The phone rings and rings and rings, before it finally clicks over to voicemail.

“Hello, you’ve reached the private and confidential voicemail of Rich Howe, Vice President of Bailey Living...”

I hang up before I hear anymore. It’s the tenth time I’ve got his voicemail today, and I could recite it by heart at this point.

I tap my fingers on my desk in irritation. Rich has been so hot and cold lately — the other day he was so helpful in getting me through all that paperwork, but ever since then getting ahold of him has been like trying to catch a mouse in a field.

Or maybe a rat, I think bitterly. I quickly push the thought out of my mind. I have no reason to be suspicious — I’m sure he’s just busy.

I pick the phone back up and try Sasha, but her phone just rings too. I drop the handset down and sigh loudly, even though there’s no one around to hear me.

Bailey Living has an entire floor of offices, and for some reason, Rich’s office is way at the other side of the building. I’m not sure why Dad kept him so far away, but maybe that’s normal for these kinds of offices. I’m so used to working right next to Margaux — literally, I can back my chair up and run right into her — that I find this whole configuration odd.

I slip my feet back into my heels. I’ll just take a little stroll down that way and see if anyone is around. Maybe someone else knows if Rich is out. Geetika has a dentist appointment this afternoon, otherwise I’d just get her to keep trying Rich for me.

I make my way through the office, saying hello to a few people whose names I haven’t yet been able to remember, and then come around the corner where Rich and Sasha work.

Rich’s door is open and I can see his empty desk, but Sasha’s sitting at her computer, clicking away loudly at her keyboard.

“Oh, you’re here!” I say happily.

She barely glances up. “Yes,” she says, blowing on her bangs.

“I tried calling but you must have been away from your desk.”

“I must have.” She’s still clicking and I gnaw on the inside of my cheek to avoid saying something bitchy.

“Is Rich around?”

She finally looks up, blinking at me a few times. “Sorry, no. He’s out.”

“Do you know when he’ll be back?”

“No.” No further explanation, just a slow blink. I roll my eyes.

“Could you just ask him to call me when he gets in?”

She blinks at me a couple more times, which I take to mean yes. Sometimes I honestly think about just firing this woman, but technically she’s Rich’s assistant, and I suppose if he’s happy with her then I should let it lay. But God, I’d love to just tell her to pack her shit and get out of this office.

Of course, she’d probably just blink at me.

I chuckle to myself as I walk back to my office, and then spend the rest of the afternoon, reviewing our ad buys for the coming month.

By the end of the day, though, I still haven’t heard from Rich. I stroll back down towards his office to see if Sasha is still around. Rich’s door is still open, and this time I can see him sitting there, laughing on the phone with someone.

“He’s back,” I say to Sasha.

“Yes.” Blink, blink.

“Did you tell him I wanted to speak to him?”

Blink, blink.

I’m just about to say something when I hear Rich hang up the phone.

“Bree,” he calls out from in his office. “Something I can help you with?”

I leave Sasha alone to blink at the wall and step into Rich’s office.

“Hi Rich. I was just hoping we could talk about some of the reports from this week.”

“Of course. You could have called, you know. You didn’t have to come all the way down here to the slums.”

I fight back a scream. Instead I plaster a polite smile on my face.

“Oh, I know. I just felt like stretching my legs.”

He gestures to the chair across from his desk and I slide into it.

“So what is it in particular you wanted to talk about?”

“Just ... the HR Report?” God. What is it about Rich that always makes me feel so nervous and incompetent?

“Yes?” He raises his eyebrows. “What about it?”

“I didn’t get one this week.” Normally I get a report every week, on Fridays, which outlines any hirings, firings or other dismissals, proposals for new positions, and any other matters that the HR Manager feels need to be flagged for the executive team.

“Must be an oversight,” Rich says. “I’ll call Bonnie for you.”

“Oh, that’s okay,” I say, feeling silly now. “I can call her.” Bonnie Thompson is our HR manager, and she’s actually one of the few people here who’s always nice to me.

But Rich waves his hand. “Bree, I won’t have you troubling yourself with that. I’ll call her and see she gets it to you in short order.”

“Okay.” I rub my hands discreetly along my thighs, surprised to find that they’re sweating. I shouldn’t let Rich get to me like this. After all, he reports to me, not the other way around. But he always seems so competent, and it makes me feel stupid that I’m still just floundering around here. “Thanks Rich.”

“Anything else?” He steeples his fingers together, a gesture that makes him look surprisingly like a cartoon villain.

“Nope. Thanks again for your time.”

“Always a pleasure, Bree.” He turns back to his computer, and it’s clear that our little meeting is over.

* * *

I feel relief when I step into the brownstone and lock the door behind me. Days at Bailey Living always leave me feeling exhausted, even though I seem to barely do anything more than look at spreadsheets and try to wrap my head around this industry and our role in it.

I look longingly at my sewing machine, gathering dust once again on Dad’s dining room table. The cream linen dress I’d started working on ages ago is so close to being finished, but for now it just hangs over the back of the chair, waiting for the time I’ll have to pick it up again. Lately it seems like the only time I get to do any sewing is when I’m at Luke’s on the weekends.

Luke. Even his name makes me smile, and I give myself a brief moment to think about him and sigh happily.

Then the frantic cleaning begins.

After I’d met her at the bar the other day, Luke’s future sister-in-law Celia and I had kept in touch. I had pulled together a few wedding dress ideas for her, things I thought would fit her figure and names of designers who I knew did custom work for reasonable prices.

I’d been happy to help, but part of me is secretly doing it because I thought that maybe Celia and I could be friends. I still don’t know anyone here — other than Luke and the people I worked with. I miss Margaux, and I miss having girlfriends to talk to. I have no idea if Celia and I have anything in common, but she had seemed sweet and down to earth, so I figure it’s at least worth a shot.

I’m just stashing the last of the dishes in the dishwasher when the doorbell rings. I scurry downstairs to find Celia and a petite brown-haired girl.

“Hi!” Celia says cheerfully. “I hope you don’t mind that I brought Hannah?”

“Of course not! Come on in!” I lead them through the house.

“Hannah is Trent’s wife,” Celia explains. “Luke’s other brother.”

“Right! It’s so nice to meet you,” I say. “I haven’t met Trent yet. He’s the CEO, right?”

Hannah nods. “Yeah. Just picture Luke, but with a bit of a stick up his butt.”

Celia snorts. “Hannah!”

“What?” Hannah laughs. “He’s my husband, and I love him, stick and all.”

Celia shakes her head and I laugh too. “Well, to be honest, I’d say Luke has a bit of a stick up his butt at times too.”

Hannah grins. “He does, actually. I mean, have you ever tried to set foot in his workshop? He turns into Scary Luke.”

I smile to myself. I don’t mention the fact I’ve made myself rather at home in Luke’s workshop. No one knows we’ve been spending our weekends together, and I intend to keep it that way.

Not that lying is exactly the best way to start off a potential new friendship, but it is what it is.

“How about Jace?” I say instead. “Any stick there?”

Celia laughs and shakes her head. “No stick there. He’s the most laid back guy on the planet and I’m ... well, let’s just say I’m not. I guess I’m the one with the stick in our relationship.”

We keep chatting about the guys as I pour us glasses of white wine and we settle into the living room. Part of me wishes I could participate more — tell them the truth about me and Luke and the crazy barrage of feelings I’ve been experiencing lately. I make a mental note to call Margaux later — I’ve been avoiding calling her because talking to her only reminds me of how much I miss Bounce, but it would be good to hear her voice again.

“Let me show you the stuff I’ve put together for your dress,” I say to Celia, to change the subject.

I pull out my tablet and move to sit next to Celia on the sofa. I flip open a folder and we start going through a whole bunch of pictures of dresses. At each dress, she squeals louder and then passes the tablet for Hannah to see too.

“I love them all,” she says. She bites her lip. “Except I don’t know if I’m any further ahead now — instead of loving nothing, I love everything.”

“Ha, welcome to my life. It takes me about an hour just to get dressed every morning. Honestly, I think the best thing is to just take these ideas and start trying things on. You’ll get a better sense of what you like once you see it on you.”

Celia’s nodding. “We’re definitely going to do that soon.” She bites her lip, and then looks at Hannah. Something passes between them, though I’m not quite sure what.

Finally Celia looks back at me. “Would you … would you be interested in coming with us? We could make a day of it, maybe have dinner afterwards?”

I look back and forth between them. I feel a little burst of happiness, but I try to tamp it down. “Sure — I’d be happy to come and consult.”

Celia looks surprised. “Oh, not to consult. Just … to come with us. We want to get to know you better, and trust me, I know first hand how hard it is to make friends in this city.”

I can’t keep the goofy grin off my face now. “Sure. I’d really like that. Thank you.”

Celia seems to relax. “Great. It probably won’t be for another few weeks, but we’ll keep in touch. Maybe we can even do something before then.”

“Sure.” I take a sip of wine to keep myself from smiling too over-enthusiastically, and then realize that my glass is empty. “Anyone for a refill?”

Hannah and Celia both follow me over to the kitchen, where I refill our glasses from the bottle in the fridge. We’re just heading back towards the living room when Hannah stops in front of the dining room table.

“This is beautiful,” she says, gesturing to the cream colored dress — or three-quarters-of-a-dress — draped over the back of the chair. “Celia, look at this. Wouldn’t it be perfect for your rehearsal dinner?”

“Oh, that’s just something I’m working on for Bounce,” I say.

“Can I …” Celia asks, setting her glass down carefully and gesturing towards the dress.

“Of course. Just be careful of the pins.”

Celia picks up the dress and holds it up against herself.

“It’s beautiful,” Hannah breathes.

“Is it for sale?” Celia asks hopefully.

I bite my lip, then shake my head. “Sorry, no. It’s for a fundraiser. I have to ship it off to Paris in a couple of weeks, as soon as it’s finished.”

“Oh.” I can see the disappointment in Celia’s face.

“I … I could make you another one though. This one probably isn’t quite your size anyway.”

“Really?” Celia’s green eyes light up, and she looks from me to Hannah and back down to the dress. “I mean, I’d pay you obviously.”

I wave off her suggestion. “We can talk about that later. Let me get my measuring tape.”

Celia giggles and the three of us joke around while I take her measurements, jotting them down in my phone so I don’t lose them.

“Your first Chicago sale,” Hannah says. “Maybe some day you’ll have your own store here.”

“We’ll be your biggest customers,” Celia adds.

I shake my head, laughing. “I wish. I’m way too busy with Bailey Living.”

“Oh, right,” Celia says, chewing her lip. “Don’t you miss fashion though?”

“Like crazy,” I say honestly, looking longingly at my sewing machine. My weekend bursts of productivity at Luke’s aren’t enough to satisfy my urge to create.

“So Bailey Living … is that a temporary thing, then?” Hannah asks. She’s still looking dreamily at the cream dress.

I shrug. “I don’t think so.”

The girls glance at each other.

“It was my dad’s company,” I supply. “And he left it to me. I’d feel way too guilty to entrust it to anyone else. So I guess this is my life now.” I try to laugh, like it’s not a big deal, but neither of them join in.

“I’m sure your father would want you to be happy, above all,” Hannah says gently.

Celia nods. “And take it from me, working a job just because you think it’s what you’re supposed to be doing is a one-way ticket to misery. Before I met Jace, I was a corporate lawyer, but I’m a million times happier running the bar now.”

I shake my head, but force myself to smile. “I hear what you’re saying but … it’s complicated.”

Neither of them look convinced, but thankfully they drop the subject. We finish our wine and make a tentative plan to get together in a couple of weeks, and then I show them out.

Once they’re gone, I wander over to the dining room table and pick up the linen dress. I bite back a grin — it is a beautiful dress, or it will be, when I’m finished with it. Making clothing is the one area in my life where I don’t doubt myself, where I feel confident and the most like the me I’m supposed to be.

I set the dress down with a sigh. None of that matters anymore. Fashion can be a hobby, but Bailey Living is my life.

That’s just the way it is.