Baby Needs a New Pair of Shoes

“Flavia?” I asked.

“Long gone.” She shrugged. “And don’t worry about the length. I’ve got Hollywood tape in my bag, works like a charm.”

She pulled a silver lamé tank top out of her bag.

“And I wore this,” she said, “the night Emmanuella fell in love with me.”

“Emmanuella?” I asked.

She shrugged again. “I think she’s with Flavia now. We can use the Hollywood tape to tuck up the hem of the tank, too.”

As I put on the clothes, I tried not to think about the fact that I was being clothed wholly in garments that had loved and lost a lot of girl-on-girl love.

In the beginning I’d felt resistant to their efforts. Why, I felt, bother trying to turn a sow’s ear into a silk purse? But, and here was the strange thing, as the day wore on, a feeling welled in me, the same Cinderella feeling I’d had when I’d slipped the Ghosts on at Jimmy Choo’s in New York. Here were all these women—Hillary, Stella, Conchita, Rivera—doing everything in their power to help me achieve my moment. I was like the real Cinderella, with the Fairy Godmother and all the creatures in the house helping her get ready for the ball. I felt magical. There was still one thing missing, though…

“Who would have guessed you could look so good?” Rivera admired her own handiwork when I was done dressing, when she was done taping me. “But shoes—” she put her finger to her lips “—that’s the big problem.”

“That’s how this all started,” I pointed out. “Remember? Once I get those Jimmy Choos, I’ll have great shoes.”

“Right,” she said, all business, “but you don’t have them now.” She looked in my closet. “All you’ve got right now are a pair of flip-flops, some winter boots and those stupid Nikes you’re always wearing.”

“Stupid—?”

“I know,” she said, cocking an ear. Yup, the shower was still running. “While your roommate’s in the shower, we’ll raid her closet.”

“Oh, no,” I said. “No, no, no, no, no. I’m sure she won’t like—”

“Come on.” Rivera yanked on my arm.

I was right: Hillary didn’t like it…At All.

“Those are my New Year’s Eve shoes!” she shrieked, towel still wrapped around her head, another around her body, when she glimpsed my twinkle toes five minutes later.

“I know,” I said.

They were her New Year’s Eve shoes, the same shoes she’d worn every New Year’s Eve for as long as I’d known her. Shaped like a simple high-heeled pump, they were covered in glittery silver, kind of like Dorothy’s red slippers, only a different color and without the bow but with a big heel. Hillary claimed they were good luck and that wearing them on that one night, and only that one night, ensured her a great year ahead.

“You look great in those towels.” Rivera winked at her.

“Shut up,” Hillary said. “My shoes! But wait a second. Your feet are much smaller than mine.”

This was true.

Extracting one foot from one shoe—really, that expensive pedi was wasted inside a closed-toe shoe—I revealed Rivera’s handiwork: wadded tissue paper. Honestly, it was hard to feel like a glam winner when there was Kleenex cuddling my piggies before going to market.

“But it’s such a good cause, Hillary Clinton,” Rivera said sweetly, enunciating each word of my roommate’s name silkily as though she were trying to sell rich cordovan leather. “And it’s not like it’s as bad as it could be, like if her feet were bigger than yours and there was a danger she might stretch them out. And you really do look great in those towels.”

“Ohh…what…ever,” Hillary conceded with poor grace, going off to dry her hair.

“Where the hell did you get that thing?” I shouted down to Conchita from the balcony of the South Park condo.

A minute before, a white stretch limo had pulled into the parking lot and Conchita had emerged from the driver’s seat, opening one of the passenger doors from which emerged Elizabeth Hepburn. Seeing the four of us out on the balcony, Elizabeth Hepburn did a little red-carpet curtsy.

Conchita smiled up at me, shielding her eyes against the blaze of sun going down behind us. “You don’t want to know, chica.”

“Ready to roll?” Elizabeth Hepburn asked. “You know, John Wayne used to always say that to me. Count Basie, too, come to think of it.”

“But wait a second,” I said. “Don’t you all need to get dressed?”

I looked at the five of them. It wasn’t that they were shabbily dressed. Indeed, they all looked better than I looked most days, but they were still all relatively casual, in summer slacks, light blouses and sandals. Really, I was the only one who looked like she might be going out on a Saturday night to a casino that had nightclubs in it.

“Oh, no,” Elizabeth Hepburn said softly. “This is your big night.”

7

Foxwoods Casino was a fair drive from where we’d started, but when we walked into the casino en masse it felt as though no more time had passed than the length it would take for a reader to turn the page.

Maybe it was that Conchita drove like a maniac. Or maybe it was the single drink I’d allowed myself from the minibar—“Never get drunk while you’re playing—” my dad’s words rang in my brain “—only losers get drunk at the table”—the champagne going down like silk bubbles as I listened to the Brazilian music Conchita was blaring on the stereo.

“Hey.” Hillary smiled at me lazily over the top of her own flute of champagne. “You’re drinking something with alcohol in it and it’s not even Jake’s Fault.”

For a moment, I felt a frisson of anxiety. I was starting to get hungry and I wondered if they had any Michael Angelo’s Four Cheese Lasagna kicking around the casino kitchen, but then I pushed the anxious feelings away. This was a special night. I would do special things.

Whatever the case, whether the ride went so quick because of the speed of the driver or because of the buzz from the champagne, I felt great as we walked through the door.

I’d never been part of a group like that before. Much in the way of people who are serially monogamous in their romantic relationships, I’d always been serially monogamous in my friendships. My mother was so sick for so many years before she died, we’d spent so much time one-on-one, it was as if I could only relate to other women one-on-one. Back at the private junior high, there’d been the best girlfriend I got drunk with during the science fair. During high school, there’d been another best girlfriend. And, ever since then, there had been Hillary. Hillary herself had other friends she sometimes did things with, and sometimes I went along, but for whatever reason, the dynamic never worked for me, unless it was something fairly innocuous like a group going to a movie. I didn’t mind her other friendships, wasn’t jealous of them in any way; the group thing just wasn’t for me. Oh, for years I wished I could be the kind of woman you see in the middle of a group of other women—laughing louder than anyone else, living large—I just didn’t know how.

It was hard to believe then that, as we strode through the casino, for the first time in my life I had a posse.

In the entryway, just outside of the casino proper, there was a woman with balloons pinned all over her clothes—she even had on a balloon hat—who was blowing brightly colored balloons into all different shapes: flowers, animals, one even looked weirdly like Bill O’Reilly. She was handing out her creations to anyone who wanted them.

“That’s kind of an odd thing to have in the entryway,” I said, “don’t you think?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Hillary, “it’s probably one of those little extras, like free rolls of coins for the people who get bused in, that are devised to lull gamblers into forgetting how much money they’re pissing away at the tables.”

She must have seen my expression, because she quickly added, “Oops, sorry.”

“Plus,” said Stella, “they need to give people something to entertain them when they’re not gambling.”

“Yeah,” said Conchita, “but every time one of those things pops, I’m going to be wondering about who’s getting shot.”

“I once dated a balloonist,” said Elizabeth Hepburn.

And then, before I even knew it, my posse was splitting up.

Going up to an information desk, Stella grabbed a bunch of brochures that she distributed to the others.

“Ooh, I want to go to the Club BB King,” Hillary said. “Look—” she pointed “—Hall & Oates are playing later on tonight, with Todd Rundgren.”