So I went into the kitchen, made her a coffee, put it on the table in front of her and closed the door for her.
‘I love the dress so much, Thelma,’ she said, sadly. ‘I’m really pleased. And I know Ash is too – she’s always like this, though.’
We could still hear her sobs in the kitchen. It was as if she had no way of expressing any extreme of emotion other than this. Crying was the only way she knew to get what she wanted. She’d worked herself up into such a state.
The thing is, you have to remember, this was the day Ashleigh had been dreaming of for years. It’s the same for all my young traveller brides, so while it’s hard to deal with at the time, you have to bear in mind what a big day it is. The trying-on day is when all their dreams are realised – it is their princess moment. But poor Ashleigh was out of control.
Pauline was in the other room trying to deal with it, trying to persuade her to at least try the dress on and see what it looked like on her. She got out the book with the sketch in it and showed Ashleigh that we had done exactly as we were asked. We were at a loss as to how or where we had gone wrong.
‘I know, I know! But it hasn’t got this on, or these flowers!’ she belted out. Her hands were flailing about, pointing at vague areas where she knew that we had not really made any mistakes.
‘But your mum’s only got a certain amount of money, love,’ I heard Pauline say, trying to placate her. I felt that I must step in at this point: ‘Apart from it looking ridiculous if we’d added all the extras you wanted, your mum only has a certain amount that she can pay for,’ I told her.
‘I won’t wear it like that, I won’t wear it like that!’ she kept saying.
‘You’ve already got nine flowers on there for nothing, love – we just did it to try and keep you happy.’
This was true. Despite my instincts, I had actually given her a huge amount of free work and detail, just to try and make everyone’s lives easier. I left her with her pen and paper, trying to make the list of specific problems. Her mum was at the kitchen table, staring down at her mug.
‘I could do with you on the day of the wedding,’ she told me, ‘just to calm her down.’
A little while later Ash came to the door of the kitchen and her face was completely streaked in black from her make-up running, where she’d been crying. Pauline had failed to persuade her to try the dress on so she could see how great it was. So we tried to get her to wipe her face and go and enjoy her moment but we were met with more tears.
‘You know me! You know me …’
And then the crying began in earnest. Ashleigh got up and ran out into the street, where her dad was waiting in the car.
Five minutes later, Marta – one of the girls from the factory – came in from having a cigarette.
‘That girl is still crying out there,’ she told us. ‘She’s just pacing up and down the road.’
Marta was right, but I don’t know whose attention she hoped to get out there because it’s a quiet road by some industrial buildings. It’s not a fancy area, so I was glad that Pauline’s mission to get her into those skirts had failed or she would have been at risk of mucking up her skirts.
She kept going, though. It was like a physical release, like she had to get something out of herself: she was wailing and grabbing at her hair as if she was a mad person in ancient Greece. Even the seagulls were going mad at the noise! It was the kind of crying that always, always gives you a headache when you’re the one doing it. How she hadn’t worn herself out yet …
I watched her for a bit. In the end it was all of us on the street in silence, just watching her run up and down, pulling at her hair. We must have looked as if we were at Wimbledon: heads turning left, heads turning right …
Just leave her, I said. Let her run up and down – she’ll burn it off; she needs to learn to calm herself down. So we went inside and had a cup of coffee.
Eventually we got the dad in and offered him a coffee. He was thrilled to be out of the firing line and before long, Ashleigh had found her way back inside too.
‘I’ve never seen a dress like this in my life,’ her dad said, nodding at the mannequin. ‘It’s something else. But I knew she’d be like this – she’s like this wherever we go.’
She was sobbing and stammering, big wracking sobs that went through her whole body.
The drama was non-stop. You’ve never seen anything like it in all your life. I mean we’ve had reactions in our time – this place is no stranger to a tantrum. But I have never, ever seen a girl react like that – about anything. It was un-believeable! Especially as she couldn’t even specify what was actually upsetting her.
‘What is it?’ I said for the umpteenth time. ‘What is actually wrong?’
It was time for me to put my foot down, as it looked as if no one else was going to. ‘Stop screaming or I’m not going to let you have the dress at all – I’ve had enough! You tell me now: what is it that you want?’
‘Well,’ she began, her shoulders still juddering. ‘Do you think, um, well … What do you think, so what can I do about …?’
Sheepishly she pointed at some areas that she felt weren’t up to scratch. She really was pulling at straws now …
‘Right! You want some of those flowers filled in. I have told you now that your mum does not have the money for any more.’
‘But I want a bigger flower here!’ Her bottom lip wobbled.
In the end we agreed to shuffle some stuff around, to create a different, fuller look. We moved flowers to create different effects.
But then when she tried the dress on, the problems started all over again. ‘I want it tighter,’ she demanded. ‘I want it tighter!’
‘Well, if you want it even tighter than this then we’re going to have to take an inch off each side because the corset is overlapping now.’ Seconds later she’d be gasping: ‘Ooh, I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe! Why, Thelma, why?’
‘You’re saying you can’t breathe and you want it tighter?’
‘Yes, but I still want it tighter.’
‘But if you can’t breathe now, and you have it tighter, think what it’s going to be like then.’
‘Oh, I think I’m going to faint – I just can’t breathe, I can’t breathe!’
In the end, I just said: ‘Yes, we’ll do that,’ just to make her think she’d had it her own way.
It was still another day’s work, though, and we’d put a ridiculous amount of effort into that dress already, and we all knew that she’d just been saying things because she needed to justify the fuss that she’d made – there was no other explanation.
The next morning she returned to see the finished dress with its amendments. Every single girl in the company had worked extra to get that dress how she wanted it: extra flowers, taking in the corset, all of it. In this instance crying really did get her what she wanted, despite everything I’ve always told Katrina, my youngest. I hate to say it, but we just wanted shot of her.
She couldn’t hide the smile on her face when she came in, though – she absolutely loved the dress, and we knew it.
When she put it on, she looked a dream and she could not have been more charming – you’d never have known she could be such a terror and she even laughed about her behaviour with us.
I told her that she’d made such a fuss that I’d put her in this book but she just grinned and looked thrilled that