Love in Ireland

/12/

-Monday August 14th-

"Come on Milena. Just for an hour!" Alannah whined.

"No." I snapped for what felt like the hundredth time. "I spent all day yesterday and the day before hanging out with you guys, and now I'm behind. I should have been done with your dress by now!"

Owen's sixteenth birthday is in two days. And he wanted a big birthday ball. So that means super fancy dresses and suits. I finished the guys' suits in about three and a half days and I've been working on the dresses since then. I managed to finish Mrs. Finnegan's because her dress was quite simple. Bridget's dress I finished a few days ago, and I also started Alannah's dress on the 11th. I worked for a little on the twelve before I was practically dragged out of the castle by Declan, Alannah, and Zach to go to the beach. We spent the whole day at the beach, so I got absolutely nothing done. And then yesterday I was planning to get stuff done, but again they dragged me outside. So now I have only a quarter of Alannah's dress done and I still need to make mine.

"You've been hauled up in here for weeks. We're just trying to get you out of the studio." Zach commented.

"Yeah. But I need to work all day today to finish Alannah's dress and work all day tomorrow to finish mine!" I exclaimed, furiously sewing a stitch and almost stabbing my thumb with the needle.

"Guys, just drop it." Declan sighed. "She does have to do her job. If we want to hang out with her, we can help her like we normally do." I smiled at Declan and mouthed 'thank you.'

"You're right." Alannah agreed, sliding down to sit next to me. "Sorry for nagging you."

"It's okay." I told her. "I get it. Most of the time, I've been in the studio. But I promise after Owen's birthday ball I will be all yours until August 20th, when I have to start sewing the dresses for the cotillion on August 30th. But those won't be as intense, so hopefully I will get more free time."

Alannah nodded. "I can work with four days. And I'll be in here with you as always. Unless I have dance."

"Are you two just going to stand there, or will you make yourselves useful?" I asked, turning my head a little to look at Declan and Zach.

"What do you want us to do?" Declan asked.

"Lets see, it's two o'clock. Zach, can you grab me a coffee and Declan? Can you clean up the scraps from the floor, please?" I asked, sewing a few more stitches.

"Aye Aye captain." They saluted.

Zach left to go get me coffee and Declan picked up the scraps like I asked. When Declan was done, he walked over to where I was on the floor, stitching the embroidery onto the bodice of Alannah's dress. I do have an embroidery machine but I've found that it comes out better on the bodices when I do it by hand. Declan sat down on my left, watching as I pulled the needle in and out of the thick fabric. He was leaning over my shoulder and every so often I could faintly smell his citrus cologne. Zach re-entered the studio with a cup of coffee and handed it to me. I smiled at him and took a sip, letting the ice cold liquid touch my tongue and go down my throat. Once the caffeine was in my system, I started to feel a tad better.

Declan and Zach left after a few hours for fencing practice, so it was just Alannah and me sitting in my studio blasting pop music like usual.

While I worked, Alannah did me a favor and tacked up a few more of my drawings. She moved to the board with our dream dress ideas for this year.

"You know, we really outdid ourselves with these this year." She breathed.

"We did. But that's the fun part. We make these insanely elegant ballgowns and wear them to your birthday ball. It always gives us something to look forward to."