On the first anniversary of the email, I went to the gallery.
It was a different gallery, a bigger one, on the east side of the city, with high ceilings and a glass front and a show that June had curated. The show was called By Her Own Hand, and it featured twelve designers, all women, all independent, all making work on their own terms.
I was one of them.
The dress was in the center of the room, on a form, under a light. It was the Second Vote. Bone silk. Clean lines. Structured bodice. A train that pooled like cream. It was the dress I had designed for myself, after I had stopped listening to the vote.
People came and went. They looked at the dress. They asked questions. A woman in her sixties stood in front of it for ten minutes and then found me and said, "I had a dress like this o
