Sunny Sheer's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

Sunny laid the pouch on her bed and counted her problems. One crooked pouch. Three dresses due Friday. And nothing to sew them from. She opened her closet and found no floral fabric, no thread worth using, just the store-bought dress that started the lie. Panic rose. She grabbed her phone and texted Daisy. Then she carried the blue machine back across town to the tailor's studio. Daisy met her at the door, measuring tape around her neck. "You again," she said, not unkindly. Behind her, bolts of cloth stood in tidy rows. Sunny explained fast. No fabric. No money left after buying the machine. Daisy frowned. "My aunt doesn't give scraps for free. She counts every yard." A girl looked up from the back table. She wore pink glasses and a measuring tape slung across her shoulder. Pins stuck out of her collar like tiny spears. "Isabelle," Daisy said. "She works here part time. Knows this place better than I do." Isabelle didn't smile. She pointed her chin at a bin shoved under the cutting table. "Remnants," Isabelle said. "End cuts. Too small to sell. My aunt tosses them monthly." She pulled the bin out. Sunny knelt and dug through it. Pink floral cotton. A strip of yellow daisies. Blue fabric scattered with small white flowers. Short pieces, none big enough for a dress. Sunny's chest tightened. "These are too little," she said. Isabelle crouched beside her. "Not for one dress. For patchwork." She held two scraps edge to edge. "You sew panels together. The seams become the pattern. People pay more for patchwork than for plain cloth." Sunny stared at the mismatched flowers lining up in Isabelle's hands. A whole dress made of pieces nobody wanted. It could work. Daisy crossed her arms. "My aunt still owns those remnants." Isabelle stood and faced her. "They go in the trash Thursday. I'll ask her tonight." She looked back at Sunny. "If she says yes, you haul the whole bin. But you cut here, where I can show you how to match seams. Mess it up at home and you waste every scrap." Sunny nodded hard. That evening Isabelle texted one word: Yes. The next afternoon Sunny spread the remnants across the cutting table. Isabelle showed her how to pin panels, how to press each seam flat. For two hours Sunny fed fabric through the machine, slow and steady, the way Daisy had taught her. By dark she held up a panel of joined flowers, pink beside yellow beside blue. Straight seams. Her own work. "That's a dress front," Isabelle said. "You've got enough bin for three." Sunny gripped the fabric. The material problem was solved. She had cloth now, and a plan, and two days. But she still had to cut, sew, and finish three whole dresses before Friday morning, and she had made exactly one panel. The clock pressed harder than before.