Fatshionista

by Vanessa McKnight

  Thank God. “Thanks, Ryan. Before you get back to the loves of your life, can you go find Lizzie and make sure she doesn’t need help with anything? She’s getting everything set up while I search for Daniel.”

  He looked longingly at his model friends but then smiled and said, “Sure thing, boss. But you owe me a drink after this, you know, since you’re breaking up my family and all.” He winked as he headed out to find Lizzie.

  I checked with a few grips, who confirmed that Mrs. Singh had left in a taxi but had said she would be back before the show. Maybe she knew where he was and was going to bring him back.

  I tried him on my cell a few times, but it went straight to voicemail. I had a text from Marta that said great job, the show was sold out, and she couldn’t be prouder of me. Really? Now was the time she started showering me with praise? When everything was falling down around me and I still hadn’t figured out whether or not I wanted to take over this whole circus of a production company?

  Shove it to the back, Millie. One more thing to put on the backburner until I got this show behind me.

  Whether Daniel appeared or not, the show would go on. I let the sound crew know to keep a mike backstage, either for Daniel to say a few words at the end of the show or for Lizzie to make the announcement that the designer was unfortunately detained and all press requests could be routed through the production company. Lizzie had a great radio announcer voice, and I would be out in the audience, unable to get backstage to make the announcement.

  The show would go on, hopefully with Daniel. I would hate for him to miss this moment he had worked so hard for over something as silly as a blog post. Yeah, it was my blog post, but still. He was taking this thing way too seriously if this was what was keeping him away.

  The house was opening in about ten minutes. I grabbed my headset, clipboard, and knapsack and headed out into the audience. Normally I sat in the back of the house, handling any last-minute issues, but since there was a chance Daniel would be a no-show, I needed to be front and center so I could troubleshoot any issues over the headset with Lizzie backstage. She had a lot on her today, but I knew she was ready for it. She was a great right-hand woman.

  I settled into my front-row seat, behind the photographers who were setting up their equipment. I exchanged some hellos with some of the ones I knew, and they all had a few questions about the blog post. Had everyone read the damn thing? Maybe I should chuck all this for a career as a writer.

  I gave them all one last smile, then slipped on the headset and finished checking things off my list. This show was going to be fantastic, I just knew it. I only hoped Daniel would be there to see it.

  “Millie? You on?” Lizzie’s voice came crackling over the headset.

  “I’m here, Lizzie. Where are we with everything?”

  “We’re good to go. Models are finishing hair and makeup. Daniel’s assistant is back here to help with the fittings, and we have our crew handing out the outfit bags. Sound cues and light cues are good to go. We had one small issue with the fire marshal, who thought we were over capacity, but the head count proved we still had five left before we were going to be shut down.”

  “Shit, that’s cutting it close. Who did we have to kick out to keep it under the maximum?” I knew we had to kick someone out; there were too many people crowding into this place for me to believe that someone willingly gave up their seat.

  “It was a couple of journos from Italy. No major publications, and they’re hanging outside, hoping to rush in when the media coverage starts. I have security keeping an eye on them, and they know that anyone else who tries to come in is going to have be turned away.”

  I glanced around to see if the major players had made it in on time. Some editors and celebrities were notoriously late for fashion shows. Unfortunately, this time we wouldn’t be able to accommodate them. I was sure there would be some backlash about that, but I couldn’t risk the fire marshal shutting us down.

  “Great job, Lizzie. Any sign of Daniel or his mother?”

  “Well, I’ll be damned. They just walked in. Both of them, only this time she has no luggage.”

  I sighed with relief. At least he was here. We would deal with everything else after the show. We only had about fifteen minutes until we were set to begin—no time for me to go back there and reassure him or even find out what had happened. We had all assumed it was because of the blog post, but maybe it was something else. I tapped my pencil against the clipboard, fighting the urge to bolt backstage and find out what had happened.

  “Millie, Daniel’s here; he wants to talk to you. I’m giving him my headset; just a sec.”

  Immediately I was on alert. I knew he probably wanted to reassure me, and I knew there was no way he could have found out I was the one who wrote the post that was causing such a frenzy today, but I still had a stone sitting in my stomach as I waited for his voice to come over the headset.

  “Millie?”

  I couldn’t help but smile at the sound of his voice. Whether it was relief or excitement or butterflies, I didn’t know. But just the sound of his voice made me feel like everything was going to be okay.

  “I’m here, Daniel. Are you all right?”

  I could hear his soft chuckle and the smile in his voice as he said, “I am. So sorry to cause you any anxiety. I was thrown for a loop this morning when Scarlett called me to tell me about the blog post.”

  Damn that Scarlett.

  “But Mom came and found me and informed me that she did not fly eight thousand miles to watch my show without me.”

  There was a pause I wanted to fill with chatter, but I felt like he was searching for the right words to say something, so I stuffed mine down and just waited.

  “Millie, I’m so sorry if I upset you this morning. Obviously we have some things to discuss, but it was wrong of me to disappear. You’ve worked your ass off for me, and I couldn’t think about anyone but myself. Please accept my apology, Millie, and I would like to take you out to dinner after the show.”

  My heart skipped a beat at the idea of us on a date, a real date where he was straight, I was on fire for him, and we were no longer client and vendor.

  “I would love that, Daniel,” I whispered into the headset. “I have some things I need to tell you—”

  “It’s me again; Daniel had to go deal with a jacket that wasn’t hanging right. But you can go ahead and whisper sweet nothings into my ear if you’d like.” Lizzie’s laughter could be heard out in the house.

  “Ha, ha. Keep it down; we can hear you cackling all the way out here. Let me know when he’s ready; we can delay just a few minutes now that we know he’s here.”

  I glanced around me and was overwhelmed by the sheer number of press and people packed into the audience. I had produced many shows, but the sense of anticipation in the audience was at a level I had never felt before. I knew it had been the right thing to do to come clean about who he was before the show. It would all work out, I just knew it. And Lord willing, I would finally be able to get that man naked.

  “Lizzie, is Daniel done checking all the models? We have about five more minutes, and then I’m going to start calling the show.”

  “Yeah…” Her voice had a hint of anxiety that I didn’t want to hear this close to the start of the show.

  “What? What’s going on now?” I couldn’t handle one more thing blowing up today.

  “I don’t know what’s going on. Daniel and his mom were over here next to me, talking about her trip; they both seemed fine. He made a joke about how much luggage she had brought for a quick trip, then she said it was mostly gifts. I couldn’t make it all out, but he said something about her not knowing anyone here to bring gifts for, and she said they were not from her. Sounded like someone from home asked her to bring them here for someone else. I couldn’t make out the rest, but I did catch the name Amandeep—sounded like maybe it was a neighbor.”

  My heart dropped into my stomach. It couldn’t be. There was no way. Calm dow
n, Millie. Amandeep was a common name in Delhi. Deep breaths.

  “Um, did they say anything else?”

  “Uh…Millie, we might have a problem.”

  Oh no. This couldn’t be happening.

  “Millie, Daniel looks like he’s kind of yelling at his mom, and she’s just shaking her head. I can’t make out what they’re saying, but…”

  “But what, Lizzie? What?” At that point, I was frantic to find out if my worst fears were true.

  “I did hear your name, not from Daniel, but from his mom. Did she meet you today backstage?”

  I hung my head and stared sightlessly at my clipboard. “No. I didn’t meet her this morning. Lizzie, whatever you do, don’t let Daniel leave, and don’t give him that microphone.”

  “Millie? What’s going on? What are you not telling me?”

  Shit, I had to let her know. It would come out sooner or later, and maybe if she knew, she could keep him from making a scene. As it was, I was fighting the urge to slink out the back and make a run for it.

  “Remember I told you I spent a year living in Delhi when I was in college?”

  “Yeah. What does that have to do with Daniel, his show, and his mother?”

  “Amandeep Singh is my Aunty-ji. The one who’s family I lived with when I was there. I don’t know how it’s possible in a city of fourteen million, but I have a sinking feeling that somehow Daniel’s mom knows her. The gifts are for me. My aunty sent me an email the other week that she had a surprise coming for me, but I didn’t know it had anything to do with Daniel.”

  “Does she know you’re working with him?”

  “No, we don’t talk about work that much. She has no idea about designers, and she says it bores her. I guess this time it might have been wise for me to have told her about all this.”

  “Millie, I don’t understand. Why is Daniel back here pacing and looking like he wants to tear someone’s head off just because his mom brought you some presents from her neighbor?”

  The alarm on my phone went off, alerting me that it was time to start the show.

  “I’ll explain it all later, Lizzie. Just do as I said and don’t let Daniel anywhere near that stage until the end of the show. Cue lights, cue music, cue models.”

  I had to focus on the show and pray that Daniel could contain his rage until we were done. By now he had figured out that if I had been in Delhi for a year, I might just be able to speak Hindi. Which would mean that I had understood his conversation with his mother the other night and knew he wasn’t gay. And that I was the only person in the US who was privy to that information. So either I told the author of the blog or I was the author of the blog. He wasn’t stupid; I had told him I wanted to be a writer.

  Dear Lord, please just let the man show some common sense and put his work first and let us settle this after the show. I wanted to run; I was literally perched on the edge of my seat, my legs trembling with the need to bolt and not deal with the shitstorm waiting for me backstage.

  The house lights went down, the music started, and the models were walking.

  “Millie? I think we might have a problem…”

  That was all the warning I needed. I slammed the clipboard into the knapsack and was seconds from flying out of the chair when all of a sudden the audience gasped. I glanced up at the stage and saw Daniel storming down the runway, searching the audience for a face. My face.

  “You.”

  With one word, everything came to a halt.

  Oh shit. Please don’t let him point; please don’t let him point to me. Oh dear God. Oh shit. Oh no; he just pointed. He just pointed right at me. Why did I have to sit in the front? Just let the floor open up and swallow my chair, my clipboard, my headset, and me.

  The music stopped. The two models on the catwalk stood frozen in place, awkwardly wondering whether they should continue strutting their stuff or stand in slack-jawed amazement at the spectacle I was quickly becoming. The cameras that had just recently been pointed at the models turned on me. The flashes were going off so quickly it was like a strobe light.

  It was as if every decision I had made over the last two months had come back to haunt me in one flamingly public moment.

  And with that, the man whose name was emblazoned on the giant banner above him gave me one last cold look, dropped the microphone, and exited stage left. Fashion week had officially ground to a halt. And apparently I was to blame.

  CHAPTER 17

  Monkeys were fighting on the rooftop across from me. The sound of horns and the smell of food cooking on the street below surrounded me while I sat with my arms around my knees and my chin propped on them, taking in the beauty and chaos that was Delhi.

  The light breeze ruffled the baggy cotton of the pants on my salwar kameez. My hair was braided down my back, and at first glance I looked like any other Indian woman sitting on her roof in the dusky hour of sunset, watching the world go by.

  I was still in a daze from the last forty-eight hours. I was mentally and physically exhausted, but I couldn’t sleep. My head and my heart were both churning around and around—reliving every action, every decision, and everything that had brought me here to this moment.

  It always amazed me that in the middle of this chaotic, dusty, crowded place I could find peace. It was the only place that felt like home—somewhere I could let down my guard, lick my wounds, and figure out what to do with the mess I had made of my life.

  As the cameras had continued to take my picture after Daniel’s dramatic performance, I had calmly gotten up, left my headset with the sound of Lizzie’s voice hollering over it in the chair, picked up my bag, and walked toward the back of the house and out of the building.

  In a daze, I caught a cab back to my place, packed a bag, called the airline, booked a flight for four hours later, and stopped by to tell Avis where I was headed.

  I also told her to shut down the blog and asked her to mail my letter of resignation to Marta for me. I was quitting it all: the job, the blog…my life. I had no idea what I was going to do, but I knew the first thing that had to happen was healing my heart.

  It had broken in two when Daniel looked at me with that mix of hatred and sadness and then walked off the stage, leaving me to deal with the aftermath.

  I couldn’t sleep on the plane. I knew I angered the man next to me, who only wanted to talk about how excited he was to see India for the first time. I tried to smile and nod, but I was so numb I could barely interact with anyone.

  I made it through customs and dodged the dozen or so men who always wanted to help the lone foreign women with their bags. I smiled politely for as long as I could, but when the seventh one approached, I snapped. My Hindi poured from my mouth as I told him in no uncertain terms that I could handle my own damn bags and to leave me the hell alone.

  Granted, it was not my finest moment, but it did result in every other baggage walla steering clear of me.

  When I made it out into the terminal and saw my Aunty-ji waiting for me, her arms wide open and tears coming down her face, that was when I gave in and cried. I held her for what seemed like hours. All my Indian cousins and uncles were there, too. They were all there to support me. No one knew what had happened; they just knew I was coming home and that I was broken.

  Once I got it together, they led me into the parking deck and we all piled into the old Toyota Innova and headed home.

  In all the years I had lived in New York and all the years I had grown up in the South, I had never felt at home until I came to Delhi. Just sitting in the traffic and listening to everyone in the car try to talk to me at the same time lightened my spirit and took my mind off my own troubles for just a bit.

  I spent the day trying to sleep, but I couldn’t. I went to the market with my cousins and brought some things back to make buttered chicken. I spent the afternoon in the kitchen with my Aunty Amandeep and over chopping, kneading, and cooking I told her the whole sordid tale.

  She listened and nodded. I knew it would be a day or t
wo before she offered any advice. She was always very thoughtful and had to spend time praying and thinking over a problem before she offered her guidance. The American in me always struggled with that; I wanted help now, I wanted answers now. But the Indian that was inside of me (Aunty had long ago told me that in my past lives I had been Indian) had learned to be patient. And I had learned that after all that contemplation, her advice would fix whatever was ailing me.

  But until then, I had to live with my thoughts and the lump in the pit of my stomach. I had come up to the roof after dinner to be alone. I knew in a city this large and in a house with this many people, I was never really alone, but I didn’t want my bad mood affecting anyone else. I hadn’t come here to depress everyone in my adopted family, so I hauled my misery upstairs and was sharing it with the monkeys and the pigeons.