by Marilyn Kaye
She was surprised when he showed up at her home at ten the next morning, early for a Saturday after such a late night. She was up — Beth, with all the typical impatience of a twelve-year-old, wanted all the details of the big event and wouldn’t let her sleep late.
Opening the door to Johnny, she could see right away that something was up.
‘I have to tell you something,’ he said. ‘My dad, he got me a summer job, working for a congressman.’ He took a deep breath, and then added, ‘In Washington DC.’ He swallowed, and more information came out in a rush. ‘I’ll be away all summer. I found out last week. I didn’t want to tell you right away, so we could have a great prom, but now …’ his voice trailed off, and he looked at her anxiously.
Obviously he thought she’d be upset that he wouldn’t be there for lazy afternoons by the pool at the country club, evening barbecues, day trips to the lake. But there was something he didn’t know.
She hadn’t even told her family the news yet, maybe because it still didn’t seem real to her. Months earlier, when she’d applied for the Gloss magazine intern programme, she wasn’t even sure why she was doing it. She’d never considered journalism as a career goal. She’d never really thought about careers much at all. But for some strange reason she kept finding herself turning back to the page in her favourite magazine that encouraged readers to spend a summer in New York and learn about magazine work. And on one weeknight evening, when there was nothing to watch on TV, she’d filled out the form. Then she went through the essays she’d written for classes and picked one to submit with her application.
There was nothing remarkable about this particular essay. She’d received an A, but that wasn’t unusual for her. The assignment, which had been given by Mrs Jackson, her English teacher, was to choose a holiday, any holiday, and write about its personal meaning.
Three of her classmates wrote about Thanksgiving and how they tried to be sincerely grateful for all they had. Two of them chose Christmas, and wrote the standard ‘think about Jesus, not Santa’ essay that you saw in newspaper editorials every December. Another friend went the patriotic route and wrote about the Fourth of July. But Sherry had written about Halloween, despite the fact that she knew Mrs Jackson was deeply religious and probably didn’t approve of a holiday that was suspiciously pagan. She’d enjoyed it, writing about the one night a year when she could be someone else.
She got her A, though Mrs Jackson had scribbled a note on the paper stating that Sherry hadn’t taken the assignment very seriously. But Sherry had liked that paper; it was something she’d written to please herself.
After sending off the application, she didn’t entertain any fantasies about winning a place in the internship programme. Gloss was the most popular teen magazine in the entire country, there had to be thousands and thousands of girls who applied. She firmly put it all out of her mind and concentrated on enjoying her senior year.
When she’d received the acceptance letter, she’d read it in disbelief. And when she finally broke the news, Johnny was happy for her, relieved that she wasn’t furious with him, and maybe a little envious. Washington DC was impressive, but New York! Even her normally protective parents were pleased — worried of course, but reassured when they received the letter from Gloss explaining that the interns would be cared for and watched over. They saw it as a marvellous little adventure for Sherry to have before starting college in Atlanta and settling down to the life she was supposed to live.
Her thoughts went back to Linda’s description today of her plans for the future. With a few changes in names and places, Sherry could have presented the same plan, word for word. And again she wondered why she hadn’t wanted to spend the rest of the afternoon with those girls.
There was the assignment to do of course. She sat down at her desk, and took the cover off her new portable Smith Corona typewriter, a graduation present from her parents.
But there was something she’d promised to do first — something she should have done the evening before, but she’d been too tired.
She opened a desk drawer and retrieved the neatly wrapped box she’d been given at the airport yesterday. She knew what it contained — all the kids in the family got a box like this when they went away from home.
Knowing her mother’s taste, she unwrapped the box with some trepidation. But it wasn’t too bad — the stationery set consisted of cream-coloured paper with a border of pink cherry blossoms, and envelopes in the same shade of pink. She took out a sheet and picked up her pen. Personal letters had to be written by hand of course.
In proper letter-writing style, she wrote ‘6 July, 1963’ in the upper right-hand corner of the paper, and on the left side she put the return address: Cavendish Residence for Women, 642 East 58th Street, New York 24, New York.
Dear everyone, Well, here I am, safe and sound, on Manhattan Island, New York City.
Of course, they already knew she’d arrived safely. At the pay phone in the residence lobby, she did what people always did to avoid paying the outrageous long-distance phone charges. She’d dialed ‘O’, asked the operator to make a person-to-person collect call to a Miss Taylor and gave the phone number of her family home.
She could hear the phone ringing and then her mother’s anxious voice.
‘Hello?’
The operator spoke. ‘I have a person-to-person collect call for Miss Taylor. Will you accept the charges?’
Sherry could have sworn she heard her mother exhale in relief before she said, ‘Miss Taylor isn’t here at the moment, could you ask the party to call later?’
There was no one named Taylor living in the Forrester household, and Sherry had no idea how that particular name had come to be employed. But that was their signal, the name that was used to indicate that a family member had arrived at his or her destination, and all was well.
I know I promised to write the first night, but it was just impossible. I only had an hour to unpack, shower and change my clothes before the formal dinner. By the way, Mama, the pink dress was perfect.
They’d both been a little worried about that, not knowing exactly how dressy the welcome dinner would be. She didn’t want to look too casual, but at the same time, being overdressed would have been just as great a sin. And there was the question of sophistication too. Pink might seem too young, but it was her colour, and Gloss magazine itself had declared in last month’s issue that pastels were very important this season. And looking around the table at the dinner, seeing other girls in pastel knits, she’d felt quite comfortable.
Naturally the editors looked much more sophisticated one wore a Jackie Kennedy-style suit with a boxy jacket, and at least three of them were in terribly chic little black dresses. The men, of course, were in suits.
There were a couple of interns who looked a little odd. The petite redhead had worn a black pencil skirt and black top, which was pretty unusual. Sherry never saw girls their age wearing black. The platinum blonde had been decked out in a shiny low-cut red cocktail dress, totally inappropriate.
But by far the worst was her roommate. As a regular reader of Gloss, Sherry knew beige was all wrong for Donna’s sallow complexion and mousy-brown hair. The shirtdress needed ironing, and the style, while OK for daytime, hadn’t been dressy enough for the occasion.
We had dinner at the famous Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, and the food was delicious! We had something called a Waldorf salad, which had apples and celery and walnuts in it. Then we had beef stroganoff— Mama, you absolutely must get a recipe for this. There were real French pastries for dessert.
After dinner we all gave our names and said something about ourselves, like our hobbies or where we came from. I’m the only girl from the South. Miss Margo Meredith, the editor-in-chief, gave a speech.
She wasn’t planning to go into detail about the speech — actually, she’d been too excited or too exhausted to remember it all that well. What she did remember was the intimidating woman herself. She’d been editor of Gloss since, well, forever
, and she had to be over fifty years old but she certainly didn’t look it. The girl she now knew as Pamela had been sitting next to Sherry and she’d whispered ‘facelift’ in her ear. Maybe so, but the woman was very striking, with shiny black hair pulled back in a tight chignon. Her make-up was perfect too, almost frighteningly so — Cleopatra eyes and dark red lips. It made Sherry think of the evil queen in the Snow White movie. She wore a simple black sheath, with large gold earrings and a strand of gold beads.
She gave a sort of flat ‘welcome to Gloss’ speech, and then promptly disappeared. Her place had been taken by Caroline Davison, also a very cosmopolitan looking woman, but not quite so intimidating, more elegantly cool, like Grace Kelly or the actress in that scary movie about the birds going wild.
Of course, we won’t have much to do with Miss Meredith. Our boss is the managing editor, Caroline Davison. She seems very nice.
Her speech, however, had been a little daunting.
‘I hope you all realize how very lucky you are to be here. We had over ten thousand applications for the summer-apprenticeship programme at Gloss this year, and you eight are the recipients of this prestigious opportunity. You were judged on the basis of the writing samples you submitted, so you must have some talent. But talent isn’t enough to guarantee a successful summer here. You will have to work very, very hard. You must be disciplined, observant, obedient, very careful and, above all, punctual.’
Sherry had noticed a couple of girls squirming or looking a little uncomfortable, and she’d wondered which of those requirements scared them. She was also a little unnerved … she had come here expecting a fun adventure. Now it seemed she’d have to start thinking about it as an actual job.
All the staff we’ve met seem very nice. The magazine photographer, David Barnes, is soooo handsome! Honestly, he looks just like Rock Hudson. But don’t worry, Daddy, he’s at least thirty years old so he won’t be interested in me, and I promise not to flirt with him!
My roommate is Donna, she wrote, and then stopped again. What could she possibly say about someone she knew absolutely nothing about? When Sherry had asked about her hometown, she’d only said something vague like, ‘Up north.’ Sherry could only guess she’d meant somewhere like Maine or Vermont. Maybe even Canada.
There was something else strange too. The other girls had dragged big suitcases into the residence, and some had also carried hairdryers and typewriters. One girl even had a portable television. All Donna brought with her was a small backpack.
Donna’s quiet, and she didn’t take up much of the closet space. The other apprentices seem very nice.
Nice … what a meaningless word. But did she really want to go into details here? How could she describe Pamela without letting her mother think Sherry would be hanging out with a slut? And describing Allison would make the redhead sound like a beatnik. Dressed in black, the boyish haircut, and that awful burlap bag she toted …
She moved on quickly to write about the residence hall.
It’s a very safe place, with a doorman on duty twenty-four hours a day. No men are allowed beyond the lobby. And there are curfews of course. We have to be in the building by eleven on weeknights, midnight on weekends. I haven’t seen much of New York yet, but a couple of interns and I went to Times Square today.
She hesitated for a second, and then added, It was interesting. That was all she was going to tell them about that particular adventure.
At ‘Gloss’ today, we were shown a new movie for teens on a projector in a conference room. Now we have to write a review of it, so I’d better get to work. Kiss Beth for me, lots of love, Sherry Ann.
She put the letter in an envelope, addressed it, sealed it and applied a stamp. Then she went back to her typewriter, inserted a sheet of paper into the rollers and typed the heading in capital letters.
BEACH BLANKET KISSES
A REVIEW BY SHERRY FORRESTER
That was as far as she got before a rumble in her stomach told her it was dinnertime. She’d assumed her roommate would be back by now and they’d go to dinner together. But maybe some of the other interns would be in the dining hall.
Quickly she washed her hands, rubbed a little pressed powder on her shiny nose and added a touch of pastel pink lipstick. A massive dose of hairspray that morning had kept her light brown chin-length flip from frizzing, but she was a little worried about her bangs. Shading her eyes with one hand, she sprayed the fringe that covered her forehead. Then she fled the bathroom to escape the pungent odour of the hairspray.
Downstairs, the dining room wasn’t very crowded. She went through the buffet line, selected meat loaf and a salad, and then scanned the room.
According to the Cavendish pamphlet, the residence was designed to give young single working girls a safe and comfortable home. Looking around at the tables, she tried to imagine what the women sitting there did for a living. Secretaries, she imagined. Or teachers maybe. Women waiting to meet Mr Right. She figured there was probably a big turnover of residents, as girls left to get married.
She didn’t see Diane or Linda, but she did spot one of her fellow interns — Allison, the tiny redhead, still in black. She sat alone, her face buried in a book as she ate. Sherry moved over to her table.
‘May I join you?’ she asked politely.
Allison looked up. ‘Please do.’ She took one last longing look at the page she’d been reading, then she put a bookmark in and closed the book.
‘What are you reading?’ Sherry asked as she sat down.
‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ Allison told her. ‘Do you know it?’
‘I’ve heard of it,’ Sherry said carefully.
‘Didn’t you see the movie?’
Sherry found herself giving undue attention to the cutting of her meat loaf. ‘It didn’t play in my hometown.’
‘It’s about racism,’ Allison said.
Sherry nodded.
Allison cocked her head thoughtfully. ‘You’re from the South, aren’t you?’
Sherry nodded. ‘Georgia.’ And then she added quickly, ‘But I’m not a racist. I’m totally in favour of integration.’ As the words left her mouth, it dawned on her that she’d never said that before out loud. Back home, it was something adults spoke about in whispers, and teens not at all.
‘How about interracial dating?’
Sherry was taken aback. ‘I — I don’t know. I guess I’ve never thought about that.’
Allison reached into her burlap bag thing and pulled out a copy of Gloss. She slapped it on the table and opened it to the table of contents.
‘“Inter-faith dating — what’s your opinion?”’ she read aloud. She shook her head. ‘I mean, really! Is that such a big deal? Maybe a hundred years ago. Nobody cares about that any more. This is a very old-fashioned magazine.’
Sherry didn’t know what to say. A girl she knew had gone out with a Jewish boy, and her parents threw a hissy fit. So yes, for some people it was a big deal. Not to Allison, obviously.
‘Where are you from?’ she asked.
‘Boston.’
‘I guess people are more liberal there,’ Sherry remarked.
‘Ha. Not in my family.’
The way she said that, wrinkling her nose, made Sherry wonder about Allison’s background. But of course it was much too soon in their relationship to bring up anything personal, so she changed the subject.
‘What did you think of that movie we saw?’
‘It was stupid,’ Allison declared. ‘Just another beach movie.’
‘Well, it couldn’t compare with A Summer Place, that’s for sure,’ said Sherry.
‘I never saw it,’ Allison said.
‘Really?’ Sherry found that hard to believe. It had been the number-one teen movie just a couple of years ago. ‘Troy Donahue and Sandra Dee, making out on the beach? It was positively dreamy.’
Allison grimaced. ‘Sounds like typical teen fodder.’
‘Well, there was an adult romance too, between the girl’s father and
the boy’s mother,’ Sherry added. ‘And it was based on a book. It was actually a pretty mature movie.’
‘Have you seen Jules and Jim?’ Allison asked.
Sherry shook her head.
‘It’s about a love affair between two men and a woman. It’s in French, it’s black and white and it’s artistic. That’s the kind of movie Gloss should be writing about. Not this squeaky-clean, unrealistic, goody-goody garbage.’ She began flipping through the pages of the magazine.
‘I mean, look at all this junk! How to throw a theme party. What to wear to the prom. Who’s your favourite TV doctor hero? My summer at cheerleading camp. And the ads! I counted five ads for silverware patterns. As if that’s the most important thing on our minds what kind of knives and forks we want when we get married.’
Sherry’s lips twitched. She didn’t think this was the moment to announce her own silverware choice, ‘Prelude’ by International Sterling. Nor did she mention her two weeks at a cheerleading camp last summer. Instead she asked a question.
‘If you think Gloss is so stupid, why do you want to work for it?’
‘To change it,’ Allison replied promptly. ‘To bring it up to date, to make the editors realize that the world is changing. You know what they should include? Poetry. Articles about folk music, experimental theatre, modern dance. The civil rights movement.’
Sherry considered this. ‘I guess that could be interesting,’ she offered. Though not to anyone I know, she added silently.
‘And all this “meeting Mr Right” junk. How to talk to a boy, should you kiss on the first date? Who needs this kind of advice?’
At least Sherry could respond honestly to this. ‘Not me. I’ve been with the same guy for three years.’
‘So you’re serious?’
She nodded. ‘We’ve talked about getting married after we both graduate from college.’
‘Wow, you’ve planned that far in advance?’