Shoe Addicts Anonymous

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

SHOE ADDICTS ANONYMOUS
. Copyright © 2007 by Beth Harbison. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.stmartins.com

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Harbison, Elizabeth M.
Shoe addicts anonymous / Beth Harbison.—1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN: 978-1-4299-1582-3
1. Female friendship—Fiction. 2. Shoes—Fiction. I. Title.

PS3558.A564 S56 2007
813’.54—dc22
2007010081

To my mother, Connie Atkins,
and her partner-in-shopping, Ginny Russell—
the original Shoe Addicts in my life.
They’re probably in a shoe store right now!

And to Jen Enderlin, my editor and friend.

W
riting is a solitary experience, but living, if you’re lucky, is not. I’d like to thank some of the friends who have made me laugh, saved my sanity, and inspired the friendships in this book: my sisters, Jacquelyn and Elaine McShulskis; the friends who have been there almost as long as my sisters, Jordana Carmel and Nicki Singer; my neighbors and pals who saved me time and again, either by taking the kids or pouring the drinks (or both), Amy Sears and Carolyn Clemens; and the generous souls who have read, reread, advised, and commiserated—often over snack food—through many years and many books, Elaine Fox, Annie Jones, Marsha Nuccio, Mary Blayney, Meg Ruley, and Annelise Robey.

S
ex in a box. That’s what it was. Spine-tingling, heart-stopping, decadent sex in a box.

Lorna Rafferty pushed the tissue aside, and the heady smell of leather filled her nostrils, sending a familiar tingle straight through her core. The feeling—this
thrill
—never got old, no matter how many times she went through the ritual.

She touched the tightly stitched leather and smiled. She couldn’t help it. This was wicked pleasure at its sensuous, tactile, hedonistic best. It made her skin prickle from head to toe.

She ran her fingertips along the smooth surface, skidding over the graceful arch, like a cat stretching under the midday sun; she smiled at the sharp but satisfying prick of the spike. Yes. Yesss.

This was hot.

She knew it was wrong, of course. Twelve years in Catholic school hadn’t been for nothing: she’d pay the price for this indulgence later.

Well, hell, she’d been planning on that for
years
.

That debt was going to have to get in line with a lot of others.

In the meantime, Lorna had these peep-toe ankle-strap Delman platform sandals to comfort her. She could walk right into the fires of hell if she had to, in shoes to die for.

One of the only things she could remember about her mother was her shoes. Black-and-white spectators. Little pink sandals with kitten heels. And Lorna’s favorites: long, slim satin shoes, with heels like narrow art deco commas, and tiny bows at the toe that were frayed slightly at the end from the years since her wedding.

If she closed her eyes, Lorna could still picture her own small feet shoved into the toes of those shoes, the heels clapping treacherously behind her as she traipsed across a faded Oriental carpet in her parents’ bedroom toward the fading blur of golden hair and big smile and the waft of Caron’s Fleurs de Rocaille perfume that was her memory of her mother.

Of all the things she knew or remembered about her mother, and all the things she
didn’t
remember, Lorna knew one thing for sure: clearly the love of shoes was hereditary.

She took the Delmans out of the box slowly, mentally shoving away the memory of handing over her credit card and waiting—like a gambler who’d bet it all on red—for the yes or no from that faraway Credit Card Roulette Approval Commission.

This time it was yes.

She’d signed the slip, promising (to herself ),
Yes, of course I’ll pay for these shoes! No problem! My next paycheck will go to these shoes),
while assuming an expression of one who pays their entire balance with every statement and whose entire life couldn’t be repossessed by Visa at a moment’s notice.

Pfffft.

She’d ignored the other voice:
I shouldn’t be doing this, and I will make a promise, here and now, to God or anyone else that if this charge goes through, I will never ever spend money I don’t have again.

Best not to think about the repercussions.

If pushing away uncomfortable thoughts about money burned calories, Lorna would have been a size 2.

She admired the shoes in her hands for a few minutes, then put them on.

Ahhh.

Magic.

Pleasure that, treated properly, would last a lifetime. Pleasure she’d
always
be ready and in the mood for.

So what if she’d had to charge them? By her next paycheck, she’d be able to throw some money at her debt. Within—what—a couple of years, maybe three, possibly four at the
most
—and that was assuming she wasn’t all that strict with her spending—the debt would be gone completely.

And these Delmans would be as awesome then as they were right now. And probably worth twice as much. Maybe even more. They were classic. Timeless.

A good investment.

No sooner had Lorna had that thought, sitting in the living room–dining room of her small Bethesda, Maryland, apartment, than the lights went off.

Her first thought was that the electric company had turned off her power. But no…she’d paid the bill recently enough. Had she missed a thunderstorm somehow? Summers in the D.C. area were notoriously hot and muggy, and this early August day was no exception. Citizens like her paid monthly for electricity that occasionally—in the worst of summer—went off for
hours,
sometimes even more than a day.

She got up from the sofa and tottered in her Delmans over to the phone on the hall table. She called the power company, fully expecting to be told everyone had overtaxed the power grid by cranking their AC, and that the power would be back on soon. Maybe she’d go to the mall and kill an hour or two in the cool air there before work, she thought idly, dialing the number on the old pink princess phone she’d whispered secrets into since she was twelve years old.

Ten minutes and perhaps fourteen automated-system touch tones later, a power company representative—who had identified herself as Mrs. Sinclair, no first name—gave Lorna the response she had, deep down, been dreading.

“Ma’am, your power was shut off due to nonpayment.”

Okay, first of all, that
ma’am
was totally condescending. And second—nonpayment? That wasn’t possible. Wasn’t it just a couple of weeks ago that she’d had a couple of really good tip nights and had come home and paid a bunch of bills? When
was
that? Like mid-July? Early July? It was definitely after the Fourth.

Or, wait, maybe it was just after Memorial Day. One of those cookout holidays. She’d worn those adorable pink Gucci sandals.

She looked dubiously at the pile of mail on the table by the door—it added up so quickly—and asked, archly, “What do you show as the last payment received?”

“April twenty-eighth.”

Her mind ticked back like the calendar at the opening of a bad 1930s movie. Okay, she’d gotten that July windfall, but maybe she hadn’t paid the electric bill that time. Maybe she’d paid it the time before, which was, what, maybe June? Could it
possibly
have been back as far as May?

Surely not
April
! No! No way. She was sure there was a mistake. “That’s impossible! I—”

“We sent another notice on May fifteenth, and on June fifth,” Mrs. Sinclair’s voice rang with disapproval, “and on July ninth, we sent a cutoff notice, warning you that if we did not receive your payment by today, your power would be shut off.”

Okay, she did vaguely remember at one point she was all ready to pay her bills when Nordstrom had sent a notice about their half-yearly sale.

That had been a great day. Those two pairs of Bruno Maglis were a
steal.
So comfortable, she could have run a mile in them.

But she’d definitely paid the bill the next month.

Definitely.

Hadn’t she?

“Now, wait a minute, let me check my files.” Lorna scrambled to her computer and pushed the button to turn it on, waiting a full five seconds or so before realizing that the computer, which held her payment records, ran on the very electricity the snarky woman on the other end of the line was withholding from her. “I’m sure I’d remember if you’d sent a cutoff notice.”

“Mm-hm.”

It was easy to picture Mrs. Sinclair as a nasty little troll sitting under a bridge, with a pinched face and curly hair.
You want electricity? You’re gonna have to get past me first. So riddle me this: When was the last time you paid your utility bills?

Lorna gave an exasperated sigh and reached for her wallet. She’d been here before. “Okay, forget it, just tell me what it will take to turn it back on. Can I pay over the phone?”

“Yes. It’s eight hundred seventeen dollars and twenty-six cents. You can use Visa, MasterCard, or Discover.”

It took Lorna a moment to digest that. Mistake. Mistake. It had to be a mistake. “
Eight hundred
dollars?” she echoed stupidly.

“Eight seventeen twenty-six.”

“I wasn’t even
here
for a week in June.” Ocean City. A week of espadrilles and Grecian tie-ups that made her feel like she was vacationing on the Mediterranean. “How could I have used eight hundred dollars’ worth of electricity? That can’t be right.” Something
had
to be wrong here. They had someone else’s bill confused with her own. They had to.

Maybe that was the collective bill for her entire floor of the building.

“That includes a one-hundred-and-fifty-dollar reconnect fee, and a two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar deposit, on top of your three-hundred-and-ninety-eight-dollar-and-forty-three-cent bill and finance charges of eighteen dollars and—”

“What’s a reconnect fee?” They’d never asked for
that
before.

“The fee for reconnecting your power after it’s been turned off.”

This was unbelievable.
“Why?”

“Ms. Rafferty, we had to turn off your power and now turn it back on.”

“And that’s, what, like a switch or something you have to flip?” She could picture pinched-faced Mrs. Sinclair sitting next to a great big cartoon
ON/OFF
switch. “You want me to pay a hundred and fifty dollars for that?”

“Ma’am”—there it was again, that ugly condescending tone—“you can do whatever you choose. If you want your power back on, it’s going to cost you eight hundred and eighteen dollars and three cents.”

“Whoa, wait a minute,” Lorna interrupted. “A second ago, you said it was eight seventeen something.”

“Our computers just refreshed, and today’s interest was just added to your account.”

The apartment was getting hot. It was hard to say if it was because the air-conditioning had been turned off or because Lorna was getting so frustrated with Mrs. Sinclair—whom she’d now decided was probably not married and had taken this opportunity to tag
Mrs.
onto her identity despite the fact that she hadn’t had sex in years, if ever.

In fact, her name probably wasn’t even Sinclair. She probably just used that as a pseudonym so that people wouldn’t hunt her down and kill her at home after talking to her on the phone.

“Can I speak with a supervisor?” Lorna asked.

“I can have someone call you back within twenty-four hours, ma’am, but it won’t change your bill.”

Except for the added interest by the time they got back to her, of course.

Lorna took her Visa out of her wallet. It was practically still warm from the Delman purchase. “Fine.” The battle was over. Lorna had lost. Hell, she was losing the entire
war
. “I’m going to use my Visa.” Assuming the charge went through.

A split second of satisfaction seemed to crackle over the line from Mrs. Sinclair to Lorna. “And the name, as it appears on the card?…”

After hanging up with Mrs. Sinclair, Lorna decided to look in the pile of mail by the door, to see if there really was a cutoff notice. Somehow, right up until that moment, she had remained half-convinced that there was a mistake.

There was a mistake, all right. In fact, by the time she’d opened all the envelopes, there was a large, ugly pile of mistakes, all of them hers.

To be honest, Lorna had known for some time that she needed to go through the stuff. The pile had sat there by the door, like a thing on fire, and she had tried to ignore it and the dull ache she felt in the pit of her stomach every time she passed it, or thought about it in the middle of the night when she couldn’t sleep. She didn’t have the money to pay the bills, but she always felt like she’d have it soon. Another paycheck, a good tip night. But her spending was out of control, and she knew it.

She just didn’t know how completely out of control it was.

What on earth did she buy with all that money?

And why did she still feel so empty?

She wasn’t extravagant. She hardly ever went out, and it wasn’t as if she was sitting around sipping Dom Pérignon all the time. The only thing she bought that could, conceivably, be considered a
nonnecessity
were a few shoes here and there. That is, if you could possibly consider shoes unnecessary.

Sure, once in a while, when she found a really great pair, she’d get an extra, just in case. Like with the Maglis last summer. But, seriously, one pair cost a mere fraction of her rent. How did that add up to tens of thousands of dollars?

Until that moment, she’d kept thinking she’d pay the debt down. Money would come in, and she’d go through the bills and everything would be fine. She’d had $250, even $300 tip nights at the restaurant now and then. August was always slow in the restaurant business, but as soon as September rolled around, she was sure she’d make a lot.

But looking at the bills, it hit her hard that she was never going to be able to make enough to get this debt under control. There were late fees, over-limit fees, finance charges…two of her five credit cards had raised the interest rate to within spitting distance of 30 percent. Of the $164 minimum payment on one, $162 was pure interest. Even Lorna knew that paying down the capital at two dollars a month would take decades.

And that was assuming she didn’t
use
the card anymore.

She had a problem.

This was serious, serious debt.

It had begun simply enough, with a Sears charge card the department store had been gracious enough to send her in her first year of college. Having grown up very comfortably in the posh D.C. suburb of Potomac, Maryland, she always assumed that she would not only meet but would
exceed
that upper-middle-class suburban life. That was a
starting
point, not the
high
point of her life.

So when she got the credit card, it just felt
right
to go out and make a few small purchases that she would pay for herself.

Her first purchase had been a red pair of Keds. She’d seen them on the Lucite stand and immediately pictured herself dockside at the Chesapeake Bay with friends, her skin a deep bronze from the sun, her blond hair gleaming like the front of a box of Clairol Hydrience 02 Beach Blonde, her new boyfriend—the son of a wealthy family who owned car dealerships all across the D.C. Metro area—so enamored of her that he would propose and they’d live happily ever after.