Part 3 (1/2)
I read the card.
Alixe Carter.
invites you to a DIVORCE SHOWER.
for Lauren Blount.
Sat.u.r.day, October 2nd.
Midnight.
The Penthouse, Hotel Rivington Gifts: For one Dress: For a date.
Bring: Eligible Man.
Prohibited: Husbands.
That was very Lauren, I thought. To have a ”shower” thrown for her just at the moment when every thirty-two-year-old girl in New York had sworn off wedding and baby showers, due to an allergy to the phrase ”dilated ten centimeters.” ”Dilated” is a horrific word. They should change it. I noticed there was something else in the envelope: another engraved card, this one with gray type on a white card. It read: Lauren is registered at:.
Condomania, 351 Bleecker Street, Tel 212-555-9442.
Agent Provocateur, 133 Mercer Street, Tel 212-222-0229.
As usual, no one had heard a word from Lauren in days. I'd tried to call her a couple of times to thank her for her birthday party, and had always been greeted by the words 'This. Voicemail Box. Is. Full.” You couldn't even leave a message. And then out of the blue she'd come up with this divorce shower thing that everyone thought was hysterical.
Although no one was quite sure exactly what it meant, that didn't really matter. After all, no one's quite sure about Lauren Blount's anything. The only thing, in fact, that anyone is certain about is that Lauren's life is beautifully arranged: she's very rich, very young, very thin, very pretty-and very, very divorced.
Professional Friends are the newest kind of acquaintance to have in New York-subconsciously, that is. In that, if you have one you are 100 percent unaware of it, it being the nature of Professional Friends to act as genuinely warm and smoochy as Real Friends. Interior designers, art consultants, financial advisers, gyrotonics masters, or party decorators, Professional Friends lurk invisibly on the payroll of the Manhattan heiress, spending her money, skimming off their 15 percent commission, and being the ultimate best buddy. Who else understands ”how stressful everything is” and will understand it at half past five in the morning, the hour at which New York princesses generally start to freak out about ”how stressful everything is”?
Feared by their married counterparts, unable to trust straight men, frequently in need of a walker, the Debutante Divorcee is easy prey. Charming Milton, I soon realized, is the most professional of the Professional Friends. You'd never have a clue that he's not a real friend. Fairly often he messengers little baskets of vitamins to all his girlfriends with a note saying he's ”worried” about them. Milton even telephones Lauren, and his other benefactresses, if it's chillier than usual and warns them, ”Don't go out. It's cold.” Naturally, they feel like they'd die of frostbite, or rickets, without him.
It was no coincidence that the day after Hunter left for his long trip to Paris, a spectacularly elegant parcel arrived at our apartment early in the morning. It was wrapped in glossy black paper and had a white grosgrain bow tied around it with geometrical precision. I tore the envelope on the top open. Inside was a thick white card with gold edging and the name Milton Holmes engraved in orange across the top. Written in beautiful sepia ink were the words, Dearest Sylvie, A little piece of Paris for One Fifth Avenue.
Adored meeting you. I'll be over at six to see you.
Hugs, Milton Over at six? How did Milton know where I lived? Maybe Lauren had told him. But what did he want?
I unwrapped the package between sips of espresso. Inside was an a.s.souline book ent.i.tled Paris Living Rooms. Several pages were marked with powder blue Post-it notes. I opened the book to one of them. The page showed a huge, white paneled drawing room filled with antique white chairs, tables, Deco gla.s.s lamps, and vases filled with lilacs. Underneath the photograph the text read, ”Ines de la Fressange, fas.h.i.+on designer, Elysee district.” On the Post-it, Milton had scribbled, ”I like the wide herringbone flooring.”
I was fully aware that I was being professionally stalked for an interior decorating job. Before we had moved to New York, we had found this charming, fairly large, and very old-fas.h.i.+oned apartment on the fifth floor at One Fifth Avenue, a 1920s building. Our apartment looked over Was.h.i.+ngton Square Park, and even though it was still only half-decorated, I loved it. Milton would be expecting me to be vulnerable to his charms now that Hunter was out of town. But, I reminded myself, I wasn't the kind of girl who went out and hired a decorator. I'd never had that kind of money in the past, and even if we did now, that didn't change things as far as I was concerned. I did things myself. I often think that girls in New York generally don't do enough things for themselves, and I wasn't interested in that kind of life. This is twenty-first-century New York, not eighteenth-century Florence, though many women here seem blissfully unaware of that fact. Apparently there are still girls on the Upper East Side who don't even brush their own hair.
I had no idea when I'd have time to finish doing up our place, but I'd figure something out. I had weekends, and now that Hunter was away, I definitely had fewer distractions. Still, I realized as I walked from the hall out into the drawing room, we had a lot of s.p.a.ce to make beautiful. I had to admit to myself that it was intimidating.
Just then the phone rang. It was Milton.
”Are you obsessed with the book?” he said perkily.
”Milton, I loved it-”
”-could you just move the chaise, maybe...six and a half inches to the right? No, a little more, yes, a smidgeola toward the terrace...that's it. Stop! Sto-o-op!!!” he howled. ”Sorry, I'm on site.”
”Shall I call you back?” I asked.
”I'm always on site. Anyway,” Milton asked, ”do I get the job?”
”I'm sure you don't have time,” I said, trying to put him off politely.
”How are you ever going to do that place alone?” said Milton. ”It's huge, and you won't be able to get a yard of decent fabric unless I take you to the D&D building. Are you awfully lonely without Hunter-”
”He calls all the time,” I said.
He did. Hunter had only been gone twenty-four hours, but he'd called from JFK and from Charles de Gaulle, and he even left a sweet love-you-miss-you message in the early hours this morning on my cell. I couldn't have wished for a more attentive husband.
”Anyway, I'm coming for coffee later. There's nothing you can do. See you at six.”
With that, he put the phone down. What was I doing at six o'clock tonight? I quickly flicked through my diary: I had a meeting with Thack and the senior buyer from Neiman Marcus this afternoon. It would be heavy going-I was sure Neimans would barely order a thing from the new collection. Maybe it was a good thing Milton was coming over later, I thought. He would definitely cheer me up after that meeting. It didn't mean I had to hire him.
”We love the gowns,” said Bob Bulton, the Neiman Marcus buyer, wrapping up his order and flicking the elastic around his folder.
Bob Bulton was one of the most influential fas.h.i.+on buyers at Neiman Marcus, though his appearance would not necessarily have led one to that conclusion. He was extremely large, nearing retirement, and clad in a bespoke Thom Browne suit, the most noticeable feature of which was the way the cuff of the pants stopped far enough above the ankle to reveal his lilac cashmere socks. Despite the fact that Thack's Chrystie Street studio was crammed with stock, sewing machines, F.I.T. interns, and Chinese seamstresses, Bob hadn't seemed to mind the chaos at all. He delicately eased his squishy behind off the dainty antique chair he had been sitting on.
”But we can't commit to more than fifteen looks until we start to see some press,” he added. Then he looked Thackeray in the eye and said, ”You gotta get press.”
”Absolutely not an issue,” said Thackeray coolly.
Thack was smiling in an easy way, perched on the edge of the old French sofa at one end of the studio. He looked completely relaxed, dressed in a 1960s Saville Row suit and a sharp, white, handmade s.h.i.+rt. A diamond and pearl rose brooch, which had once belonged to his mother, was pinned to the lapel of his jacket. Suddenly he looked at me, saying, ”Sylvie here is very connected in New York. She's already got at least three really beautiful young girls who have signed on to wear gowns at...Alixe Carter's New Year's ball.”
Like many fas.h.i.+on designers, Thackeray was more deserving of an Oscar than most actors. What an absolute, wretched lie, I thought, nodding and smiling and saying, ”Isn't that great news?”
No doubt I would be punished for perjuring myself later.
”Well, I have to congratulate you,” said Bob, looking impressed. ”You've nailed those girls down very early. We'll add two of each of the dresses that will be worn at the party for our pre-spring order.” He seemed to be opening his folder again. ”If they're photographed they'll fly out of the store. Do you think Alixe herself will wear a dress?”
”Her fitting's in two weeks,” said Thackeray, in an inspired spurt of fibbing.
”Well,” said Bob, ”I will have to congratulate Alixe on her taste. She's an extremely close friend of my wife's, you know.”
”How lovely,” I said, feeling slight chest pains. ”So will you be at the ball then?”
”Wouldn't miss it for the world. Congratulations, Thackeray,” said Bob warmly.
Alas, I thought, alas.