Blood Is the New Black

by Valerie Stivers

  “Gay Casablanca,” I blurt, hoping he won’t be offended.

  He’s not. “Mmmm. Bogart. I love it. And what’s yours?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Recycle-iste? Almost all my clothes are repurposed from something else.”

  “How about Lillian Hall?”

  “Lillian’s got the best style. She always looks pulled-together, but also kind of dangerous. Victorian editrix.”

  Rico calls for another round of drinks because, “Marc Jacobs would have wanted it that way.”

  Once we’re working on our second round, Rico becomes even more confidential.

  “Did you tell her, honey, about the other mysterious violent incident to happen at Tasty this year?”

  “Honey” in this case means James, who stares at him curiously. “What incident?”

  “Hello!” Rico cries. “You were there! The casting call gone awry?”

  James nods, explaining, “One of the models hurt herself at a casting call.”

  Rico and I both wait for further detail but none is forthcoming.

  “Straight men are the worst storytellers,” Rico sighs. “His boss was doing a casting call, so, as usual, there are about fifteen or twenty gorgeously androgynous young women clustered around Art and Photo. The casting was for a bathing-suit story, the girls were being Polaroided in their underwear, and there was a lot of confusion as people were getting dressed and undressed. The girls were using an empty office to change. And between one thing and another no one saw what happened.”

  “What happened?” I can’t help it. I’m hooked.

  “We still don’t know!” Rico says salaciously. “But when the elevator doors opened at A Man’s World, Roger Whiteman, ‘The Elegant Gentleman,’ was greeted by the sight of a disoriented teenaged model wearing only Victoria’s Secret ‘Pink’ and a sheath of bright red blood. Roger Whiteman is gay and about seven hundred years old, so you can imagine how shocking it was for him.”

  “What?” I can’t shake the sense that Rico is putting me on. “What happened?”

  “All we know is that the security camera in the elevator and the one in Tasty reception show the same thing. The girl pulled her Carrie move before she left the floor. She claimed she didn’t remember a thing.”

  “What was the source of the bleeding?” I ask.

  “It was horrible, darling, tiny incisions all over her arms and torso. A few of them quite deep. No one knows what caused them.”

  “And what did the police say?”

  “You know how corporations just hate photographs of the police storming into their headquarters. It was all handled in-house. And I think it was decided that she’d done it herself to get attention.”

  “She was a confused girl,” James says. “She probably saw some brutality-chic photos and thought she’d found a creative way to get herself in the game. The difference between a fashion spread and a trailer for Saw III is becoming less and less obvious. Some people say it’s Lillian’s influence.”

  “But then why go get on the elevator in your underwear, before you’ve had your picture taken?” Rico asks.

  “I don’t know about the details.” James turns to me. “Take my word for it. There’s nothing to worry about.”

  “Nothing to worry about as long as you’re not in the fashion business,” Rico adds. “There was that other lurid murder this spring where two girls died in the Jean Saint-Pierre atelier. You remember?”

  I shrug apologetically.

  “I guess you wouldn’t have heard about it out in the provinces. They hushed it up pretty well.”

  “Do you think you should be engaging in this kind of distasteful speculation?” James interrupts. “Kate’s new in the office. Does she need to hear all the gory details?”

  “Yes,” I say.

  “Yes!” Rico says.

  James shakes his head and busies himself stirring his drink.

  “Jean Saint-Pierre has a simply breathtaking atelier in the Fashion District in one of those former warehouse buildings with huge windows, pressed tin ceilings, and wooden floors. This spring he decided to forgo a show in favor of having a one-day open house. I don’t approve, but more and more designers are doing it that way.

  “Anyway, it was a huge success. Fashion came out in force. And everyone agreed that the collection returned the focus to the body but without giving up the volumizing elements that have made Jean Saint-Pierre so re-relevant with the past few collections.”

  “Lexa was wearing Jean Saint-Pierre on your first day of work yesterday,” James says. “That black top.”

  I look at him, surprised that he noticed.

  “I have a good visual memory,” he disclaims.

  “Oh, sweetie,” Rico says laughing, “That’s what they all say.”

  “Is that what it’s called these days?” I ask.

  James comfortably tells us to go to hell. “Finish the story for Kate,” he prompts.

  “Two people excused themselves for a smoke in the stairwell and never came back. No one noticed. They weren’t big names. One was a buyer for a Midwestern department chain. Another girl was from Yarn Daily and was lucky to have been on the list. A seamstress found them the next day, stuffed behind some rolls of crepe de chine. Their throats had been cut and the buyer was missing her Birkin bag.”

  “That’s…grisly. I can’t believe it. What did the police say?”

  “Chiqua, the police only investigate things on TV. In the real world they say ‘Huh?’ scratch their asses, and move on to the next problem. I think they got the seamstress deported.”

  THE DING of the elevator door opening into Victoria’s apartment doesn’t seem so muted when I get home at one A.M. I hope I’m not waking her up.

  I jimmy my shoes off and sneak into the living room, wishing there was someone to tell about my first evening out in New York City. The flat-screen, however, is once again hidden behind the Caspar David Friedrich painting and there are no signs of life. My aunt may not even be home. Walking past the door to the master bedroom confirms my suspicion. The door is open, the spot-lighting illuminates the scary succubus painting hanging over the bed, but its red velvet cover—matching the one in my room—is unrumpled.

  Victoria stays out awfully late for a fifty-year-old woman.

  Feeling a little less proud of my own “wild” evening, I curl up in bed with a notebook and a pen and work on that list of stories I might want to write that Lauren asked me to prepare until I fall asleep.

  6

  Hot, Young Blood

  IF A PERSON sets her mind to it, she can open and log contest entries pretty fast.

  I show up early the morning after drinks with James and Rico and work at a breakneck pace. Rachel and Nin periodically help out, and by noon the empty mail buckets are stacked up in the hallway outside our door and I have a densely populated Excel spreadsheet in hand. We’re done.

  “Let’s go give this to Lexa,” I suggest to Nin, who is at her desk. Rachel is on some errand related to her blog. I still haven’t summoned the courage to ask her what the blog is about or what the URL is.

  “We’re away from our posts, I see,” Lexa says when Nin and I knock on her open door.

  Annabel’s head pops up; she looks outraged. The girl is on her hands and knees cleaning out the space under Lexa’s credenza while trying not to be run over by her chair.

  “I’m sorry I haven’t been able to watch them better today,” she apologizes.

  “We just came to let you know that we’re done. And we brought you this.” I hand over the spreadsheet.

  Lexa peers at it through her glasses. “Well done,” she says grudgingly. “We’ll schedule a meeting…at a convenient time…” she trails off and starts snapping her fingers. Annabel leaps to her feet and races out of the office, returning in a flash with Lexa’s appointment book.

  “Tomorrow you’re judging the accessory awards all afternoon,” she says, looking worried.

  Lexa keeps snapping.

  “You could
do it exactly at noon?” Annabel volunteers.

  “Get Art and Photo in the meeting. And book the conference room,” Lexa commands. Her squinty green eyes pass over Nin and me where we remain trembling on her threshold. “As a reward,” she tells us, “interns can come to the meeting.”

  “Lexa is great about mentoring.” My eyes meet Annabel’s wide, gray ones. She’s given no hint of it in her tone, but just the same I detect sarcasm.

  When we’ve left Lexa’s office, I tell Nin I’m heading for the ladies’ room, but instead I approach Lillian’s area. With Rico’s horrible stories percolating in my brain, I want—no, need—to revisit the scene of the crime.

  The supply closet door is locked.

  In Bambi’s chair sits a delicate-looking girl with a tiny nose ring. She introduces herself as Sari. Since it’s very unlikely anyone has told Sari about the events of yesterday, I ask her if she has a key for the supply closet. She doesn’t, but helpfully suggests that there might be one in Lillian’s office.

  “Can you come back later?” she asks. “She’s not in and I shouldn’t go in there. It’s my first day and I barely had a chance to meet Lillian.”

  Even better.

  “Oh!” I beam at her. “Lillian’s really nice! I’ll just go in and get it myself. She won’t mind!”

  I sidle into Lillian’s huge corner office, disappointed to see that even here the blinds are drawn tightly shut. The room is nice, though. Lillian has Oriental rugs and instead of a desk, she uses an antique hardwood table. Interestingly, a fresh beet juice already sits on its polished surface. I wonder where it came from, since Sari’s too inexperienced to know her boss’s favorite beverage. A brief perusal of the desk’s spick-and-span surface doesn’t turn up any keys. Nor are there any keys on a heavy black glass conference table stacked with fashion books. On the wall facing the table is a bulletin board thick with photos of Lillian at various events—Lillian receiving awards, Lillian in period costume, press clippings with Lillian’s name highlighted. Lexa has something similar in her office, but less populated. There are no keys tacked to the bulletin board. A big crate takes up one corner. I walk over to it, surprised to discover that it smells like earth. I am both fascinated and repelled by the dank, musty smell. What the hell could be in that?

  “Can I help you?” a flat voice asks.

  Lillian Hall, the woman Herself, has silently materialized right behind me.

  For a second I’m too shocked to do more than gawk down at her. A tiny mink stole—complete with the head and feet—curls around her drooping marble-white shoulders. She’s wearing huge ruby earrings in addition to the rings and a corset-looking top. Very S&M princess on Zoloft. It is only now that I realize I’m much taller than she is.

  “What are you doing in my office?” she sighs, as if the answer can be of no interest to her.

  I’ve never been a particularly apt liar, but inspiration strikes. “I wanted to come thank you in person for arranging this internship for me.”

  “Sit down,” she intones.

  I sink into one of the tall-backed chairs as if shoved.

  Lillian walks over to the door and looks out, toward Sari.

  “You’re fired,” she says. “I won’t have an assistant allowing people into my office when I’m not here.”

  Sari starts crying.

  I try to get up but have no strength. “It’s my fault, Lillian,” I blurt. “I told her it was okay.” Oh my God. First the beanbag, and now this. I am a menace.

  Lillian shuts her door. “She shouldn’t have listened to you, cherie.”

  “I told her you wouldn’t mind,” I say. “I said you were nice.”

  Her face remains blank but it looks like the corner of her mouth almost twitches upward. “Then you lied.” She looks marginally more animated. “You are your mother’s daughter. Not many interns would dare to come into my office.”

  She knew Eva? I want to know when and how, but tell myself this isn’t the moment to ask. “Don’t fire Sari for my mistake,” I plead.

  Lillian sighs heavily. “Don’t bore me,” she slurs. “I’m so sick of being bored.”

  Moving as if she’s floating—how does she do that?—she approaches me and pulls up a seat. For a few long minutes she just stares. I’m reminded of Rico’s warning not to share her elevator. Could it really be dangerous to be alone with her?

  She edges her chair a little closer to mine. It’s amazing how bloodlessly pale she is. Round blue eyes. Heart-shaped face. She’s wearing a strange, strong, swampy-smelling perfume. At least I hope it’s perfume.

  She’s so close that her bare knees touch mine. I’m pressed all the way back in the chair. What does she want with me?

  “You’re so fresh and young,” she sighs. “So alive. I can feel the life in you. All that hot, young blood pulsing through those tender little veins.”

  I wonder, for a crazy second, if she’s going to kiss me—her perfect, poreless face is so near mine and the strange smell has intensified. It might be her breath. Is Lillian a lesbian? Her lips part. I catch a glimpse of the sharp, white teeth I’d noticed before, and shiver.

  The moment passes.

  She gets up and retrieves her beet juice. “How old do you think I am?”

  A Victoria-rule comes in handy: Take your honest estimate of a person’s age; double the number of the decade and then subtract it from the honest estimate, to achieve a polite underestimate. So if you think a woman is twenty-nine, you double the decade to get four; subtract four from twenty-nine and tell her you think she’s twenty-five. If a woman looks sixty-five to you, say she looks fifty-three. And so on. It’s like the frat-boy equation that the youngest girl a guy can respectably date is “half your age plus seven.”

  “You look twenty-nine,” I tell Lillian, cutting down my estimate of about thirty-five. I’d think she should be even older than that, but her skin is way too smooth. “But I don’t think you can be, because you’re the editor-in-chief.”

  This is the right thing to say. Her mouth definitely turns upward this time.

  “I feel eight hundred and fifty years old. It doesn’t show?”

  “Not at all,” I say. And then, with sincerity, because this is true: “You don’t look old in any way. You could be a super-model.”

  “As the years go by, I find myself having to spend more and more time in spas. Not to keep my looks, but to remain fresh and, how shall I say, alluring.”

  “You can do acupuncture, spa treatments,” I tell her. “Though from what I’ve read, getting enough vitamins makes a huge difference in a person’s energy levels.”

  She goggles like I’ve lost my mind, then bursts into rusty-sounding laughter.

  “I could write down the names of a couple of good multivitamins for you—”

  “That won’t be necessary. Thank you. I have a vitamin-rich diet. Though I don’t get to eat as much as I would like.”

  “Who does?” I sympathize.

  “You really have no idea!” She laughs again. The tiny hairs on the back of my neck known colloquially as hackles flutter. There’s something very weird about this woman. My gut is telling me to get out of here, and fast, but some other, perverse part of me feels sorry for her. She seems lonely, a feeling I understand these days. Maybe all these stories about how scary she is are a self-fulfilling prophecy.

  “Can I help you out at all?” I ask. “Now that you’ve fired Sari, would you like me to answer your phone until you find a new assistant?” The words are out of my mouth before I can think better of it.

  She’s surprised by the offer, I can tell, but after thinking for a moment, she likes it. “Yes,” she says slowly. “That has…possibilities. Lexa will be miffed that I’m stealing you away from her, but she’ll survive,” she says, and smirks. “You can fill in until HR sends another temp over. And from now on you will cover for my assistant during her lunch break.”

  “I’m honored.” I’m horrified. What have I gotten myself into?

  I’m
on my feet and bolting for the door when she calls after me, “Just one thing, Kate. Stay away from that supply closet.”

  IT’S JUST my luck that Lexa is waiting for me in the hallway when I finally get back to my desk an hour later, after covering Lillian’s phone until a temp arrived to replace Sari. My heart sinks when I see my boss’s blond pouf.

  “Hi, Lexa!” I try cheerfulness. “Have you come to see the finished work?” I point at the four towering stacks of Tasty Girl applications, in folders and sorted by state.

  She sinks her claw into my upper arm. “Into my office. Now.”

  She half-drags me down the corridor, moving so fast it’s hard for me to keep up. Those fashionably emaciated limbs pack incredible strength.

  She shoves me in front of her and I stumble in the darkness, tangling briefly with her guest chair before catching my balance. This is crazy. I’ve never heard of a job in the modern world involving physical abuse at the hands of one’s employer. Except for celebrity assistants and Naomi Campbell’s maids.

  Lexa clicks on the lights.

  I draw myself up, trying to regain some dignity.

  “What are you bloody well trying to accomplish?” Lexa shrieks. “What were you doing in Lillian’s office?”

  She looks unhinged.

  “Nothing, I—”

  “I warned you to stay away from her. She’ll blame me! You don’t have a sodding clue….”

  “She wasn’t mad, Lexa. I swear, it’s okay.”

  I remember Sari’s fate and hope that this is true.

  Lexa stops short. “She wasn’t mad? How about displeased?” she asks.

  “At first maybe a little. But she asked me to answer her phone until Human Resources could send over a temp assistant. That’s why I’ve been away from my desk for so long. I’m sorry.” My explanation tumbles over itself.

  “You mad cow. I’m under a lot of pressure, Kate. New country. New publicists. New paparazzi. Those American spelling rules. A person in my position has to do everything right. I can’t afford to make mistakes. I’ve only been mentioned in the gossip columns three times since I crossed the pond. Do you know what that means?”