Sequins, Secrets, and Silver Linings by Sophia Bennett

massive turquoise necklace and purple patent Bally heels.
    “Like the outfit, Granny.”
    “Of course you do, darling. You have taste. Or you will shortly, when you grow out of this metallic phase. I’ve come to meet your friend Crow. Your mother has told me all about her. By the way, Sally’s taking an age to make tea and I’ve been here for hours. Will you be so kind as to introduce me?”
    I’m a bit surprised. Granny doesn’t usually ask to meet my friends. She wasn’t remotely interested when Jenny came back from her first trip away shooting with Hollywood’s Sexiest Couple Alive, and only talks to her because she met Sir Lionel at a few house parties in the seventies. She’s tried to make an effort with Edie, buthaving established that they don’t have any friends or relatives in common, she quickly ran out of things to say. Edie thinks Granny is a certifiable loony and doesn’t like to be left in a room with her, which doesn’t exactly make for a great relationship. So what Granny’s going to make of a little black immigrant girl who lives with her aunt in a flat off Gloucester Road, I can’t imagine.
    Nevertheless, I’m curious. I’m about to take Granny downstairs when I realize that Crow’s been standing behind me the whole time, observing Granny from the shadows with a sort of half smile. So I bring her into the room and Granny holds out her hands.
    “Darling child! What a pleasure! Sally has been telling me all about you. I’ve been looking at those beautiful drawings you do. I sense the influence of Dior and Balenciaga. Are you a great fan of Dior?”
    “Yes,” Crow whispers, sitting at Granny’s feet. She doesn’t know this, but it happens to be the perfect thing to do. Granny was brought up in an age when children sat at their elders’ feet and looked up at them adoringly. We, of course, tend to curl up on the sofa and eye people like Granny a bit suspiciously, which doesn’t go down so well.
    “My mother bought one of the original New Look designs in nineteen forty-seven. Do you know,” Grannygoes on, “when I was a girl I wore Dior regularly to all the best places? Oh, those Paris fittings! What a joy!”
    “Did you know Yvette Mansard?” Crow asks eagerly. “She worked for Dior.”
    “Yvette?” Granny thinks for a minute. “In the atelier flou ? She specialized in dresses, didn’t she? She was a legend. Is she still alive? She must be ninety.”
    “She’s ninety-two. She’s been teaching me.”
    Granny smiles a huge smile and practically kisses Crow, who’s succeeded where all my other friends have failed. She and Granny have a friend in common. And not only that, but a friend who reminds Granny of the happiest time in her life, before all her family money was spent on her mother’s boyfriends, death taxes, repairing the roof, and educating Mum and Poor Uncle Jack (who lives in a bungalow in East Anglia, mends MG sports cars, and is rumored to Take Drugs), as we are so regularly reminded.
    At this point, Mum arrives with a tray laden with china cups and saucers, teapot, milk jug, and sugar bowl (Granny doesn’t take sugar, but is appalled if the bowl isn’t included). Granny waves her away.
    “Your delightful guest and I are going to visit the workroom. We have lots to talk about. Please don’t disturb us.”
    And off they sweep, Crow happily trailing in Granny’s wake. Mum and I look at each other in mild disbelief and I help her take the tray back to the kitchen.

    As usual when Granny visits, she takes over all our lives. Luckily for him, Harry’s traveling in India, so he’s spared the normal inquisition about his studies and his love life. Mum, however, is investigated at length about her love life (lack of) and pronounced SO disappointing. I’m allowed not to have one, for the time being. Instead, I become the family fetcher and carrier and have half my wardrobe vetoed as too weird or too tarty. Crow is treated like the family star.
    Granny takes us all