by Karen Quinn
“There’s my little Cookie Wookie,” said a gaunt man with lacquered red hair dressed in jeans and a blue work shirt as he ambled up to the stoop. He wore a massive gold Rolex watch. I recognized him as Phillip Shayne, the manager of Old Time Records around the corner.
Pops stood and placed the fluffy Maltese in his arms.
“How’d my little baby girl do?” the big guy asked as Cookie furiously licked his nose.
“She was lonely and cried for you,” Pops said. “So I let her sleep with me and gave her some extra TLC.”
“Thanks, man,” the guy said. He reached in his pocket and pulled out a ten. “Here you go, Pops. C’mon, Cookums.”
Pops went back inside and soon came out holding a black-haired shih tzu with a pink bow in her hair. “Meet Orangy,” he said.
“That’s her name? Orangy?” I said. “Even though she’s black?”
“It’s ironic,” Pops said, feeding her a chocolate Munchkin. “Her human is Fran Stevens, the rock singer. She’s on her way over.”
“Pops, I don’t think chocolate is good for dogs.”
“Really?” He seemed surprised. “Even with all the antioxidants? What about dark chocolate?”
“No chocolate, period,” I said. “It’s full of sugar and caffeine.”
Not a minute later, a petite dynamo with a squidged-up face bounded up the block. She had a turned-up nose, freckles, jet-black hair, and a remarkable resemblance to the dog she had come to claim. “Orangy, Mommy’s here,” she sang.
Pops put the ecstatic, trembling dog in the woman’s hands while the pup emitted high-pitched squeals of joy and leaked urine. “She really missed you,” he said. “But don’t worry. I let her sleep with me and gave her extra TLC.”
“Thanks, Pops.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a twenty. “We appreciate the special treatment,” she said. “Don’t we, Orangy? Yes, we do.”
“That’s quite a hustle you got going there,” I said, after Orangy’s owner disappeared down the block.
“Isn’t it?” Pops said proudly. “I pick up an extra fifty a day making owners feel like I love their pets the most.”
“You think that’s okay?”
“I’m not lying. I treat ’em all the same—like royalty. And anyway, I need the money. Whole Foods wouldn’t hire me. Said I was too old.”
“They can’t say that. It’s against the law.”
“Oh, they didn’t use those words exactly,” Pops explained. “They said I was overqualified. That’s code for too old.”
“Aw, sorry,” I said, laying my head on his shoulder. “I didn’t get the job I expected, either.”
“Why not?” Pops asked.
“My boss said I wasn’t good enough…didn’t dress the part…couldn’t bring in big donations like the Sammie-come-lately she hired.”
Pops gave me a squeeze. “I’m awfully sorry about that, Holly. You had a rough day yesterday, didn’t you?”
“Truer words have never been spoken, Pops.”
Put Your Dreams Away
I WAS THE FIRST TO arrive at the office that day, except for Gus, of course, who had been minding the store all night. He was snoring and whistling, just like in a cartoon. I gently shook him awake. “Here, two vanilla-glazed doughnuts with sprinkles, the way you like ’em.”
Gus yawned and stretched his arms. “Thanks, Holly. You are the brightest star at this museum.”
“Awwww, shucks.” I giggled, blushing. Gus always lifted my spirits. “You’re too good to me.”
“I’d do anything for you.”
At least somebody appreciated me at work. Tanya’s door was closed. I stepped into my cubicle, switched on the computer, and checked my e-mail.
“Oh, lord,” I muttered, crumpling into my chair. Everyone I knew and scores I didn’t must have seen the papers. My in-box was crammed with messages: “Are you okay?” “What happened?” “Call me!!!” “That shithead!”
I checked Gawker and PerezHilton. Photos of Alessandro and me fleeing the police station, along with snarky stories, topped the sites. Perfect. There was no way Tanya hadn’t heard about it. I started to google Alessandro’s name to read more press, but I couldn’t bear it.
I pondered for a moment and then typed in newyorksocialdiary.com. If you want to read about the Manhattan blue bloods and observe them at play, this was a good place to start.
I entered Denis’ name and pages of photos came up with him posing at various fetes with the same woman, a sapling, really, on his arm. With a click of my mouse, I scrolled through the photos. The human bauble by his side was Sydney Bass (of the Oyster Bay Basses). She was a beautiful girl if you liked perfectly proportioned designer-clad blondes with long, sinewy legs, translucent skin, piercing blue eyes, and sultry lips. You know the type—they don’t burp, fart, poop, or take public transportation. I had read about her in the Style section of the Times, in an article about ambitious well-born daughters pursuing the new socialite game—the one in which they use their family names and contacts to become nationally recognized brands, like Aerin Lauder and Ivanka Trump. If you ask me, that was piggish. What, it’s not enough for them to be rich and gorgeous? They want meaningful lives too?
Sydney Bass played a leading role in her family’s real estate business. She had inherited twenty-five million square feet of office space on four continents from her father. While attending Harvard Business School, she along with her advisers parlayed her inheritance into the largest privately held portfolio in the city. The woman was smart, rich, beautiful, socially prominent, and twenty-six years old. I hated her on principle.
Scrolling through the photos, I noticed she looked the same in every picture—arched neck, pouty lips, a naughty little wink—which led me to believe she must have spent hours working with a smile consultant to fashion the perfect paparazzi face. Call me crazy, but anyone I’ve ever known with a rehearsed snapshot pose has turned out to be a liar and a fornicator (Alessandro immediately comes to mind).
I googled Denis and clicked on parkavenuepeerage.com. There I read that he was forty-eight, divorced, father of a ten-year-old girl, a real estate developer—well, that part I knew. Let’s see, he had a yacht, a jet, houses in Southampton and Sun Valley, a two-floor penthouse on Fifth Avenue with a basketball court and paintings by Picasso, van Gogh, and Matisse. Well la-di-da, I thought. So he’s the ninth-richest man in America under fifty (according to Forbes). Hrrmph! What’s a billionaire his age doing squiring about a girl more than twenty years his junior? Because he could, I supposed. Still, my respect for him dropped a notch, as it always does for older gentlemen who pursue the taut flesh of youth.
Checking Denis’ rating on famestat.com, the site run by catty society blogger Chessie Knickerbocker, I saw that he was one of two real estate moguls with high ratings, the other being Donald Trump. Three hundred and eighty parties, two hundred and seven pictures. Jeez, who would want to live like that? I would! I would! my less-evolved self squealed. Google revealed that Denis was part of the King real estate dynasty that had built some of the most celebrated buildings in New York. Their family’s foundation had donated millions to the Metropolitan Museum, Lincoln Center, the New York City Opera, and Sloan-Kettering Hospital, just to name a few. No wonder Tanya was working him for a major gift.
I sighed. A woman could live happily ever after with a man like that. Any guy who would return to help the stranger his car splashed could be counted on to hold your hand when you walked down the street or your hair back when you puked. Not that I’m the kind of girl who expects some knight in a shining white Maybach to come along and sweep me off my feet. That only happens in the movies, and life isn’t like that. Although I often wish it were.
The happy ending I had hoped to have with Alessandro was dangling by a silk thread. Apparently, the neighbor who spotted him on the roof videotaped the crime-in-progress as Alessandro did the deed. He only shot the perp’s backside. Last night, the arresting cop played it and asked if the ass on top was Ales
sandro. I could tell by the way he…oh, never mind. What if the only reason he wanted to marry me was so I couldn’t testify against him? There was a case like that on Law & Order once.
But back to Alessandro, the philandering perv. How could I say “I do” to a guy who would cheat a month before his own wedding? Sure, I’d had my doubts about us, but that was normal. On the other hand, what if he needed me now more than ever? Was this craving to be with underage girls a sickness, a sort of pedophilic cancer? If I helped him get counseling, could we start over? That would be the right thing to do, the loving thing, the Buddhist thing. I’m not Buddhist, but I’ve read they’re a forgiving people. I like to think of myself as forgiving, at least theoretically.
I pictured myself alone with Kitty in an empty studio apartment located multiple subway stops into Queens, eating Duncan Hines chocolate frosting out of a can, maybe starting some kind of spinster blog. A wave of sadness swept over me and I started to cry, then sob, right into my computer keyboard. Tears fell down my cheeks, alien sounds spilled out of my mouth, and a torrent of snot poured from my nose.
Tanya stuck her head out. “Holly, would you cease with the boo-hooing? How do you expect me to get any work done with you carrying on like that? Take it outside. Go on. Go.” She waved her hand toward the staircase, and then retreated.
“I’m okay,” I called, wiping my nose on my sleeve. “I’ll sto-op.” Bugger! Tanya Johnson was the last person on earth I wanted to see me cry.
All things considered, my circumstances had deteriorated so quickly that this was shaping up to be the worst twenty-four hours of my life so far. I didn’t know what to be more upset about. Finding out I wouldn’t be promoted? Discovering my fiancé was a cheater? Learning he was a pedophile? Seeing my stricken face and bleeding red suit on the front page of the News and the Post? Knowing that I might have to break my engagement and undo months of wedding plans? Realizing I may soon lose my home? At least things couldn’t get worse. Of course, having thought that, I was certain it was only a matter of time before they did.
The Lady Is a Tramp
I RETIRED TO THE BATHROOM and checked the damage. Blotches of mascara framed my red and raw eyes. Lovely. Splashing my face with cold water, removing the hasty makeup job I’d attempted that morning, I looked at myself in the mirror. “Pull yourself together. You can do this.”
Grabbing the folder for What’s My Line? I hustled to Tanya’s office. Martin Goldenblatt, our doughy-skinned audiovisual guy, stood by her desk sniffing the top of his hand. The lapdog (aka Sammie) was flipping through the Post.
I mustered a thin smile. “Ready to prep for What’s My Line?” I asked Tanya.
“How are you?” Sammie said. “I read the paper. You are so brave. I can’t imagine how you got out of bed today.”
“I’m fine,” I said. “And you know what they say…”
Yes, those who can’t, work in museums,” Sammie finished.
“I was going to say, the show must go on.”
Tanya pursed her lips. Then she laced her fingers together and cracked her knuckles.
Oh, boy, I thought.
“Holly, these headlines are humiliating…” Tanya said.
“I know,” I said, wondering if maybe she would show me some compassion.
“…to the museum,” she finished. “I think it would be best if you didn’t appear in public with me today, or possibly forever,” Tanya said. “You understand.”
My stomach sank.
“But who’s going to support you up there?” I didn’t want to say it, but what Tanya knew about vintage couture could fit in a hummingbird’s bladder.
“Well,” Tanya declared conspiratorially, “Sammie will sit by my side. She’s new and needs the visibility. But you will secretly feed us answers through hidden receivers. We’re wearing them now. Can you tell?”
I checked their faces, hands, hair. Nothing. “You got me. Where is it?”
“It’s built into our earrings,” Tanya explained, pointing to the large gold balls clipped to her lobes and the matching pair that Sammie wore. “Martin made them. They’re wireless and surprisingly chic. No one will ever know.”
Tanya was asking me to cheat for her. That took brass ovaries. “But, Tanya,” I said, “that’s dishonest. You can’t do that.”
She turned to me. “Oh, really, Mother Teresa, and why not?”
“Yes, Mother Teresa,” Sammie added. “Why not?”
“It is, uh, wrong,” said spineless Martin.
“And you who leaves early on Fridays,” I accused. “Is the fancy yarmulke for show? Does it mean nothing to you?”
“Tanya said I had to. She’s the boss,” he said. “It’s an ingenious device. I should patent it.”
“No, it belongs to the museum,” Tanya said. “You made it on company time under my direction. Any profit it generates belongs to us.”
Sometimes I think Tanya is psychotic, and I mean that clinically.
“I’ll be able to answer the questions,” Sammie said, smiling eagerly. “I did graduate from Bauder College.”
Tanya gave her an incredulous look. “I’m not willing to stake my museum’s reputation on your delusions of adequacy.” Sammie’s smile disappeared.
“Seriously, Tanya, what if you get caught?” I said. “There’s a fifty-thousand-dollar prize at stake. If you win by fraud, that’s a crime.”
“I will not get caught,” Tanya said. “The plan is foolproof.” She handed me a microphone that Martin had hidden inside a cell phone shell. “Just speak into this and I’ll hear you through my earring.”
It occurred to me that when your boss insists that you cheat or commit a crime, the only way to say “no” is to resign. But I was about to lose my fiancé and his rent-controlled apartment. If I quit my job, I’d have nothing left but Kitty (and he only had three legs).
“It’ll be our little secret,” Sammie declared. “No one will ever know.”
“Martin, if we get caught, you’ll back me up in court, right?”
“Well, I, uh,” Martin stammered, “whatever Tanya says.”
I rolled my eyes. If I was going to be part of a criminal conspiracy, why did it have to be with Martin Goldenblatt? “I guess,” I muttered, “but I’m acting under protest.”
Answer Me, My Love
THAT AFTERNOON, I FOUND myself standing in the back of a white tent at the Bryant Park fashion shows. What’s My Line? would be the warm-up act for last year’s Project Runway wunderkind, who was showing his highly anticipated collection. It was a hot ticket and the room was buzzing with designers, buyers, movie stars, editors, socialites, and various and sundry jet-setters. Paparazzi snapped away at the audience. Billy Bush from Access Hollywood was interviewing Donald and Melania Trump by the tent’s French doors. Camera crews were setting up. Scarlett Johansson sauntered in with an unidentified hottie wearing a kilt. One of the Olsen twigs was gossiping with Heidi Klum, who was seated with Michael Kors. Anna Wintour and her Chanel sunglasses ruled sphinxlike in the front row. I would have enjoyed the whole juicy scene if I weren’t about to soil myself from sheer terror over the dirty deed I was about to do. All my life I’ve been morally against breaking the law, especially when I’m afraid of getting caught.
Nichole Cannon, senior curator of the Costume Institute at the Met, and Candice Broom, another of their top dogs, were both being miked at the dais. Tanya made her way to the stage, stopping frequently to double and triple air kiss potential donors and well-wishers. Sammie followed a few steps behind, waving at the socialites she knew through family connections. Maybe she is the better choice, I thought. She’s so plugged in to the charity circuit. I don’t know any of these people.
Once Tanya and Sammie were settled and miked, I tried out Martin’s nifty invention. “Testing, testing, one, two, three,” I said into the cell phone. “Do you read me?”
Tanya turned and caught my eye, curling the corners of her mouth upward. That would be a yes.
I repositioned mysel
f to the far side of the room, where I could see both my boss and the runway. At this point, I was sweating like a four-hundred-pound woman running for the crosstown bus.
Valentina de la Costa, director of the Fashion Council, welcomed everyone and introduced the players who would be vying for the fifty-thousand-dollar grant.
My real cell phone vibrated. I flipped it open. There was a text message from Alessandro:
H, the wedding is off. Pls return the ring ASAP.
Must sell it to pay lawyer. A
I gasped with disbelief. Alessandro was breaking up with ME? By text message? After he cheated with a minor? Isn’t there a mandatory penis-cooling-off period before making such a drastic decision?
“How come you aren’t up there?” asked Elaina, my coworker and curator of the Audrey Hepburn show. I hadn’t noticed her next to me.
“Huh?” I said, snapping the cell phone shut. A lump was forming in my throat. Alessandro’s leaving me? Shouldn’t I be leaving him? Stop it. I took a deep breath. Think about it later. Pull yourself together. You have laws to break, crimes to commit.
“Why aren’t you up there?” Elaina repeated.
“Um, you know Tanya,” I said. “She wanted to give Sammie a try.”
Elaina’s eyes widened. “That’s risky.”
“She thinks I’m bad news with Alessandro getting arrested and all.”
“Alessandro got arrested?” Elaina said, her eyes wide in horror. “What happ—”
Suddenly, “Puttin’ on the Ritz” blasted from the speakers.
If you’re blue and you don’t know where to go…
Music blared and camera shutters clicked at deafening volume. A lightning storm of fluorescent flashes was followed by the sound of editors’ notebooks snapping to attention. Out strutted a gazellelike brunette wearing a flirty red silk crepe number. This was so obviously Chanel’s little black dress realized in red. The topstitching technique was unmistakable, visible even from where I stood. And of course, the fabric-covered buttons were signature. “Chanel, 1927,” I said into phone/mike.