Target Underwear and a Vera Wang Gown (14 page)

Needless to say, I took the job very seriously.

The reports were a free service for the shop owner, and when they started getting customers based on what I had reported on the Web site, the shop owners let me have whatever I wanted, sometimes at 50 percent of the cost. If a lot of people came into the store because they’d heard about it on
Shopright.com
, the shop owners would even give me an item of clothing I liked, free of charge as a thank-you. One place gave me a gorgeous pair of gold hoop earrings. Another gave me a cream-colored cashmere sweater, which I gave to my mother for her birthday.

Sometimes the shops didn’t trust me and kicked me out of the store for writing down notes. The Powers That Be at
Shopright.com
advised that should something like that happen, I should tell the shop owners that I was just taking notes for a friend who really wanted those particular D&rG jeans ... and by the way also wanted that Rebecca Taylor silk top and those Prada boots in black. That didn’t happen too often, though.

Another turnoff was when I walked into some boutique that never got any customers, especially, say, at four in the afternoon on a Wednesday. All the salespeople wanted to do was talk about nothing of any importance, and they wouldn’t give me a second to write down any sale items. I avoided those places.

The Powers That Be at
Shopright.com
were upset with me twice. The first time was when I was reprimanded for concentrating on Los Angeles stores and disregarding the San Fernando Valley. Truthfully, the thought hadn’t occurred to me, so I added the Valley to my route.

The second time
Shopright.com
lectured me was when a rule came down that colors could not be described with their basic names. They felt that clothing didn’t sound as glamorous, and I was right on board with that idea. Instead of saying beige, for example, they asked that you say “camel.” If the article was blue, you should say “sapphire” or “azure.” I got really into naming my colors and got a little too carried away. They drew the line when I referred to a blouse in yellow as “black-and-blue-mark-after-a-week yellow,” or saying that a charcoal gray suit jacket came in a shade of “my friend Jimmy’s dirty kitchen floor.”

I’ve never been a big sale shopper. I have no artistic eye for what the future could hold when looking at a pair of linen pants that have been crushed by the clothes surrounding. them on one of those circular clothes-hanger merry-go-rounds. I’ve always been the type of person who needs to see it on the mannequin. I can’t shop at Loehmann‘s, though I’m jealous of those who can. Because I had to do it for the job, though, everything was closely scrutinized and commented on when necessary.

For example:

The Powers That Be loved it when I did things like that.

verything was going my way in the winter of 1999. I was actually using my gym membership, my hair had grown out from the last horrible haircut and, after a lifelong search for jeans that looked halfway decent on me, Theory introduced a wonderful pair of stretch jeans.
Shopright.com
not only paid very handsomely, but it also introduced me to all the salespeople in the best shops, thus giving me the unique opportunity of knowing when to be at the right shop at the right time when the hottest clothes came in or went on sale this in turn made me a more desirable-looking object on the single scene.

It put my girlfriends’ minds at ease as well. Heidi begged to borrow my Miu Miu multicolored three-quarter-length coat (which I’d really like hack one of these days). When Rachel still couldn’t find the black pants she needed, I recorded every pair of black pants I saw in her size and wrote up a report for her. Susan had no time to shop for the Women in Hollywood Luncheon, so I picked out a lovely DKNY pantsuit in gray and had it sent over to her. When Serena had a friends thirtieth birthday party that called for “French Chic” attire, I knew the exact outfit she should get and we fixed the fashion emergency in a record ten minutes.

I was living in a utopian paradise except for one thing. What ever happened to that Democrat in Republican’s clothing who fake gasped? I thought we had a connection there. Did I say something wrong that night? Was something in my teeth? Was my beige ... er, camel-colored shift dress as awful as I thought it was? These were questions I posed in my mind from time to time as I drove from one upscale boutique to another.

Six months after our first date, I was taking notes on an Armani cap-sleeve dress in aqua (Was: $864 Now: $639) when my cell phone rang.

“Hi,” a voice said apologetically, “remember me?”

“I’m sorry, who is this?” I feigned perfect ignorance.

“I’m sorry I haven’t called sooner. Work has been nuts, my family is driving me crazy and, to be honest, I was dating someone and we just broke up.”

“Me too on all accounts,” I answered as I made a mental note to call the guy I was dating at the time to tell him it was over.

“So what’s going on with you?” he asked.

“Oh, nothing much, I’ve been made the Los Angeles editor of an upscale fashion Web site called
Shopright.com
,” I casually mentioned.

“Editor!” he exclaimed. “Wow, you’re an editor! That’s so cool.”

“It’s OK,” I said with a pout. “I mean, the one nice thing is that I now know where all the hottest clothes are at the best prices.”

“For men, too?”

“Oh sure. Men, women, children, dogs, ferrets ...” I tried to joke, but it fell flat.

“Do you know the designer Dries Van Noten?” he asked.

“Oh sure,” I answered confidently, since I absolutely did know who he (or she) was, or at the very least certainly, his (or her) designs.

“I have these awesome Dries Van Noten shoes in black that have this really comfortable rubber sole, and I really want to find them in brown.”

“Oh sure,” I said, unsure. “I think I know exactly where to find them. I actually have to go over to that store, so I’ll look for you.”

“Great. You can let me know when I see you on Friday.”

“Friday?”

“That is, if you’re free for dinner,” he said as his voice softened.

“I’m free,” I said, blushing.

“I really can’t wait to see you,” he said, possibly sincere.

“Me too,” I said.

It was two days until the date. I had one day to dump the guy I was dating, get my hair done, get my nails done, get a facial, a massage, and contemplate Botox. The other day, of course, would be for finding those shoes ... and, of course, finding out whether Dries Van Noten was a man or a woman.

could not find a thing wrong with my Democrat who dressed like a Republican. Turned out he was really good at investment banking.

“Internet stocks,” he said, “that’s the way to go for a quick buck right now.”

So I did.

And when he told me to sell, I did, doubled my investment, and bought him a Co-Op Harris Tweed blazer in mushroom as a thank-you, which he looked adorable in.

From his perfectly tailored Hugo Boss and Armani suits to his rugged jeans and the skull caps (which, by the by, he was sporting way before the craze started) that he wore on the weekend, anything he said or wore was right and just and warranted, because in my eyes this guy could do no wrong. While the overly romantic statements he’d make still gave rise to a small question of authenticity in the way back of my head, in time I was able to disregard my pessimism completely.

“I need to make out with you for at least ten minutes before we go to dinner,” he’d say as he entered my door to pick me up for a night on the town. Then he’d take me in his arms and sink his lips into mine. It might have been a cool sixty degrees outside, but even in my skimpy sheet of a DKNY satin slip dress in sapphire, the way he wrapped his arms around me so tight and secure made me melt into a sea of balmy passion, and I felt like someone could have taken a picture and put us on the cover of one of those romance novels.

“I need a second of gorgeous,” he’d say when he called me in the middle of a workday, much to my euphoric delight.

Even when he’d arrive at my house after working a twelve-hour day, to me, the wrinkles in his dress shirt or the ketchup stain he had on his jacket was the height of charming.

“How cute is this?” I’d say to Felicia. “He had a burger for lunch and the ketchup dripped on his jacket.”

“Oh no,” she warned jovially, “my little girl is in love.”

“You’re letting this guy get you too easy,” Heidi said. “You need to play hard to get,” she cautioned.

I was too far gone to listen to anyone’s opinion at that point. I would have given him the safe combination to Fort Knox if he had asked me for it. I would have sold secrets to the Soviets. I would have told him who Deep Throat was, had I known at the time. In short, I was nuts for this guy.

He loved everything that I wore.

“Like a little French schoolgirl,” he said when I went to visit him at his office in a pleated skirt and frilly white cotton blouse with a Peter Pan collar.

Or when he came over to watch a DVD and order Chinese: “Damn, your ass looks fine in these Levi‘s,” he said as pulled them off of me.

When we went to the theater, my Theory red-and-black flowered cigarette pants, DKNY black rayon sleeveless V-neck top, and especially-made-for-Bloomingdale’s Tahari three-quarter-length jacket in black sparked a most welcome jealous streak in him. “I’m going to hold your hand all night so all the other guys know to back off,” he said.

And I knew that he could definitely be the one when he said the kindest, most magical words every girl with high-heeled shoes on begs to hear: “I’m going to go get the car and bring it around so you don’t have to walk so far.”

When I checked every store in Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley for those Dries Van Noten shoes in brown and came up empty, I went to him wary and apologetic.

“I can’t even believe you were still looking for those,” he said, throwing his suit jacket around my shoulders as we left a movie theater one chilly night. “I totally forgot about that. You know something?”—he stopped, pulling me in tight—“I think you are the most perfect woman in the world.”

Was he out of his mind? How could this be possible? He liked me as much as I liked him? What were the odds? Had I become the cynical single gal that I was afraid of becoming? Yes, I had. Of course I had. How stupid could I have been that very first second we saw each other? That fake gasp was real! How could I have ever mistaken it for anything else?

I brushed his hair from his eyes, and he put his hands through mine and kissed me on the lips. Images of our future flashed through my head. Our wedding: I’d wear Vera Wang, of course. The birth of our children swaddled in cashmere blankets each time we left the hospital—the first one pink, followed by blue. Thanksgiving with my family back in Philadelphia in Ralph Lauren sweaters in an array of neutral browns, oranges, and tans would always be a photo fest, watching the children play in the leaves that so tidily matched their sweaters. My Internet stocks would come in even bigger, so vacations at our Aspen compound with matching blue-and-white ski suits and yearly Christmas holiday breaks to Hawaii in skimpy bathing suits with leis around our necks would always be the holiday cards that friends loved to get the most. “You have the picture-perfect family,” they’d say. I was getting to imagining the end of the montage at our fiftieth wedding anniversary party (“I still gasp in awe at her beauty every time I see her,” my black-tie-attired, graying love would say in his speech as our children and grandchildren dabbed their eyes). That’s when a shiver of fear shot through my body, a huge pit formed in my stomach, and the montage faded to black. None of this would ever happen for one colossal reason: How on earth was I going to make my perfection charade last for fifty years?

y lies in the pursuit of perfection started out innocently.

“Cute underwear,” Evan said. “Who makes them?”

“La Perla,” I answered suspiciously.

“Are those six-inch heels?”

“Yeah, right,” I scoffed with a nervous laugh. “Not Quite. Only four.”

“Do you remember your prom dress?” he asked one day.

“Oh sure, did you ever see
Broadcast News
?”

Evan loved everything about me, and if he loved what he saw, then I couldn’t let him down.

The thing was, I knew Evan wasn’t playing some game with me, and that killed me to no end. When we spent the weekend together in Santa Barbara, he brought only a bathing suit, some extra underwear, and sunscreen.

“We’re on vacation,” he said. “You don’t care if I wear the same thing every day, do you?”

“Heck no,” I said as I watched him try to stuff my oversize suitcase into his trunk. Each day he threw on those same jeans, thermal shirt, and T-shirt, I felt such a hit of jealousy He looked so comfortable, and all I wanted to do was wear the jeans and tank top I was wearing when we drove up. I just couldn‘t, though. In the nine months of dating, he’d never known me to wear the same thing twice, and he commented on it with friends, saying, “She’s so up-to-the-minute in fashion that after she wears it, it’s out of style.”

We had been dating for about a year when he called one Saturday morning to extend an invitation from his boss to come to the boss’s beachfront home in Malibu for a day of sun and surf. This was out of the question.

“You know what? I don’t know what I ate last night, but my stomach is just going crazy,” I said as I let out a little cough followed by a sniffle.