Being Audrey Hepburn

by Mitchell Kriegman

  “Well,” she said after a moment that seemed to last forever, “we would like to provide you with a few samples of our new line of handbags.” With a finger snap, she signaled the store manager waiting attentively in the background, and instantly an army of store clerks brought out six shopping bags filled with the very latest D&G handbags.

  As I stood there speechless, everyone was waiting for me to say something. Tabitha gave me a little kick, and I blinked.

  “I know a critic of your integrity may not accept gifts,” the woman continued, undaunted, as if she were presenting to a CEO of some important organization, “so naturally we will be glad to have them picked up after you have had a chance to peruse them.”

  “Why, thank you,” I managed to stutter out. She seemed greatly relieved that I had broken my silence.

  “That’s absolutely wonderful,” she said and held out a little black and gold D&G card. “If you have any questions or ever feel as if you might like to keep any of the bags, please don’t hesitate to call on me. Can we help you out to your car?”

  As the army of store clerks swept us and our loot out of the store, I noticed the woman in the leopard stilettos glancing back at her store manager, who nodded emphatically as she hung up the phone. It seemed an odd thing at that moment. I don’t know why, but I wondered who they could be calling. We spun through the revolving doors, having no idea what was waiting for us outside.

  For maybe two seconds, it felt as if we were in the middle of a TMZ video. Ten or more burly leather-jacketed men with cameras poured out of cars as they skidded to the curb, shouting and snapping pictures of us like sharks devouring guppies. At first, I felt excited that everyone was making such a fuss, but that changed quickly. As the mob of paparazzi attacked, we found ourselves in the equivalent of a slow-motion car wreck.

  “Chill out. Guys, chill out,” Tabitha said calmly. So many more of them were taking pictures of her. I guessed she was used to it. I wondered where Mocha was.

  “Hey, Tabitha, how have you been?” one shouted as if he actually knew her.

  “Sing for us, Tabitha,” another said.

  “Give me a break,” she said.

  A crowd of tourists gathered and through the flashes of light I saw Chase with a crew standing outside Harry Winston, across the street. Would he swoop down on us, too? After all, he was one of them. As I saw Mocha aggressively working his way through the thick crowd, I held one of the D&G bags in front of my face.

  “Hey, Tabby, who’s your new girlfriend?” one guy asked, and I wondered what that meant. A camera flash went off almost point-blank in my eyes, and I began to panic.

  “Back off!” I heard her say. I worried Tabitha would slug someone in a drunken rage. We were jostled, mauled, and surrounded. There was no way out. Being photographed seemed beside the point. It flew through my mind that the stiletto-heeled marketing director had contrived this entire sequence to get these photographs, regardless of whether I reviewed her bags or not.

  “We’re just doing our job, Miss Eden,” someone shouted. In the darkening light, the flashes were dizzying, like a strobe, and I was losing my balance.

  As one of the beefiest of photographers walked right up to me with his camera poised to flash, I grabbed one of the D&G bags to shield my eyes. He gripped my arm, pulled the bag away, and shoved his camera up to my face. The flash stunned me, and I stumbled. I saw the sidewalk before I crashed.

  But nothing happened.

  When I opened my eyes, I found myself looking at Chase. He was holding me up. In the chaos, I hadn’t even seen him slip in. He unceremoniously set me on my feet, as one of his crew held a giant white card, those big sheets of foam board they carry for video shoots, to protect us and give us room to recover.

  The paparazzo tried to squeeze around, but Mocha had finally broken through and was standing guard. He seemed ready to throw a punch. Chase stepped in front of Tabitha and me as they removed the card.

  “Dude, you’re ruining the shot,” one of the men said.

  “This is my interview,” Chase said, and though he was a pipsqueak compared to the hefty photographers, he didn’t seem like he was bluffing.

  “Who the hell are you?” another photographer asked as Mocha started shooing away the rest of them.

  “Love you, Tabitha,” the beefy guy said as he left. As if. Chase and his crew began gathering their gear.

  “Thanks, Chase,” I said, embarrassed, trying to pull myself together.

  “I’ve seen you before,” Tabitha asked suspiciously.

  “I’m a fashion shooter for Lux.” Chase gave me a conspiratorial wink. “I just wanted to make sure you guys were all right. I’ve got to get back to a shoot across the street.”

  His phone buzzed.

  “Shit. Here now?” He looked up, and I saw the stunned expression on his face and what he was looking at—Dahlia Rothenberg and her entourage approaching.

  Dahlia wore a tight beige skirt with towering heels and a see-through blouse under a YSL boyfriend jacket—it screamed money, power broker, and sex in the same breath. There was a makeup person trying to catch up behind her. As she made long, elegant strides our way, I could see the curl of her wicked smile. I wanted to run.

  “Lisbeth, nice to see you,” she said, swooping in, her eyes all daggers. “Slumming with our little Tabby?”

  Chase leapt to make amends. “My apologies, Miss Rothenberg. We had just set up for you when we saw…” But Dahlia walked right past him.

  “It’s nice to see you’re finally getting a touch of class, Tabby, trying to buy something with taste instead of wearing those slutsuits you usually wear.” Mysteriously silent, Tabitha seemed easily intimidated by Dahlia. Then again, Dahlia rendered everyone speechless, and you could see the satisfaction on her face. We had just been through this crazy situation, yet she managed to make us feel apologetic. For reasons unclear to me, I felt uncharacteristically obligated to stand up for all of us.

  I took a deep breath and did my best to channel Holly Golightly at her most flamboyant. “I’m so sorry, Dahlia,” I began. “We’ve just had the most ghastly time at Dolce and Gabbana, not a bit ‘dolce,’ I’m afraid.” Then, dipping into Holly Golightly’s goofy French, “The entire mise-en-scène was très fou, but nothing more fou than this little paparazzi disaster. Please accept our apologies for the delay.”

  Dahlia was stunned. Either she was aghast at my backbone, offended by my mangled French, or thought I was plain crazy. But who cares? When you have nothing to lose, you have everything to gain, I guess. After all, I was just a Jersey girl. I recognized that our little Fifth Avenue confrontation was essentially the same trash talk that went down in the girls’ locker room at Montclair High, only we were wearing better clothes.

  Dahlia took the longest time glaring at me, hoping I’d sizzle to vapor, I suppose. If I hadn’t just rambled on in the silliest way, I assume, I would have. But on this strangest of days, I had something I don’t think I’ve ever had before—audacity. Why the effin’ not? I thought. I wanted to make the sign of the horns and dance around her sorry ass like some football player who’s made it to the end zone.

  “Well, thank you, Lisbeth,” she said finally, regaining her composure. “Chase, come along. I only have a few moments now, or we’ll have to reschedule.” She spun around and walked back toward Harry Winston, awkwardly waiting to cross the street with Chase following obediently behind her.

  Tabitha seemed dazed as we piled into the limo and headed “home” to East Seventy-seventh Street. We sunk back into the black leather seats, and she looked at me with a sense of admiration, it seemed. I felt for a moment like the older sister I never had. As Mocha pulled up to the Mark, I stopped worrying about my fake address and told him to let me off by the lobby. He deposited the Dolce & Gabbana handbags inside with the young hotel doorman’s help. Tabitha hardly noticed me leave—she was pretty hung over anyway.

  There I sat in the middle of the Mark Hotel lobby with all those bags and not a clu
e where I should go or what I should do. I felt only disgust for the D&G marketing woman and these handbags that were likely worth thousands of dollars. I considered hocking them on eBay. I remembered the little black and gold card in my purse, and the tiniest thought occurred to me. I rose, and the attentive doorman sprinted over immediately.

  “Can I be of service?” he asked.

  “Would you retrieve an item I checked?” I asked, handing him the ticket from the concierge. “And also if you wouldn’t mind, please call the number on this card and have them collect these bags? I’d be so grateful.”

  “Certainly,” he said.

  I smiled in thanks and he tipped his hat.

  I stepped through the doors onto the street with my tiny white La Perla bag and my clothing bag and headed home feeling like a million dollars.

  36

  Once in the eleventh grade, I attended an art opening at my high school in South End Montclair. They hung paintings and drawings all the way up to the ceiling in the main entranceway of the school for a night. I think they even served juice and Coke. The kids who were good at drawing were buzzing with self-importance. Some of them were pretty talented. This one guy made these dot paintings that were almost like optical illusions, sort of ethereal visions of heaven that he called Change, Loss, Memory and AIDs. Then there was this girl who specialized in photographs of roadkill, mostly deer and rabbits. Sometimes she’d frame the actual flattened creature next to the photograph. I’m not sure what that statement was supposed to mean, but it started smelling pretty funky after a while. That’s what I used to consider an art opening.

  Wrong.

  Actually, I had never really been to an art opening before. Think fashion, celebs, glamour—a “Schnabel opening,” at the Mary Boone Gallery in Chelsea, was more like a Hollywood premiere.

  El Schnabel, as ZK referred to him, would be the larger-than-life artist Julian Schnabel, as I discovered in a Guest of a Guest post. The bearded, barrel-chested, sixty-something art provocateur was famous for painting with broken pottery on giant canvases and making art-savvy movies that never quite made it to the Clearview Clairidge Cinema near me. Fashion-wise, he attended art openings in his jammies and slippers, wearing yellow-tinted sunglasses, looking like a homeless bum out squandering his lottery winnings. He was also ZK’s godfather.

  ZK effortlessly swept us through the throngs standing outside, who stared at us like deer in the headlights of an onrushing sixteen-wheeler of boho-chic wealth and status. Art openings were challenging for even the most dedicated celebrity stalkers because the superstar art attendees tended to be better disguised and more clandestine. We brushed past the Olsen twins, those trench-coated spies from the Kingdom of Anorexia.

  Holding on to ZK’s arm, I felt content to be completely swept up in his graceful motion as he expertly navigated the gallery overflowing with guests.

  Inside, boldfaced names were sprinkled generously throughout the crushing crowd. My heart skipped as I brushed past James Franco wearing a knitted hipster beanie and holding a plastic cup of white wine. Even Courtney Love struggled to get to the main gallery. She wore a strapless white Vivienne Westwood dress that she had crammed herself into, looking like she would spontaneously combust, and railed at a security guard for not giving her better access.

  I noticed that ZK seemed to make eye contact with a few key individuals as we moved forward. Some seemed to be security and some didn’t, but his eye contact miraculously parted the waves of people, enabling us to smoothly enter the very center of the gallery without pausing for a second. He had so much grace and bearing, everyone seemed to make way for him.

  We came upon a thin old guy in bleached-white skinny pants and a white shirt that matched his shock of white hair. He seemed familiar, but I couldn’t place him at first. ZK offered a quick bow, and the man smiled approvingly, then nodded hello to me before we plunged farther into the exclusive back room.

  “What an interesting-looking man,” I said. “He looks like an old version of that Talking Heads guy,” I whispered in ZK’s ear.

  “That is the Talking Heads guy,” ZK chuckled.

  “Oh,” I said, feeling instantly embarrassed.

  How would I keep up with ZK? Despite Tabitha’s wealth and fabulous music career, she wasn’t particularly sophisticated. ZK, on the other hand, was utterly well educated and connected. He was a consummate player, moving in and out of every strata of high society. I simply didn’t have the background to play on his level.

  My phone buzzed, and I took a quick glimpse to see who it was. Mom. I ignored it, turned off the phone, and buried it in my purse.

  We reached the room within the room within the gallery. This space wasn’t actually part of the show. The walls were covered with huge canvasses and works of art of all kinds. It was so small it almost felt like someone’s office. It was the most exclusive place you could be in that moment. ZK and I were standing close enough to kiss. I took time to breathe him in, having dreamed of being this close to him ever since I saw him outside the Met, which now seemed like a lifetime ago. He smelled delicious, like apples and wine.

  “You know, you’re bewildering,” he said with that self-amused expression of his. “In some ways, you seem far older than your years, and in other ways, you seem as if you’ve been in hiding your whole life.”

  “Can’t I be both?” I asked.

  He grinned and took my chin in his hand, lifting my head until I was looking into his eyes. I trembled, wondering if he would kiss me right there in front of everyone and what I would do if he did. A shrill cackle broke our moment, rising above all the chatter in the room. It was immediately recognizable as the icy laugh of Dahlia Rothenberg.

  She wore a Hervé Léger bandage dress so sleek and minimal that it was hard to call it a dress. What does it feel like to be almost naked among so many people? Her admirers didn’t mind. Men flocked around her as she talked, the center of attention. I hoped to duck her scrutiny, but within seconds her eyebrows arched as she observed ZK and me standing arm in arm. I felt myself shrinking from her penetrating glare.

  “Mr. Northcott!” someone yelled from across the room, mercifully diverting us. An attractive young man with an open face, ringed by Renaissance curls of brown hair, waved us over. I gladly followed ZK away from Dahlia’s intense stare. The two men greeted each other with a big hug.

  “Good to see you, Mr. Schnabel,” ZK said. This was odd. Where was El Schnabel, the PJ-wearing master painter? This Mr. Schnabel was well dressed and elegant and too young to be a godfather. His eyes lit up as he saw me.

  “And this must be the lovely Lisbeth Dulac,” he said. “ZK has told me so much about you.” I couldn’t help feeling a bit confused as he bent down for a hand kiss, barely suppressing a schoolboy giggle. ZK smiled broadly, hardly able to hold back his laughter.

  “Do tell,” I said, withdrawing my hand. “What would you two find so humorous?”

  “Maybe you were expecting someone older and perhaps wider?” the young man with the Roman curls asked, self-amused. I hesitantly nodded agreement.

  “That would be my father,” he said gleefully. “I guess it would have gone over better if I had worn my PJs?”

  “Sorry Lisbeth,” ZK said. “It’s an old joke of ours.”

  “Allow me to introduce myself,” the man said with a flourish. “Vito Schnabel. ZK and I have been best friends since Saint Ann’s in Brooklyn … playing hooky, getting high, and sneaking into a thousand crazy parties and openings, and … what can I say, making silly jokes.”

  “Of course,” I said and managed to smile.

  “Will you forgive us?” ZK said, putting his arm snuggly around me in a way that felt delicious.

  “So are you a fan of my father’s work or is ZK just showing you off?” Vito asked, but then stopped abruptly and elbowed ZK.

  “Um, Dahlia is … here.”

  She was already upon us, looking as if she was about to crush the little plastic wine cup in her hand.

 
; “Dahlia, it’s … so good to see you,” ZK began, dropping his arm from my waist. But Dahlia ignored him and turned her laser focus on me.

  “You’ve been such a bad little mouse,” she said in a quiet voice that only I could hear. I could see in her eyes that she hadn’t forgiven me from the day before at Dolce & Gabbana. I struggled to sustain my poise. She leaned closer.

  “Social climbing by nicking my boy?”

  She waited for a response, but I didn’t have one.

  “No clever quip this time? I’m not surprised. You’re out of your league,” she said and briefly glanced back at ZK. “He’ll be bored and unfaithful by the end of the evening.”

  She turned to leave, and ZK grabbed her arm.

  “Dahlia, be reasonable,” he said.

  “ZK, I am always prepared to be reasonable when the situation demands,” she answered, then threw her cup of red wine across his shirt and casually walked away.

  “Oops,” she said over her shoulder, smiling.

  37

  Swooping in, Vito whisked me away before I could say anything to ZK, who had scurried after Dahlia.

  “There’s something I have to show you,” he said. I tried to track ZK as Vito escorted me across the room. “Have you seen Terence Koh’s white cock? It’s quite famous.”

  “Pardon, I’m sorry, what did you say?”

  He had walked me across the room. “Look.”

  Gazing up, I saw mounted high on the brick wall the shape of a giant rooster outlined in neon tubing. I turned to catch a glance of ZK, but he was gone.

  “Watch, it lights up!” he said, flipping a switch, and the rooster hummed, flickered, and flashed on, casting a white glow down on us. The joke was less than stellar even under the best of circumstances. To his credit, Vito seemed to know it was lame, but was intent on distracting me.

  Vito’s cell phone buzzed. As he answered, I knew it was ZK.

  “Yes, no problem,” Vito said. “Yes, she’s fine.” He closed his phone.