The Overdue Life of Amy Byler

by Kelly Harms

  I narrow my eyes at Talia. “I’m not Amish,” I tell her. “I’m from Amish country. And this isn’t a momspringa. It’s a trip to New York by myself for a few days, not an extensive exploration of the outside world that exists far from my insulated, isolated existence among my family.”

  Talia puts her hands up and shrugs. “You say tomato . . .”

  I snort and shake my head in dismissal.

  “Either way. You’re not reading books. You’re living life. You’re doing all the things you haven’t been able to do since your jerk asshole douchebag left you with nothing but two kids and a closet full of mom jeans.”

  I look down again. I am indeed wearing mom jeans.

  When I look up, Talia is frowning at me. “Are those clogs?” she asks me needlessly.

  “They’re very comfortable.”

  It’s like I just blasphemed the pope. She exhales fully and closes her eyes, seemingly searching for forbearance. “Never mind. The point is you can sit around and read anytime. This week, you grab life by the balls.”

  “I always thought that was kind of a violent metaphor.”

  She tilts her head. “Ok, let’s say you stroke life by the balls, then.”

  There is no way I can keep a straight face to that. “Oh, Talia. I’ve missed you terribly, and the worst part is I didn’t even know it. I’m so sorry I’ve been out of touch.”

  Talia takes my hand. “I can hardly blame you. I tried to be there for you after John left, but I never knew what to say, and I didn’t feel like I was much help from here. Husbands, kids . . . it’s all beyond me, you know.”

  I smile. “You did send me a ham.”

  Talia laughs. “Not the right thing?”

  “It takes a long time for three people to eat a ham. Next time send a housekeeper.”

  She grins at me and wraps me in a hug. “You got it.” She pulls back and takes me in. “We are going to have such fun, you know that? I’ve been doing nothing but work, work, work for weeks. Nay, months. Now I have a playmate! One of my favorite people in the world, and I haven’t seen her in years, and she’s here under my thumb in my spare bedroom slash walk-in closet! What could be better?”

  “I can’t think of anything,” I say. Well, except for all that plus a few good books. “Maybe I could read just a little? Just in the mornings?” I beseech. “I get so little time completely to myself back home.”

  She sighs. “Hey, Alexa, tell Matt to push all start times back to eleven a.m. through Friday.”

  I beam at her.

  She rolls her eyes again. “But promise to at least consider reading in a chic café or something? Maybe while sipping a perfect coffee or a Bellini with a crepe?”

  “Ooh, that sounds amazing. I absolutely promise that will go on my schedule. Now sit down and tell me all about your life since I last saw you. Don’t leave out a single thing. We need to get totally up to speed.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Dear Mom,

  Talia sounds incredibly cool. No offense, but when you and she video called us last night, I was sort of astounded that you knew anyone that chic. I cannot believe what you guys got up to in college, how much fun you had, how you visited the city all the time and hung out at museums and went dancing. I am going to do all that stuff and more when my time comes.

  Don’t worry—you did have one responsible kid. Joe is such a weirdo. Today he went to the library for like four hours to do activities that I can only describe as mathletic. At the rate he is going he’ll be getting his doctorate at Columbia before I even turn sixteen. I hope he becomes a doctor and buys me a car.

  As for me, after I win the Olympics, I’m going to go be a magazine editor like Talia. Ask Talia if I actually have to write journals for that job, because let me tell you, after this summer is over, I’m never writing anything by hand again.

  Other questions to ask Talia (or yourself):

  1. Why didn’t you visit her sooner?

  2. Why aren’t you as cool as you used to be?

  Wait, don’t tell me. I know the answer to both questions: you’re going to blame it on your kids.

  So help me god, that will never happen to me. I could never love any baby more than I love being cool.

  Love,

  The daughter you wrecked your life for, Cori

  —

  It is 10:30 a.m. on Monday morning, and I am standing in the offices of Pure Beautiful, the print and online fashion guide for, as Talia affectionately refers to her readers, “women who aren’t quite ready to give up.”

  I am one of those women. I read Pure Beautiful the moment it arrives in my inbox. It always has one of those ten-items-ten-ways capsule wardrobes, and those are like porn to me. Is there anything more appealing in my world of homework and swim practice than wearing some variation on the same thing every day? A grown-up uniform? And that feeling of completeness I imagine you’d have if you owned every single one of the items in the spread, even though they average out at roughly $475 apiece. It would be almost transcendent. Hmm, I imagine thinking as I stare into my all-black-and-white-with-teal-accents closet, I think I’ll combine the classic black one-button crepe blazer with the crisp tailored white shirt and the . . . yes, the linen palazzo pants today. Yesterday I wore the white shirt under the teal sheath dress with the scarf, but the shirt is still clean enough. Tomorrow I can wear the blazer over the sheath dress with the scarf in my hair and the palazzo pants fashioned into a belt. Maybe I can wear the blazer as a kind of cape for day four.

  Anyway, I love that crap. And I love the pages where they show a famous person wearing whatever they wear to get Starbucks, which to said famous person probably feels like pajamas and to me looks like a ball gown, and then the magazine shows me how to make that same outfit for $75 from Zappos or Kohl’s or the like. And my favorite column, where they have a financial expert who lovingly yells at people for their failure to save up for retirement and then tells them not to buy a boat. And the excellent pages upon pages of book excerpts that make it so I don’t have to read all of the depressing-yet-important new books they pick but can still talk about them competently around other librarians. And best of all, Pure Beautiful uses a mix of model sizes. Whether size 2 or size 16, they are impossibly attractive and well proportioned, so they still make me feel plenty insecure, but at least there’s some stinking variety. Pure Beautiful is, to my mind, the greatest magazine of all time.

  And then there is the fact that Talia runs it. I imagine her as the Devil Wears Prada–style boss, all shine and hard surfaces and double macchiato extra hot, or else, but when I get past the very New Yorky reception with the impossibly effete man on the phones, I find what looks like a Silicon Valley office. It’s a big open loft except for glass-walled, triangle-shaped offices in the corners. The art department takes up the bulk of the space, and the rest is monster printers and little tables with staff members working on laptops scattered throughout. If Talia wants a double macchiato extra hot, she can just make it herself on the enormous Italian espresso machine on a floating bar island near one side. Or I suppose one of her assistants can. There are clear glass dry-erase boards, fresh-fruit bowls, basketball hoops, and yes, a small dog. The only thing that distinguishes Pure Beautiful as a magazine and not, say, a Groupon office is the long glass room that stretches the length of the solid wall, filled to bursting with clothes. The fashion closet of legend. In bold Helvetica font on the double glass doors is a sign that reads, WELCOME TO PARADISE.

  Talia has explained to me that only the creative departments work in this office in New York, where rent is expensive and salaries are too. The rest of the magazine’s staff are in farthest North Carolina. She goes there four times a year. As a result, there are no normal people in the entire office. Just the highly fabulous. And me. About seven people look up at me and my clogs in confusion when I walk in. Several people on cell phones stop talking. I suddenly feel like I am standing there naked. Or that perhaps naked would be preferable to what I’m wearing. If I were
naked, I would spread my arms wide and say in a big, bold Joan d’Arc voice, Look upon me, builders of a magazine, writers of stories, takers of pictures! I am your reader! Kneel and quake before me!

  Luckily Talia’s assistant, Matt, appears before my pronouncement. He has the look of a marine but is wearing slim jeans and great wingtips and a perfect french-blue shirt. He has the sweetest smile and looks to be about twenty. There is no question in my mind that in a room full of Ashleighs and Arandiahs and, yes, Talias, Matt had to fight to be called Matt instead of Mateo or Mathias or Mathieu.

  “You must be Matt,” I say as he beelines to me from the executive office on the far corner.

  “That’s right. Matt Clarke. Are you here to see Talia?”

  “I am,” I say. It is nice of him to pretend she didn’t tell him to watch for the Pennsylvania rube in the bad shoes. “My name is Amy Byler.”

  “We’re expecting you,” is all he says. “I had a lot of fun getting a nice schedule together for you.”

  I crook my head at him. “Did you?”

  “Sure. It was sort of the ‘What I’d do for my mom if she came to New York City’ list. You know, museums, galleries, concerts, spa.”

  Fair enough. “Would you book your mom a bra fitting?” I ask him archly.

  Matt shrugs. “That I might leave to her.”

  “Well . . .” I smile cautiously, hoping Talia has honored my request to keep the bill for all this to a reasonable level. “It all sounds wonderful. Even the fitting. I’m lucky to have a friend with such a great team.”

  At that moment Matt starts buzzing. He looks down at his iPhone and says, “I’m so sorry—I have to take this. Should only take a second.

  “Matt Clarke,” he says into the phone. “Mm-hmm. Yes. Right. I hear you. Very good. Ok.” And then he hangs up.

  “That was Talia,” he tells me.

  “Where is she?” I ask. “I thought she was meeting me here this morning.”

  “She’s in there,” he says and points to a glass-walled boardroom to our left. I look over, and she is sitting in the chair facing me and looking stern. “She says we need to rearrange your schedule because . . . um . . .”

  I look at her. She shakes her head slowly, despairingly, and then puts her head in her hands. “Because of my outfit?” I ask. I am wearing navy pants and a yellow twinset, all from the L.L.Bean factory store. I thought I looked preppy smart. And I have the special handbag. I adjust my position so Talia can see it better. She continues to look at me despairingly.

  “Well,” says Matt.

  “It’s ok, Matt,” I tell him. “I’ve known Talia for a long time. That said, I didn’t think I needed to be dressed up to go to a place whose express purpose is to make you over.”

  “Anyone could make that mistake,” he says charitably. “So listen . . .” He leans in and lowers his voice. “My boss, your friend, doesn’t quite realize how impossible rescheduling your haircut would be. I think the next available appointment would be sometime after the second coming of our Lord and Savior. Let’s grab something from the closet and just get you there on time and never breathe a word of it to her. Sound ok?”

  “But won’t she notice me fishing around in the closet?”

  “Oh, you can’t go in there,” he says like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “You go back to Jean-Peter, in reception, and tell him I’m bringing you a couple looks and we need his opinion, ok? And I’ll be there in ten minutes. Dress size?”

  I look at him like he’s crazy. “Can you just grab stuff in a medium?”

  “Medium means nothing outside of Pennsylvania,” he tells me with a smirk. I can tell he’s parroting his boss.

  “Ok. Fine.” I lower my voice. “It’s just that . . .” I pause. I think about saying size 8. I’ve always guessed the plus-size models they use are actually 8s who lie and say they are 16s. “I don’t know if you have my size in there? So pick something stretchy, maybe, that I can wear with these pants?”

  Matt levels me with a stare. “We have your size. Which is . . . ?”

  I hem and haw.

  “I can just look in your pants, you know. I have assaulted people’s clothing tags before on Talia’s orders. I’m not above it.”

  I laugh. “Ok, ok. Hands off the pants. They are twelves.”

  “We have twelves. Shoe?”

  “Size seven. But I cannot walk in heels.”

  “Talia would say you can.”

  “Thank god she’s out of shouting range, then.”

  Matt chuckles. “Ok, I’ll look for flattish. Off to Jean-Peter. If he makes you throw away that sweater, just do as he says.”

  —

  Twenty minutes later I am wearing

  my own yellow sleeveless sweater,

  a killer one-button white blazer with the sleeves pushed up,

  a just-above-the-knee pencil skirt in a floral print so large that only two flowers fit on the front of the skirt, in a colorway so bold I can’t look directly at it, and

  three-inch pink stiletto heels.

  I stagger out of the bathroom, making tiny mincing steps, and find Matt and Jean-Peter examining me carefully.

  “It seems,” says Jean-Peter very carefully, “that she does not know how to walk in heels.”

  Matt sighs. “They didn’t look very tall in the closet.”

  “You will have to give her the flats. She walks like the hippos from Fantasia.”

  “But in the flats she’ll look like we did an Ambush Makeover.”

  “We did do an Ambush Makeover,” says Jean-Peter.

  “Please let me wear the flats,” I beg.

  “Turn around,” Jean-Peter commands. I do a full revolution, as though I am on a morning show showcasing frumpy women from the street. “No, turn around. Face the wall. There’s something wrong with your butt.”

  I pinch my lips together but still do as I’m told.

  He and Matt start laughing the minute I am facing the back of the reception room. “What?” I ask and then start craning around to see what is so hilarious about my rear view.

  “Oh, Pennsylvania,” says Jean-Peter.

  “What?” I try again.

  “She’ll have to take them off,” he adds to Matt, not to me.

  I think we are talking about the shoes. “Thank god! They are killing me! And I haven’t even walked anywhere yet.”

  They both laugh some more. I turn around and try to look annoyed when actually I’m kind of having fun. “Someone tell me what is so awful about my butt.”

  “You have a lovely butt,” says Jean-Peter. “Clearly you spend your days running around a lot. Not too much sitting. I cannot wait to get you into some good jeans.”

  “Then why are we laughing? And when can I take off these shoes?”

  “You can have the flats on one condition,” says Jean-Peter. “Remove the Depends.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Matt jabs Jean-Peter and clears his throat. “Your, ah, briefs, Ms. Byler. There’s an unsightly line.”

  My eyes bulge. “These aren’t Depends! Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I had two kids! Some women need Depends. These are not Depends. Why am I still discussing this with you? I am wearing my underpants.”

  “No flats, then,” says Jean-Peter, and he turns back to his phone bank as though the matter is settled.

  “I can’t walk in these things . . . these stilts,” I say to Matt, and to prove it, I sort of stumble toward him to reach for the flats. “Have some mercy.”

  He starts to hand them to me, but in a flash Jean-Peter has them and is holding them in the air like a schoolyard bully. “The undies, Amy. Give up the bulky undies.”

  “You want me to walk around New York City with no panties on?” I ask him incredulously.

  “Why not? The skirt is long enough. Just get out of cabs two feet at a time. Swing on your butt and then push off with your abs and lean against the doorframe with one hand.” He demonstrates an exaggerated two-legged exit on his de
sk chair. “See? That’s just a life skill.”

  “It seems like it would just be a lot easier and safer to keep my underpants on.”

  “Well. If you want easy and safe, put that horrible pair of stretch pants back on.”

  There are three mirrors in this reception area, so I’ve seen the drastic improvement made by these guys in about fourteen minutes. Even I can see that the old pants are headed for the trash. Maybe I should just do as they say.

  “Can you get me, like, a skirt that flares away from the panty line?”

  Jean-Peter just dangles the flats in response.

  “I’ll die in these shoes out there. Forget getting out of a cab. I’ll be hit by one when I fall down in the street. Do you want that on your conscience?”

  Jean-Peter looks at me with a completely straight face. “That would not be on my conscience. That would be on the conscience of whichever vile corporation made those underpants. And the person who bought the underpants. Do you want your children to be orphaned because you have terrible taste in intimates?”

  I cannot stop myself from laughing at this. “Fine. You can have the underpants.”

  “Thank you, but no. No one wants that. Please dispose of them in the ladies’ room,” Jean-Peter says. Matt, who has been politely holding his laughter all this time, gives in to a howl.

  Smiling, I look at him and shake my head. “You people. You . . . you . . . New Yorkers . . .”

  But I march off to the bathroom anyway. When I come back, I feel the air-conditioning on my nethers and the sweet relief of ballerina flats on my feet. “Am I ready, folks?” I ask my peanut gallery.

  “You’re ready,” says Jean-Peter. “Good luck with this one, Matt. Have fun at the salon.”

  “Thanks for all your help,” I say dryly.

  “You’re most welcome,” he says without a drop of irony. “Matt, tell them to do the brows. Don’t let them forget the brows.”

  “Let’s get out of here while I still have some dignity left,” I tell Matt and bolt for the elevator.

  He jogs behind me and says, “You do look just great, Ms. Byler,” as the doors close. “I think Talia is going to be very pleased.”