I Unintentionally Became Her Kitten

Chapter 35: Kitten’s First Dress

Stella brushed my hair out and sprayed it with a fine mist until the water dripped down.

She pulled it taught and examined the length.

“So,” she said. “If you want I can transition your cut to something else as it grows in.”

“That might be nice,” I said. The pixie cut wasn't bad but I did miss the longer length.

“What do you think you'd like?” she asked.

“Something with layers,” I said. “Something that might frame my face nicer.”

She nodded, agreeing. “I can work on putting some curtain bangs in or even do a kitty cut. They're all the rage right now.”

“But is getting a kitty cut a little on the nose?” I asked.

“So?” she asked. “If you like it, you like it. And kitty cuts come in lots of variations.” She pulled some more hair away to examine it.

“Okay,” I said. “What does a kitty cut look like?”

She pulled out her phone to pull up some pictures and showed them to me. “I think something like this would suit you.” She showed me a picture of a woman with longer hair and curtain bangs. Her hair fell in gentle wisps and layers.

I nodded. “Yeah. But… how long will it take to grow my hair that long?”

“A long time. It's about a quarter inch a month so about three inches a year… her hair looks like… maybe three year’s time. But everyone's different. And I see you've grown out quite a bit since the last time,” she said and ran her hand along my scalp. “How about I trim up the layers and start thinning it out so it feels more wispy? You don't have to make any commitments today.”

“Okay,” I agreed.

She went about her work, combing, pulling, trimming and then combing again.

“So how has it been here?” she asked. “I didn't really expect you to stick around too long. You were so scared when you first came.”

“I didn't understand what Alisha wanted with me,” I explained. 

“Mm,” she agreed. “She does keep her thoughts to herself for the most part.” There was some more snipping next to my ear and I felt the gentle patter of trimmed ends falling against the salon apron.

“But I think you've had a good effect on her.”

“Have I?” I asked.

“Yes. When she first hired me, we went through entire styling sessions where she only said one or two words. And some clients are quiet but usually there's some chatter at some point. But with her it was just blankness.”

“That does sound like her,” I agreed.

“Well, yes. But the last few sessions she's been engaged with me. I even got her to smile today despite… she doesn't usually have me do her chauffeur or body guard’s or whoever’s hair unless she's got a very stressful event coming up.”

“Oh, yeah,” I said. I wasn't sure how much Stella knew about Tye’s job duties. Or Alisha’s work for that matter.

“So I think you've had a good effect on her,” she repeated. “I don't know if you two are together or not but it isn't really my business either way.”

“That's okay. We are,” I admitted.

“Hmm.” She finished with the trim and sprayed my hair down more before giving it a thorough combing.

The next phase was drying my hair with the blow dryer, which made conversing impossible. The layers fell gently away as she finished each section.

And then she chattered at me about this restaurant she went to over the weekend. I followed along and answered politely but I didn't really understand her fascination with the place.

And then she went quiet, gently separating my layers out and twisting them with some product on her hands.

“Alisha took me to this Szechuan restaurant,” I told her. “I don't know the name but it has amazing food.”

“Mm. I imagine Alisha knows some good restaurants. What's Szechuan food like?”

“It's different,” I explained and went into detail about the difference between the Americanized Kung Pao and the more authentic variety I’d had.

She listened and nodded agreeing with me on things and asking questions about others until finally, she finished my hair with a clap. “What do you think?”

“It's very pretty,” I admitted. My hair was longer than the last time I'd had her do this and she had styled it to bring out the length more. I was already out of the long pixie cut phase and had more of a short layered bob now.

“I'm very glad. Hearing people say that is what makes my job worthwhile.” She pulled the apron away and gave it a gentle shake over the floor so my little pieces of hair tumbled off.

“You're all set,” she told me.

I nodded. “Thank you,” I told her and got off the chair.

“Anytime,” she said cheerily.

I left the bathroom looking for Alisha and Tye just to find them at the dining table.

She looked up and I spotted a little blush as she took me in. I'd done some makeup before Stella got here so I was cleaned up quite nicely. Alisha had never seen me put this much effort into my appearance… but it would've been hard to cover up the marks on my neck and have it blend in without doing the rest of my face.

“Are you ready to go, Kitten?” she asked.

I nodded. “Whenever you guys are.”

Tye drove us. He had also gotten cleaned up by Stella, his hair trimmed short and professional. On top of that, he had worn a suit today. It wasn't anything spectacularly fancy or anything but it was formal. Alisha was in a dark blue dress, formal but understated. Stella had done her hair up in an ornate knot and slid a sparkling hair pin in at an angle. It was hard not to admire how well the look suited her. If there wasn't so much anxiety in me, I'd probably really enjoy this.

I felt underdressed, forced to wear the nicest clothes I had but they still came off quite casual. Alisha had said we'd get a dress but I couldn't be sure I'd find one that suited me. So far, I didn't actually know where we were headed, but it was in a different direction than I was used to.

Alisha was typing on her phone, as always. I could see Matteo’s name at the top but didn't bother reading further than that. It wasn't really my business. I'd let her approach me about anything she wanted to talk about 

Tye pulled to a stop in the heart of the city, where the buildings were tall and I had to crane my neck to see their tops. The sun was harsh as Alisha walked down the street. She blended in better here. The other people were well dressed and it made me feel like a visitor in somebody else's world.

Tye followed two paces behind us, acting far more body-guard-like than usual. The fierceness in his gaze was more pronounced when he was so well-groomed and so obviously watching for danger to his charges.

Alisha stepped out of the walking space and in front of a small vestibule for multiple businesses that climbed up the building.

She gave me a quick glance as I blankly followed and then pushed the door open to go in. I held my foot back a moment for Tye until I felt the weight of the door pull away from it and then scurried to catch up with Alisha. We waited for an elevator at the end of the hall and I tried to see where she might be taking us in the directory, but the elevator arrived before I could puzzle it out.

I leaned a bit closer to her in the small space, seeking her warmth but didn’t have much time before the doors opened again.

There was another small lobby-like area but there was absolutely no furniture and the walls were painted blank. The only sign of humanness was a hung picture of what looked like orchid flowers and a small number plate next to each of two doors.

I followed Alisha as she approached one of these and opened it, letting an unfamiliar smell escape. It was a mix of electronics and perhaps the smell of drycleaning, with a lavender scent blanketing everything.

Inside the room was brightly lit and full of mannequins wearing the kind of dresses that Alisha tended to have.

A man heard the door and popped his head up from where he had been delicately stitching some fabric together.

“Alisha,” he lit up and hurried between a couple racks of colorful clothes. “It’s so good to see you,” he continued. “What can I get for you today?”

He reached out to take her hand with long fingers. There was a bonyness to the joints and a parchment-like appearance to his skin I associated with the elderly. On a second look, he was an older gentleman, but still had a young energy to him.

Alisha accepted the taking of her hand but then herded me in front of her.

“This one needs a dress,” she explained, her free hand on my shoulder.

The gentleman turned his gaze to me and I immediately felt his eyes on my body. It wasn’t like the way Sergei did it. There was no sexual hunger in his gaze, only neutral calculation.

“I see,” he said and released Alisha’s hand to reach over to me.

I stayed very still as he put both hands on my shoulders. “What type of dress would you like?” he asked.

“I-I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve never gotten a dress before.”

“A fine young woman like you?” he asked. He glanced at Alisha accusingly. “Well alright then, what color and what purpose is it for?”

“A nice dinner out,” I explained. “And I like dark colors for formal things. But the exact shade isn’t important.”

“Alright, let’s see what I can find.” He gave me a final look over before turning and beginning to browse through the racks.

I was uncertain how to behave here. I’d never been in a clothing shop like this.

Alisha, however, walked over to a few arm chairs set up next to some empty racks and gestured to another one which I took to mean I should sit.

I did so and tried to find a comfortable position.

The gentleman came back a few moments later with two armfuls of dresses and began hanging them on one of the empty racks.

“So… you have a rather cool complexion so I thought some of these colors might suit you,” he said.

I nodded and stood up again as he made a gesture for me to look through. I browsed through them and felt rather overwhelmed by the choices. There were so many different styles and cuts and the like that I didn’t even know how to describe.

He pushed another empty rack over to me. “Any ‘no’s you can put on here,” he explained.

I nodded, grateful he picked up on my uncertainty. A few dresses were easy to eliminate. Too long–down to my ankles– and not what I needed. I was going to dinner, not a fancy rich-person party. A few more were too light colored and when held against my skin washed out the tone. Another was a rich black which I considered briefly but was turned off by a liberal use of lace around the hem. 

I picked up a dark purple one and found I rather liked it. There was a luster to the material as I passed my hand under it, but it didn’t feel plastic-y like some of the skirts I had picked up with the same kind of sheen.

The gentleman nodded his approval as I held it against my skin to test the color. It was an almost-black shade of purple and reminded me of an early morning sky when the sun wasn’t yet visible but the purple hue was starting to eat away at the darkness.

“I think this one would do,” I said but looked at Alisha for her approval.

She nodded.

“Yes, that’s a good compliment to your appearance,” the gentleman agreed. He made a gesture to a changing stall behind the seating area and I wandered over.

The door shut and I was so grateful it wasn’t the kind of changing stall with a large gap people could see through.

The mirror hung on the wall showed my reflection as I set the dress’s hanger on a hook and started to strip out of my clothes.

I hesitated, running my hand over the dress again. What was this material? It was so soft and drapey and had such a nice sheen to it, but it was also breathable.

I gave up. I didn’t really know much about fabric materials. It would be more worthwhile for me to just try it on and hope it wasn’t the most expensive dress in this place.

Alisha was probably about to mindlessly drop a bunch of money on me again, wasn’t she?

I should get a job, I realized. Even if I continued to live with her and couldn’t contribute much to the household’s funds, I’d be able to pay for my own needs.

That would probably be a good step for me to not be as helpless without her.

I slid into the dress, finding it even more comfortable than I expected but immediately found it to be problematically over-sized. I did my best to zip up the back but couldn’t reach despite my best efforts.

I swallowed and cracked the door open to peak out at Alisha. She stood, seeing my anxiety and came over.

“What’s wrong, Kitten?” she asked.

“I can’t zip it,” I explained.

She turned me around and I felt her hand at the base of my spine, then pulled up until the zipper stopped. I blushed. The dress was loose enough it hung off my shoulders.

“I think I need a smaller size,” I told her.

She shook her head. “It’s supposed to be big,” Alisha told me. “He’ll adjust it for you.”

“Oh… like getting it tailored?” I asked.

She nodded. “Exactly.” Her hands lingered on me but she finally pulled away.

“Are you sure this is okay?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said. “Trust me he will make it fit you perfectly.”

“No, I mean, the price. This can’t be cheap.”

“Kitten,” she sighed. “I know you didn’t grow up surrounded by wealth, but trust me when I say this is nothing to me.”

“But it is…” I said. “It feels like everything to me. I mean just my phone… would’ve been a month and a half of wages when I had a job.”

Her face shifted. “What are they paying people these days?” she scoffed.

“It was over minimum wage so I thought it was pretty good for a crappy job,” I told her.

She put her hand on my head, careful not to ruffle it for once as the styling was still in its pristine condition. 

“It’s okay, Kitten,” she said finally. “If it makes you feel better, I could buy you ten phones before it becomes any kind of expensive to me.”

The mental math happened before I could stop myself. She considered…. twenty thousand dollars… not expensive? How much of the city’s territory did she control?

“Don’t worry about the price, okay?” she asked. “I will let you know if expenses become a problem.”

I nodded, still a little price shocked as she reached to open the door and herded me back out.

The gentleman was waiting patiently, looking pleased as I reappeared.

“Yes, that’s a wonderful color on you,” he said and approached to pull at the excess material. He took some in at every seam, right up to my chest. I grit my teeth as he was suddenly uncertain at my breasts. “I think we may need to get you a proper bra,” he said.

I felt my face heat up.

He noticed and took a step back. “Ah, sorry,” he said. “It’s just… the underwire isn’t your size so it’s making it stick out on the sides. That’s no big deal with shirts but a fitted dress is going to show it… and I’m sure you’ll find it’ll be far more comfortable if it fits correctly.”

I didn’t even know there were different sizes of bra outside of band and cup sizes.

“I’ll help her with that,” Alisha offered. “If you give us the underwires.”

He nodded, “yes, of course,” he said and went off to rummage through some drawers.

I still felt so embarrassed but it was good to know Alisha wouldn’t be letting any strange man mess with my boobs.

She brought me back into the little fitting room and pulled the dress off to my waist. It was still embarrassing as she undid my bra from behind and it fell away.

I was doing my best not to go red in the face but it wasn’t really in my control. I looked away from my reflection as she started to sort through a bag full of what I guessed was under-wires.

“Can you support your breast?” she asked.

I nodded and did so, flinching as she put some icy cold metal against my bare skin. After a few different tests the shock wasn’t so much and I was starting to calm down as it wasn’t so bad with Alisha. She wasn’t ogling me, either, even if I wouldn’t mind if she were. Instead she was focused on her task of sizing me and finally started to compare between two of those curved wires.

It shocked me when she moved to the other side and repeated the same process.

“I didn’t know there were different underwire sizes,” I told her.

“It would be way too much effort for mainstream retailers to accommodate for it,” she explained. “But it makes a huge difference when you’re wearing fully tailored clothes.”

I nodded as she finished.

“I’ve also heard it's a lot more comfortable,” she said and helped me pull the dress back on before we went back out into the main room.

She handed the gentleman his wires back and pointed out the ones that were supposed to fit me.

He nodded and looked them over before wandering off to another section of the store again.

Alisha sat down and Tye resumed his position at her shoulder. Part of me wanted to tell him to just sit down but they were in public-appearance mode and that wasn’t the kind of thing a professional would do.

It was such a contrast to last night when she had given him wine. 

The gentleman came hurrying back with a few fistfulls of bras. He asked for my size and selected one before sliding the underwire in through tiny slits under the cup and gave it to me to try on.

Alisha let me do this on my own. It did feel so much better. There was support in places I had never felt support but the digging and pinching that bras usually gave me when they gave me any kind of lift was nonexistent.

This was the magic of tailored clothing, I realized. I could even admire the curve of my breast in the mirror.

I left the tiny room, old bra in hand. Alisha took it from me and put it in her purse so it wasn’t out in the open while the gentleman finished the adjustment process and finally stood back to examine the mess of safety pins covering every seam.

He nodded approvingly. “I’ll get this all set for you,” he said finally. “If you would like to get changed.”

I agreed and returned the dress to him and he went off to work at a sewing machine in the back as I sat down to wait.

“Would you like some coffee?” Alisha asked.

I nodded but regretted it as she looked up at Tye who took this as his cue to go make coffee.

I didn’t mean to give him more work to do. Especially not demeaning work like making coffee for his boss.

He didn’t make any indication that it was beneath him as he brought back two to-go cups from a machine pushed back against the wall.

I accepted mine with a quiet thank you and took a sip.

It was not particularly good coffee, but I’d been getting spoiled by whatever grind Alisha had at her house that made the smoothest cup I’d ever had. The machine might’ve made a difference, too.

In this time, I decided to text Sophia. There was still a great deal of anxiety in me over meeting Mrs. Takeno and even if I couldn't really go into details about things she could still put in a soothing word or bit of advice.

That advice was, “just be yourself. If she doesn't like that then maybe Alisha’s right to not talk to her.”

This did not make me feel better. It was easy to say something like that when you were separated from the situation.

The gentleman returned with the dress, all safety pins removed and I took it to try on once again.

The fit was exact, I felt myself blush a little at my own reflection. It went down to my knees, the hem having also been adjusted a couple inches shorter. The curve followed my waist and chest exactly and flared at my hip to make a skirt that flowed with my movements.

I sat on the tiny bench provided and almost gasped in disbelief as there was no unpleasant tightening anywhere. It was tighter than my usual clothes, and I would imagine I’d get tired of being in it by the end of the day, but it was far less intrusive than any other fancy clothes I’d worn, which fit me looser.

I went out, still a little embarrassed and the gentleman turned me around, examining the fit with scrutiny.

“You feel comfortable?” he asked me.

I nodded.

“Good, what do you think, Ms Alisha?” he asked.

Alisha nodded with an expression I couldn’t quite place. It wasn’t a bad emotion, but she was definitely hiding something.

Maybe… she liked me in this dress? Or maybe she thought it was ugly… I didn’t know, but she stood and agreed to it.

The gentleman took her card to charge her for it. There was no discussion of price, which made me wonder if it was one of those ‘if you have to ask, you can’t afford it’ times that was so alien to my lower middle-class brain.

Still, I accepted it. Alisha was very honest with me when she was comfortable and she wasn’t uncomfortable discussing money. Not like I was. 

We left the shop, my old clothes neatly folded and put in a small paper bag to carry. I also put my phone in there as I was once again without pockets.

“We have a little bit of time,” Alisha told me as we walked on the sidewalk again. It felt way different now. My legs could feel the air around me and I wondered if I should’ve worn some short shorts or something so I could keep some more security under this dress. I felt… exposed in a way I didn’t like. This was part of being a woman, I supposed though. Alisha certainly never flinched away from dresses and many of the other women we passed also wore them. I just missed wearing leggings under my skirt.

“Would you like to go somewhere while we’re here?” Alisha asked.

I shook my head. “I’m content,” I told her.

She took my hand for a moment, pulling me to walk directly next to her. “How about we just walk a bit then?” she asked. “I don’t feel any need to rush to dinner.”

I glanced behind us at Tye, but his expression was still indifferent.

“Okay,” I agreed and adjusted my pace to keep up with her properly. We walked along several blocks, she occasionally stopped to point out something in a window and ask me what I thought about it. It was mostly clothes and shoes and other things. I couldn’t tell what her goal was, but she was more in her element next to these expensive shops. There was also a building tension in her shoulders I could see as the minutes ticked by.

She really didn’t want to go to this dinner, but when the time came, we went back to the car and Tye got back in the driver’s seat. There was a silence I didn’t dare break as we drove.