‘It looked like a costume too,’ Tori murmurs. ‘This is way better,’ she adds, pointing to the loose-fitting shirt I’m now wearing with beige trousers. It’s white linen, slightly see-through and shows an awful lot of chest, but it works for Romeo.
Olive has stood up. ‘How about this?’
We all look over to her.
‘For Romeo?’ Marian asks dubiously, eyeing the dark red trousers – they’re in a flowing fabric and so wide-legged that at first I thought they were a skirt.
‘No, for Juliet.’
Eleanor immediately reaches for the trousers and holds them up experimentally. ‘Potentially quite cool,’ she says.
‘Don’t you think it would be more suitable to stick to a dress?’ asks Marian.
‘Why?’ Olive snaps back. The mood is still pretty tetchy after the argument over lunch. ‘Because she’s a woman?’
‘No, because it’s classic,’ Nathan comes to Marian’s assistance. ‘Like the play.’
‘They might as well wear their school uniform in that case,’ says Olive, drily.
Nathan doesn’t reply.
‘Well, I think the trousers are great,’ Tori says, into the silence that follows.
‘So do I,’ I add.
‘We’ve made my role so modern that I think it would fit to wear something bolder too,’ Eleanor says, raising her head. ‘Let me try it at least.’
The others nod and Olive hands her a white blouse that’s just as baggy as my shirt. Before she vanishes into the dressing room with Eleanor, to help her out of the dress, she exchanges glances with Tori. It seems to me that she looks a bit more conciliatory than she did earlier.
‘Ta-da!’ Eleanor steps through the curtains with a flourish and does a twirl. The pleated trousers swing out around her long legs. When she stands still, the way the fabric hangs means they actually look like a long skirt. The white blouse has loose, long sleeves and Eleanor’s tucked it into her waistband. She looks stunning.
‘I love it,’ Tori says at once.
‘Yes, isn’t it great?’ Eleanor beams.
‘Sinclair, come and stand beside her.’
I do as Nathan says, looking into the others’ delighted faces.
‘Yes, that’s it,’ says Tori. ‘Do you both feel good?’
Eleanor nods right away and looks at me, and I follow suit.
‘I think we need a Juliet in trousers,’ Tori declares, which wins her nods of agreement. ‘Thanks, Livy.’
It’s ages since I’ve heard that nickname, and it makes Olive flinch slightly too. She mumbles something that sounds like ‘’S OK, no problem,’ and lowers her head.
‘Do you guys find the whole uniform thing really old-fashioned too?’ Eleanor asks, out of the blue. ‘I heard a couple of girls talking about it in the hall the other day.’
‘Yeah,’ says Tori. ‘We were only just saying so at lunch. I’ve been thinking for ages that we need to take a stand again.’
Eleanor looks down at herself. ‘Well, the performance will do it in a way, but we can start before that.’
‘What do you mean?’ asks Olive.
‘We don’t have to make things unnecessarily complicated. We could all just wear trousers to assembly next Monday, instead of skirts.’
‘And get sent back to your rooms to change?’ asks Nathan.
