Loki X Reader || Girl With The Gold Earring

19 | Exposed, Accentuated, Colourful

Getting into the dress took a little while because Y/N was terrified of breaking anything. It wasn't that she didn't trust the obviously high-end material, it was that she didn't trust herself not to jam her leg into the skirt too hard, or her nails not to catch one of the mesh sleeves and push her whole arm right through it. Thus, she climbed into it like a lizard shedding its skin but in reverse; a lot of awkward shimmying and uncoordinated peeling.

When she'd settled in---leaving the back undone for now (she'd tackle that later)---Y/N raised her head to the vast mirror above the sink. She hadn't looked at herself as she'd been getting into the dress; she'd wanted to save it, like a big reveal at the end, for the first time in her life experiencing a slight hint of vanity. She has never been a largely vain person, although, perhaps that is down to the fact that, the way she sees it, she doesn't have anything to be vain about.

When she did raise her head, she didn't recognise herself.

Well, she did. If anything, she looks and feels more like herself than she ever has. That is clearly her staring back from the glass, awestruck, lips parted, her whole expression a series of 'O's as she gazed at her reflection with wide-eyed wonder. That's her chest, her neck, her hips, her hair, the tight little bun atop her head. But Y/N has never seen those features in this way before, so exposed, so accentuated...so colourful.

She looks alive.

The dress clings, all of it clings softly to the curves of Y/N's body, highlighting them, complimenting them, presenting them in a way no item of clothing she's ever worn has. She's used to drab dresses so stiff with starch they barely bend enough for her to lean over, let alone hint at her figure. But this dress...it's almost as though it's doing it on purpose, with a consciousness. Like it's taken a good long look at Y/N's form and is saying 'Yes, we'll emphasize this bit here' and 'This area is gorgeous, let's pay attention to that'.

After many minutes spent just gawking at herself, Y/N eventually moved her hands tentatively to her back to begin the tricky business of doing the thing up. She'd known it would be difficult as soon as she'd seen it; many complex strings of ribbon, weaved and knotted into a labyrinthine pattern that was pretty, as well as constructed to securely hold the dress together just right, giving it that perfect figure. Y/N had had to undo the mass of ribbon to get into the dress, and she tried to conjure the memory of it now in her head and reverse it, then replicate it with her hands.

She managed a few knots, looping the ties clumsily into what she could only assume were the right holes. The ribbons kept slipping from her fingers like tens of tiny eels, the slick whispers of silk against the pads of her fingers seeming to tease her graceless attempts as they fell free just for the fun of it.

After several admirable minutes of stubbornness, Y/N rendered the feat impossible---on her own, at least. She can't see what she's doing, and the mirror is no help; throwing her reflection back the wrong way just to confuse her fumbling fingers.

'This is why upper-class women have ladies maids to dress them,' Y/N thought with a defeated, silent sigh. She doesn't have a maid because she's an imposter, a poser, only pretending to be part of this world. She has no one to help her figure out this (what is now a) tight tangle of dainty ribbons---

No one except Loki.

-- ❈ --

Humiliated, Y/N used both her hands to clutch the back of the dress together as though it's an open wound, and nudged the door with her foot. Bashfully, and with an uncomfortable heat scorching the tops of her ears, she found the prince waiting for her, lounged on a divan with a book spread neatly in one hand.