After Evy and Liv said their goodbyes to the guys, they walked back to their neighbourhood. During their icecream break they discoved both lived pretty close to each other and they were excited about future sleep overs and craft projects.

“Hey Liv, can I ask you something?”

The girl turned around, her blue hair moving with the motion, and then continued walking backwards.

“Sure!” A genuine smile appeared on her face.

“Do you consider us friends?”

“Ofcourse! Why you ask?”

Evy looked down and stopped walking. She could see a glimpse of worry on the girl’s face as she walked back to her and grabbed her hands. Liv’s hands were soft to the touch. She sighed. She really felt as if she could open up to this girl, but what if she was wrong?

“We moved around a lot due to my dad’s job in the military. I always found it hard to make friends because I rarely understood the social rules of friendship as a kid and the constant moving didn’t help either,” she blurted out, “Whenever I finally thought I had friendship figured out, we either moved or the kids abandoned me because I was too... clingy.” Evy’s eyes started to prick when she said that last word. A few seconds passed and she wondered if she had said too much. Not everybody appreciated her sharing her feelings so openly.

“Oh honey,” Liv finally said, “I won’t abandon you like that, and neither would Jamie or Evan.”

Evy looked up, staring through the purple contacts. Liv pulled her in for a hug, a comforting one. The blonde let herself soften into Liv’s embrace, the tears she so desperately tried to hold back, now wettened her face.

“Thank you,” she murmured almost silently.

“No problem, you’re welcome anytime.” Liv carefully broke the embrace when she felt Evy had calmed down enough, and then grabbed her hand. “Come, let’s get walking again.”

Evy smiled through the tears still clouding her vision. She wiped them away with her free hand. Even though she was an emotional mess and had blurted out stuff about friendship and her feelings, this girl had accepted her, and that was all she felt that mattered right now.

* * * *

Monday arrived and Evy found herself hauling her first sewing machine up the stairs to the the club room. It was a cheap Singer machine she got for her birthday two years ago, but it still worked perfectly fine. Her brand new one (a Brother computerized machine) was still at home. Until she knew how the other members handled this machine, she didn’t dare to bring it. Not to mention how they would handle scissors. She had heard way too many stories of people abusing fabric scissors by cutting paper with them.

“Jamie will be here soon with the other two bags,” Liv mentioned, carrying two herself, “And Evan found a floorlamp that should be bright enough to work with.”

Evy had mentioned that sewing black on black was Hell, so they needed as much light as they could get. Liv refused to open the curtains, something about aesthetics, so they had decided on bringing in a lamp that would suit the occult club’s looks.

“Hey girls,” Evan, with his silvery hair a bit of a mess, called out, “Guess what, I found two lamps! They were even on sale!”

The boy was carrying two lamps, with thin posts, a wide delicately decorated foot and lights that looked like they were made to mimic fire. All in black ofcourse. Jamie trudged behind him, having more trouble carrying his bags than Liv had.

“Liv, did you give me the heavy ones?” he complained, looking at her suspiciously. The girl smirked, but didn’t say anything.

“You bitch.”

They dumped all their supplies in the room, locked the door and then went on to their classes. First Biology with Liv, then Math with Evan. She only saw Jamie at PE, which was on Fridays. That was the only time she had noticed he would wear his hair tied back, the black ribbon moving in the wind.

* * * *

The next few days went by in a haze. On Wednesday they had a general idea of the looks for the festival and they discussed details during lunch.

“Do you really want to wear a corset?” Evan asked Liv, “They are uncomfortable.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve worn one before.”

“Huh, I need to see that some other day,” Liv grinned, “What do you think, Evy?”

“If made well, corsets can be very comfortable and supporting, she said dryly, not noticing the girl wasn’t aksing about that, “I have to order some special boning for it though.”

By now barely anything surprised her anymore about the three people in front of her. They were weird, but the good kind of weird. Evy liked them and all their little quirks. They were pretty open minded, so the fact that Evan had worn a corset before didn’t faze her one bit. Actually, he would probably look really hot in one.

Liv sat up happily. “Then, what will you be wearing?”

“I’ve always wanted to try Lolita fashion, I could probably make a nice dress out of the purple taffeta with black and silver details. I’m going to buy a petticoat though, I hate ruffling tule.”

While Liv and Evy were discussing their dresses, Jamie had taken out his sketchbook and pencil, and sketched any details the girls described. Soon he had two of the four looks down. Evy’s outfit was her purple dress, with a faux lace up detail in black in the front, a high neck decorated with a lace trim and long sleeves that ended in a bell shape. The skirt was to the knees, poofy and gathered at the waist, with several layers of lace and ruffles decorating the bottom. Accessories included a satin belt with a silver buckle (which Evy had to order online too), a classic headbow in the same purple taffeta as the dress, paired with rose patterned, slightly sheer tights and black Mary Janes with a short heel. The tights and shoes were Liv’s, and Evy was glad they turned out to have the same size in shoes.

Liv’s outfit consisted of a high-low black skirt in the satin they had bought, with a blue lining and black ruffles along the hem, a taffeta corset with cups also in black and a flowy blouse in black cotton voile. They decided to add blue boning channels to the corset to match the skirt’s lining.

Evy looked over the shoulder of the guy, taking a closer look at the sketches. “Those look good, Jamie!”

Liv agreed. “Though what do we do for shoes? I do have some black lace up boots that I could replace the ribbons of.”

Evy smiled, loving the suggestion. “Gonna add some blue ribbon to the online order.”

The bell rang, signaling the end of lunchbreak. The group packed up their things and decided on brainstorming for the guys’ outfits after all classes of the day ended.