Jinafire Long's Gloom and Bloom diary

Ninth Moon, 10th Day
I have been asked by Jane, Venus, Catrine and Cleo to design their dresses for the Gloom and Bloom dance. It is a great honor to be trusted with such a task, and I am looking forward to getting started.

Ninth Moon, 17th Day
The first dress I am designing is for Jane. This will be tricky because she is not comfortable standing out in a crowd, so I cannot create something that is too loud and attention-grabbing; yet she deserves something that is not plain either. I created a design that I believe will work nicely. I just needed to get her to agree to it. Jane was a bit hesitant when I showed her, but the more we talked about it, the more I could sense that she was getting excited. Finally, she said, “Ghoul for it!” So I called Wydowna to ask if she had time to help me do some of the sewing, which she was only too happy to do. Jane also requested a matching bowtie for her zombie sloth, Needles. I think they will look perfectly wild together.

Ninth Moon, 20th Day
I do not think I can design a dress for Venus that is more vibrant than her already colorful personality, so I have decided to accentuate rather than try to compete. I got all rose and no thorns when I presented the design to Venus, and in the end, I believe I created the perfect “vase” to display her beauty.

Ninth Moon, 26th Day
It has been a joyful experience designing this dress for Catrine. She has been so enthusiastic about every step in the process. She was most excited about the color palette that I used, and that I designed the dress to accommodate her tail. Of course, having a tail myself, I have a lot of experience designing around one.

Tenth Moon, 6th Day
I finished Cleo’s dress and she arrived for the fitting in a rather distressed state. I was concerned at first that she might not like the dress, but she declared it to be beautifully designed and exquisitely made. No, there was something else wrong. It is not my way to pry into the troubles of other monsters, for even though I am merely a teenager in dragon years, I have lived long enough to know that most difficulties have a way of working themselves out if they are not added to with unwelcome or unwise advice. But Cleo is also my friend, so I gently asked what was troubling her. Cleo told me how this celebration was causing many old and unwelcome memories to come creeping back. She then took a deep breath and told me the story of the years she, her sister and her father spent trapped underground in the dark. How her mother was separated from the rest of the family, and how they've never been able to find her, even though they have spent years searching. How a corpse flower just like the one preparing to bloom at Monster High was entombed with them, and how when it bloomed it transformed into a ghoul named Amanita Nightshade. How Amanita eventually escaped and promised to bring back help, but never did. “I do not know how many corpse flowers there are in the monster world, but if it is the same one who spent all those years with us, she is a bad seed.” I had never heard such a story, and when Cleo finished, I did the only thing I could think of: I gave her a hug, which turned out to be both welcome and wise.