“Oh, I—I don’t know,” Lily stammered, but she took a step closer to the case. The tuxedo jerkin was in a navy blue fabric with notched black lapels.
Miss Stevens took out the jerkin and laid it on the glass. “And it’s hand washable. Very smart.”
Lily reached out and touched it, her fingers running lightly over the crisply pressed texture.
“I can bring an appropriate size to the fitting room if you’d like,” Miss Stevens said.
“Lily! There you are.”
Lily jerked her hand away and looked up. Her mother was walking toward her, boxy black handbag slung over her arm, a blond salesgirl following with an armful of shirtwaists and skirts.
“I’ve found some things for you to try on,” her mother said. She glanced down at the tuxedo jerkin and raised her eyebrows. “What’s this?”
“A wonderful collection of mix-and-match separates, ma’am,” Miss Stevens said. Her gaze flickered briefly to the blond salesgirl and then back to Lily’s mother, who went to the case and examined the jerkin and the ad.
“Where would you wear this, Lily?” Her mother’s tone was short and critical.
Lily was embarrassed. “I don’t know. I was just looking.”
“It’s perfect for parties,” Miss Stevens said. “If Miss Marshall is preparing a fitting room for you, she could bring this ensemble too.”
The blond salesgirl—Miss Marshall—stepped forward with her armful of clothes, her face blandly expectant, but Lily’s mother shook her head.
“Thank you, but I don’t believe this is right for my daughter. Come to the fitting room, Lily. I have some school clothes for you to try on.”
Lily gave Miss Stevens an apologetic look before hurrying after her mother and Miss Marshall. Miss Stevens returned her glance with a thin smile as she folded the jerkin to put it away.
In the dressing room, the salesgirl hung a row of dresses, shirtwaists, skirts, and matching jackets on the wall-mounted rail. Lily’s mother took a seat on the bench inside the room. “Try on the brown dress first,” her mother said. “That one, with the black buttons.”
There was a succession of brown and gray dresses and skirts, with pale pink or baby blue cotton shirtwaists featuring demure round collars or cuffed three-quarter-length sleeves. They were the teenage version of her mother’s church suit, inoffensive but boring. Lily thought longingly of the tuxedo jerkin, but as she made her way through the clothes her mother had chosen, the idea of it became increasingly outlandish. Maybe her mother was right. Where would she wear such a thing? It would cause a sensation at the fall dance, but she wasn’t the kind of girl who caused sensations.
“The jacket is too big for you,” her mother said, studying the latest suit Lily had tried on.
It was taupe-colored and boxy, and Lily thought it was old-fashioned. “I don’t like it,” she said.
“You’re going to be a senior,” her mother said. “You need to have the right look.” She opened the dressing room door, but the corridor outside was empty. “Where’s that salesgirl?” She glanced back at Lily. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”
After her mother left, Lily gazed at her reflection in the mirror. You need to have the right look. Lily knew what her mother meant. She needed to look respectable and serious. The girl in the mirror looked like a schoolgirl dressing up in her mother’s clothes. Her mouth was pinched shut and her forehead was creased, her body swallowed by the jacket’s padded shoulders. If her mother could see her now, she would tell her to stop being ungrateful. They hardly ever shopped upstairs at Macy’s unless there was a major sale, but here she was in the junior miss department with all the latest fashions, not the bargain basement with its odds and ends from last season.
Lily remembered a different visit to Macy’s when she was a child—nine or ten—with Eddie clinging to Mama’s hand as she pushed the buggy with baby Frankie in it through the heavy doors onto the first floor. It had been a struggle to get all of them into the elevator and up to the fourth floor where Santa’s workshop was located. Lily remembered silver snowflakes hanging from the ceiling, tinsel strung over the display cases, and boxes and boxes of toy cars and airplanes stacked on the shelves. An electric train circled a miniature Christmas village, and Eddie knelt to stare at it, transfixed, while Lily was drawn to a table-top chemistry set. There were test tubes in a stand, and a tiny Bunsen burner, and strangely colored liquids housed in little glass vials. The box that the chemistry set came in had an illustration of two boys playing together, and over their blond heads were the words DISCOVER THE FUTURE TODAY!