by Carmen Reid
Finally, right in the middle of dinner, she declared a terrible headache and Annie and Ed found themselves gulping down the remains of their meal so they could hurry her back to Elena’s.
‘Do you want me to stay with you, my darlin’?’ Annie asked with as much big-heartedness as she could muster at the apartment door.
Fortunately Elena was there to intervene. She put her arms around Lana and insisted that she would be in charge of her for the night.
‘I don’t think Lana wants to go out,’ Annie warned.
‘No. I stay in too,’ Elena replied, ‘but you two must go out. Lana and I look after each other. Single girls have to stick together. You two lovers go off and enjoy Ed’s last night in New York.’
‘Are you honestly single?’ Annie asked Elena, ‘have you not made up with—’
Elena shook her head vigorously and waved away any further questions about Sye.
‘But …’ Annie tried to protest.
‘Go out!’ Lana told her. ‘Or I’m going to feel even worse.’
As Annie stepped out of the building’s front door, her hand in Ed’s, the great burst of energy that was New York at night took hold of her.
Lights were bright; cars were honking, sirens still blaring up and down the nearest avenue. People were out and dressed up big even though this was Sunday, the very last gasp of the weekend.
‘How tired are you?’ she asked Ed.
‘Hardly tired at all,’ he replied, although when he turned to grin at her, his eye bags told an entirely different story.
‘Shall we go out? You know, just go out without a plan – like we used to. Well, no,’ she remembered, ‘we never used to because I’ve always had children, but do you remember, way back, going out and not knowing where you were going or how long you’d be out for? Can we do that? Just for once?’
‘Yes!’ Ed agreed with a grin, ‘that’s what we’ll do. Go have a New York adventure!’
First of all, they bar-hopped in the streets off Union Square. Sipping long, icy cocktails, they chatted but also could not help listening in on the loud and totally New York conversations going on all around them.
‘Poor Morty, I kept telling him to go to the dawcta’s. I’d say “go to the dawcta’s Morty, it might be serious.” But no, he just kept taking the tablets, hoping it would go away. And he’s dead now. Let that be a lesson to us all. If something’s not right, you’ve got to go to the dawcta’s.’
‘What kind of a wedding is this going to be, already? They’re not going to use Schwartz’s for the flowers? Why not? Everybody knows if you want the best flowers, you gotta go to Schwartz’s. And have you seen the size of her ring? Microscopic. Really. Barely half a carat. She’s throwing herself away.’
‘My date? My date was terrible. Truly. He had alopecia and eczema and, oh my God, he grew up in Queens!’
‘Yeah, well my therapist wants me to think about Freddie and how this is affecting him. But I’m thirty-seven, it’s time to think about me and ask: whaddo I want?’
Ed drained the last of his drink and leaned back in his chair: ‘He’s dead now, let that be a lesson to us all,’ he repeated, making Annie laugh.
‘What would you like to do tonight?’ he asked, ‘what’s your idea of New York big night out heaven? Do you want to go and queue for a nightclub? Walk across the Brooklyn Bridge?’
Before Annie could answer, a small, sharp-faced man in a pinstriped waistcoat and vibrant red, ruffled shirt appeared at their table.
‘You are a very beeeeeauwtiful couple,’ he said in a heavy accent Annie couldn’t place. ‘Famous? I think I know your faces from somewhere.’
Ed shook his head and laughed.
‘Yeeeeees. I think you both movieee starrrrs, but trying to keep it quiet, no?’
‘No,’ Annie assured him.
As if by magic a large bunch of roses was revealed.
‘Ah, roses for sale.’ Ed understood the flattery now.
‘It has been so long since we were offered roses for sale!’ Annie exclaimed.
‘I’ll take three red ones,’ Ed volunteered without hesitation.
‘Thirty dollar,’ the man said, without blinking.
‘Fifteen,’ Annie offered.
‘Twenty,’ the man agreed.
‘The romance,’ said Ed, extracting a $20 note from his pocket.
Annie took the three roses and unpeeled them from their tragic cellophane wrappers. ‘Thank you, you’re very sweet,’ she told Ed, holding the slightly droopy flowers up to her face.
‘So where would you like to go?’ he asked again.
‘What do you think about a ride round Central Park in one of those horse-drawn carriages? Do you think that’s just tooooo cheesy?’
‘Your wish, my darling, is my command,’ Ed promised. He led her out of the bar and into the street, where they hailed a cab for Central Park.
There was a queue at the rank for the horse-drawn cabs, but it didn’t take much longer than half an hour to get to the front.
In the back of the carriage, it was a little breezier and bumpier than Annie had expected. But she snuggled up against Ed for warmth and watched the glittering lights of the buildings on Fifth Avenue go by.
‘Is this as romantic as you were hoping?’ Ed asked.
‘Yes, definitely,’ she insisted. Although really, she hadn’t expected the horses to break quite so much wind. Then there was the whole business of the rubber sheet at the back of the horse which caught the droppings – noisily. That wasn’t quite so picturesque or romantic either.
But still, she snuggled up under Ed’s arm and told him: ‘This is beautiful. I think I’m falling in love.’
‘Well, that’s good, what with us being married and everything.’
‘I’m in love with you already, babes. But I’m falling in love with this city. Deep, deep, deeply in love.’
Chapter Twenty-One
The Bloomingdale’s secretary:
Black and white wrap dress (Diane von Furstenberg)
Purple suede heeled pumps (Cole Haan)
Diamond engagement ring (Tiffany’s)
Total est. cost: $2,750
‘She only has a few minutes.’
‘Hi, I’m Annie Valentine, I’m calling you from Perfect Dress …’
‘Hello, my name is Lana, I’m a representative with Perfect Dress …’
‘This is Elena Wisneski I wish to speak with you about your Perfect Dress order …’
Monday morning and the Perfect Dress team were back in business at the tiny apartment table, using every available phone.
Everyone who’d already placed a dress order needed to know when those dresses were arriving, and that there were going to be some changes in the fabric and the design for the initial consignment of dresses.
‘Just the first fifty dresses will be like this. We wanted to do something especially fresh and now for the first consignment, and you are going to love it, absolutely love it. I’ve worked in fashion for a long time and I am 100 per cent confident you will not be disappointed.’ Annie was trying to sound breezy with the prickly woman on the other end of her line.
Annie glanced over at Lana, who seemed to be doing fine on her phone call. Annie wanted Lana to stay busy because when Lana was busy she didn’t sob, which was definitely a positive.
They were in New York for another two weeks and Annie needed to make sure all was absolutely fine with Perfect Dress before she left.
Part of her was desperate to go home, because saying goodbye to Ed as he’d boarded the bus to the airport had felt very hard. He was going back to their lovely home and all the people she missed very much: Owen, Micky and Min, her sister, her mum.
‘No! You can’t cancel, please don’t cancel the order.’ Elena was clearly dealing with a tricky customer. Annie and Lana exchanged a worried glance. Quickly, Lana scribbled something down on a piece of paper and slid it over to Elena. ‘Pass her on to your style consultant!’
Elena looked at the pa
per and frowned.
Lana pointed at herself.
‘I’m just going to pass you on to our style consultant,’ Elena said obediently.
‘Hi,’ Lana took the phone with a burst of confidence, ‘would you like me to send you over some images? We have photos of our in-house model in the grey dress. I’ll get those over to you right now and I think you’re going to love it.’
When she hung up, both Elena and Annie stared at her in surprise.
‘That was good,’ Annie said, ‘but we don’t have any photos.’
‘No worries, we’ll get Elena to put the dress on and we’ll take some.’
‘No,’ Elena said, ‘you put on dress Lana, I take your picture. You’re going to look vonderful in this dress.’
This made them all laugh as ‘vonderrrrrful’ had always been Svetlana’s catchphrase.
Lana slipped into the sample dress, and then Annie couldn’t help styling her a little. She added high brown boots and a shiny blue belt, borrowed from Elena’s beautifully reorganized wardrobe. Then she brushed out Lana’s long dark hair, tied it into a ‘very now’ messy plait, and added a chic blue beret. A slick of berry-coloured lip gloss, and Annie pronounced Lana camera ready.
‘I’ll take the pictures,’ Annie said, getting out the camera she’d brought for this trip but had not used once since the very first day at the top of the Empire State, ‘but really, we should have some professional shots … Maybe you should speak to that very, very nice photographer you know, Elena …’
Elena gave her trademark ‘tscha’ and immediately turned back to her laptop.
‘Elena, you can’t break up with him just because he’s a photographer who happens to take pictures of beautiful girls!’
Quickly Elena picked up the phone to avoid any further conversation.
Annie sighed and redirected her attention to Lana. ‘C’mon my lovely model, let’s try and find a clear space for you to be photographed in. Stand beside the café table there, with the light behind you – perfect.’
Once Annie had pictures she was happy with, she sat down at her computer and began to download them. She emailed them across to Elena, and she also sent one to Ed.
‘What do you think of our model girl in our brand new dress? Hope you like. Call me when you get home, I want to hear how you coped with back to school and jet lag. A xx’
Elena was looking at her computer screen with intense concentration. A little furrow was biting deep between her eyebrows.
‘What is it?’ Annie asked.
Elena’s fingers pulled at her lip anxiously: ‘Email from Bloomingdale’s,’ she replied, ‘they cancel the whole order of dresses. Our biggest single order.’
The doorbell and Annie’s mobile began to ring at the same time, before they could even react to this disaster.
‘Connor!’ Annie exclaimed, seeing his name on the screen, ‘now’s not exactly the perfect moment.’
‘Oh yes it is, my princess. I have found the Gawain!’ Connor announced joyfully, ‘I am coming to New York to train with Gawain.’
‘Really? You’re coming here?’ Annie asked in total surprise, as Lana went to open the door. ‘When?’
‘Very soon,’ Connor replied.
‘It’s like Piccadilly bloomin’ circus. Lana’s here, Elena’s here, Ed’s been over – and now you!’
‘But I have found Gawain,’ Connor repeated.
‘Who?’
‘Gawain my green knight. I have found him. He’s living in Williamsburg and working in a SoHo gym.’
‘Who is this Gawain? Is he a boyfriend I don’t know about?’
‘No! I wish. I told you – he’s the personal trainer. The one and only. The body shaper. He’s not known as Mr Spanx for nothing.’
‘You are flying to New York for some personal training sessions?’
‘Yes. It’s cheaper over there anyway. Plus, I’m going to beg him to come back to London. Plus, have I told you, I’m going to be on Strictly!’
‘Strictly Come Dancing?’
‘Yes! Is that not the most career-revitalizing news you have heard in a long time? Connor is back, this time in dancing pants and very, very shiny shoes.’
‘Perfect,’ Annie had to admit, ‘but I thought you wanted to be an action hero?’
‘Still on the cards, doll,’ he assured her, ‘and talking of career-reviving moves … have you heard any—’
‘Not a peep,’ she interrupted him, ‘not a whisper, not one iota of news of any kind at all.’
‘Sit tight, baby. This too shall pass.’
‘I would love to see you in New York. I’m in total love with New York. I’m trying to work out how I can get my family to move over here.’
‘Really?’
‘Well, sort of … fantasy really.’
‘TV is very, very hard to get into over there. Especially if you’re carrying just a teeny little bit of excess …’
She burst out laughing: ‘You’re very sweet. But I think what you are trying to say is if you’re a thirty-something who’s not had a brow-lift and zeroed down to a lollipop stick, we can probably forget it.’
‘But you never know, baby, maybe they need a bit of reality TV. Maybe they need some Annie love. As soon as I get there, we will go out. Prepare to party. There are some people I met in a Florida sauna who I’m meeting up with again.’
‘Just when I thought I’d heard all the lurid gay sex tales I’d ever wanted to hear.’
‘I’ve told Gawain about you. He can do crisis management too, baby. Crisis management. That’s what you need.’
Annie glanced up to see a delivery man struggling in with the biggest pink and blue bouquet of loveliness she had ever seen. She saw Lana’s face turn to the delivery man with just a glimmer of hope.
Annie hoped it too.
Maybe this was Taylor apologizing. Maybe Annie could call off the hit man … well, not that she’d arranged one, but the thought, the thought was still well and truly there.
‘Delivery for Wis-net-ski?’ he stumbled over the name.
‘Oh yeah, she’s just here,’ Lana said brightly.
But Annie had seen her face fall.
‘So. Exciting, huh?’ Connor asked. ‘I’ll be there very, very soon. Not telling you when. Surprise!’
Before Annie could ask another question, he hung up. Infuriating!
‘Tscha!’ Elena exclaimed, ripping open the card, then tossing it to the floor, ‘Sye. So Annie, what we do about Bloomingdale’s?’
‘You’ll just have to go, Elena. In person. Looking totally ‘vonderrrrrrful’ and carrying the beautiful, purple dress with you. If anyone can get Mrs Bloomingdale to change her mind – it’s you!’
Somehow, Annie had made it sound easy.
So Elena had, as calmly as she could, phoned Bloomingdale’s and asked to speak to the head women’s fashion buyer, Mrs Westhoven.
Although the thought of actually speaking to Mrs Westhoven had made Elena’s heart hammer painfully, because Mrs Westhoven also happened to be Sye’s mother.
Elena had told Mrs Westhoven’s secretary that she would be coming to Bloomingdale’s today, and would Mrs Westhoven be available for a very quick meeting? After a long and agonizing pause, the secretary had come back on the line to tell Elena that Mrs Westhoven would be delighted to meet with her at 4p.m.
This was why Elena was now surfacing from the subway station exit and making her way nervously towards the Bloomingdale’s staff entrance.
There followed a long, nervous wait in a large, minimally furnished room, in which she busied herself nibbling at the skin around her nails.
Sye’s mother and the first Bloomingdale’s dress order had been crucial to the fledgling Perfect Dress business. The first release of dresses over Spring and Summer had sold well through Bloomingdale’s and new orders had been placed almost immediately. Although Elena and Sye had been a couple for almost six months, somehow the opportunity to meet Mrs Westhoven had never come about. She was too busy, Sye w
as too nervous, Elena was too scared … many reasons.
Had the dress order been cancelled because she’d broken off with Sye? Elena bit deep into the side of her nail at this thought.
She’d thought breaking off with Sye would bring her some sort of peace from the relentless jealousy, the constant worry about where he was, who he was with, whether he’d met someone he liked better than her. But, in fact, now that she’d told him it was over, she seemed to worry about him ten times more.
Yes, of course, when she and Sye had been together Elena had indulged in a little daydream of meeting his parents. But she’d never imagined it would happen like this, with Elena in a waiting room, expecting a formal summons any minute, and an argument about a cancelled dress order.
‘Miss Wisneski?’
The secretary was at the door.
‘She’ll see you now, but she only has a few minutes.’
Elena picked up the briefcase, into which she’d carefully folded the tissue-wrapped purple Perfect Dress, and followed her down the corridor.
She was shown into a light, airy room with a small but magnificent, 100 per cent Manhattan view. But all of Elena’s attention was focused on the woman sitting behind a tiny laptop at the otherwise empty desk.
Hello Elena,’ Mrs Westhoven said, standing up and leaning over to shake Elena’s hand, ‘it’s lovely, just lovely to meet you. I’ve been dying to meet you, to tell the truth.’
‘Hello, nice to meet you too,’ Elena said, smiling broadly and shaking hands.
Mrs Westhoven did not look nearly as ‘fashion’ as Elena had expected. But then Annie had warned her that buyers were like fashion editors – they almost always wore very expensive black clothes in classic shapes because they didn’t like to risk getting caught out. Wearing something too high fashion the nanosecond it was ‘over’ was career suicide.
Mrs Westhoven was a small, sinewy lady in an expensive-looking navy blue jersey dress. Maybe Gucci, Elena guessed, taking in the golden touches. She had a highly blonde bob and eyes – almost exactly like Sye’s – that looked piercingly acute.
‘Sit down, tell me all your woes,’ she began in a crisp, cultivated New York accent.
