Sorpresa looked at her finger and saw a jagged cut. “Ow,” she said, “something bit me.”
Madame Rochie giggled. A very girlish sound for the haggard crone.
Sorpresa’s mom ran to her and inspected her finger. “Looks like you found a stray pin, sweetie. You really shouldn’t be touching the dresses before their finished.” Mom looked up at Madame Rochie whose belly still jiggled with laughter.
“Oh that dress is finished,” said Madame Rockie. “It has been waiting for just the right wearer for a very long time. Would you like to try it on, little destructioness?”
Sorpresa didn’t mind the old lady’s taunting names. She didn’t know that her dresses were torn in battle. She couldn’t know how brave and mighty Sorpresa was. “I would like to try it, sorceress of stitching,” she said, trying to match the old woman’s tone.
Sorpresa, having gone through fittings with Madame Rochie many times, no longer felt any shyness and let her old dress fall to the floor.  Madame Rochie carefully removed the new dress from her tailor’s dummy and slipped it over Sorpresa’s up-stretched arms.
It wasn’t confining like her previous party dresses, and it wasn’t loose either. She thought of Goldilocks finding the thing that is just right. Oddly the bodice seemed to breathe with her. She thought she heard it breathing, and smelled a faint wood smell, like a cedar chest, or bark chips every time she breathed.
“Oh Sorpresa, you look so beautiful. It’s as if that dress was made just for you. You’ll be prettier than the birthday girl. Madame Rochie, be honest, you made it for Sorpresa. You knew we’d be back soon and made it just for her.”
Madame Rochie didn’t say anything. She grinned a knowing grin, and somehow her eyes sparkled behind her thick, thick glasses.