Summary:Kori goes dress shopping and gets advice from Helena Wayne and Sarah Rainmaker. Log Info:Storyteller: None |
Related LogsTheme SongNone |
   |
.~{:--------------:}~.
In the Young Anvenger's comfortably appointed residence, it had been a quiet day until someone asked of Kori, regarding her graduation party: "What are you going to wear?"
Three hours later, Sarah and Helena are walking Kori through a blitz of sartorial exposure in the Eastside Mall shopping center. So far it's been a bust— five stores, no good finds, and in fact the sole useful bit of information has been that absolutely *no one* makes things for someone of Kori's…. stature.
"What about this one?" Kori asks, and steps out of a dressing room wearing a denim dress, the hem hanging to mid-thigh and even sporting a collar and the classic Levi buttons. She tries to stand provocatively and aims her knees left and right for the benefit of her fashion consultants.
"Denim is very popular *and* durable," she reminds them. "My jeans are the favorite of my casual wear." She blinks twice. "Why do they call them 'jeans'?" she asks, apropos of nothing.
"…uh. Well, yeah, but you're not really looking for durable..you're looking for beautiful, and sexy, and fancy." Sarah says, eyeing the dress. "And they're named after a city in Italy where the type of fabric was first created." She shakes her head. "You want something more…uh…elegant, too. That's more a work around day to day sort of dress." Says the Apache who hasn't exactly had the opportunity to shop till she drops, but then again, she HAS spent entirely too much time looking at fashion magazines a bit longingly.
Helena Wayne, on the other hand, is very familiar with shopping. It's not so much her Dad's thing, and her mother would prefer to window shop and then acquire things the old-fashioned way, but shopping is kind of like…casing a scene! Except your goal is the perfect dress. That's actually her mission today, but when she hears familiar voices, she glances over the racks.
Except…Helena Wayne doesn't know these people. Blackbird does. Then again, Helena Wayne did determine recently that she could use more friends…
"That's cute," she calls over with a friendly smile. "What're you shopping for?"
"I do not understand this concept of 'sexy'!" Kori complains, and props her hands on her hips. "It meets no logic! I must wear sexy clothing to tell people that I feel sexy? To what end?" she demands. "I will simply tell people, 'I feel of the sex!'" Naturally, Kori's speaking entirely too loudly.
"I am shopping for the sexy!" she tells Barbara, exasperated. She starts unbuttoning the dress and walks back into the changing room, neglecting to close the door. "This is the last celebration I will partake in as a schooler of the highness," she reminds Rainmaker. "All of the other girls are telling me they are 'dressing to leave a reminder'. I still don't understand why I cannot just wear my comfortable shorts and my hoodie!" she complains.
Sarah's eyes widen, staring for a moment, before she catches ehrself and snaps out of itShe steps forward to block the door to outside eyes, closing it, before she lets out a little sigh. "Yes, well, you can also wear it because you look good in it and just enjoy looking good…without worrying about reminders." she says with afaint flush, then blinks as Helena calls out, turning to look at her. "Oh, ah…hey. Graduation dresses, today." Sarah says, idly tucking a loose strand of dark hair behind her ear. "My friend is…kind new to style here. And if I'm gonna be honest, I've more, uh, read about it than…really shopped for something like this." She glances towards the door, raising her voice. "Kori, maybe we could find a color first? I mean, green eyes, green dress…or something that goes good with it? Purple? Gold?"
"Yeah, the whole concept of 'sexy' comes with a lot of cultural baggage," Helena chuckles as she comes closer, smile deepening at one corner. "I'm shopping for a graduation dress too, though. Maybe we can find something together. Or you can wear your shorts and a hoodie, if you want," she shrugs. "Pretty sure you're going to stand out either way." She seems to mean that well, at least.
"How fancy is it?" she asks, looking between Sarah and Kori. Possibly because Sarah looks like she has a better grip on things.
Kori walks back out in a floor-length black gown. The cloth would normally pool on the ground but Kori's tall enough to account for the hemp drop's expectation of heels. "Is this better?" she asks of Sarah, and pivots in a quick turn. Gold glints from the torc around her neck and the subtle metal loops binding the material and keeping it taut around her athletic frame. The hem lifts to expose her calves, and then falls again.
"This has no color!" she complains. "If I am forced to wear clothing, why must I wear clothing that has no color?!" she demands crossly. Her shockingly green eyes transfer to Helena, the irises glinting. "I do not know how fancy it is. There is the graduation ceremony, then the 'official' party, then the 'unofficial' party, which is confirmed to be happening, so it may as well *be* official," she explains. "I am unsure of what protocol demands here. I am not from New York— I am from Malta," she adds, as a clarifying(?) fact.
"Well…." Sarah begins to say, then Kori comes walking out, forcing her to step to the side to get out of the way, then pausing as she blinks at Kori, looking distracted. "It's…a graduation party so…um, high school graduation, I mean, so…sorta fancy? But not black tie fancy." she says after a moment, her dark eyes running down Kori then back up. "…well, black is because it goes with anything…though the torc is nice. We can find something more colorful though…" She glances at Helena, then says hopefully. "Ah…I don't suppose you know what the best shop for that sort of dress would be around here?"
"So like…homecoming, but not prom," Helena muses once she's gathered information from both Kori and Sarah. "Okay, we can work with that. So question one, you already answered," she grins to Kori. "Color over black. That looks great, but you should enjoy what you're wearing. So next question: long or short? The dress," she clarifies quickly. Because open-ended questions are dangerous.
"I do not know," Kori tells Helena, crestfallen. "I do not typically wear much clothing. Where I am from, it is considered very incicental to the attractiveness of the individual. It seems as if some people prefer the shortness of the skirt, but others think that a long dress is preferable. But I have no idea why one is preferred over the other!" she complains.
"Sarah, what do you think? Would you want to see more of my legs, or less?" she asks the dark-haired woman. Fists prop on her hips. "This is what I was telling you earlier, the customs do not make sense!" She looks back to Barbara. "A friend of mine said I should try modelling because I am bad at everything else, and then she chastised me when I was looking for work! I printed up fliers saying 'I will remove my clothes for money', which is what a model *does*, and she told me I was confusing people. How is that confusing?!"
Sarah blinks, looking a bit flustered for a moment by the question. "H-huh? Ah…w-well, I mean…technically, models WEAR clothes for money, and…I guess…more…?" she says after a moment. Yeah, that faint flush is back. "I mean…we're both tall, so it's kinda hard to find dresses with low helms for us…"
Boy, that's some culture shock. Helena's lips twitch as Kori explains her problem. "As she said," she points a thumb toward Sarah, wry. "Models technically wear clothes for money. Strippers take them off for money. For the purpose of getting people sexually excited. Which is frowned upon by a lot of American society, because the country came out of a religiously Puritan background that saw nudity and sexual things as sinful. Objectively speaking, there's nothing wrong with it, but if you didn't mean to cause that sort of reaction, there might be some misunderstandings."
Cultural lesson delivered, she heads for a rack of short dresses in bright colors. "So, short! If you don't usually wear much, then let's get you something that makes an impact without a whole lot of fabric."
"Yes, I know all about the puritans and their bizarre fetish for nonsexual activity," Kori tells Helena. "We studied them in school. I find their attitude entirely perplexing. Who *doesn't* like sex?" she demands rhetorically. "They must have all been *terrible* at it."
Kori fights her way clear of the black evening gown and tosses it back into the massive pile of 'rejects' in the chnaging room. Wearing black panties and a green brassiere, she walks across the departmnet store floor without any self-consciousness and stops near Helena's location.
"Sarah! What do you like better?" she calls over to her friend, and holds up two miniskirted outfits to hang in front of her, one at a time. "Which do you like better? The red, or the green?"
She pauses, holding them aside. "Or, neither?" she offers, as a third option.
Sarah's lips twitch at Kori's opinon of European colonizers and such. "…probably." she says dryly, then her eyes widen as Kori just drops the dress. "A-ah, whoah, just…ah, you shouldn't just…walk out in…." she stammers, totally flustered a bit now as the miniskirts are offered. "…ah..green. You're more a green?" she says helplessly, looking at Helena with a 'pleeeeease help' look on her face.
Unfortunately for Sarah, Helens just doesn't seem all that worried about Kori running around in her underwear. It is efficient, after all. "Maybe they were bad at it," she agrees, shrugging. "My theory's more that they were all insecure. Worried about someone else being better, so had to come up with a wry to make sure no one ever tried anything else."
She flips through the racks, pausing as she finds a romper in a silky material with a purple and green batik print and a deep v neckline. "How about this?" she suggests, holding it out to Kori.
Kori examines the dress that Helena and Sarah suggest, and flips it around in her hands. The Tamaranean lifts it overhead and tugs it on like a shirt, and wriggles so it hangs properly. One it's settled, she twists left, then spins once to the right with a smooth pirouette. It's a calf-length dress with a long slit along the left leg, and Kori's skin tone sets the batik print off with a rare happenstance of chromatic synergy. "I like it!" she says, effusively. "It is not so tight that I am going to break it by dancing, and it is of a pleasant color!" she exclaims. "The green and purple, they are so restive, are they the not?"
Sarah makes a small noise of relief as Kori is a bit more covered…not that the dress doesn't in many ways add to how good she manages to effortlessly look. "….they do look good on you." the Apache girl admits after a moment, folding her arms across her chest, nodding to Helena. "She's got good taste." She pauses, then offers. "I'm Sarah, by the way. That's Kori." She looks thoughful. "…too bad there's not a place with Chinese quipao, that sort of thing in silk would look wild on her…."
"Helena," she introduces herself, smiling approvingly as Kori gives the dress a spin. "The colors go great on you. It's a nice contrast all around." At Sarah's suggestion, her smile flashes a little broader. "Hey, it's New York. You can find just about anything you want here with enough time and money. Just depends on what you're willing to put into it. Where are you graduating from, by the way?" she asks, looking between the pair.
"I am pleased to meet you, Helena!" the orange-skinned girl says, beaming. She glances at Sarah, brow furrowing. "Qipao?" she repeats tentatively. "I do not know this word."
Kori looks back to Helena. "I am matriculating from Midtown High School," Kori explains. "I do not have any specific area of study— I am on a student visa from Malta. My friend, Peter— he is *very* smart, and he is graduating with an 'emphasis in techology'," she says, carefully. "But he has been accepted to several universities already. Oh, I hope he stays in New York!" she says, with a fretful gesture. "He is a good friend and I will be sad if he accepts the invitation to the colleges in California or Massachusets."
For just a moment…Sarah gets a slightly far away look, a faint frown creasing her lips, before she shakes her head. "I'm not, she is. I'm just here for clothing moral support and such." she says, avoiding looking at the two for a moment while she digs in a pocket and pulls out a cellphone, typing on it. "And there are plenty of good schools in New York, or pretty close…" She frowns in though as she carefully tapes the screen. "Mm, hey, there is a thing…ah…Nabiki's Secrets that says it has them, down the mall a bit? It says 'exotic clothing' anyway…"
Helena tilts her head, brows rising as her smile spreads to a grin. "Peter Parker?" she guesses, and there's a definite fondness in her voice. "Funny story, that's kind of what I'm shopping for too. I'm graduating from a different school, but Peter invited me to the whole party thing. I'm pretty sure he's planning on staying in New York, for what it's worth. Science Fair managed to get him set up pretty well with ESU."
When Sarah suggests the other store, she pauses, smile flickering as she holds back amusement. "I mean, if you want to go to the exotic clothing store, you can. I've just got this feeling it might mean 'exotic' less like models and more like strippers."
"Oh my gosh! Yes, it is exactly that person!" Kori exclaims. She laughs, loudly. "That is so the funny! Peter was the first student who I met at school. Oh, joy!" Kori *crashes* into Helena, but at least it's with a hug. "Then we are friends doubly, for we are both friends of Peter and friends of each other now!"
She releases Helena (sets her back down, really) and looks to Sarah. "Friend Sarah, if you believe this is a good place to find a dress, I will trust you," Kori assures Rainmaker. "But I think I should buy this dress, as it is very pretty and I may need to attend many graduation events in the future. I will retrieve my other clothes!" she announces, and wriggles out of the dress and sets it aside before walking back to the dressing room to get her original outfit back on.
Sarah's lips part as she starts to say something and Kori just…sheds the dress. Again. There may be a faint 'guh' sound from the tall Apache as her head turns slightly to watch her go, before she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. "Right, well..I'll just…pay for that. Graduation gift for you, right?" And so she does, and then the trio can make their way to the othre store. Which…okay, Helena is sort of right! IN that it appears split between more exotic styles of dress that one could wear in public, and more intimate apparel that isn't really intended to be worn without something over it. Or in private. Very private, in some cases. There's as much leather as silk on display.
Sarah just lets outs out a sigh and rubs her face. "Right so…ONLY the stuff on the left, Kori. That is clothing for wearing in public." And she doesn't think her heart could take Kori on the other side of the store. She quick marches towards the quipao displays!
Helena laughs as Kori sweeps her up, but returns the hug. "Well, glad to be your friend," she grins once she's set down. "I can't imagine being your enemy." She keeps any further thoughts about the upcoming store to herself, though once they get there and she's proven right, she can't quite hold back a little snicker.
"Well. I did warn you." Hands in her pockets, she follows the others into the store, looking around idly. Given the way her parents behave, there's frankly very little that shocks her anymore.
Kori looks left, then right, then does the 'L' thing with her hands and veers to the left. She plows into a bunch of clothing on display and for a few seconds, all can be seen is her bobbing red mane heading towards the changing rooms (which some stuff employee had *insisted* on her using).
She emerges from the changing room wearing a blue and white qipao, the high collar a contrast to her bare arms and the slit in the dress that goes up to the join of her hip and pelvis. "This is very much the prettiness!" Kori exclaims. "But is it too much fabric for the graduation party, do you think?" She turns once in place, looking back over her shoulder at herself.
Sarah mmphs. "…you did." she agrees with Helena. "But as long as she stays on this side, should be fine…" She hopes. She watches Kori disappear with the pile of clothes with a faint little smile, then glances over to Helena. "So, which school did you say you went to? Peter's? Or another one?" she wonders.
When Kori re-emerges she looks over the latest outfit thoughfully. "No, it's fine…you don't HAVE to go super short. It's more elegant, like I said. And less likely to have a chaperone tell you to go put something on." she adds, wryly. "But it slits up the side so you can still move. And plenty of female warriors have kicked ass in outfits like that, so…should be good for anything energetic you might want to do. Could try gold and green too, if you wanted?"
"Private school," Helena waves a hand to Sarah. "Midtown's great, but it would've been a heck of a commute, and then there were security concerns, so." She shrugs, as if that's a perfectly normal thing to say or worry about. "You could get it trimmed if you wanted, but I think it works out all right," she says thoughtfully. "A different material might do it, too. Maybe something in a cotton or a linen instead of the silk."
Back into the morass of clothing she goes, and when Kori emerges against she's found a cotton dress with a skirthem so short it almsot qualifies as a shirt. But it *is* in gold and green!
She tugs repeatedly at the diamond-shaped scoop neck under the collar. It's matched by a similar backless cutout for the garment. "Helena, how did you meet friend Peter?" she inquires of the woman, curiously. "He is very sweet and cute, but I have observed that he is very much a 'the nerd'," she remarks. "He knows me, and I know his friend Mary-Jane Watson and Harry Osborne. He has not introduced me to any new friends, however!"
Sarah mutters something under her breath that sounds suspiciously like 'oh god there's two of them', then valiantly tears her gaze away to look back at Helena. "Ah, yeah, it's weird that you two both know him. Guy gets around, I suppose?" She tilts her head. "I mean, if he's a bit techie guy, you'd think he'd be at one of those fancy top student sort of tech schools or something."
"Science fair, as a matter of fact," Helena chuckles with a glance to Sarah as she answers Kori. "He's pretty much always in the regional finals, I usually manage to at least get close. Never beaten him, though. I mean, we've run into each other off and on a few times, but this year we finally got a chance to really talk and…"
The entire right side of the store hardly made her blink, but now she blushes slightly. "Well, people can say what they want about nerds, I guess, but I don't see anything wrong with it."
"Well, he *is* very intelligent," Kori agrees. "And surprisingly physically robust!" she adds a beat later. "Most of the nerdly types are not good at athletic activities. But he is 'the shred'," she assures Helena. "I do not know why, of course. Oh!" She grips Helena's arm in a hug, beaming. "You will very much like his 'Aunt May'. She is very sweet and loves to cook pies!"
She looks back to Sarah. "Friend Sarah, which dress should I get?" she asks, leaving the final decision in Rainmaker's hands with an expression of implicit trust. "You know more about the culture of the high schools than I do."
She pauses, and her eyes go wide. "Oooh! Friend Helena, as you are going with friend Peter— Sarah, would you go with *me*?" Kori inquires, wide-eyed. "It would be very nice to attend the dance with someone as pleasant as you!"
"Heh, science fair, huh? Well…nothing wrong with smart guys." Rainmaker says thoughtfully a hand on her hip, shrugging her shoulders. "Cool that you're going with him though…."
Then Kori emerges and asks her opinion. "Well, I still think that the green looks-" the native girl starts to say, then gets her train of thought promptly derailed by the second question.
"…h-huh?" she says intelligently, her brain starting to run in little screaming circles mentally. "W-wait, you're asking me to…to the dance?" The tall girl seems utterly thrown for a moment, her eyes a bit deer in headlights. "Uh…I…um.." She stammers a bit, a foot twisting a little as she reaches up to nervously brush a finger along the tip of the long braid hanging in front of her right shoulder. "Um…ah…s-sure…sure, I'll go with you." she says, her eyes locked on Kori now.
"I have met his Aunt May," Helena laughs softly. "And she is very nice. And does make excellent pie. I think they're coming over for dinner soon, actually. Which should be interesting, because Alfred is usually a little touchy about people taking over his kitchen, so I'm tempted to put a camera in there just to watch."
As Kori invites Sarah, she grins broadly. "Well, there we go. Sounds like it'll be a great time for everyone, right?" And she's successfully avoid the topic of Peter's abs.
"Oh, joy! What a wonderful day!" Kori declares, and applauds in front of her sternum. She even hops twice, looking beamingly enthusiastic. "Thank you, friend Sarah! I will feel much better with you as company. I am always making the mistakes when I am attending these social events," she confesses. "I am trying to learn your customs but they still confuse me a great deal."
She moves to a chair and drops into it, looking up at Sarah and Helena. "You two seem much more familiar with the dancings and the rituals than I am. Where I am from, dances are reserved for declarations of war and expressions of courtship. I do not wish to inadvertently offend someone with the wrong gestures. Is there anything I should know about these parties? What is it I am expected to do?"
Sarah gets a faintly sheepish look. "Ah…" She sighs. "…I don't know, I've never been to one, since I was stuck…ah…" She says, pausing as she realizes Helena is there. "…um, I didn't really get to go to any. Strict family." That and hiding out from evil covert black ops units and all that. "I mean, I can dance, but…never danced at an actual dance." She twists her lips in a faint frown. "But, ah…mostly it's just for fun? Depending on the dance. Fast dances, they're mostly just to move to the beat, have fun, maybe show off what you can do. Slow dances are more courtship dances, though they don't always have to be. Couples tend to dance them more than strangers though."
"If it makes you feel any better, I'm pretty much only any good at the more courtship type dances anyhow," Helena smiles ruefully to Starfire. "I'm terrible at just dancing to dance. I can do formal dances, the stuff that's got…you know, rules, and patterns. But turn on some music and tell me to move and I reveal myself for the dork I truly am. I haven't gone to a whole lot of dances either," she nods to Sarah.
"I think as long as you have good fun, everything'll be fine. And even if you do something weird, it's a graduation dance. Chances are you won't see most of these people again. So who cares if they think you're weird?"
"Maybe… but I am still worried that I might accidentally communicate that I am declaring war," Kori remarks dubiously. "It seems less likely that I may accidentally propose marriage, I have noticed that marraige is a forbidden topic among my fellow students. And," she adds, tugging at her dress' neck, "I do not think anyone would wish to engage in the ceremonial duel of courtship, so I can perhaps try to do the dancing that you do for its own sake of enjoyment."
She tugs the minskirted qipao off over her head and folds it over her arm. "But if you *do* see someone who looks angry or suspects I am threatning to destroy their genetic community, please assure them that it is just a miscommunication!" she requests. With that, Kori turns on the ball of her foot and heads to the changing rooms again.
She really should be expecting it at this point, the dress coming right back off, but it again derails Sarah as she starts to respond, her eyes blinking a bit as she watches Kori walk back to the changing room again in just underwear. "S-sure. No problem." she answers, before she pauses to rub her face. "…spirits give me strength." she mutters, then glances over at Helena. "….if you're going to be there to, do you mind spotting me on helping her not declare a dance off war with someone? Or marrying them? Please?" she says hopefully.
As Kori heads over to the changing room, Helena leans toward Sarah. "Is it a bad thing if I kind of really want to show her the Step Up movies now? Maybe West Side Story? Even though I know it can only end in disaster?" But then Sarah is asking for help, and she can't really say no to that. "The good news is, I'm pretty sure most of the students at Midtown aren't really the dance off sorts," she chuckles. "But yeah. I'll do what I can."
Kori returns, back in her floofy red skirt and the black tank top with the elaborate cross-strapping over a deep V-neck. "Very well, I will get the longer qipao as well," she agrees, and shoulders a neat but worn old purse while moving her purchases into her free hand.
"I think I just need shoes, and then we are done for the shoppings for today?" Kori queries her friends. "Unless you two need dresses as well! Though I suppose it does not need to be a dress," she amends. "I know there are a few girls who are wearing suits, and a boy who will be wearing a dress." She exhales in exasperation. "I will never be able to keep this all straight! In my home country, we all wear the same thing and no one cares if another person is naked, let *alone* how their attire is configured. You have such silly customs!" she says, and with a cluck of her tongue, heads to the cashier.
"I do need a dress," Helena starts to say, but her phone buzzes before she can say anything else. "Buuuut that's my parents. Looks like I need to head home. Kori, Sarah, it was great to meet you," she smiles warmly, leaning in to give Kori at least a hug. Clearly she's partial to them. "I'll see you two at the party!"