Nine
Ashley
I am having so much fun! I adore shopping, I always have. But it’s not like my mother ever wanted to take me shopping and Robin was always too concerned about his masculinity. Maybe if I’d had some friends who I wasn’t having sex with we could have hung out sometimes but a woman gets tired of being asked to buy absolutely everything that someone lays eyes on, you know?
But it’s totally different with Jess and Alex. My two lost waifs are wandering around at my side with eyes like kids let loose in a toy store (which is one of our stops, by the way). We stop in a shoe store and I tell Alex to grab anything he likes the look of while a neatly dressed saleswoman measures Jess’s feet and brings out a selection of shoes for her to try on.
Jess is looking at them with big ‘I can’t afford this’ eyes so I have to lean down and whisper in her ear that rich socialites don’t look at price tags which seems to help. She really is a great actress and once she gets over glancing at the hundreds of dollars the shoes cost we can buy her sandals for relaxing in, heels for evening wear and some fabulous slippers with rhinestones on them.
Alex gets these little boots that are just about the most adorable things ever. Even the shop girl is cooing at him by the time we leave.
It feels like being part of some sort of TV show where people are given the chance to get everything they want. Alex is hopping along with a grin from ear to ear and Jess looks dazed and delighted and more like a gorgeous fairy than ever.
We pick up some perfume and I buy enough toiletries and makeup to last for months. Jess keeps whispering brand names under her breath in the kind of way someone does when they’ve never seen them before so I get carried away and put way more than we needed in the tiny shopping basket.
After makeup it’s on to clothes, something we all so desperately need. We grab bathing suits from a cute little store that sells us an inflatable dolphin for Alex to ride on and goggles with cartoon sharks on them that he puts on immediately. Fuck, I’ve never met a kid this cute before.
I find a crew member who agrees to take our bags to our suite for us and then sweep Jess and Alex on to the clothes boutiques. There’s a range of brands selling on board to cater to the rich and privileged who never want to wear anything that doesn’t come with a price tag in the hundreds or thousands.
Of course I want to get a few statement pieces for Jess. The way to look like real old money is to have a few big ticket items that you wear as though they’re old friends. If you act like you can’t possibly wear your dress anywhere dirty because it might get a stain and it cost thousands then you obviously don’t have enough money to replace it.
No, real old money, family money have their favorite pieces that they could replace whenever they like so they wear them everywhere. Then good quality but not necessarily designer wardrobe essentials to mix them with. This much my mother at least bothered to teach me.
I have to pick out a few things for myself in the first store so I get Jess and Alex to brows the evening dresses while I go through the coats at the other end of the shop. There’s this amazing blazer with silver beads embroidered onto the collar that look just punk enough to be sexy without being so punk that it would raise eyebrows at a dinner party.
With my find victoriously held over one arm I head back towards Jess, only to be stopped in my tracks by the sound of the snobbiest voice I’ve heard in my life.
“And I tell you again, madam, I don’t care if you are waiting for your fiance to join you. You cannot use our shop to wait in. We are very exclusive and only cater to the most discerning customers.”
Oh. Oh wow. I didn’t think this really happened in real life.
I round a rack of clothes and see a short blonde looking down her nose at Jess while Jess holds onto Alex with both hands and seems to be caught between terror and anger. This will never do.
“Hey babe,” I say casually, sauntering over to her and throwing an arm around her shoulders. “Look at what I found, isn’t it just my style?”
She sends me a relieved look and then smiles at the coat on my arm. “It’s very sexy, honey. Do you mind telling ‘Marsha’ here that we have just about enough money to shop in this store? I’d love to try on that little number for you.”
She gestures towards a green dress that is about as mini as you can get while still being decent enough to wear it in public with a plunging back and the kind of neckline that leaves things to the imagination in the best of possible ways. My mouth goes dry.
“Yeah I want to see you try that on,” I say. “Take it into a changing room. I trust that won’t be a problem?” Here I inject a hint of the ice that I learned from my father into my voice and flash my credit card.
Marsha quails. “No no! Of course not! Just a misunderstanding.”
“Okay then. Try it on, honey.”
Jess heads off to the changing room with a victorious expression and Alex pretends to be deep sea diving under the clothes racks. I can see Marsha looking at him and normally I’m no fan of making sales staff’s jobs harder than they already are, but she was a bitch to Jess so I’m not going to do anything about it.
A bubbly blonde and tall brunette come in and start chatting away to Marsha as though they’re old friends. I can see about when Marsha drops the knowledge of my wealth into the conversation because it’s like a light switches on and they come over to me with beaming smiles.
“Hey there,” the brunette simpers. “We haven’t seen you around the deck yet.”
“It can get awful lonely on a cruise, maybe we should become better acquainted?” adds the little blonde.
Normally this is about when I’d start suggesting a threesome but instead I only have eyes for the changing room as the curtain twitches and Jess steps out. She looks like a dream, the dress hugging every curve of her body to perfection. I can tell that the two girls are trying to get my attention but I couldn’t care less.
“You look amazing,” I say quietly and the smile Jess turns on me is every bit worth it.
We finish clothes shopping without any issue and on the way back to the cabin we bum