The Outfit Clash: I'm Told to Strip novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: Open Session

I sat on my bed with the dead phone line in my ear until the recorded voice repeated itself three times.

Then I hung up.

Will was in my doorway. Maddie was behind him in her sheep pajamas.

"He's gone," I said.

"He's not gone," Will said. "He's bought."

"Same thing on Monday."

Maddie didn't say anything.

She went back into her room and came out holding a garment bag.

"I was saving this," she said. "For after. If we won."

"Maddie, I can't think about clothes right now."

"Yes, you can." She unzipped it. "Because you're going to walk in there tomorrow in front of thirteen trustees and the paper and Hunter Sterne. And you're not going to do it in a cotton shirt I made out of a thrift store sheet."

Inside was a white silk shirt.

The pleated bib ran right to left, every fold as sharp as a blade.

Under the collar stand, two tiny blue cross-stitches.

"I bought the silk with my first back-pay check from you," she said. "I'm aware that's circular."

I couldn't say anything.

I just held it.

At nine the next morning, the main auditorium was full.

Two thousand seats. Every one taken. Students sat in the aisles and stood along the back.

The Hartford paper had a row. Two TV cameras stood on tripods by the stage.

The thirteen trustees sat at a long table on the stage under the lights.

The oldest trustee was at the end, her cane hooked on the table edge.

Hunter's father sat in the middle, in a gray suit, reading his phone.

Hunter sat in the front row below the stage, in his navy suit, legs crossed.

Patrice stood at a lectern stage left in a cream jacket with gold buttons.

Maddie's hearing went first.

The dean of students presided from a small table below the stage. He looked like he hadn't slept since August.

Patrice read the charges into the microphone.

"Theft of university materials. Production of counterfeit goods on university property. By the student's own public admission."

Maddie stood at the table beside Will in a plain navy dress she'd sewn that weekend.

Her hands were folded so tightly her knuckles were white.

"Ms. Fenn," the dean said. "Do you deny it?"

"No," Maddie said. "I sewed them. I'd like to say who told me to."

"Objection," Patrice said. "Irrelevant."

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