Dolly All the Time(26)
“Boston Common,” Stewart says.
“Yes, Boston Common,” I say, relieved. Of course. That’s over by him.
“You two,” she says. “Bikes are forbidden on the paths in Boston Common.”
“We found that out the hard way,” I say, nudging Stewart with my elbow like we’re frat brothers. This was actually the hardest way to find that out. “We got tickets because of it. Not on the same day. Different days. Stewart got two. But we went back.” I do not have the power to stop. “With bikes.”
“We bike in town now,” Stewart says, and asks about their summer plans.
I need a minute. Despite my absolutely perfect dress, that was a screwup. I am entirely unprepared, and this isn’t going to get easier. There are going to be jokes and references that I’m not in on. No one here is going to get excited about my Boston parking arbitrage scheme. I need to figure out how to plaster a pleasant look on my face without saying any more words. I could be Stewart’s girlfriend as a mannequin. I excuse myself to go find the restroom.
The restroom is nicer than the dressing room at Wendell’s. It has a seating area with gilded mirrors and pale pink sofas. Two women in their twenties are seated, laughing at something on their phones. I use the bathroom without ruining my dress and emerge from my stall anticipating a round of applause. I wash my hands with a tiny trickle of water to ward off any splashing and dry my hands with an environmentally questionable paper napkin. Just as I pull my lipstick out of my gold purse, a woman in her fifties comes out of the stall behind me. Our eyes meet in the mirror, and I smile my pleasant smile. She does not smile back.
“This goddamn dress,” she says to no one. She’s holding on to the spaghetti strap of her pink chiffon gown and then lets it fall away, torn from where it should be attached at the back. She wets a paper napkin and dabs it at her neck and forehead. “Sweating.”
“Do you need help?” I ask, tentative.
She turns to me. “All the help in the world. I have to go out there, and I knew this dress didn’t fit. The salesgirl assured me it did. And I liked the size, the number, you know. It made me feel good. So I bought it and now I have to go out there, sweating—do I stink? I bet I do!—in a broken dress like I just crawled out of the back of someone’s car.”
“You look beautiful,” I say, because she does and because it’s what I wanted Stewart to say to me when I was nervous. “And look what I have.” I open my gold bag and show her my CVS emergency needle-and-thread kit. “My grandmother never left the house without ChapStick, five dollars, and a sewing kit. May I?”
“Yes,” she says. She’s staring at my little red kit like it’s a miracle. “Thank you.”
“No problem. I am not a great seamstress. But I can hem things and make curtains. I can do basically anything that’s going to end up a rectangle.” I take her pink strap and stretch it to where it was previously sewn, and it’s tight. I don’t like the way it presses into her skin like she’s trapped. “If you have five extra minutes, I can sew this one on a little looser and then let out the other strap. You might be more comfortable?”
Which is how it came to be that I spent an extra fifteen minutes in the bathroom altering a couture gown. The woman’s name is Jen and she lives in Providence. She has teenagers too and thinks they’re monsters. I tell her about the time Gus split his pants at a Little League game and I repaired them in the car while he crouched down in the backseat in his underwear. I tell her about Maud and how she could make anything out of nothing—a dress, a biscuit, a total shift in a room’s energy.
Jen is no longer sweating, and she hugs me in thanks. Stewart is standing outside the bathroom when we walk out. He’s agitated, pacing a few steps and putting his hands in his pockets, pulling them out, and then adjusting his cuff links. “There you are. It’s time to sit and I couldn’t…Jennifer. Hello.”
Jen kisses his cheek. “Do you two know each other?” she asks.
“Yes,” he says. “This is my girlfriend, Dolly Brick. Dolly, this is Jennifer Quigley, head of the cancer center.”
“No wonder you didn’t want to look like you were climbing out the back of someone’s car,” I say.
She laughs and gives me another hug. “When I wake up tomorrow, this will be my favorite memory of tonight.” She turns to Stewart. “Well done. Much better.”
He thanks her after she’s already turned to go. “What was all that?” he asks me.
“Nothing, she was in a jam and I fixed her dress. I always carry a sewing kit.” I hold up my purse.
“Of course you do. And jumper cables.”
“Yep, though not in my bike basket.”
He places a hand on my back and starts kind of nudging me through the lobby toward the ballroom. I stop and say, “I think you should hold my hand.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, it just feels more believable. Like if you were really my boyfriend, I’d like to be holding hands as we walk in.”
“Okay,” he says, and takes my hand. It is not a soft, melty hand-holding situation. He does not entwine our fingers, and the warmth of his palm against mine does not tug at my heart. In fact, I get no palm action at all. He grasps me by the fingers and pulls. He holds my hand like he’s holding a dog’s leash.