Every evening after work, I walked past the boutique on Main Street — not because I could afford the dresses, but because I dreamed of making them. I wasn’t a designer; I was just a cashier in a black polo with calloused hands and a sketchbook full of napkin drawings. The mannequins in the window didn’t just wear gowns — they wore everything I wanted: elegance, purpose, possibility. The only thing I had that felt mysterious was a small brass key I’d worn since I was a baby — no origin, no story. Just something left with me when I was abandoned at a hospital. One night,
