My first client is Laurel, who is here because she’s been invited on a corporate weekend, dress “casual,” and her idea of casual is a pair of track pants and a Hanes T-shirt.
“You look like shit,” she says as soon she walks in. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing!” I smile brightly. “I’m just a bit preoccupied at the moment.”
“Are you fighting with your mother?”
My head jerks up.
“No,” I say cautiously. “Why do you ask that?”
“It’s par for the course,” says Laurel, taking off her coat. “All brides fight with their mothers. If it’s not over the ceremony, it’s over the floral arrangements. I threw a tea strainer at mine because she cut three of my friends off the guest list without asking.”
“Really? But then you made up.”
“We didn’t speak for five years afterward.”
“Five years?” I stare at her, aghast. “Just over a wedding?”
“Becky, there’s no such thing as just a wedding,” says Laurel. She picks up a cashmere sweater. “This is nice.”
“Mmm,” I say distractedly. Oh God, now I’m really worried.
What if I fall out with Mum? What if she gets really offended and says she never wants to see me again? And then Luke and I have children and they never get to know their grandparents. And every Christmas they buy presents for Granny and Grandpa Bloomwood, just in case, but every year they sit under the tree unopened, and we quietly put them away, and one year our little girl says, “Mummy, why does Granny Bloomwood hate us?” and I have to choke back my tears and say, “Darling, she doesn’t hate us. She just—”
“Becky? Are you all right?”
I snap into the present, to see Laurel peering at me concernedly. “You know, you really don’t look yourself. Maybe you need a break.”
“I’m fine! Honestly.” I summon up a professional smile. “So… here are the skirts I was thinking of. If you try this beige one, with the off-white shirt…”
As Laurel tries on different pieces, I sit on a stool, nodding and making the odd absent comment, while my mind still frets on the subject of Mum. I feel like I’ve got so far into this mess, I’ve lost all sense of proportion. Will she flip out when I tell her about the Plaza? Won’t she? I just can’t tell.
I mean, take what happened at Christmas. I thought Mum was going to be devastated when I told her Luke and I weren’t coming home, and it took me ages to pluck up the courage to tell her. But to my astonishment, she was really nice about it and told me that she and Dad would have a lovely day with Janice and Martin, and I mustn’t worry. So maybe this will be the same. When I explain the whole story to her, she’ll say, “Oh darling, don’t be silly, of course you must get married wherever you want to.”
Or else she’ll burst into tears, say how could I deceive her like this, and she’ll come to the Plaza over her dead body.
“So I was going into Central Park for my marathon training, and who should I see, standing right there like a Barbie doll?”
Laurel’s voice filters into my mind and I look up.
“Not the blond intern?”
“Right! So my heart starts thumping, I’m walking toward her and I’m wondering what I’m going to say. Do I yell at her? Do I hit her? Do I completely ignore her? You know, which will give me most satisfaction? And of course half of me wants to run away and hide…”
“So what happened?” I say eagerly.
“When I got up close, it wasn’t even her. It was some other girl!” Laurel puts a hand to her head. “It’s like, now she’s messing with my mind. Not content with taking my husband, wrecking my life, stealing my jewelry…”
“She’s stolen your jewelry?” I say in surprise. “What do you mean?”
“I must have told you this. No? Things started going missing around the time Bill was taking her back to our apartment. An emerald pendant my grandmother gave me. A couple of bracelets. Of course, I had no idea what was going on, so I thought I was being careless. But then it all came out, and I realized. It had to be her.”
“Couldn’t you do anything?” I say, appalled.
“Oh, I did. I called the police.” Laurel’s chin tightens as she buttons up her dress. “They went and asked her some questions, but they didn’t get anywhere. Of course they didn’t.” She gives me a strange little smile. “Then Bill found out. He went crazy. He went to the police and told them… well, I don’t know exactly what he told them. But that same afternoon the police called me back and said they were dropping the case. It was obvious they thought I was just some vindictive, spurned wife. Which of course I was.”