Fatshionista (19 page)

I kept up a
steady stream of comments on the way downstairs and out to the sidewalk. He
continued to “hmmm” and nod at me, but he was obviously not listening to
anything I said, which was actually a good thing, since I was just babbling
with nervousness.

He told me to go
ahead and sit down and that he would order for us.
Great, now I get to sit
here and stare at his cute backside while I contemplate what fresh hell he’s
going to unleash on me.
Couldn’t he see that I had already had several of
the most challenging days of my young life?

He came back with
a pot of tea and two mugs on a tray. I was not normally a tea drinker, but I
decided to go with the flow on this one until I heard why he felt the need to
whisk me out of the workroom for some private conversation. He took forever
pouring and adding sugar and a little milk to his; I shook my head no and
grabbed the mug so I had something to do with my hands.

“I am assuming
that whatever dreaded thing Scarlett was hinting about at dinner the other
night has happened and that it is the cause of your complete lack of attention
during our meeting. I thought it best if we sat down and you could tell me what
happened. I have too much riding on this show to not have you 100% involved in
the conversation I was attempting to have with you upstairs.”

It was funny to
me how snippy, snarky little comments sounded oh-so-much-better when spoken
with a British accent, especially one sweetened by the cadence of India. But in
this case, I was not lulled by it; I was pissed. Well, kind of pissed. Pissed
that he had noticed. I thought I was doing an excellent job of keeping my inner
turmoil under wraps, but I was obviously mistaken. How many serious
conversations would I be required to have before I could go home, curl up in
the fetal position, and decide what I was doing with my life?

“Daniel.” Grrr, I
hated apologizing to clients. “First, please let me apologize for my
preoccupation with other matters. I would never let my own issues interfere
with the quality of work that I deliver to my clients. I am sorry, and I assure
you that my head is now completely in the game. I would be happy to return
upstairs and answer any questions or concerns you may have about the final
proposal for the show.” There, that ought to make him feel a little better.

“While I
appreciate your professional reassurances, I am concerned about you…on a more
personal level, shall we say?”

Sorry, what? He
continued despite the look of confusion I knew was all over my face.

“I don’t think it
is untoward of me to say that we have rather enjoyed our time working together.
I feel like we have become friends as well as working colleagues. While,
certainly, the show is a high priority for me, I wanted to get you away from it
because I could tell you had something on your mind. As your friend, if I may presume
so much, I wanted to see if there was anything I could do to help.”

Ohhh. That was so
well put. Poor Daniel, if he had any idea just how friendly we had been getting
in my head, he would run screaming out of the café. Of course my late-night
text probably went a long way in moving us closer to the friend end of the
spectrum than the colleague end. And I was dying to blurt all this out to
someone and see what they thought. My plan had been to get through the day and
head over to Avis’s to get her two cents worth, but I didn’t think I could hold
it in for that long.

So I blurted out
the whole story. The whole story. Even the bit about my weight and Marta’s fat
comment. It all came flying out of my mouth, and my brain wasn’t acting fast
enough to edit that particular section out. It made me nervous that I had put
the weight issue out there in front of a man. Gay or not, men never really knew
how to handle that. Should he act like I never brought it up? Should he tell me
what he thought I wanted to hear? Or should he tell me how he really felt? At
least in this case it wasn’t a direct slam to my body size, it was simply an
observation on Marta’s part, so maybe he would just let that seep into the
narrative and not pluck it out and want to talk about it.

“She told you
that you should lose weight on your first day on the job? Why in the world did
you ever come back the next day?”

No such luck. Apparently
the man had an uncanny ability to hone in on the one subject I didn’t want to talk
about. Great.

“Daniel, what
choice did I have? She only said what every other person in this industry
thought when they interviewed me; she just happened to say it. And I knew it
going in to this field. It is a body-conscious profession that we have put
ourselves into, so it wasn’t a surprise to me that my own body was being called
into question on day one.”

He started to say
something, but I cut him off by putting my hand over the one he had wrapped
around his mug. “If it wasn’t that I was too fat, it would be that I was too
tall, or too short, or too blond, or too brunette, or too old. The list goes on
and on. But I also knew that what I looked like didn’t have anything to do with
the job I was going to be doing. So I let it slide. I wrote down her quotes, I
watched her work, I took notes of my own, I made my own connections. It all
worked out. Was it painful to have her discuss my body in such familiar terms?
Absolutely. Would that have happened if I had taken a job in teaching or
banking? Probably not. So, please don’t hone in on that one aspect of the
story. I need your opinion on this. I don’t know why; we haven’t known each
other for very long, but for some reason your opinion is very important to me.”

There, I had said
it. If your opinion was important to me, then you were important to me. If this
man was as sensitive to subtext as I believed him to be, he should hear the
message loud and clear. Too bad I couldn’t just blurt out, “So, are you really
gay? Because I’ve been fantasizing about you for weeks and I would be so happy
if I thought there was even a tiny chance that those fantasies could become
reality.”

“Is this what you’re
passionate about?” he asked as he covered my hand with his other hand.

What? What was
the question again? I kept staring into his eyes, and it took me a second to
realize that: one, he was referring to my job and not my unrequited lust for
him, and second, I was still staring at him, not uttering a word.
Focus,
Millie, focus.

“I don’t know.
That’s what I have to figure out, I guess. There is another field that I’ve
dabbled in on the side that at one time was my dream career, but I also really
love many aspects of what I do. I love the art, I love the staff we have at
Marta’s, and I love the designers and artists I get to work with every day. The
hours suck, the pay isn’t much better, and I rarely have any social interaction
with potential bedroom partners, but I do love it.” Once again, the mouth was
moving faster than the brain, evidenced by his eyebrow winging its way up his
forehead at the mention of no sex. Yes, admitting to this man I had been having
raging sex dreams about that I haven’t had time for dating anyone…oh yes, I was
reeling him in one depressing life fact at a time.

“Well, the
dreadful impact to your sex life aside,” he smirked, “what do you think would
happen if you didn’t take the job?”

“I hadn’t really
thought about it. I guess Marta would look elsewhere for a replacement, but
that would seem kind of awkward for me to then begin reporting to someone who
has the job I could have had.” Is that something I could do? Or should I plan
to quit?

“You know what I
do when I’m faced with challenging career decisions? I listen to my body. I
work myself into a meditative pose and then I relax and let the two choices
flow through my mind. Then I notice how my body reacts to each choice. Does it
tense up? Do I feel like a cloud has passed over me? Do I relax? Our bodies are
very in tune with what is and isn’t a good choice for us. We get so distanced
from it that we lose the ability to tap into it and let it help us make our
decisions.”

I wished I could
tell him about the ashram I had visited while I was studying in Delhi. I wished
I could tell him about the guru I studied with who helped me to calm my mind in
times of trouble. I wished I could tell him so much about my time there. I
suddenly wanted us to have a lot in common and be connected on many different
levels, not just work.

“Is that how you
decided to become a designer and to follow the, um, path less taken for most
Indian men?” Was there any delicate way to say “Was this how you decided it
would be okay to be an openly gay man?”

He smiled. “By
the path less taken for Indian men, I assume you are referring to my career
choice?” I loved it when that eyebrow of his inched up his forehead. He always
added that little element when he was trying to be funny or intimidate me;
either way, it always worked to melt me just a little bit. Two could play at
this game, though.

I raised my right
eyebrow to mirror his and said, “Why yes, of course. Whatever else would I
possibly be referring to?”

“Hmmmm, indeed.”
Now I was really melting. That “hmmmm” noise he made always got me—a
little farther down south, but got me nonetheless.

“So, now you know
the whole sordid dilemma. I have to make the decision by tomorrow night, and I
still have no idea what to do.” I went to reach for my mug when I realized we
were still holding hands over his mug. Dratted man. I was so comfortable around
him that I wasn’t even aware we were still touching.

I pulled my hand
out from under his and took a sip of my tea. He stared at his now empty hand
and looked up at me. Somehow the tone at the table had become very serious very
quickly, and I couldn’t tell what that look was all about. I hated how in all
the romance novels the heroine got “the look,” the one that signaled yes,
absolutely he was as hot for you as you were for him, jump him, jump him. That
never, ever seemed to happen in real life. My heart said that was what his eyes
were telling me, but my brain was saying this was a man who liked other men.
Could this day get any more confusing?

I abruptly stood
up, turned on my heel, and put my mug on top of the trash bin and called over
my shoulder, “Enough soul searching, Mr. Singh; we have a show to plan, and we’re
not going to spend another minute hashing over my issues. We have Delhi fashion
to put on the New York map, so
chawlo.”

Oh shit.

“Did you just say
chawlo
?” he was practically yelling at me because I was already
sprinting out the door.  How could I be so stupid as to tell him “let’s
go” in Hindi? Stupid, stupid, stupid.

“What? No, I said
‘hello?’ Like ‘hello, let’s go?’ Come on, man, this is America!” Hopefully that
would be enough to bury it.

He followed me
across the street and didn’t say anything else, but he did keep shooting me
curious looks in the elevator. Oh well, I would tell him some day, but not
until after the show.

Get your
flip-flops (well, for you bitches I would say it’s more like platform espadrilles)
and your Bain De Soleil. Resort wear shows are right around the corner, and
your mama is hearing great things about this season’s collections. Marc Jacobs
is said to have been inspired by the 1950s pin-up girls, so expect a lot of
black and a lot of one pieces. Also a little tropical birdie told us that
Versace’s collection will be all about red. Well, your mama always packs her
Bain de Soleil, so red is never a color she sports, you know what I mean?

Enjoy these
following images your mama compiled of some of the best resort wear in the last
five to ten years. Let’s hope this year’s collections bring it as fiercely as
these years past. Later gators!

--April 15th
“It’s just fashion, bitches” blog--

Avis was still up
when I had gotten home last night, and I filled her in on the major dilemma and
shared with her the advice Daniel graciously offered me after he green lit my
proposal for the show.

Basically he said
more about the meditation and also said to spend some time picturing in my head
what it would be like to go in every day and have Marta’s job. Would the
rewards be worth the sacrifice? Would I still be able to have time for the
other things that were important in my life? (That would be a big no—I didn’t
have time for those now!) But most importantly he said I was an extremely
intelligent woman who knew what the right decision was; I just needed to listen
to my intuition and stop worrying about it.

I did agree with
him that I knew somewhere deep down I had already made the decision. I just
needed to get quiet enough to hear what I had decided. I also agreed that I
didn’t need to poll a lot of people on this to hear what they had to say. At
the end of the day, the people in my life wanted the best thing for me. They
could tell me what they thought I should do, but that would be looking at the
situation from their perspective. I was the only one who was facing this choice
and would have to live with the consequences. So as much as hearing what other
people thought tended to make me feel better about my choices, I thought in
this case it would confuse me even more. And I knew the more I loved my own
choices, the less it mattered what others thought of them.

So I stuck with
Daniel and Avis as far as advice went. Avis chimed in along the same lines as
Daniel and said that I knew what was best for me; it was just a matter of me
getting quiet and deciding what path I wanted to take. Avis certainly had the
unique advantage of being the only person who knew about my other career and my
lifelong dream to be a writer. I told her I was scared that I wouldn’t have
time to do both, and that it might even be a conflict of interest to write
about things I found out about at work once I became the head of the company.
If I took this position, I would have to retire the blog. And it could never
get out that I was the one who authored it or it might undermine my credibility
with my peers. I certainly couldn’t imagine anyone sharing a confidence with me
if they found out I used to be the one who blabbed everyone’s secrets for the
world to read!