Changing Habits: A Short Story (A Giulia Driscoll Mystery)

Praise for the Giulia Driscoll Mystery Series

NUN TOO SOON (#1)

“For those who have not yet read these incredible mysteries written by an actual ex-nun, you’re missing out...Brilliant, funny, a great whodunit; this is one writer who readers should definitely make a ‘habit’ of.”

–
Suspense Magazine

“With tight procedural plotting, more flavoured coffee than you could shake a pastry at, and an ensemble cast who’ll steal your heart away,
Nun Too Soon
is a winner. I’m delighted that Giulia–and Alice!–left the convent for a life of crime.”

– Catriona McPherson, Agatha, Macavity, and Lefty Award-Winning Author of the Dandy Gilver Mystery Series

“You’ll love Giulia Falcone-Driscoll! She’s one of a kind—quirky, unpredictable and appealing. With an entertaining cast of characters, a clever premise and Loweecey’s unique perspective—this compelling not-quite-cozy is a winner.”

– Hank Phillippi Ryan, Anthony, Agatha and Mary Higgins Clark Award-Winning Author of Truth Be Told

“Grab your rosary beads and hang on for a fun ride with charming characters, amusing banter, and a heat-packing former nun.”

– Barb Goffman, Macavity Award-Winning Author

“Colorful characters and a unique, lovable heroine make for another enjoyable read from Alice Loweecey.
Nun Too Soon
is a funny, snappy, well-paced mystery with a whodunnit that kept me guessing till the end.”

– Jennifer Hillier, Bestselling Author of
Creep, Freak, and The Butcher

“We’re hooked! Entertaining characters and a twisty plot make
Nun Too Soon
a winner.”

– Sparkle Abbey, Author of the Pampered Pet Mystery Series

“I love Giulia (I’ve always been a sucker for kick-ass nuns), and Loweecey really knows how to turn a phrase. The sense of detail is deft; the timing is exquisite, the characters are real.”

– James D. Macdonald, Author of
The Apocalypse Door

Books in the Giulia Driscoll Mystery Series

by Alice Loweecey

Novels

NUN TOO SOON (#1)

SECOND TO NUN (#2)

(September 2015)

Short Stories

CHANGING HABITS

(prequel to NUN TOO SOON)

Copyright

CHANGING HABITS

A Giulia Driscoll Mystery Short Story

Part of the Henery Press Mystery Collection

First Edition

Kindle edition | December 2014

Henery Press

www.henerypress.com

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Henery Press, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Copyright © 2014 by Alice Loweecey

This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Related subjects include: cozy mysteries, women sleuths, humorous murder mysteries, whodunit mysteries (whodunnit), whodunit short stories, murder mystery series, private investigator mystery series, mystery novella, novella series.

ISBN-13: 978-1-941962-72-5

Printed in the United States of America

Dedication

For Dru Ann, this is her story

I

Giulia Falcone stared in horror at her full-length reflection in the bridal shop’s mirror.

“I am not walking into a church with chandelier bits dangling from my nipples.”

Her sole bridesmaid laughed. Laurel and Giulia became friends the day Giulia walked into Laurel’s soup kitchen three years earlier. Giulia became Katie’s godmother and Laurel was the only one Giulia trusted to give a sensible opinion on wedding gowns.

“If you make them swing against each other like wind chimes, they might go with the organ music.”

Katie, Laurel’s fifteen-month-old daughter, reached for one of the dangly bits.

“Pretty!”

Laurel caught the tiny hand before it did irreparable damage to the designer wedding gown.

“Enough.” Giulia unzipped herself and stepped out of the ridiculously expensive dress. “Katie, it’s time for ice cream.”

Katie clapped. “Strawberry!” she said, minus all the
r
s.

“It’s your own fault for leaving the dress shopping so late,” Laurel said. “You do realize you’re getting married this Saturday?”

Giulia climbed into her jeans and sweater. “Trust me; the date is never far from my thoughts. I blame work. Driscoll Investigations has been buried for the past four months. Frank is being more of a boss than a bridegroom. I told him if I didn’t find a dress tonight I’d walk down the aisle draped in a white sheet. He said video of a toga wedding would be sure to go viral.”

“Men.” Laurel said, and Katie managed “Den.” Giulia and Laurel tickled her.

Giulia brought the final three dresses of the evening out to the sales staff. Laurel got Katie’s coat on her and the three of them escaped into the February evening.

“There’s a new custard place two blocks from here,” Giulia said, pulling her alpaca wool hat down over her ears. “Is Katie up to the trip?”

“Katie will do anything for strawberry ice cream.” Laurel hoisted her daughter on her hip and they walked along slushy sidewalks past stores decorated for Valentine’s Day.

Couples walked mitten-in-glove as they headed into restaurants covered in red and pink for the holiday.

Giulia pointed at an antique store on the other side of the street. “A steampunk wedding. Frank wouldn’t have a clue what was happening. His mother would love it.” A gust of wind snatched at her hat and she clamped both hands on it.

They entered the custard shop as two sets of teenagers exited. Giulia breathed in the rich sweet aroma of hot fudge. Multiple conversations and the voices of adults and children competed with piped-in Sinatra ballads. Valentine’s Day decorations covered the walls, the tables, the custard machine, even the glass counter protecting thirty flavors of hard ice cream.

Giulia traced a bright red heart with lace trim. “I’d look like a Wild West saloon girl if I wore a red dress with white lace, wouldn’t I?” To the teenager at the counter, she said, “Coffee-vanilla twist in a waffle cone, please.”

“The dangly crystals would work for that outfit,” Laurel said. “Two scoops of cotton candy in a sugar cone, please, and a baby-size strawberry in a regular cone.”

They sat at a table next to a window. Now that rush hour had passed, people on the sidewalks outnumbered cars on the street. Giulia savored the custard, the flavors as good as an extra-strong cappuccino. Laurel held her own cone in one hand and Katie’s in the other. Giulia kept a pile of napkins in readiness.

“You tried on nine dresses tonight and not one of them made you smile,” Laurel said. “Do you have any idea what you want to wear?”

Giulia bit into her custard. “Everything is so cookie-cutter. I spent ten years dressing exactly like four hundred other nuns. I want a gown that’s different but not weird.”

“Katie, it’s dripping down the side. Lick it! There you go. Giulia, every one of those dresses came from different patterns. Three had clingy skirts, four had cathedral trains, two were off the shoulder, one had fur trim, and don’t forget the dingleberries.”

“I wish I could. The styles may have varied, but all they really looked like were ‘generic winter bride.’”

“I don’t know what to tell you.” Laurel sucked pink ice cream from the tip of her sugar cone.

“I know.” Giulia gave her custard the attention it deserved. “Solving crimes is less stressful than planning a wedding.”

When they’d finished their ice cream, Laurel took Katie to the ladies’ room to de-strawberry her. Giulia stared out the window at the stores opposite. Heart-shaped neon lit the chocolates in one storefront and strings of white mini lights illuminated the antique store displays. A mannequin in a fringed flapper dress posed with its hand on one of those huge vintage radios. Opposite it, a polished table set for high tea crowded against a filled bookshelf and a jewelry display case.

“More dangly bits,” Giulia muttered.

Laurel reentered the store carrying a sniffling Katie.

“What happened?”

“Somebody refused to let mama wash her face and hands. Somebody then sat on the floor in a pout right into a puddle.”

Giulia cringed “Please say of water.”

“Thankfully, yes.” Laurel struggled a squirming Katie into her coat. “I have to desert you because somebody needs a change of clothes and a time out.”

Giulia kissed Laurel. “No problem. Thank you for coming on this futile quest.”

“The right dress will grab you. Try that consignment shop up on Park, where the filthy rich live. You never know.”

“I’m having serious thoughts about a 1200 thread-count Egyptian cotton sheet from Bed Bath & Beyond.” Giulia made a sad face at Katie.

Katie crossed her plump arms and stuck out her bottom lip. Giulia bit her cheek so she wouldn’t laugh.

Laurel jogged back toward the bridal shop’s parking lot, Katie bouncing in her arms. Giulia followed till they were out of sight, then turned around and headed the opposite way.

The still-crowded sidewalks were a relief. No one noticed her. Her phone wasn’t ringing. No one needed Driscoll Investigations to save the day. Not one family member knew where she was. Frank’s multitude of brothers, sisters-in-law, aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, and nephews were all of them wonderful and welcoming. They were also constantly on the phone or inviting her over to offer her advice or discuss wedding favors or music or food or flowers.

She couldn’t imagine the added chaos if her own family got involved, but none of them had spoken to her since she left the convent. If her brother saw the notice in the paper, he might unbend enough to send a card. Giulia grimaced. If he did, it’d probably have Our Lady of Sorrows on the front and a pointed message about how he would pray for my soul, even though she was surely going to Hell.

“Surprise, now I’m depressed. Falcone, you’re supposed to be happy. You’re getting married in six days.”

She crossed the street to detach herself from this funk and to delay going back to her stripped-down apartment. It was her own fault for moving everything but the essentials into Frank’s apartment. Also her own fault for not moving in with him before the wedding. She shook her head at the thought. Like she’d ever have considered that.

The antique shop loomed in front of her. She went in to look at pretty things that weren’t wedding gowns, without pressure since she’d already bought Frank’s gift. She’d scored two tickets to the exhibition match between Manchester United and Real Madrid at Foxboro in June. She’d warned all his brothers to have their phones ready when Frank opened it in case he squealed like a girl.

That made her smile again.

She wandered the crowded store, inhaling lemon furniture polish and the musty smell of old books. She admired pocket watches, Tiffany lamps, and more fragile china. When she spotted a set of five first-edition Nancy Drews, only the fact of her savings being earmarked for the elusive, frustrating, impossible wedding gown saved her.

A hand-lettered sign pointed to a door in the back: Vintage Clothing 1800-1940. She followed it.

The gown hung on a wicker dress form in the center of the room. Eggshell satin with a diamond-shaped lace insert in the center over the stomach. A V neckline with a modest plunge. Satin sleeves with smaller lace insets. A little scoop of a train.

Giulia came toward it, both hands out to touch the satin. The skirt flowed through her hands like water. She realized she was holding her breath.

It won’t be my size. The pits will be stained. And smelly. It’ll cost a thousand dollars.

She walked out of the room and straight to the counter with its 1930s cash register.

When the white-haired man behind it set down his cell phone, she said, “Good evening. Could you tell me about the wedding gown on the dress form?”

“I can’t, but my daughter can.” He reached over to a small speaker on the wall and pressed the button beneath it. “Maggie, got a lady about the clothes room.”

A tinny voice replied, “Be right down.”

A minute later, an elegant middle-aged woman in a navy business suit came into the shop. “Caught me before I shed the Daily Grind getup. What can I show you?”

“The satin wedding gown.”

“Isn’t it gorgeous? I’m too much of an Amazon to squeeze into it or it’d be all mine. If I ever stuck my neck in the marriage noose again, that is.” She appraised Giulia. “You’re a… twelve? Hard to tell under that coat.”

Giulia nodded. “Yes, twelve.” She tried to keep hope out of her eyes as she stood before the dress again.

If the woman saw through her, she didn’t let on. “Here’s the details: The dress is from 1938, originally that color, silk satin and Shetland lace. The tiny covered buttons hide a zipper. A detachable bustle was originally part of it, but it ripped and the dress was retooled with the miniature train you see now. It’s been professionally restored and the lace in the sleeves re-knitted by a little old lady who only touched it on Sundays.” She laughed.

Giulia steeled herself. “Give me the bad news.”

“Three seventy-five.”

“I’m sorry?”

The woman laughed again. “No, really. It’s beautiful but delicate. Women tend to want a wedding dress they can party all night in. This one won’t take a beating.”

“You’re trying to talk me out of it.”

“Cross my heart I’m not. This is the full disclosure part of my sales pitch.” She appraised Giulia again. “Want me to help you try it on?”

Twenty minutes later, the old man swiped Giulia’s credit card through the reader attached to the old-fashioned cash register. She signed the slip of paper and the woman came out with a four-foot by two-foot box held closed with silver duct tape.

“I put the business card of the dress restorer in the box. They might be able to find lace that’s a close enough match.”

“For what?” Giulia said.

“To make the veil.”

Giulia grinned at her. “This is one bride who’s not wearing a veil.”