which you shouldn't ever be," Letty interjected, approaching Ringo with the tape measure held out in silent permission to start measuring.

"--I'd go to the 60-62 centimeter section and look there. Things like pants will have waist, hip, and inseam measurements, skirts will only have hips and waist. It's all very organized."

[soniaroadsqueen]

"Well," Ringo admitted as she followed Letty's directions as the girl used the tape to take Ringo's measurements with an ease of long practice that was reassuring all by itself, "that doesn't sound too bad, I suppose."

She glanced over at Kathy, mentally comparing herself to the other girl. While they probably had similar waist measurements, Kathy's extra height made her look slender and elegant. Doubly so given Ringo's wider bust and hips. "I'm betting I shouldn't wear very many of the things that you do," she announced thoughtfully after a moment.

This had really just occurred to her.

[spin_kick_snap]

"Nope!" Letty said before Kathy could. "She's got damn fine legs, so we show those off. Play up the whole lithe, willowy thing she's got going on. You're a lot curvier, so the stuff she wears is only going to look silly on you."

"That's her way of saying that you're not shaped like a boy," Kathy said with a grin.

"Honey, no boy has an ass like yours," Letty shot back without missing a beat. "But anyway, no, we put you in the stuff she wears and you'll look like grapes in a straw. We're going to find you cute, flirty things that work with your body shape, don't you worry."

[soniaroadsqueen]

Ringo snorted in surprised amusement at that mental image. "Grapes in a straw?" she repeated, still giggling.

"I think that that's probably not a good look, huh?"

[spin_kick_snap]

"Not in the least," Letty returned. "And I have too much professional pride to let you out of this store like that. I mean, if you wanna try a few things on here in the back room to decide that for yourself, I won't stop you, but you won't be leaving in it."

"She told me that, too," Kathy said. "I was looking at a cute skirt--"

"It looked like a smock for an artistic five year old."

"--And she told me I could try it on to see what it looked like, but the only way it would leave with me was if I stole it."

[soniaroadsqueen]

"And how did it look?" Ringo asked with a grin, rather suspecting she knew the answer to that one.

[spin_kick_snap]

"It was cute!" Kathy protested over Letty's snort of derision. "It was! I mean, granted, it was cute in a 'I'm five and on my way to kindergarten' way, but still cute!"

[soniaroadsqueen]

"So you stole it?" Ringo teased, putting her arms down at Letty's instruction.

[spin_kick_snap]

"Yeah," Kathy said, nodding. "I thought you might really like it."

Braaaaaaat!

[soniaroadsqueen]

Ringo rolled her eyes. Then stuck out her tongue in Kathy's direction.

"You didn't even know me then, I bet."

[spin_kick_snap]

"Are you really making another bet with me?" Kathy asked. "Do you not remember what happened the last time you did?"

"Umm, I don't," Letty said, threading the tape though Ringo's arms. "What happened? This sounds fun!"

"Ringo?" Kathy said. "Wanna share the grand story about how you doubted me and had to live with the consequences?"