The woman’s voice cracked. “I wanted you to know: you didn’t just make clothes. You made a map back to the world.”
At the center of the room was a single empty vitrine. Beside it, a card in Isabelle’s own handwriting: “The most important garment is the one you have not yet dared to imagine.” She pulled a small notebook from her pocket. On the first page, she wrote a single line: “A coat that remembers.”
Isabelle touched the glass. “You were angry then,” she whispered to the dress. It had been the season after her mother died, when she had unlearned every rule of tailoring and discovered that imperfection was its own kind of armor.