❝ my head is bloody, but unbowed... I am the captain of my soul. ❞
━ william ernest henley.
in which tommy shelby drags a dressmaker into peaky blinder business
and she's none too happy about it.
𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐌𝐀𝐒 𝐒𝐇𝐄𝐋𝐁𝐘
𝐏𝐑�...
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Although, Eli was more than happy to have some extra hands on deck with her newest employee, Ada Shelby, she wasn't quite sure it was going to work out. Especially not if Ada couldn't learn the difference between customer service and Shelby service...
"No, I will not go check the back again! For the last bloody time, woman—" Ada exclaimed, drawing the attention of Eli who spared her a lingering glance over her shoulder from serving a customer at the till. "We don't have that dress in red. So either buy it in grey or fuck off down the road to Mr. Pauly's for a suit."
Eli's eyes widened for what felt like the dozenth time that day. Rushing through giving the client facing her the change for her purchase, she bid the girl a farewell before hurrying over to her friend and the sneering woman. "Apologies, Ms. Jean. I'm afraid that particular dress is only manufactured in grey, perhaps, you'd rather a red one of a similar style?"
"Perhaps, she'd like to shove her request up her arse." Ada mumbled from beside her as she crossed her arms over her chest in a childish sulking manner.
Ms. Jean scoffed, having heard Ada's muttering and sent a heavy glare flickering between the two women. Eli's apologetic look did nothing to stop the woman from roughly shoving the dress she'd been asking about into the blonde's chest before bitterly storming out of the shop.
The owner of said shop gritted her teeth as she watched yet another customer exit without a purchase by fault of the newest addition to her staff. She hadn't thought of training or even interviewing Ada much before giving her the job because she was practically family, and Eli had (perhaps wrongly) assumed the brunette knew how to speak to actual people. Although, now that she thought about it, a training day would have been more efficient.
"Ada, sweetie..." the blonde turned to Ada with barely concealed frustration under a stiff smile, "you can't tell the customers to shove their requests up their arse."
"I can't?" She raised an eyebrow in question as if challenging the authenticity of Eli's statement. "Well, I don't see why not? I'm a Shelby, I can say whatever the hell I bloody well like."
"Not if you don't want to lose your job. I'll run out of business at the rate you're going at." Eli warned, returning the younger girl's daring look.
Ada frowned, confusion washing over her face. "Well, how am I allowed to speak?"
"Ada," the older woman sighed.
Perhaps, Rosalie, Eli's ten or something year old sister, would have been a more experienced shopkeeper... At least, the littler version of Eli knew how she was "allowed to speak".
