SURROGATE : Conception (+18) BOOK 1 (COMPLETE)

| 53 | Somehow Transformed ||

"Are you okay? You've been, bouncing your leg like you're going before a judge on your 3rd DUI."

Penelope frowned over at Frida before looking down at her own freshly manicured hands. She exhaled as they were on their way to her final fitting. The final fitting was the same fitting that she would meet Catalina Viselli. The Catalina Viselli! She looked down at the hard cover of her sketchbook. She decided, after much deliberation, to bring her work.

"Okay, you're driving me bonkers." Frida said, putting the car in park in front of their destination. "What is going on with you?"

Penelope exhaled before glancing at Frida from under her lashes. "Catalina Viselli introduced me to fashion. She's inspired so much of my work that meeting her just feels surreal."

"Hold up a minute." Frida held up her pointer to emphasize her point. "Your work?"

Penelope nodded, presenting a sheepish smile.

"You design clothes!"

"Yes."

"Holy shit!" Frida exclaimed a broad smile distorting her freckled face. Why didn't you tell me? Is your work in there?" She nodded at the sketch pad.

Penelope nodded.

"Let me see then."

She handed it to the woman. Who flipped through will gasps and comments. "I can't believe you didn't tell me you designed clothes. Hello! I would totally want you to custom design some things for me. It'd make all my friends jealous." She smiled at that.

"Dare I ask how much this beauty costs?" Frida asked thirty minutes later inside Catalina's shop while she ogled the dress on an adjacent manikin.

"Well," Catalina said, "Once it's complete it will have ten thousand dollars worth of crystals on it, so maybe twenty-five thousand dollars."

"Oh, wow, it is lovely isn't it. Who is it for, might I ask?"

Catalina paused pinching in an area around the bust of Penelope's dress before she placed the pin. "Vanessa Lynn."

"The actress?"

"One in the same. It's for the Oscars."

"This train is beautiful." Frida bent over to look at the detail in the displayed dress.

"Yes, I was trying something new on that one." Catlina said dismissively with furrowed brows all her attention focused on Penelope's dress.

"You always had a way with trains." Penelope clamped her mouth shut but it was too late. She already spoke, didn't she?

"I had a period indeed." The woman kept working unbothered.

"Is that the same thing with sleeves." Lord, more speaking. "I remember the sleeves in your fall collection a handful of years ago, the exotic bell sleeves, I believe is what the magazines called them. Do you remember that?"

Catalina laughed a little bit. "Yes, I do remember those sleeves. Dear God, that's been so long ago it feels like." The woman laughed a little bit more. "I called it my sleeve phase." There was silence as she pinned a couple more places on the dress. "Hmm."

Penelope frowned. "What?"

"Suppose I'm just wondering why I stopped designing like that."

Penelope shrugged. "We all evolve as designers."

"We?" The woman was now crotched down focused on something. "You design?" She looked up at Penelope even as her trained hands kept working.

"Uh, yes." Penelope swallowed the lump. "I do. Those sleeves were some of the first bits of inspiration that went into my sketchbooks."