Lili
“Do you think they’ll love it, or just fake it really well?”
Gareth glances at her reassuringly. “Trust me, babe. They’ll love it.”
Lili smiles, lets herself believe it as she keys in the building code. “They’ve seen the sketches, sure. But this is different. Today they’re seeing everything. The full collection, flaws and all.”
“That’s what the review is for,” Gareth says as they step into the hall. “Ashanti, Johan, the whole team. This is what they do. They’ll style it, shape it, make it even better.”
Lili exhales, counting her breath as they walk the empty corridor. She’s fishing for her key, still smiling, until she sees it.
The door to her studio isn’t closed. Something in her gut sinks—first confusion, then dread. She pushes the door gently. It opens with a soft creak.
She steps inside. Feels it before she sees it. Fabric is everywhere. Bolts torn open, spilling in heaps. Mannequins toppled, one decapitated. Her sewing machine smashed, pieces scattered across the floor. Mood boards sliced clean through. Spools of thread rolling underfoot. And across the wall: a broad arc of something—paint or dye—splattered violently.
Then she sees them. Her garments. Ripped and slashed beyond recognition. Silk, tulle, lace—trampled into the floor, tangled in a heap of scraps. Weeks of work. Her blood, sweat, and hope. Something cracks beneath her boot. Glass, maybe. Or a bead.
“No,” she whispers. “No. No, no!”
Her knees hit the floor. A feral wail tears loose. And only then does it register: It’s me. I’m the one screaming.
Gareth’s beside her now, crouched on the floor, pulling her in. She collapses against him, shaking, breath jagged against his chest.
Then, a stunned voice breaks through: “What… what happened?”
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Lili looks up over her shoulder. She sees Gareth, his face stricken. Then past him, Ashanti Mondrian stands in the doorway, flanked by Johan and three members of the Élan West team. They hover just inside, their eyes sweeping the studio in muted shock.
“We just got here,” Gareth says, breathless. “Someone broke in and ransacked the place.”
Ashanti stays perfectly poised, her eyes cutting briefly to her team, who seem to read her mind before she speaks. “How are we supposed to work with this?”
“Ashanti, please! I can fix it. I’ll remake what I can—”
“We go to press in a week, Lili. This collection was our designer showcase. But now… we’ll have to pivot.”
“There must be a solution,” Gareth says, frozen in place, almost begging. “If you really believe in the line—”
Lili cuts him off, desperation cracking through her composure, but she’s not ready to let the panic win. “I’ll start from scratch! I’ll work day and night. We’ll fix this.”
“Lili. Gareth. I think you mistook our enthusiasm for… commitment.” Ashanti shakes her head, calm to the point of dismissive. “The collection’s lovely, but the truth is, there are a dozen other designers we can tap to fill the space where you would’ve been.” She turns to Johan, still surveying the room behind his silver-framed glasses.
“What do you think?” she asks, as if the question is just a formality.
For a fragile moment, Lili hopes Johan will defend her. That he’ll remind them why her vision mattered. Why the moonflower meant something.
But his voice is flat beyond indifferent: “It’s just content. We’ll get more.”
No. No, no, no, no, no!
“It’s unfortunate,” Ashanti says, smoothing her Yohji Yamamoto. “But we’ll find something else. We always do. And try not to take it too hard. Hardly anyone reads print editions anyway.” She shrugs, blasé. “This was always about justifying our print run, more than anything. We have to print… something. Whether or not anyone reads it.”
Her stare cuts to Lili like a stylist sizing up the wrong dress on the wrong client. “A word of advice? Fall apart if you need to. Just not where they can see you. Because all of this?” Ashanti gestures to the room with a flick of her hand, tossing an indifferent glance, already done caring. “It’s more than anyone needs or wants to see.”
She turns to Gareth with a crisp nod. “Thank you for your time, sweetheart. Good luck, Lili.”
And then she’s gone. The others follow. The door thuds shut behind them. Lili forces herself to breathe. Once. Again. But it’s impossible to steady herself, not even with Gareth beside her, still and hollow-eyed. Not with her studio gutted, shelves overturned, fabric shredded into scraps across the floor, the wreckage of months—no, years—strewn in silence. And still, the words echo: It’s just content. Because maybe, despite everything she’d wished or wanted to believe, that’s all it ever was.