office,” Roberta goes on. “So kindly explain to me why I opened the Journal this morning to find this.”
Roberta hands me a copy of the New York Journal, open to the second page…
… on which there is splashed a huge black-and-white photo of Monsieur Henri and his wife, standing in front of the shop and grinning ear-to-ear beneath the headline “Meet the Designers of Blubber’s Wedding Gown!”
The first thing I feel is a bubble of outrage burst inside my chest. Designers! They aren’t the designers of Jill’s dress! That’s me! I am! How dare they try to pass themselves off—
But then as my gaze skims the article, I see that the Henris haven’t tried anything of the sort. They are extremely upfront about the fact that Elizabeth Nichols—“an exceptionally talented young woman,” according to Monsieur Henri—is the one who refurbished Miss Higgins’s wedding gown, after having met Miss Higgins “at the law offices of Pendergast, Loughlin, and Flynn, where Miss Nichols works as a receptionist, and where Miss Higgins sought representation for the handling of her prenuptial agreement with husband-to-be John MacDowell.”
And then—grainy but still recognizable—is a picture of me, hurrying through the doors to the lobby of the very building in which I’m standing now.
And all I can think is,Gray Cords! It was Gray Cords! I knew he was trouble the first minute I saw him!
Also,Why, oh, why, did the Henris have to open their mouths about me and how Jill and I met? True, I never told them it was a secret—but why did I tell them anything about it at all? I should have just said she was a friend. Oh God. I’m such an idiot!
“You know how much we here at Pendergast, Loughlin, and Flynn pride ourselves on keeping our association with our clients private,” Roberta is saying. I can hear her voice only dimly through the roaring in my ears. “You were warned once before. You know I have no choice now but to let you go.”
I look up from the newspaper article, blinking rapidly. The reason I’m blinking so much is that my eyes have filled with tears.
“You’re firing me?” I cry.
“I’m sorry, Lizzie,” Roberta says. And she actually looks as if she means it. Which helps. Kind of. “But we talked about this. I’ll make sure your last check gets mailed out to you promptly. I’ll just need your office key. Then Raphael will escort you out.”
My cheeks burning, I dig around in my bag until I find my key chain. Then I remove the key to the office doors from it and hand it over. The whole time, my brain searches feverishly for some kind of response to the charges laid against me. But there’s really nothing I can say. She had warned me. And I didn’t listen.
And now I had to pay the price.
“Good-bye, Lizzie,” Roberta says, not unkindly.
“Bye,” I say. But a bubble of spit, brought on by the fact that I am weeping openly now, prevents me from saying more. I let Raphael guide me with a hand on my arm through the office—conscious of everyone staring, although of course my vision is so blurred I can’t actually see whether or not they really are looking at me—and to the elevators. We ride down to the lobby in silence, because there are other passengers on board with us.
When we reach the main floor, Raphael continues to guide me through the lobby, because I still can’t see. At the doors to the outside he stops and says a single word to me: “Bummer.”
Then he turns around and heads back to the security desk.
I push open the lobby doors and head outside into the bitter Manhattan cold. I have no idea where I’m going, really. Where can I go? I have no job, and soon, I’ll have no place to live. I have no boyfriend, either, which is really, you know, freeing, on top of the just-getting-fired-and-having-no-place-to-live thing. I feel, in fact, just like Kathy Pennebaker probably did, when she finally admitted that New York City—that big, gutsy, glittering town —had beat her to a pulp and sent her packing.
I’d actually seen Kathy while I’d been home for Christmas. She’d been at the Kroger, pushing a cart in the produce section, looking so washed out and wan, I hardly recognized her.
Is that going to be me someday?I’d wondered, as I’d stared at her from my hiding place behind the nut and dried fruit bins. Will I cease to care what people think of me and go to the grocery store in an over large ALLSTATE 400AT THE BRICKYARD SUMMER RUMBLE NASCAR T-shirt and cropped cargo pants (in the winter)? Will I start dating a guy whose mustache is yellow from nicotine, and who is stocking up on cold medicine—so much so that he can only be planning on mixing up a batch of crystal meth for the weekend? Will I ever actually buy radishes? I mean, for a salad or even just to use as garnish?
And then, hurtling down the street with tears streaming down my face, trying not to slip in the slush beneath my feet, I realize something.
And not just because I’ve suddenly found myself standing in front of Rockefeller Center, its ice-skating rink and gold statue of a man lying down iconic to New York City’s image—the more so with the glittering, towering Christmas tree behind.
No. No, I realize. That will not be me. That will never be me. I would never wear cargo pants in public. I don’t think I could bring myself to date someone who has a yellow mustache. And radishes are only good on tacos.
I’m not Kathy Pennebaker. And I will never be Kathy Pennebaker. EVER.
My resolve thus strengthened, I turned around and found a cab—on my first try! At Rock Center! I know! It was a miracle—and gave the driver the address of Monsieur Henri’s.
When he pulled up in front of the building, I opened my purse to find I had no cash—except the ten-dollar bill Grandma had given me.
But what choice did I have? I handed over the bill, told the driver to keep the change, and barged into the shop, where I found Monsieur and Madame Henri chuckling over the copy of the Journal with steaming mugs of café au lait in their hands and a plate of madeleines in front of them.
“Lizzie!” Monsieur Henri cried delightedly. “You are back! Did you see? Did you see the story and photo? We are famous! Because of you! The phone won’t stop ringing! And the best news of all—Maurice! Maurice is closing his shop down the street and moving it to Queens, instead! All because of you! All because of that story!”
“Yeah?” I unwind my scarf, staring at both of them with fury. “Well, I got fired because of that story.”
This wipes the smiles off their faces.
“Oh, Lizzie,” Madame Henri begins.
But I hold up a single finger.
“No,” I say. “Not a word. You’re going to listen to me. First off, I want thirty thousand a year plus commissions. I want two weeks’ paid vacation, full medical and dental. I want at least one sick day per month plus two personal days per year. And I want the upstairs apartment, rent free, all utilities paid for by the shop.”
The couple continue to stare at me, openmouthed in surprise. Monsieur Henri is the first one to recover.
“Lizzie,” he says, sounding wounded. “What you ask, of course, you deserve. No one is suggesting otherwise. But I don’t see how you can ask us to—”
But Madame Henri silences him with a“Tais-toi!”
While her husband looks at her with surprise, she says to me, clearly and concisely,“No dental.”
I practically feel my knees give beneath me, I’m so relieved.
But I don’t let on. Instead, I say, with all the dignity I can muster, “Done.”
And then I accept their invitation to join them for café au lait and madeleines. Because when your heart is broken, carbs don’t count.
Aaahhhh! You’re home from the honeymoon! Time to start enjoying wedded bliss, right?
WRONG. You have work to do. Get out your stationery—maybe you’ve sprung for the thank-you cards that match your invitations; maybe you’re merely using your new monogrammed note cards—and your favorite pen, and start writing .
If you were smart, you didn’t wait until after the honeymoon to begin the thank-you process, but started writing and sending out thank-you cards as you received each gift . If, however, for some horrible reason you chose to wait, you have your work cut out for you now. At the very least, you ought to have been saving each gift tag, with a note scribbled on the back as to what the gift actually was. If this is the case, you have it easy: just jot a thoughtful note—MENTIONING THE GIFT RECEIVED BY NAME—to each giver, signing it cordially with both
