the reception desk, trying to look important or maybe casual—a sad attempt at flirting. But the woman wasn’t rolling her eyes like we would’ve. She just smiled and laughed and touched his arm.
She took off her blue coat and handed it to Anderson, who draped it over his arm like a waiter. Underneath, she wore a woolen mauve dress with a gold braided belt. I looked down the front of my navy shift dress and noticed a stain smack in the center of my chest—remnants of toothpaste I thought I’d gotten out that morning. I opened my bottom drawer and took out the brown cardigan I kept for when the building’s heat got spotty. Horrid, I thought, putting it on and rolling the sleeves into cuffs.
“New typist?” Gail asked.
“Nah,” Kathy said. “We’re full now with the Russian.”
“Russian American,” I corrected.
Judy tossed a broken eraser at me. “Go find out, Anna Karenina.”
But Anderson and the redhead were already moving toward us. He led the way, pointing out mundane features of the office, stating that the Xerox machine was “a year away from being released to the public” and the water cooler distributed “both hot and cold.” They reached my desk first.
“Sally Forrester,” the woman said and stuck out her hand.
I shook her hand. “Sally,” I said.
“You’re Sally too?”
“This is Irina,” Anderson said for me.
Sally smiled again. “Pleasure.”
I nodded dumbly, and before I could say it was a pleasure to meet her as well, they’d already moved on down the line, shaking hands with every member of the Pool.
“Miss Forrester is our new part-time receptionist,” Anderson said to everyone. “She’ll be in the office occasionally, helping out as needed.”
* * *
—
We debriefed in the ladies’ room.
“Those clothes!”
“That hair!”
“That handshake!”
Sally’s handshake had been firm. Not like some of the men whose grips crushed our fingers, but enough to make us notice. “Firm, but not too firm,” Norma said. “That’s how the politicians do it.”
“But why’s she here?”
“Who knows.”
“Well, I know they don’t put women like that behind a reception desk,” Norma said. “And if they do, it’s for a reason.”
* * *
—
After work, I took the long route home so I could pass Hecht’s. Their elaborate window displays were my favorite in the city: mannequins dressed for the ski slopes atop a tiny hill of cotton snow in winter, searching for Easter eggs in their prettiest pastel frocks in spring, lounging in their bikinis by a blue cellophane pool in summer.
As I passed, a man with a tape measure in his back pocket was arranging a trio of mannequins dressed as witches behind a black plastic cauldron. I told myself I was just going to pass the window and be on my way. When I went inside, I told myself I was just going to browse. When I started browsing, I told myself I’d just look to see if I could afford anything that didn’t look handmade—something that looked like something Sally Forrester might wear.
I passed my hands over the racks, fingering the silks and linens between my fingers, and ran my hand along a skirt’s perfect stitching. If my mother had been with me, she’d have shown me how machines had cheaply achieved this uniformity and how, over time, the seams would fray, the buttons would fall off, and eventually the ill-informed shopper who’d purchased the overpriced skirt would come to her so she could fix it. She’d have held up a calloused sewing finger and told me there’s no replacement for hard work.
As I pressed a red blouse with a red-and-white paisley scarf under its Peter Pan collar against my chest, a salesgirl asked if I needed help. “Just looking,” I said. Salesgirls always intimidated me, which is why I hardly ever went into department stores in the first place—that, and I never had the money to spend.
“Lovely blouse,” the salesgirl continued. She was dressed in a fit and flare black skirt and white blouse, her bangs shellacked into a high arch above her forehead. “It would look fabulous on you. Like to try it on?” She took the hanger from me before I could respond, and I followed her to the dressing room. She placed the blouse on a hook. “Let me know if you need another size.”
Before undressing, I checked the price tag. I couldn’t afford it, but I stayed in the dressing room for a few minutes to make her think I at least tried it on. I’d tell her red just wasn’t my color.