Lisa couldn’t sleep. Her covers twisted up in knots as she ran from hot to cold. A faint perfume lingered on her skin from the night, a scent that curled its thin tendrils into her nose.
At the crack of dawn, at the kitchen table, she ate farina with a melted pool of butter and sugar. Her head hung over the bowl, eyelids swollen.
Her schedule showed an international flight this morning.
“How are you?”
Her mother ironed in quick bursts. Lisa stared at the scene and started to gag on a lump in her throat—a congealed mass stuck down low. Steam from the iron puffed up into quick clouds, and Lisa watched it billow as she swallowed the lumpen bit.
“I’m fine, Ma.”
The steam recalled to mind the condensation escaping from the vent pipes of a diner, an idle sight from a darkened parking lot in Brooklyn. The other week Billy had lain with her in the back seat of his car, his warm lips close to her ear. His cologne was musky. I’ll never leave you, babe. His arms had wrapped tight around her waist, as though he’d caught her. He was the only boy who knew the warm, close curve of her breasts.
For nearly two years, she’d had him to look forward to upon her rearrival in Brooklyn. When he picked her up from Idlewild, he would grab her electric-blue valise, ushering her through the crowds and outside to his red car with the soft leather seats. As he drove them from Queens to Brooklyn, he would sing to the radio, turning to kiss her at traffic lights.
Yesterday was the first time he hadn’t shown up.
He still hadn’t even called to explain himself.
He just lost interest.
Lisa struggled to take another bite, to shake herself awake.
Her mother spoke through another cloud of iron steam. “How long will you be gone on this trip, Lisa?”
“A week and a half, Ma.”
She forced her voice to come out brisk and informative. She would jet out in the usual way, her legs shiny in her pharmacy nylons.
“Where are you headed?” her mother asked warily.
“Paris, then Rome the next day, then Beirut.”
“Bay rot?”
“Beirut.”
“Where is that?” The iron blew out a loud burst of steam.
“Lebanon.”
“Are there any Catholics there?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, I think it would be nice for you to be able to go to church. You haven’t gone to Mass one time since you’ve had this job.”
“I’ll see what’s there.” She held her forehead.
Her father called out from the bathroom as he rinsed soap from his face. He always took his time, trying not to use too much, trying not to waste it. “Don’t get in trouble walking around by yourself!”
“I won’t be walking around by myself.”
“Well, how do you get places, then?”
“I don’t know. Usually the airline hires cabs,” Lisa answered, though they never did.
She was thankful that her father had slept through her early-morning return from the Starlite. He would have asked her where she had gone—she would have found it difficult to make up a story at that hour. He would have been shocked to find out about those women laughing and dancing, as free as they were.
Lisa shot a glimpse now at the clock in the kitchen. It was eight o’clock, time to leave. She scraped the last pearls of farina from her bowl and rushed to her room. She had a schedule to keep. She packed swiftly, scouring her closet as usual. Her clothing rack was nearly bare, flanked by peeling fibers of wallpaper. Only one decent dress hung from a wire hanger: a dark-violet piece with a pleated skirt. She placed it in a plastic garment sleeve in her suitcase.
Effort completed, she climbed into her hard bed and closed her eyes to rest for a moment; the scent of the prior night played on her pillow.
“Where is Lebanon, anyway?” her mother shouted through the door.
“It’s in the Middle East.”
Come evening, her parents would still be in this small apartment—her mother making dinner, her father watching TV.
I’ll never leave you, babe.
Lisa opened her lids halfway, blinking through the sudden moisture in her eyes. A note Billy had once written stuck out from a stack of papers on her shelf. He had given it to her with a single rose. His smile was wide and earnest as he grabbed her hand to slide an invisible ring on her finger, resting his lips on that very spot.
* * *
Lisa’s flight was delayed because of ice on the runway, so the crew went to dine together in the staff cafeteria before departure.
As they took their seats at their customary table, the copilot smiled at Lisa, taking the seat adjacent to her. He was in his late twenties, golden haired and clean-cut, with a gleam in his eye.
When Jane saw his choice of seat, she narrowed her eyes at Lisa, sitting herself on his other side. She batted her eyelashes at the copilot and primped her bun, engaging him in conversation about Beirut.
Lisa sat quietly, even as Betsy, her friend on crew, joined them at the table. She gave Betsy a weak hello, but she didn’t say anything else. Too many people were around to talk about what had happened with Billy.
The air at the crew table crackled with predeparture energy, especially once their energetic pilot joined them. As the rest of the crew engaged in high-velocity chatter about the nightlife, beaches, and watersports in Beirut, Lisa remained quiet, picking idly at her food.
The copilot took observation of her silence. “How about you, Lisa? Will you join us for some water-skiing in Beirut?” He was straight-backed in his airline cap, masculine.
“I don’t know how to swim, actually.” Lisa’s cheeks grew red. “I never went to summer camp.”
“You don’t know how to swim?” Jane giggled.
“Nope, never learned.” Lisa mixed together her mushroom sauce and chicken fragments.
The copilot flashed her a smile, his teeth a shade of blinding white. “Oh well, they have life jackets anyway. I think you’ll do great!”
From across the table, Lisa felt Jane burrow her eyes into her skull, planting hatred like a seed. Lisa looked over to Betsy, who gave her a sympathetic look.
Once onboard the jet, Jane wasted no time putting Lisa to work on drink service—cups in a line, just so. Napkins—perfectly flat. A pour with only subtle wrist action—no ungainly movement of the arms. As the purser, Jane was in control.
Lisa set the fine glassware down in careful rows as the plane’s motors roared to life. The engines were deafening, with heavy blasts, but Jane’s hisses were louder. “You need to offer everyone blankets right after they board, remember? Quick. It’s chilly.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Lisa scurried to grab a stack of blankets, trying to maintain their crisp folds. “Care for a lap blanket?”
She pushed the edges of her lips upward as she glided down the aisle, smiling at each passenger. Betsy took the back of the plane, keeping up the tempo. It was a full plane today for this leg of the trip, and the passengers were subdued, in anticipation of transatlantic travel.
Soon, a passenger in row two broke the quiet with a series of barking coughs. Lisa searched the cabinets to find him a handkerchief as Jane delivered the preflight announcements over the loudspeaker. The passengers stared to the front of the cabin, their eyes glued to Jane; she soaked up their attentions with a cutesy voice and perky smile. The passengers clapped when she finished, and she gave them a little curtsy.
Lisa scanned their faces. Couples and families, business travelers. Her eyes fluttered to the middle rows to estimate how much she would need to bring out for service.
She drew in a breath.
It was the light-brown hair. Strands of gray slicked in a V shape. The cleft in the chin. His horn-rimmed glasses. His smirk.
Billy’s father was on her plane.
His arm was around a woman who wasn’t his wife. She was a young thing with platinum-blonde hair and bright-red lips, gazing up at him like a smitten puppy.
Lisa buckled herself into the jump seat, hand over her chest.
With ascent at a full ten minutes long, she turned away from the passengers. The chicken and mushrooms from her lunch reconstituted in her throat.
The woman’s laughs traveled down the aisle, high-pitched scratches in her ear. The plane reached cruising altitude. Drink service would commence.
Lisa raised herself with effort and grabbed her beverage cart. Her hands shook like an aged woman’s as she poured the beverages into the little Pan Am cups.
“Water?” she asked everyone in turn.
She ambled slowly, but eventually she was one row in front of him. He had his mouth to the ear of the woman; giggles bubbled up from under her plump pink lips.
Lisa’s legs swayed on her unsteady feet. She tilted her head to make eye contact with Billy’s father as she would any other passenger.
“Water?”
He didn’t meet her eye as he wordlessly accepted the cup. His arm was slung over the woman’s shoulder. His hand grazed the woman’s breast.
Lisa had met Billy’s father at least ten times over the past two years. Just a few weeks ago, at meat loaf night at Billy’s apartment, his father had embarked on a long, steady monologue about his “important” job in politics. Lisa had listened politely.
Now, from down the aisle, Jane watched Lisa’s every move with the intensity of a panther.
Lisa stumbled toward her as she finished drink service, and her heel tipped sideways in an ungainly way.
Jane communicated silently, pointing to her legs.
You’re representing Pan Am.
Lisa contorted her lips into straight folds and averted her gaze.
“Get it together, Lisa! Remember who you represent.” Jane sprung forward in a sudden blast of sour breath.
Lisa’s mutter was barely audible over the whir of the jet engine. “You don’t even know.”
Jane turned, fire in her eyes. “Did you say something?”
Lisa cleared her throat, unable to speak at first. Then she pointed to a patch of exposed white skin on the back of Jane’s leg, below the hemline. “You have a rip in your nylons.”
Jane reddened. “You should have told me sooner!” She scurried to the restroom.
Lisa smiled faintly—but her smile soon faded.
In her peripheral vision, she could see Billy’s father, nestling his head into the crook of that woman’s neck.
6
Madeline
The Starlite’s first Valentine’s Day Bash had been a last-minute affair. The ladies had listened to the radio and nibbled on Madeline’s homemade cupcakes, in decorous avoidance of the burned parts.
But now they were at the Fifth Annual Bash—a startlingly different affair. It was a big and beautiful hoopla, with three kinds of strawberry cakes, four varieties of cocktails. Thousands of pieces of pink confetti fluttered through the air like rosebuds.
This night was alive with dazzling music. Catherine Huxley worked at full strength, belting out her gorgeous songs for hours on end. A clear and powerful jazz singer, she concluded her sets with flourishes of her delicate wrists. Between these sets, Madeline set Elvis on the turntable. Then at eleven o’clock, it was rhyme-and-rhythm time. Elaine Huxley read her poetry, and the rest of the literary circle presented the audience with works about love, lost and gained.
After midnight, the three sisters from Italy put on a play near the fitting rooms. They opened and closed the fitting room doors, and each assumed the part of a different character in a performance about looking for love in Brooklyn. The sisters took turns playing the roles of failed suitors. Graciela was a long, limber brunette who usually had a heavy Italian accent, but in this performance she put on the voice of a Brooklyn guy and postured with her legs spread wide, mocking.
“Why don’t we just go and eat a hot dog at Nathan’s?” She slouched forward, laughing, everyone in on the joke. “Hey, I have an auto dealership on Eighty-Sixth. I’ll take you for a ride after.”
Everyone was giddy at midnight. They laughed until salty tears flowed from their eyes into their drinks. They giggled into their cocktails and nearly snorted them backward, in chokes and sputters—it didn’t matter. Someone put Elvis back on, and Madeline took out the roses she had bought for a couple of dollars on the avenue and stored in the back room all day. She passed the roses to the women, who began to toss them on one of her mannequins, and then someone made a sign for the mannequin’s neck: Aphrodite. More and more women joined in; soon Aphrodite was transformed into a goddess in full bloom, strewn in an array of crimson petals.
Madeline posed next to the mannequin, beckoning everyone onward, and the ladies took the cue to decorate her too. She became their own goddess in full bloom as the ladies sprinkled rose petals on her hair, gathering the petals back up from the ground in a chorus of laughter, then showering her in a floral cloud.
Petals fell from her auburn locks, and Madeline twisted to the music with a beatific smile on her face.
Everyone danced, danced, danced and she cranked up the record player. She had made a little red mark on the dial, as she knew just how loud they could get before the music leaked through the door. She maintained the volume at this careful threshold, enough to fill their ears without drawing attention from the outside.
Men weren’t supposed to know about the Starlite’s social club, after hours.
Madeline’s high-backed mannequin displays stood in front of the windows, along with her tallest dress racks. Everything was positioned strategically to obscure the bustling activity within the shop.
Now, it was time to eat. Madeline brought out the chocolate cake, along with some champagne, and the confetti flew everywhere—landing on bouffant hairstyles and ballerina buns. It even adhered to the cake. Everyone squealed when the little pink squares stuck to the cocoa frosting on their plates and lips.
Madeline was everywhere at once, and she mingled with all. But when it neared two in the morning, she was almost asleep. The dress shop had been open since midmorning; she had been going for hours.
Yet most of the women remained in the store. Madeline gave them a hint with some big-band music—slow-tempo swing, a wind-down. At three in the morning, the shop was almost empty. All that remained were those few who always stayed later to help clean up.
They started to do what they usually did when they cleaned: argue about the movies. Tonight, it was Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Madeline declared that Holly Golightly was a misunderstood fashion plate, but the other girls called the character “weak” and “irritating.”
“She has no real backbone!” Harriet was adamant, her brown eyes blazing. “She’s living life for a dream!”
“Well, what is anyone doing? We’re all trying to live our dreams!” Madeline bit her lip, her eyes stuck on the piles of trash strewn about.
Together, the women plucked little pieces of confetti from the carpet.
Harriet shook her head. “You know, Madeline—Holly Golightly doesn’t even come close to living her dreams. I mean, don’t you get that she’s a hooker?”
Gloria chimed in, her hazel eyes flashing with earnest indignation. “And what about her desperation? She was selling herself to these bastards!”
Cynthia shook her blonde curls in laughing disbelief. “I mean, Audrey Hepburn is beautiful, but let’s not confuse a beautiful woman with a crazy character!”
“I guess.” Madeline’s voice went low. She picked at the confetti, which clung to everything. “Listen, why don’t you girls just bunk in the back room for the night? I got a few extra bedrolls, you know, and a space heater.”
The women smiled at her, thin lipped. They made excuses, reasons why they had to leave. Everyone was on borrowed time. Gloria lived with her parents—they believed she was babysitting. Harriet’s husband was coming back home from a business trip, and she had left her phone off the hook. Cynthia had to be in Cana
rsie in a few hours for her shift at a convenience store; she was able to change her hours only with well-timed references to an “ailing sister.”
The women soon pulled on their muffs and hats to leave. Madeline trudged around and switched off the small red lamps she had placed out for atmosphere. They said good-night to her, and she locked the door.
Only the clothing racks and bags of garbage remained. She turned off the overhead lights and raced into her little bathroom. She always sprinted to the back rooms, in a flush of heat, to outrun any rodents or shadows that might slink in the desolate space. Once she had seen something move, a shape like a rat beneath the clothing racks. She had screamed so hard that her voice didn’t work quite right the next day.
In the bathroom now, she gave herself a sponge bath to wash away the sweat of the evening. She pulled her nightdress over her head and dabbed some cold cream in the corners of her eyes, and then she headed to her back room to set out a blanket on the fold-out sofa. It was chilly, but cheaper to bundle up than to keep the heat on.
She slipped on her sateen eye mask and tossed in discomfort on the lumpy mattress of the pull-out sofa. The Valentine’s soiree had been a smashing success, and there had been no disagreements except for that Breakfast at Tiffany’s incident.
It had been a time of laughing, crying, and being free.
It was almost enough to make Madeline forget that she had been living at the shop for four years, since ’57.
None of the girls even knew that Madeline didn’t have her own apartment. She still didn’t have enough to pay rent on a place of her own, since any extra money from her dress shop went straight back into the social club.
She was choosing to support something even bigger than herself.
* * *
The social club had started off small, as just a fun activity—finger foods and chats in the evenings. Madeline still had her apartment at the time, but she needed something to distract herself in the evenings so she wouldn’t think about Fred.
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