Nine Women, One Dress (5 page)

“I'm sorry, I shouldn't have gotten so personal about your dad.”

She laughed. “My father lives a few blocks from here with my mother and has since the day I was born. You are so gullible!”

I pushed her onto the bed and we rolled around wrestling for a blissful moment or two. I wanted more than anything to kiss her, but the thought of her rejection kept me in check. She didn't have daddy issues. She just didn't find either Jeremy Madison or Stanley Trenton attractive. I decided I would meet her on Wednesday for the shoot and then never see her again. If I wanted this kind of rejection, I could go back to auditioning.

As I hung up the phone after speaking with the woman who I was confident would become our one hundredth client, I couldn't help but smile to myself. Sure, things hadn't turned out exactly as planned, but they had turned out well. I was proud of the life I had created after my other life imploded, proud of the role model I'd become for the twins. A lot can change in three years.

It was three years ago to the day that I called an emergency meeting with my three best college friends at an out-of-the-way coffee shop just off the West Side Highway. When you admit to yourself that your storybook, love-at-first-sight, ten-year, honey-you-stay-home-with-the-kids-and-I'll-make-a-ton-of-money marriage has fallen apart, you don't want to discuss it at great length and varying volumes in your own 'hood. This felt particularly true when said 'hood was the Upper West Side of Manhattan, though my guess is that jilted ladies from Chappaqua to Chattanooga feel the same. Once out, a cat like infidelity is particularly impossible to get back in the bag. But holding it all inside was eating me alive, so I'd called my college roommates. We didn't see each other that often, but we found ways to stay connected. I knew they would travel to the ends of the earth for me, or, in this case, a diner on Eleventh Avenue that looked like it had been dropped there from suburbia circa 1969. It even has its own parking lot, which is unheard of in Manhattan, except for Tavern on the Green and a McDonald's somewhere in Hell's Kitchen.

Allison was the first to arrive but not to speak. At least not to me. She entered mid-call and unpacked the entire contents of her briefcase on the table. She was looking for a file and began handing me things one by one in a very chaotic process of elimination that I remembered well from college. The drill came right back to me, as I had spent hours and hours helping her tear through our room for a paper or her birth control pills or whatever it was that she was desperately searching for. She found the file she was looking for and I recognized that calm smile of hers as relief. She spoke with authority.

“In the documents marked January eleventh it clearly states that Mr. Ackerman was out of town on that weekend.”

The person on the other end of the phone spoke, but Allison stopped listening. A large plushie plopped down in our booth, and both of us were momentarily distracted from our respective trains of thought—Allison from whatever case she was arguing, me from the end of my life as I knew it. If you had had a young child or grandchild in the past decade, you would immediately have recognized this plushie as Dora the Explorer. Knowing that didn't make it any less insane that a life-sized stuffed toy had squished its way into our narrow booth. Allison said, a little rudely, “Excuse me, maybe you don't see well in that thing, but this booth is taken!”

Dora pulled off her stuffed head. “Hola, ladies.”

It was CC, our other college roommate. Clearly I was not the only one with troubles.

“Gotta go,” Allison said into the phone, and hung up. “What the hell, CC?” she shouted, as if Dora's presence alone weren't enough to draw attention our way.

CC shrugged. “Brett's been out of work for six months,” she said matter-of-factly. “I needed a job.”

“You graduated magna cum laude from Wesleyan, for god's sake—this was all you were qualified for?” Allison was still in outraged-lawyer mode.

I came to CC's defense. “She
was
a Spanish major.” Allison didn't have children; she stared at me blankly. “Dora's Spanish.” I smiled.

“It did help me get the job,” CC happily chimed in. She looked at Allison's disappointed face. “Come on, Allison. What do you think my résumé looks like at this point? It was basically this or sex worker.”

Allison wasn't having it. “That's BS. You can do anything.”

CC's problems simultaneously made me feel better and further scared the crap out of me. I thought about my dilemma while Allison continued her interrogation. I knew it was only a matter of minutes before CC would no longer be able to take it and would turn the conversation toward me. After all, I was the one who'd called the emergency session.

I looked over at CC, her Dora backpack squeezed up against the rim of the table, and decided to spare her further misery and just come out with it. “Derek is cheating on me,” I said, stopping them dead in their tracks. I love it when people act just as you expect them to. I pulled out a folder; I had compiled a treasure trove of damning facts, incriminating photographs, and logically drawn postulations. I'm not one to fall quickly into paranoia or victimization, and Allison and CC know that about me. So they knew this was serious.

I'm a good judge of character, and when my gut tells me something, it's usually correct. There were not a million signs of infidelity, like people say to look for. “Is your spouse wearing new aftershave?” He wasn't. “Is your spouse suddenly working out more, concerned with his appearance?” Derek was always vain and in good shape. There was just this one thing that was bothering me. I told them the whole story.

For years we had fought the same way, and suddenly he was fighting differently. Like intentionally picking a fight and then storming out to “cool off.” After it happened a few times I thought maybe he'd started smoking again. We'd made a pact to quit together a few years earlier, and I thought maybe this was what he was hiding. I started smelling him when he came back, and at first I thought I was right. He wouldn't smell like cigarettes, but he always smelled so clean. Like someone covering it up with soap and toothpaste. It went on for months, and I just never confronted him. I thought there were worse things than smoking and covering it up. Like cheating, for example. Then one day he picked a fight with me over a game of Words with Friends. I put down the word
muzjiks
on a double word score, using all seven letters for, like, 147 points, and he was like, what does
muzjiks
even mean? And I kind of knew what it meant but didn't feel like defending myself, so I just said I didn't remember. He accused me of cheating. Said there was something called Words with Friends Cheat and that I was a cheater. He stormed out, without a coat, which I noted because it was raining. I went over to his computer and clicked history and there it was—Words with Friends Cheat.
He
was the cheater. I said it out loud to myself right there alone in our apartment: “He's the cheater.”

“Oh my god, Andie, seriously?” Allison interrupted me, laughing. “You had us worried.”

CC was annoyed. “I ditched a book fair in Tribeca to come here, and he was cheating at Words with Friends?”

Looking at CC, Allison again shook her head in disappointment. CC attempted to defend herself. “Swiper and Diego will have to cover for me all day.”

“Let me finish!” I protested. “All I'm saying is that before that point, it never entered my mind that he would cheat. But the minute I saw the word
cheat
a lightbulb went off in my head. I jumped in the elevator and went to the lobby, hoping with all my being to see him smoking with Miguel the doorman. Miguel was outside smoking, but he was alone. So I asked him, ‘Miguel, which way did Mr. Banks go when he left?'

“Miguel was nervous, said he hadn't seen him. But I pleaded with him. I told him I wasn't mad at all, I totally knew what Mr. Banks had been up to, and I really didn't care that he was covering for him. He panicked and started blabbering about how maybe I wouldn't be mad but Mr. Prescott would be furious, and he hadn't wanted to be their lookout, he didn't want to lose his job, but at that point I stopped hearing what he was saying because I had put it together: Derek's been having an affair with Chelsea Prescott from the sixth floor of our building. Every time Rick Prescott leaves to ride his bike around the outer loop in Central Park, my husband's riding his wife around their bedroom.”

I pointed to Exhibit D in my folder, a picture of Derek getting off the elevator on the sixth floor. “Miguel is on my payroll now,” I said. “So I have the elevator pictures to prove it.”

CC was silent.

Allison was outraged. “Did you confront him?”

“No. Not yet. I started looking for evidence everywhere—from the trash in our bedroom to the trash on his computer. Then I put a GPS in his briefcase; he arrives at our building sometimes an hour before he comes home and sometimes in the middle of the day. I installed an app on his phone that lets me see who he's called.” I showed them the printout. “Here, see? The highlighted phone numbers are her cell.” Allison's mouth was wide open. I was surprised. “I can't believe you're so shocked—you must see this kind of thing with clients all the time.”

“I'm shocked by the case you've built against him. You did all this on your own?”

I nodded my head, feeling good about myself for the first time in a long time.

“You know, most women just stick their heads in the sand,” she said, full of admiration. “You're really going to be able to screw him in the divorce!” Hearing that word out loud made it seem inevitable. Oddly, I started laughing uncontrollably. Soon all three of us were laughing, though none of us really knew what was funny.

Allison was the first to regain control. She turned to CC. “CC, what's a muzjik?”

CC laughed. “It's a Russian peasant.”

Allison shook her head. “No more Dora the freakin' Explorer, CC. You are two of the smartest women I know.”

We stopped laughing. She was right.

That was the day the idea for the Ostrich Detective Agency was born. CC and I got our PI licenses. Allison fed us our first clients, and word of mouth got us the rest. Three years later and here I was, talking to our hundredth client. Her name was Caroline Westmont and she reminded me a lot of myself. I was looking forward to meeting her.

It had been a couple of days, and I was starting to get nervous about what I'd done with the dress. I don't know why I always have to be such a
metiche
—translation, buttinski. They even created a category just for me in my high school yearbook: Most Likely to Butt In. As I carried that last size small Max Hammer over to gift wrap like a lamb to slaughter, I realized that it was doubtful we would receive another shipment. I loved this dress. It was one of those head-turners that make every girl feel like the belle of the ball. I couldn't bear for that ungrateful child to get such a treasure—the dress
or
Arthur Winters. So I butted in! I sent the last size small little black dress with the invitation for dinner to Arthur's age-appropriate secretary and the matronly cashmere throw to the gold digger! I thought about all the possible repercussions. The worst-case scenario was that I would get fired for messing up an order. I doubted that, though. Charlene from lingerie was still boasting about the time she purposely sent a lace teddy to a lecherous customer's wife instead of his girlfriend. That card read “Just 24 hours till she leaves to visit her mother!” This was tame compared to that.

The second-worst-case scenario was that Arthur's adoring secretary would get her hopes up at being invited for dinner and arrive to see Artie's face fall in disappointment. This scenario made me ill. The thought of sweet, caring Felicia all excited to finally be noticed and Artie still being too lost in grief to recognize true love was right out of one of my
abuela
's
telenovelas
.
Dios mio!
What had I done?

“Excuse me, I would like to exchange this dress for a bigger size.” And there she was, right in front of me, dress in hand. By the grace of god I didn't throw my arms around her and yell out “Felicia!” I had bet on the likelihood that middle-aged Felicia wouldn't be the same size as the Skinny Minnie harlot, and I'd been right! Thank god she'd thought to try the thing on in advance. But of course she had; she'd been waiting for this date for seventeen years.

“Can you help me?” she added, with not a hint of annoyance at my being lost in my own romantic daydreams.

I snapped to attention. “I am so sorry, lost in thought, yes, I can absolutely help you with that.”

I set her up in a dressing room, and when I knocked to see if she needed anything, she asked my opinion on the fit.

“It's perfect!” I said, meaning it.

“It is!” she responded joyfully. She spun around like a schoolgirl. “This may be the most beautiful dress I've ever worn.”

Then out came the buttinski. “What shoes are you going to wear with it?” She pointed to the at-
least-
two-seasons-ago black pumps on her feet. No good. “We're having a secret sale today,” I lied; I'd give her my employee discount. “If you want, we can lock this door with your stuff inside and go to the shoe department together!”

“Okay, thanks!” She beamed. “This is a special night.”

“Really?” I replied, as if I didn't know. “You can tell me all about it on the way there.”

We headed to the second-floor shoe department and picked out a pair of sexy black suede sandals with a heel. It took me forever to steer her away from the practical pumps that she was used to.

“You have the best taste, Tomás. Thank you so much.”

“That's what happens when you spend half your life in a closet.”

She laughed. Sitting on the soft couches in the shoe department, she opened up to me about Arthur and her unrequited love for him. She told me how it broke her heart to see him in such pain after his wife died and how her friends at work said that she should make her move. Unknown to her, they had all been aware for years that she was in love with him. Everyone could tell. Everyone except Arthur. She waited what she thought was the appropriate amount of time, six months, but still she couldn't get up the nerve. Then one day Arthur's oldest daughter, Jessica, called and asked if she would join them for a Labor Day weekend barbecue. The invitation had felt like the daughter's blessing. Felicia was thrilled and baked a perfect seven-layer cake. It took three tries, but she did it; she took the other, almost-perfect fourteen layers to the soup kitchen where she volunteers. This woman is a total gem.

We bought the shoes, and I convinced her to let me take her to the first floor for a makeover. By now I could have convinced her to get an
I
♥
Artie
tramp stamp. At the makeup counter, in between pursing her lips and widening her eyes, she finished the story of the Labor Day debacle. She walked in, cake in hand, and was greeted very warmly by Arthur's daughter. She thanked her for the cake and took her aside.

“Felicia, I know my dad is devastated by my mother's death and it will take him a while to come out of that. In the last weeks of her life my mother confided in me that her greatest fear wasn't dying. It was that my father would be alone. She asked that I guide him toward a wonderful woman. She specifically said, ‘Someone like Felicia.' ” Felicia had been so taken aback that tears had formed in her eyes. As she blinked them away, Arthur walked in with a scantily clad and overly perfumed young lady, who he introduced as Sherri. (Only a gem would describe that harlot as a young lady.) “My heart broke,” she said. “My hands began to shake and I had to give the cake to Jessica, as it was now shaking too.” Jessica was utterly gracious—she had learned from the best. She welcomed Sherri and introduced her to Felicia. When Arthur and Sherri were out of earshot she whispered, “I'm so sorry, Felicia, I had no idea.” Felicia smiled and assured her that she was okay. But of course she wasn't.

So tonight, Arthur inviting her for dinner at the Four Seasons—well, this was the most promising thing to happen to her in like…ever. The makeup artist turned Felicia toward him to concentrate. As I watched her take herself in in the mirror, my mind was beginning to fill with dread, thinking of the possibility of her evening ending poorly. I vowed never to butt into other people's business again. My thoughts wandered to what God and Ruthie would have in store for me as a punishment when “Voilà!” The makeup artist spun Felicia around. She looked beautiful. All my worries melted away. If Arthur Winters could not see the jewel in front of him, so be it. It was time for Felicia to move in or move on. I told her exactly that, and she left Bloomingdale's with renewed confidence.

There's a good chance I'll never know what happens tonight. That's one of the more unfulfilling parts in the life of a salesperson. Everyone comes in searching for the perfect dress for her big day, whether it's her high school prom or her fiftieth high school reunion. The dress needs to match more than just the shoes. It needs to match her hopes and expectations. It needs to remove all worry and doubt about looking good from the equation so that everything else can fall into place. While I'm 100 percent in on the groundwork, I rarely get to hear the outcome. This time I was overly invested and would be thinking about Felicia long after she left the store.

As promised, I hid the size small Max Hammer she had returned in the back room for Natalie to wear to her photo shoot with the movie star. I also promised her that I would not hit on him if he ever comes into the store again. In return she promised that when he officially comes out she'll fix us up!