xx49.07.30 | 12:49 | Still Wednesday

THAT. WAS. AMAZING. Let me start right where I left off last time, the whole morning has been great—I know I should be more serious, I know there are so many things to be worried about and even scared of but SERIOUSLY I HAD THE BEST MORNING EVER.

First of all, Mum turned around as we stopped outside this cute little shop and said (more like announced actually):

"We are going shopping."

"For clothes?" I asked. I may have been a teensy bit excited. "Is it for clothes? Is that the appointment? At this place, is this a clothes shop? Is that name there the name of the amazing person who owns the shop who's going to make amazing clothes for us, is that what's happening, is that what's happening right now PLEASE TELL ME THAT'S WHAT'S HAPPENING RIGHT THIS INSTANT."

AND IT WAS! The guy's name is Briq and I am UTTERLY convinced that he has a superpower and that superpower is BEING AMAZING AT CLOTHES. His shop is so cute and amazing too, it's just small, I mean not big, not tiny but not huge, just a perfect size really, with all, you know, amazing lights and smooth walls and just, oh, it's perfect. I can't even describe it, there are some mirrors I guess, and lights, I mentioned those, and it's kind of brown and kind of blue and I know that doesn't sound that perfect but trust me it is PERFECT. There aren't even any clothes around, just like twenty assistants who scurry in and scurry out and none of them EVER say anything and Briq is like, I don't know, he's like the conductor of his own clothes circus—no, that's totally the wrong way to put it, it's not a circus, it's ... it's MAGIC.

So anyway, let me just take a moment here to calm down, a few deep breaths, a sip of my vanilla milkshake (it is the BEST vanilla milkshake), a little nibble at my dessert slice, I'm not sure what it is but it's got banana and caramel and it's flaky and crumbly and chewy and pretty much the best thing to ever exist in the history of the world. We're at a restaurant now, by the way, Mum's gone off to do something and Dad's talking to C2 about some of his early adventures, Golden Age stuff, I've heard the stories way too many times and the Golden Age isn't my favourite anyway so I'm just writing this.

So yes. So anyway. So at first Mum was actually kind of rude but I'm used to that, she was all 'oh C2 we'll pay for your clothes too seeing as your family is so totally poor', not exactly those words but you get what I mean. I know, I know, full-strength honesty curse but still. C2 was great about it, she said about how it's true, how her family IS poor, although of course they have enough money for clothes, although if I'm honest (and I don't have a choice) I kind of doubt they'd be able to afford Briq's clothes. What's that expression, 'if you have to ask, you can't afford it'? There weren't any prices in Briq's shop. There wasn't even, like, a place to pay. I guess Mum and Dad sorted it out beforehand or afterwards or something, he certainly seemed very pleased to see them ... anyway, enough of that boring stuff, back to the DRESSES.

Oh, the dresses.

Oh oh, the dresses.

C2 hasn't ever really worn a dress before, she's not a dress sort of person. I could tell she was nervous but like I said, Briq's a genius. Actually I don't think I did say that, but it's true, he is.

"Oh, what a treat," he said, before pretty much anything else, just totally went straight to C2 before Mum or Dad or me. "Those hands, those shoulders, that potentially gorgeous hair—you are hiding yourself, but there is nothing wrong with that. Some things are all the better for their mystery, some beauty should remain hidden. To give everything away, that is a true shame. Your name?"

"C2. Charlotte Crescent. C2."

"Charlotte, the same as your friend—to whom I will attend once we have perfected you, C2. Now let me see. Let me look at you. Those shoes, those we will keep. They are yours, truly and completely."

C2's shoes, she DOES always wear nice shoes, those shiny black things I've never actually learnt the proper name of but which I always think of as 'school shoes'.

"Now. Now now. To the body. Behind here, please, and I will be with you momentarily."

While he spoke Briq guided C2 behind a kind of elegant screen thing and some of his assistants rushed off to fetch things for her—I have no idea how they knew what he wanted them to get. Anyway, while that happened it was MY turn.

"Now to you, Charlotte Powers, and what a 'you' it is. With this, I will have fun. Your body is so playful, so lean and firm and, ah, just nice. What you're wearing now, it goes, all of it."

And it went. All of it. Even my armour, which I felt kind of naked without, out here in the real world. I guess you have to make some sacrifices for style, though. Sacrifices I am MORE than happy to make. Anyway, while that was going on Mum and Dad were getting their clothes, too—Briq wasn't attending to them, he had his silent assistants doing it, his special attention was just on C2 and me, which was, I can't lie, fantastic.

Anyway, while I was being measured and so on—and they did it without touching me ONCE, so impressive—C2 was actually trying on her dress, and by the time I was ready to see what Briq had for me, she was wearing what he'd chosen for her. And smiling. And blushing. And SMILING.

Briq really got her. I'm going to try extra-hard to describe the dress properly, because it really deserves it. Where to start, though? I'll try for a general description and try not to use the words 'elegant' and 'perfect' too much. It's an elegant (whoops!) brocade and gleaming satin ankle-length gown with a hooded bolero jacket to cover, all in shades of utterly beautiful bronze with a subtle floral pattern. It was like C2 was wearing the world's most beautiful and graceful trenchcoat, except that doesn't do justice to it at all. It didn't exactly hide the shape of her body, which is ... I don't want to be mean, I think C2 is VERY pretty especially when her hair isn't covering her face, but her body is kind of, I don't know, is there a nice way to put this? Clunky? No that sounds awful, try again Charlotte, solid? I'd say 'boyish' but she's actually kind of tall and she's got great shoulders so maybe 'mannish' but again no, that sounds terrible—she's not unfeminine but she's not un-unfeminine? Does that make ANY sense? I really wish I was better at this stuff. Somewhere out there is the perfect description for how uniquely beautiful C2 is. I just don't know how to find it.

Well anyway, I'll just say that the dress made the parts of C2 that maybe she wouldn't particularly want people to notice seem totally unnoticeable, and it made the parts of her that are great totally amazing. Three of the assistants brushed her hair out until it shone, and clipped away some of the split ends, and sprayed this magic stuff in it that made it look just amazing, and then Briq did the final arrangement, which was just basically him gathering C2's hair up and then dropping it, and it just kind of naturally fell around her shoulders and made her look almost TOO good.

While C2 was staring at herself in some mirrors and blushing and smiling, Briq turned his full attention to me.

"Your wonderful arms we leave uncovered, your shapely neck we expose for admiration, the fire of your hair ... the fire of your hair is what we shall build around. Have you a favoured colour?"

I was kind of in a daze and I've always liked the grey-black colour of my stealth armour so I stammered out: "B-black."

"Oh, no no no, black is not your friend, Charlotte, black makes you look sallow and weary. To begin, we will attempt convention. Green. Emerald green, to bring out the sparkle of your eyes and to complement your blazing fire."

Okay, so here we go again—I didn't actually pick this dress but Mum bought it for me anyway, so I guess I'll describe it. It was emerald green, like Briq said, except lighter near the top and darker near the bottom, either silk or something even better than silk, it felt wonderful against my skin. Briq said it has a halter neckline and petal sleeves, to me it just looked like a princess dress. He did the same thing for my hair as he did for C2's, except with mine he had to make some adjustments so it flowed nicely back over my shoulders.

Like I said, I didn't actually go with that dress, but when I was looking at myself in the mirror, wearing something so beautiful, I have to admit I kind of got a bit teary.

"Natural, natural," Briq said, as he made tiny adjustments to my posture and the dress, somehow improving on perfection with each movement. "But my feeling is that convention is not your strength. Away with this dress! Burn it!"

"No!"

"Jesting, jesting, I would not burn such a thing. But it is not for you, not for this night."

Which is when Mum stepped in and said we'd take it anyway. She's great, my mother.

"Now now now," Briq said, as the next dress was brought out. "Something interesting for an interesting girl. On with this, and we'll see what we can see."

If the first dress was something a princess might wear, this dress ... it was something a superhero might wear. A superhero princess, whose power was 'super-style'. When I first saw it I thought 'oh, it's kind of old-fashioned' but then ... then I don't know, it's not old-fashioned, it's almost futuristic, except not in a cheesy way, in a totally awesome way. I have to use Briq's words to describe it because I don't have any of my own:

"A densely ruched chiffon gown in ombre tones, washed-out purple-grey melting down into pink, with a sweetheart bodice and an uneven hem to make you float like the ethereal being you are."

"I'll take it. We'll take it. Mum, this is—I'll take it."

I got a little excited, I admit. I wish I could have just worn that dress forever but I'll have to wait until tonight, I CAN'T wait! I mean I can, obviously, or I have to, or oh, I don't know. Anyway, Dad just got a boring but nice suit, in his old colours of blue and gold, and Mum chose a kind of out-there strapless thing in the same colours. She looked really good, although not quite as good as C2 and me. Hey, I can't lie!

Before we left C2 and I got together in our dresses, Mum wanted photographs, and we were kind of giggling together (okay so I was doing most of the giggling but C2 was in a really happy mood too) about how it's going to be so much fun tonight—important too, of course, but mostly just SO much fun.

"I admit, I wasn't quite looking forward to tonight's event," C2 said, just before we had to take the dresses off again. "But now I feel more positive about it."

"I know EXACTLY what you mean," I said. "It's been really hectic and kind of weird since we got here, but in this I feel ready to face ANYTHING."

After we got changed back into our 'street clothes' Mum and Dad took us to the restaurant that we're in now, not super fancy but really nice and with awesome food, and now I guess we're just going to wait until tonight, for the big meeting. Oh, I started telling Dad about the georod plant and Galaxy Tower, but apparently Daniel already sent them all the relevant information. They've arranged for extra security on both places, which kind of surprised me.

"We may be old," Dad said to me, "but we're not entirely useless. Mr Falchion was a great help, he has a lot of influence in this city."

Dad hasn't said anything but I'm pretty sure Mr Falchion helped organise tonight's thing too. I'm so excited about meeting everyone that I have to stop myself from thinking about it too much—and it's not just the old supers like Trigger Harpy and Lightning White, it's going to be NEW supers too, 2nd Gens like me and New Powers like C2. Her parents said it's okay for her to attend, C2 called them earlier. I said hello too, they were lovely as usual. They said how proud they are of C2, apparently she sent them some articles about Mum and Dad from back before The Event and now Mr and Mrs Crescent are total superhero supporters, it's kind of sweet actually.

...

Mum's back now, and the first thing she said to me was 'don't ask where I've been', so of course I couldn't. I have to respect the wishes of someone with an honesty curse, as much as curiosity BURNS inside me. Dad's going off to meet up with someone (I just BET it's Mr Falchion) so C2 and Mum and I are just going to walk around this area, there are lots of interesting shops and things. It's really nice to feel normal for once, this is what normal girls do, right? Just go out shopping with their mother and best friend? I see this sort of thing on TV all the time so it must be normal. I plan to enjoy it, anyway. I probably won't write again until tonight's meeting, I bet it's going to be a long entry!