"You like it?" I twirled around. "It was in my CIO box."Cherished Items Only.
My friends gasped. Most of our boxes contained photos of people long gone, or records, or books, but hardly ever did one contain clothing.
"Was it a wedding dress?" Olive continued to scrutinize the dress.
"Probably." I shrugged. "I was able to refurbish it into something stylish." I twirled again, and everyone but Olive complimented me. We then hurried to get punch and sandwiches and waited for the boys on the other side of the room to ask us to dance.
After eating, I sat politely with my legs crossed, tapping my foot nervously. Milton wasn't here. He'd promised he'd come. We'd been writing secret notes to each other for months now, and now that I was a Young Lady...
"Happy birthday, Eleanor."
My heart skipped a beat as I turned toward the voice. My smile fell when I saw it was Harold, not Milton.
"Thank you, Harold.”
He handed me a present, and I opened it in front of him. "They are leather gloves specifically for the above world. There are plants with sharp leaves that will cut you if you touch them barehanded. Now, you can pick them."
I forced a smile. “This is a wonderful gift.”
Dion's song, “Take Good Care of My Baby” came on, and my chin quivered. Was this some weird sign from the universe? Had he ditched me in favor of someone more attainable? We both knew we had to keep our feelings a secret, but he had made me think he liked me just as much as I liked him.
I asked Harold if he had seen Milton.
He perked up and looked around the table at my friends. "Yeah, he took Cal to get everything ready for, you know"—he leaned in to whisper—"the real party."
"The real party?" I shook my head in confusion. I looked around the table. My friends were grinning deviously.
"It's a tradition," Veronica, my friend with the darkest skin, brightest dress, and smile, said softly, "You don't get to know until it's your time."
I was the youngest out of my group of Young Ladies, and they never stopped reminding me. I crossed my arms like a child.
"Well, now I'm glad Daddy didn't come."
"Eleanor, didn't you notice no one else's Daddy is here?" Helen, the redhead, motioned around the room. I blinked in surprise when I didn't see a single Daddy in sight. She squeezed my shoulders. "It's a rite of passage. You didn't convince him of anything. He's letting you go with us."
"Go where?" Something about this didn't feel right. My nerves were on edge.
Pearl cleared her throat and smoothed her lavender dress. "Will you keep your voice down? We're going to the above world." She said it in a way that made it sound like a secret, but we'd all been there countless times.
"Tonight? Alone?"
Our Daddies would never allow us to go above in the dark, let alone without them.
Olive stood and lightly shoved me. "No, dummy, we’ll have the DITs. It’s just us, having fun for once."
My stomach churned. I'd never gone up alone before.
Not without my Daddy.
Rule Two - Eleanor
Everything is a risk in the above.
"Should I change?" I asked after we cleaned up the party and were leaving the rec room. "Or will we be seen if we go back?"
"Well, normally, we don't," Veronica said, giving me a side-eye. "Young Ladies don't need to wear PARA Suits, so we can go right on up. However, you are wearing white..."
"It's gonna get dirty." Olive smirked. "And not in the good way."
