The Dress (6 page)

Sally opened her mouth in mock horror, although actually, in this case, it was genuine. She was wearing skin-tight mock-croc leggings and a pastel tinted sweatshirt with a gold unicorn emblazoned across the front.

‘You think I wore this magnificent ensemble,' she said, running her hands down her front in a dramatic sweep, ‘to be hidden in the fashion desert of the middle row? Sometimes I wonder if we work in the same business, Lily, honestly I do.' But she sat down anyway and started to root about in her handbag.

‘Tell me you haven't got a sandwich in there, Sally?' Lily said.

‘Of course I have sandwiches. You think I'd sit through the tedium of a show like this without proper sustenance? If we're not in the front row at least I can eat my sandwich in peace.'

Lily laughed. She loved Sally. She fingered the picture in her bag and wondered if she should tell her about the cutting. Sally would probably think she was mad. She thought Lily was stuck in the dark ages. ‘Vintage is fine but there is so much more you could be doing with it. Forget the past, get with the future.'

Lily decided to leave it until she had heard from the woman in Wisconsin and distracted herself from thinking about it with some people-watching.

Immediately she noticed an almost impossibly handsome square-jawed, sandy-haired dreamboat of a man in the front row. He looked as if he had stepped straight off a yacht and was flanked by two women, one with long shiny black hair and one with long shiny blonde hair – both models. He whispered to one of them, and she threw her head back and laughed, prettily.

‘Who's the man with the shiny teeth?'

‘That's Jack,' said Sally, ‘and urgh, he's got “the twins” with him. He does love matching his girlfriends. So predictable.'

‘Rich
and
handsome – just your type,' Lily said. ‘He's waving at you.'

‘Still-breathing and own-teeth is my type, dear, and he's waving at me but he's
looking
at you...'

He was, too, looking right at her. Lily blushed and turned away.

‘...the dirty slut.'

‘Gee, thanks.'

‘Not you,
him
. Jack's a disgrace. He's probably identified you as the only woman in the room he hasn't slept with.'

‘Including you?'

‘Not on my own doorstep, dear. Oh God, he's incorrigible – he's
still
looking at you.'

‘Don't be silly.' Lily found herself smiling. ‘Is he? Really?'

She was trying to be dismissive but he really was extraordinarily handsome in an American celebrity type way. He was so not her type. Nonetheless, his efforts to catch her eye were quite flattering as well as amusing. She let her eyes flick over to him again for a second.

‘His teeth are so
white
.'

‘You are such a grubby Brit,' Sally said. ‘
Everyone
has teeth like that in America. It's the law.'

As the show started the house lights went down until it was pitch black in the windowless box, and deafeningly loud dance music travelled down the metal girders of the roof and up the hollow legs of the chairs they were sitting on. As the models pounded up and down the catwalk in their fluorescent sports gear, Lily had a mental flashback to her college show. She had been in her element that night, loving every moment from the hair and make-up marathon beforehand, with Sally helping to peel the models in and out of outfits, to the glorious walk down the catwalk with her girls when it was all over. She remembered looking down from the stage with the other graduates and feeling as if she was shining from the inside out. Lily had believed that night was the beginning of her life as a fashion designer, but then she had got that bad review. The journalist had called her collection ‘historically derivative', which, as a selection of 1950s-inspired dresses Lily could see that it absolutely was. Disillusioned, Lily put down her pencil and sketchpad and started indulging her passion for genuine vintage instead. Blogging fame followed. Lily was happy with life the way it was but sometimes, when she was at a show like this, she couldn't help but wonder what would have happened if she had stuck with the designing.

The show itself was average. Scott's had obviously spent a fortune on the lighting and music, and the girls they sent down the runway were a good mixture of alluring and competent. The hair and make-up was superb – gothic, techni-coloured – but the clothes?

‘They were rubbish,' Sally said to Jack when they found themselves pressed up beside him in the single-exit crush to get out.

But Jack was looking at Lily and Sally felt a frisson of annoyance as he said, ‘Lily Fitzpatrick, the vintage blogger? We're honoured to have you.'

Jack's eyes were fixed on her as if she were the only woman there. Lily guessed it was the kind of thing rich, slick dreamboats like him did to everyone, though she was taken aback that he knew who she was.

‘Don't get excited,' Sally butted in now, as if she could read her mind. ‘I told him who you were so he could put your name on the door for me. Thanks for the front row seat, buddy...'

‘Ah, Sally, you do know how I like to keep my best girl happy but alas, there wasn't room for you both.'

‘The clothes were pure pants,' said Sally. ‘Day-Glo? 80s slogans revisited? Yawn, that is
so
2010. We want something different, you know? Not more retro crap. Lily's a much better designer than any of the idiot kids coming out of college these days.'

‘You're a designer as well as a blogger?'

‘Only the best damn designer of her generation,' Sally said.

‘Oh?' said Jack. ‘What happened?'

‘She got a bad review and gave up...'

‘Actually, I discovered I preferred vintage,' Lily said, glowering at Sally.

‘I can see that,' Jack said, fixing Lily again with his playboy blue eyes. ‘I like it. Do you think those old shoes will walk you across the road for a drink?'

‘They are this season Kiely,' Lily said, ‘and I'm afraid I have to go home.'

‘Ah,' said Jack, with genuine regret in his voice. ‘Can't we persuade you?'

Sally looked in astonishment at Lily. ‘You're being weird. Are you ok? I know you're still upset over Joe...'

‘I'm fine,' Lily said. ‘I'll call you tomorrow. Nice to meet you, Jack.'

*

On the way home Lily sat on the packed tube and wondered if she was fine or if she really was being weird, leaving her best mate and a handsome man so she could go home and check up on a lead to some long lost great-uncle and his wife.

She was still sad after Joe, of course, but she probably could do with a night out. Why was she rushing home?

As if to answer her own question Lily clipped opened her leather purse bag and took out the
Vogue
cutting of Joy Fitzpatrick in her magnificent dress. Even in this black and white computer print-out, the voluminous skirt made Joy look as if she was sitting on a bejewelled cloud. For a moment Lily wondered if it was the rather haughty looking woman she wanted to be related to, or the exquisite gown she was wearing.

With that thought, the seed of an idea planted itself in Lily's head.

New York, 1951

On his first day back at work after their New Year's break, Frank's secretary came into his office and said, ‘There is a Miss Rogerson waiting for you in reception, sir.'

Frank had thought of nothing but Joy since New Year's Eve. When he closed his eyes at night he saw her face, her lips parted, waiting for his kiss. However, Frank decided to put her out of his mind. The girl's age, but also her grace, her wit, the sheer audaciousness of her mesmerizing beauty was way beyond him. He told himself, repeatedly, to forget Joy. She was simply a flighty girl who had passed a moment with him. Also, she was from an important family and Frank didn't need that sort of trouble.

‘Tell her I'm busy, Nina.'

Nina came back two minutes later and said, ‘I am sorry, sir, but she refuses to leave until she has spoken to you. She was adamant.'

Joy was sitting on the long black chaise in an eye-catching cherry-red suit.

‘As I told Nina, I intend to sit here, in this lovely reception area, until you agree to take me out to dinner tonight. She told me she'd be kind enough to supply me with coffee for as long as it takes.'

Nina smiled, a little nervously, but Joy had certainly charmed her.

She stood up and held out her hand for Frank to kiss and, like a fool, that's exactly what he did.

He took her to a modest Italian bistro for an early supper, hoping the gauche gesture would put her off. ‘I know what you're doing,' she said, ‘but you can take me here every night and feed me spaghetti until I am as fat as a house. I'm holding out for my kiss.'

‘You'll be waiting a long time,' he said.

‘And why is that?' she said. ‘Because you're too much of a gentleman?'

Frank leaned across the table and held her eye so intensely she could feel her skin burn. ‘No,' he said, ‘because I couldn't stop with a kiss.'

She had no reply, only a blushing cheek and a flickering eyelid.

‘You, Joy Rogerson, would turn this gentleman into a man.'

They married within five weeks.

Frank wanted to ask her father for Joy's hand. He understood that he was an outsider, older and unknown to her parents, but Frank hoped he could win them around. However, Joy persuaded him that they were not reasonable people, especially when it came to their only daughter. It was better for her to present the engagement to them as a fait accompli, she said. It turned out she was right.

The Rogersons were furious at both her choice of husband and the lack of consultation. However, they also knew that their daughter was a handful and they worried that if they turned this one down, she might never find another, so they conceded.

The wedding was a small affair, unforgivably small for someone of her social standing, but Joy did not care. She was marrying the love of her life. After the church service the bride and groom, along with Ruth and Charles Rogerson and a handful of carefully chosen cousins and great-aunts, went for a discreet wedding breakfast in the Waldorf.

Frank was anxious to impress Joy's parents but they virtually ignored him throughout the meal. Ruth barely acknowledged him, and it became clear that Charles did not even intend on saying the customary few words of congratulation.

Frank was humiliated. There were circles in American society where the Irish were respected: the unions, the judiciary – even politics. However, the old money of the Rogersons did not recognize new respectability. Frank was not entirely unsympathetic. He understood their chagrin at his daughter marrying not just an Irishman but a common Catholic, outside not only their social circle, but also their creed.

Joy was not as forgiving. Ashamed and hurt by her parents' behaviour, Joy did not eat throughout the wedding breakfast but stroked her new husband's hand and gazed into his eyes to let everyone know how she felt about him. As coffee was being served she stood up, held her Martini glass aloft and said, ‘I should like to propose a toast to Frank Fitzpatrick and his new wife – me!' While the glasses were raised she added, ‘Now, if you'll excuse us, I have a husband to attend to,' and before he could object, she dragged Frank away from the table.

‘You are a dreadful and wicked person,' he said as they made their way up to the suite. ‘Your parents will never forgive me.'

‘My parents will never forgive you anyway.'

When they got up to their suite Joy suddenly felt nervous. They had both been waiting for this and, while she had kissed boys before, she had little idea of what was ahead of her. Stripped of her flirtatious bravado Joy went over to the drinks cabinet and poured them both a whisky. Frank stood watching her, looking at the pert ladylike way she moved, her lacquered hair caught up in an elaborate swoop at the base of her neck, the demureness of her white, wool suit. Joy handed him the whisky and smiled but there was a glimmer of girlish fear in her eyes. Frank threw the whisky back in one gulp then took the glass from her hand and laid it on a side table. He cupped her face in his hands and kissed her until she thought she would faint, then lifted her onto the bed. Everything became lost to her in the certainty of his touch. Joy was powerless with desire; this was everything she had ever wanted. As she felt the sting of him entering her for the first time, Joy held her husband's eyes. In them she saw a kind, beautiful man who was drunk with love and Joy felt, for the first time in her young life, as if she completely belonged.

*

Joy was determined to prove to her parents that they had made the right decision in allowing her to marry Frank, and over the coming year she poured everything into becoming the perfect wife, as her beauty, poise and education had prepared her to be. She quickly worked her way into the very heart of her parents' social set and brought Frank with her. Although he would always be something of an outsider, Joy's own background, coupled with her respect for and adoration of him, helped place Frank firmly at the centre of America's oldest banking families. The ‘Irishman's' business acumen and charm did the rest.

Within weeks of the wedding Frank bought them a large, two-storey apartment on Fifth Avenue. Joy drafted in the Hollywood interior designer Adele Faulkner to decorate it. Faulkner found the beautiful young socialite both charming and surprisingly discerning. Impressed with her client's good taste, she guided Joy towards the finest young designers and artists of the day. Joy filled the Fitzpatrick home with revolutionary modern design. She took risks, placing Gerrit Rietveld classic Zig Zag Chairs around an Eames plywood table. Clean lines and modern tastes were unusual among the Rogersons' traditional set but Joy was not afraid to stand out. When the Fitzpatrick apartment featured in
Architectural Digest
, the doubters all came to her housewarming cocktail party and cooed over the new, modern look.