The Button, Chapter 2 - "Sequin-tial Access"
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"I could have danced all night..."

Yana was still humming softly to herself as the cab dropped her off at
home again.  The glitter of the ball, the dancing, all the attention from
people who would normally never even give her the time of day...  It had
quite gone to her head, making her feel like Eliza Dolittle.  The champagne
had helped, too.

After a little fumbling, she managed to get her key into the lock, and
open the door.  At the threshold she paused, balanced between two worlds.
Outside still felt like magic and glamour.  Inside... inside was the reality
of living in a rented townhouse, and scrounging for enough money to make
ends meet, never mind buying pretty dresses.

She sighed once, stepped forward, and closed the door behind her.  "It
was fun while it lasted," she murmured, to nobody but herself.

With uncertain step, she traced her way back to the bedroom, trailing
her fingers along the yellowing paint of the stairway wall.  As the door
to the bedroom creaked open she saw Darryl's rented tux, still laid across
the bed.

"Oh no!  Darryl!"  For one disoriented moment she looked about the bedroom,
almost as if expecting him to be hiding in the closet, or behind the door
of the en suite.  Then, slowly, she raised a trembling hand to her breast,
and the sequins of her party dress.  The party dress she had accidentally
transformed her fiancé into, was it really only a handful of hours ago?
It felt to her like half a lifetime.

Suddenly shivering, Yana quickly unzipped the back of the dress and slipped
out of it.  She half-collapsed onto the bed, pulling the dress into her lap
and running her hands over the sea of sequins.  "Which one?  They all look
alike, which one?  Oh, Darryl, I'm so sorry.  What can I do?"

Yana rocked back and forth, mumbling tearful apologies to the dress clutched
to her bosom, for a very long time.  

Somewhere in the wee hours of the morning, Yana cried herself out, and started
to think a bit more clearly.  She remembered how Darryl had shown her the magic
button, capable of transforming pillows - or people - into clothing.  All it
had taken was pulling the button off again to reverse the transformation.
She just had to find it.  So she started plucking, gently, at sequins along
the hem of the dress.  She didn't want to tear off the wrong one, fearful
of what that would do to Darryl... but she also wanted to be sure that she
wouldn't miss the button.

* * *

The rising sun found Yana still perched on the bed, bent over the dress.
She had only tested perhaps a third of the sequins, and with the
growing light was rapidly losing hope.  Her eyes bloodshot from lack of
sleep, she was staring at the dress, hardly daring to blink for fear of
losing her place and missing the all-important sequin...

The phone rang.  Yana's eyes darted briefly to it, then rapidly back to
her place in the glittering blackness of the dress.  She ignored it.  She
had to ignore it - there were more sequins to test.  After four rings,
the answering machine in the kitchen cut in, and silence once again
reigned in the bedroom.

Then it rang again.  Obviously, someone was feeling persistent.  Yana
tried her best to ignore it, but by the fifth call, her nerves were
completely frayed.  Pinching the dress in one hand in a forlorn attempt
to mark her place, Yana took up the receiver in her other hand.

"This had better be important." she started, testily.

"Hello there dear.  You must be Yana."  The voice on the other end was
soothing but firm, a grandmotherly voice.

"Y...yes.  Who are you?"

"Darryl didn't tell you about me?  Tut.  I'm an old family friend.  How
did you enjoy the present?"

"The... you gave him that?"  Yana's full attention was on the speaker, now,
the dress dropping forgotten to her lap.

The voice chuckled.  "Yes, he got the button from me.  And the tickets,
for that matter.  Can I speak to Darryl, please?"

Yana shook her head, not thinking that the other woman wouldn't be able
to see it.  "No.  I... kind of <sniff> turned him into a dress."

"Oh, is that what's wrong?  Didn't he tell you?  Just take the button
off and he'll be back to normal.  <chuckle>  I told him that it had
a taste ..."

Yana cut her off.  "You don't understand...  He's a *sequined* dress,"
she wailed.

The voice suddenly acquired a very official tone.  "Oh!  I'll be
right there."

The click of the call ending was nearly simultaneous with the ringing
of the doorbell.  Yana looked up in sudden surprise, and dashed off
to the door, trailing the dress behind her like a banner.

Opening the door a crack, Yana saw an older woman on the doorstep.  The
shock of white hair among the black formed an odd complement to the
incongruous leather jacket she wore.

The woman on the doorstep spoke first.  "Yana?  May I come in?"

"You're..."  Yana trailed off, leaving it half a question.

"Darryl's Aunt Beatrice.  Aunt Bea for short.  I talked to you on the
phone a moment ago."

Yana nodded, recognizing the voice.  She opened the door wide.  Aunt
Bea clucked softly and hustled Yana inside, closing the door behind
her.  "Dear, don't you think you should be wearing *something* when
answering the door?"

Yana blushed and held up the dress, vainly trying to cover the fact
she'd not worn a bra under it last night, and hadn't thought about it
since then.  The dress didn't afford much modesty, as it crumpled and
drooped rather sadly.

Aunt Bea sighed, shaking her head.  "I take it that's Darryl, dear?
Let's see if we can't find that pesky button."

With a bit of gentle coaxing, Yana was seated at the dining table,
wrapped in a bathrobe.  Aunt Bea was puttering in the kitchen while
keeping an eye on the distraught woman.  Soon, two steaming mugs of
tea were on the table, and Yana had been coaxed into retelling the
details of the night.

"... so then I started tugging at individual sequins, but there are
so many!"

Aunt Bea nodded.  "Which is where I came in.  Drink your tea, it'll
help you warm up."

Yana nodded gratefully, her hands wrapped about her mug.

Aunt Bea picked up the dress, examining it critically.  "Very nice
work...  Ah!  Was the zipper down when you made it?"

Yana's brow furrowed.  "No...  No, I had to unzip it to get it on."

Aunt Bea smiled, laying the dress across Yana's lap.  "Then perhaps
you should zip it up - we wouldn't want Darryl appearing with a zipper
down his back, now would we?"

Yana giggled at the image.  "Best not."  She set her mug down, and tugged
dutifully at the zipper.  "Oh!  It feels a bit... odd."

"Really?  Well, well...  Do you notice anything else about it?"

Yana peered down at the zip, her eyes widening in realization.  "It's blue!
The same blue as the button!"  With a sudden tug, the zip came free, quickly
reforming into a simple blue button.  A moment later, the dress inflated into
a humanoid torso that quickly grew into the familiar contours of her husband.
For a moment a black satin version of Darryl perched in her lap, then suddenly
he was real, whole, and *heavy*, sending both crashing to the floor.

"Darryl!  You're back!"

Darryl just lay there for a few moments, panting.  Yana struggled out from
under his unresisting body, and Aunt Bea stepped around the upset chair to
drape him with the other robe she'd fetched.  "Give him a moment, dear - he's
been a dress for half a day, now."

Yana nodded, kneeling by his side and peering into his face.  "Darryl?  Sweetie?
Are you OK?  Please talk to me..."

Aunt Bea frowned.  "Normally they snap out of this faster..."

"Normally?  This has happened before?"

Aunt Bea sighed, and nodded.  "I've loaned it out to my charges before, often
for much the same reason... it does have a knack for finding someone to change.
Usually, I hear about it quickly, and return to help immediately."

Yana blushed, lowering her head.  "And instead, I went to the ball..."

Darryl groaned and slowly sat up, reaching uncertainly for Yana.  "It's...
OK."

Yana hugged him tightly to her.  "But wasn't it terrible?"

Aunt Bea nodded.  "Most people react rather worse than you have."

Darryl shrugged, snuggling in closer against Yana.  "Mmmm, warm.  At first
I did panic a bit - I couldn't see or feel anything.  Somehow I knew that Yana
was near me, and that made it all come into focus.  You wore me, right?"

Yana nodded, still looking a bit tearful.

"It's OK, sweetie.  Really!  It felt right, somehow, and made me feel warm."

"Then why are you so chilly now?"

Darryl cuddled a bit closer.  "Because you took me off, I think.  I'd much
rather be close to you, no matter what shape I'm in."

Aunt Bea cleared her throat.  "Ah, well then I'll just take the button and
be off."

Darryl tore his gaze from Yana to look at his godmother.  "Um... actually, can
we keep it a bit longer?"

"What?" asked both women, incredulously.

"After what it did, are you sure?" asked Aunt Bea.  "It will do this again,
you know.  Somehow, it always finds a way to change a person.  Not always,
but often enough."

Darryl nodded.  "That's OK."

"OK?" echoed Yana.  "You were a dress!"

"And it wasn't really all that bad.  Honestly!  I know how much you love to
wear pretty things, sweetie.  You know how broke we are, and this isn't such
a bad price to pay."

Yana just stared at Darryl with a look of surprise on her face.  "You..."

Darryl shook his head.  "Not me.  A pillow or something."

"Oh.  I guess that's all right, then."

Aunt B looked dubiously at Yana, then shrugged.  "Well, if you change your
mind, you know how to reach me..."  As her voice trailed off she realized
that Darryl and Yana weren't really paying attention to her any more.

Darryl whispered in Yana's ear, "Do you have any idea how good it feels to
snuggle up to you?"  His hands were roving over her back, and looking ready
to go further.  Aunt Bea quietly retreated, leaving the young couple to their
own devices.

Neither heard her motorcycle racket off into the distance.