I listened and tried to share his dismay with the rules and the work, but the whole idea of school felt like privilege. Suddenly I had an idea. “Can you take me there?” I asked. “Can I see your school?”
Josh slid his arm around my shoulders, and I leaned into him. It was an easy movement, as natural as blinking. “Sure,” he said. “As a matter of fact, Homecoming’s next month. I was going to find a clever way to ask you to the dance, but I guess this will have to do. Will you go with me?”
I nodded happily. I wasn’t sure what “Homecoming” meant, but dancing was involved and I’d get to see the school. And Josh wanted to take me. It was something else I could step into and try on. I smiled and nestled against him. The smell of his skin was achingly familiar, and the weekend stretched ahead of us, long and enticing.
It turned out that Homecoming was a pretty big deal. I found that out when Valerie and Jill showed up at Rachel’s door the next day, their faces shimmering with excitement.
“We heard you’re coming to Homecoming with us,” said Valerie.
“We’re going together?”
Jill nodded, her dark curls bouncing. “There are twelve of us in the group—six couples. I’m going with Steve.” I quietly readjusted my image of the dance to accommodate this new information.
“So,” said Valerie, “do you have a dress?”
I thought about the dresses in my closet, then realized that Valerie must mean a different type of dress. I shook my head.
“Okay, we’ll shop together. I need one too,” said Valerie. “And I’ll help you order Josh’s boutonniere. Pictures are going to be at my house.”
“Pictures?”
“Yeah, we go to someone’s house before the dance, and the parents take pictures of us all dressed up. It’s kind of lame, but the parents like it.” Valerie stopped. “Oh,” she added. “Can the people you work for come in place of your parents?”
“I guess so.” This was sounding complicated.
Within an hour we were at the mall, starting with lunch in the fast-food area.
Valerie punched her fork into her lettuce. “I hate salads.”
“Then why did you order one?” I asked, looking around at all of the other choices she could have had.
“I want to lose weight before the dance.”
I looked at Valerie. She was a slender girl. I couldn’t imagine that she wanted to take up even less space than she already did.
Jill turned to me, her face full and open. “So, what are the boys like where you’re from?”
“Yeah,” said Valerie. “Are there any hotties?”
Valerie and Jill were both leaning forward now, their elbows resting on the table. I thought of Daniel and wondered if these girls would think he was a “hottie.” But I wouldn’t tell them about a boy whose voice was as tender as a ball of cotton. So I just said, “Yes, there are. And my friends at home all want to know what the Yankee boys are like.”
Valerie raised her eyebrows. “Do they know about Josh?”
I thought about Annie and Kate reading my letters, perhaps disapproving of me in a thrilled, breathy way. I smiled. “They know.”
“Josh is one of the good ones,” said Valerie. “When we went out, he was a perfect gentleman. Our breakup was mutual.”
Heat prickled around my ears. I looked down at the table and busied myself gathering the crumpled remains of my lunch. Josh had never told me that he and Valerie had been a couple. When I looked up, I thought I saw an exchange between her and Jill, the quick meeting of their eyes. “Anyway,” Valerie said, her voice a bit too loud, “we’d better start shopping. It always takes longer than we think to find the right dress.”
I followed them through the mall, shaking off thoughts of Josh holding Valerie’s hand, pulling her toward him for a kiss. Or more. I took some deep breaths, willing myself back to the moment.
I trotted to catch up with the girls, who were taking long, sure strides along a path that would have been called a sidewalk if we were outside, but that didn’t have a name in a place where there was no outside. Valerie looked over her shoulder at me and pointed at a store with a big red star in the window. “Come on, we’re starting at Macy’s.”
Within a few minutes, I didn’t have time to think about my boyfriend and his secret ex-girlfriend. My world shrank into the narrow realm of fashion. Did I want short or long? What color? What fabric? What style?
I followed Valerie and Jill along the seemingly endless racks of dresses. They flicked through the plastic hangers, periodically pulling out a dress and holding it up for scrutiny. I reached out tentatively for a dress the color of a cherry blossom. The fabric felt silky between my fingertips. Smiling, I draped the dress over my arm and walked forward briskly.
Minutes later, my arms were heavy from the weight of the dresses I had chosen. Valerie and Jill were also embracing armloads of colorful fabric. Together we made our way to a large fitting room and hung the dresses on wall hooks. Immediately, Jill and Valerie pulled down their jeans and stepped out, leaving them in denim pools on the floor. I looked away as they took off their shirts and stood before each other unself-consciously, wearing only bras and panties. Even after all the days I had spent with Valerie at the mall, I was still getting used to the lack of modesty here.
I stepped out of my jeans and pulled off my shirt, then reached for the pink dress and slipped it over my head. Its soft folds slid over me, clinging to my waist and hips. I stared at my reflection. The dress made me look curvy, and the neckline crept down low. The skirt stopped a few inches above my knees. “I like it,” said Valerie. I turned away from the mirror. Valerie was wearing a short black dress with a similarly plunging neckline. Jill was pulling a red dress over her head.
I soon found myself slipping out of dresses as comfortably as if I were in my room at home, whirling around, eager to see what the girls thought and to share my opinions of their dresses. It was luxurious to step in and out of these fancy clothes, to feel the sensations of the different materials against my skin. Soon I forgot about being humble and plain. I forgot that the important thing was how people treated each other, not how they looked on the outside. In this miniature place filled with extravagant clothing, I felt like one of the fancy people I had been warned about all my life.
I stared at myself in the mirror, wearing the last of the dresses I had brought into the room. It was the blue of a dusky sky, and it fitted itself to me as though someone had sewn it around my form. The skirt fell to my calves and billowed around my legs when I moved. At once, Valerie and Jill were on either side of me, and I saw their satisfied reflections in the mirror. “This is it,” said Valerie. “You found it.”
“You think?” I asked, but already I was imagining myself wearing the dress, dancing with Josh the way we had at the club, when our bodies had melded together. I pictured how he would smile in that surprised way when he first saw me, and how proud he would be to introduce me to all the people in the group. Then I remembered that I hadn’t thought to look at the price. The small white tag fluttered down the side of the dress, and I reached around to look at it. One hundred and fifty dollars. I sucked in my breath. Valerie was stepping back into the black dress she had first tried on, and Jill was glancing around to see how the gray dress she was wearing looked in the back. They both turned to look at me.
Valerie glanced at the price with a nod. “That’s how much most of these dresses cost.” I looked back at my reflection, noticing that my eyes were just a little bit bluer when I wore this dress. And the fabric hung in a way that made my waist look small, a quality that I had recently learned was sought after.
I thought quickly about how much money I had. My debt to my parents was paid, and there was enough in my checking account to pay for this dress. “Do you think I’ll ever wear it again?”
Valerie glanced at Jill and shrugged. “We usually wear a different dress to each dance.” So this would be an entirely frivolous purchase. For a few hours on one night I would be p
retty in a way that I had never been before and might not ever be again. And the cost of this vanity would be a hundred and fifty dollars.
“I’ll take it,” I said, my voice filled with the bravado of impulse. My words were met by excited shrieks from Valerie and Jill, and I basked in their attention, pushing aside my teachings about humility and frugality. I stepped out of the dress slowly, reluctant to bring an end to the richness of these feelings.
Back in my jeans and shirt, I perched on the one chair in the room, my arms wrapped around the blue dress, and watched as Valerie and Jill made their decisions. Jill chose the red dress, and Valerie decided on a black-and-white print. Minutes later, after I wrote a check, and the other two girls plunked down their charge cards, we stood together holding identical shopping bags emblazoned with red stars. It was then that Valerie asked the question that I hadn’t considered. “What about shoes?”
I glanced down at my sneakered feet and thought about the sandals and the sturdy black shoes in my closet. I looked at Valerie and shook my head. In the shoe department, I watched as Jill and Valerie held up one shoe after another for me to consider, each with overly high and slender heels, and signaled a salesman with our choices.
The salesman emerged from an unseen room, balancing four rectangular boxes in his arms. I sat down and reached for one of the boxes before I realized that the man, seated on a low stool before me, was already opening it and reaching for my foot. He deftly slid the sneaker and sock off of my right foot and slipped the black shoe on, adjusting the buckle at my ankle. I blushed that a strange man was helping me on and off with my shoes, but a quick glance around the room showed me that everyone was being assisted in the same way. When both of my feet were settled in the shoes, the salesman pushed back the stool he was sitting on and urged me to stand up. My ankles wobbled, and I staggered until he reached for my elbow to steady me. I took a few shaky steps, wondering how I would walk, let alone dance in these shoes. Valerie and Jill offered me words of encouragement each time I stepped around in a different pair of shoes.
“We all feel the same way in heels,” said Jill. “You should practice walking on them at home before the dance.”
“And bring a pair of white socks in your purse,” added Valerie. “We all dance in our socks.”
I finally decided on the pair that felt the least uncomfortable, and watched as the salesman placed them back into the box. Again the checkbook came out, and again I signed my name to an amount of money that seemed obscene.
Now, carrying two shopping bags and trying not to think about the amount of money missing from my checkbook, I let the girls lead me to the panty hose department to buy sheer stockings. “Are we done yet?” I asked, setting the checkbook back in my bag for what I hoped was the last time.
“What about jewelry?” asked Jill. And in minutes we were standing at the jewelry counter, staring at necklaces and earrings. “I’m guessing your ears aren’t pierced,” said Jill. I shook my head.
Valerie spoke up. “They do it for free here; it only takes a minute.”
Jill pointed to the silver earrings that shimmered from her earlobes. “I got mine pierced when I was eight years old.” Valerie leaned forward and pulled back her long hair to reveal three silver earrings marching up the side of her ear.
I shuddered at the thought of a needle slicing through my earlobe. But that wasn’t the issue. Making a permanent wound in the body in order to hang decorations could never be accepted among the Amish. And I realized that these girls, waiting eagerly for my response, would probably know this.
Valerie leaned closer. “It only hurts for a second. We’ll be with you.”
“No,” I said. “Thanks for the offer, though.”
“Here are some clip-ons,” said Jill, pointing to a small rack on the counter.
But Valerie wasn’t finished. “Is it because you’re not allowed?”
“That’s right. I can wear jewelry while I’m here, but I can’t do anything permanent.” I hoped that my voice sounded final, because that’s the way I was feeling.
“You know,” said Valerie, her tone like a mischievous child, “you can get your ears pierced and wear earrings while you’re here. Then when you go home you’ll just take them out.”
“Val,” said Jill. “Let it go.”
Valerie reached up to her earlobe and lifted out an earring. “See?” she said. “You can’t even see the hole. No one would ever know.”
I looked at Valerie and said simply, “I would know.”
Jill quickly reached for a pair of dangly earrings with light blue stones and held them up to me. “These would be good with the dress. And, look, they’re clip-ons.” She unhooked the earrings from the cardboard that displayed them, and snapped them gently to my earlobes. I loved the way they glinted in the light, looking like tiny bits of indigo.
I was grateful that they had stopped talking about ear piercing, but something felt familiar about all this attention. Then I remembered. It was the first movie I saw, the one where the popular girls fixed up the unattractive girl so she could go out with the handsome boy.
I looked in the mirror at the reflections of Valerie and Jill smiling beside me. They seemed to be having fun dressing me up, making me like one of them. I wondered why this would bother me. After all, I had dreamed about fitting in here. But one thing kept leading to something else, as though there was no end to this task. Getting ready for the dance made me think about the el trains, going back and forth all day and night, never done with their work.
“I’ll take these,” I said, pointing to the earrings with the blue stones, and to a simple silver necklace. Jill and Valerie murmured their approval and nodded to the saleswoman. I pulled out my checkbook once again, and watched as the woman set the earrings and necklace on a pad of cotton inside a small white box.
“Will this be all?” she asked.
“I hope so,” I said. And I meant it.
Walking through the parking lot to Valerie’s car, I looked at my assortment of packages and imagined Kate and Annie reaching for each item, gasping at the jewelry, fingering the material of the dress, and shaking their heads in wonder at the shoes and panty hose. In the backseat of the car, I listened to Valerie and Jill chatting about the other friends who would be going with us to the dance—Chelsea and Michael and Ashley and Oscar and Carly and Alex. I had met a few of Josh’s friends over these past weeks, but still there were more names to learn. There would be more curious faces, more questions about how I could get through life without a hair dryer and an iPod.
Valerie pulled the car into Rachel’s driveway and turned around to me. “Can we come in for a while?” she asked. Upstairs in my room, Valerie reached into the closet for a hanger and carefully hung up the new dress. It looked like it didn’t belong in there among the blue jeans and the other casual clothing I had bought to be a part of this world. “What’s this?” Valerie asked, still facing the closet. She reached for the Amish clothing my mother had made me bring. I had almost forgotten about the purple dress, the kapp, and the apron, pushed to the back of the closet on the day I arrived.
Jill walked over to where Valerie was standing. Both girls stared at the dress as though it had walked into the room under its own power. “Wow,” said Jill. “So this is what you wear at home.”
“Yes,” I said. “It’s what all the girls wear.”
Valerie turned to me, still clutching the hanger. “Can I borrow this?”
I looked at her quizzically. “What for?”
“I’d like to show it to my little sister. I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve told her about you, and I think she’d love to see these clothes.”
I nodded, shrugging off that old feeling of being on display. But Valerie looked so satisfied when I agreed that I felt all right about the request.
“What’s this?” Jill asked. I glanced over to see her by the night-stand, Daniel’s wood carving in her upturned palm.
“Oh, that’s something my friend made for me be
fore I came here,” I said, forcing my voice to sound casual.
“Someone made this?” Jill asked. “By hand?”
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s pretty common for Amish boys to do woodworking.”
“So, who’s the guy who made this?” Valerie asked, her voice playful. “And is he cute?”
I looked from one girl to the other—Valerie holding my Amish dress, and Jill clutching the wood carving of the bird leaving the nest. The two remnants of my other life were on exhibit in the hands of these English girls. “My friend Daniel made it,” I said, keeping my voice bland and final.
Jill set the carving back in its place, and Valerie draped the dress across her arm. “Well,” said Valerie, “I have a ton of homework waiting for me. Thanks for letting me borrow your outfit. I’ll take good care of it.”
Standing at the window, I watched the girls walk out to Valerie’s car. I had to admit I felt a bit uneasy at the sight of my purple dress fluttering in the breeze.
On the next Saturday afternoon, a week after the shopping day and with the dance still two weeks away, I sat at the kitchen table huddled over my checkbook, staring at the amounts of money that had gone out of my account, and the smaller-than-expected amount I had left.
Rachel sat down beside me. “Has this been an expensive time?”
I nodded, closing the checkbook and putting it back in my bag. Then I remembered something. “I forgot to tell you that I won’t be coming home the night of the dance. The girls are all sleeping over at Valerie’s house.”
Rachel seemed to be mulling that over. “Well, it’s not exactly in keeping with our promise to your parents that you’d be home by midnight.”
A World Away Page 22
