Secret Shared: A S.E.C.R.E.T. Novel (6 page)

“Here,” I said, placing the glass in front of her.

She gulped the water back and wiped her mouth, regaining her composure.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “That’s never happened to me before. Maybe it’s the heat.”

“It is quite hot for early April,” I said.

“Maybe.” She took another gulp of water. “Sorry, I don’t mean to intrude, but that thing you did with that guy—asking him out? Very impressive.”

“You saw that?”

“I swear I am never this nosy. But that was hard to ignore.”

A strange compliment from a strange … stranger, but I’d take it.

“It
was
impressive, wasn’t it?” I said, sounding surprisingly pleased with myself.

“Well … thank you for the water and for your concern. But I’m feeling better. So I’ll just head back to work.”

She pushed up her sunglasses, grabbed her purse, and just at the moment she stood to leave, Matilda arrived. They awkwardly engaged in the “you first, no, you first” dance around the crowded patio table. The woman smashed into Matilda’s left shoulder, then her right. Finally free, it seemed she couldn’t get away from us fast enough.

Matilda and I watched her as she headed into the Funky Monkey next door. Matilda lowered herself into her chair, patting down her hair as though she’d just survived a small tornado.

“Who was that? Or
what
was that?”

My eyes stayed glued to the door of the store.

“I don’t know. Just a woman … I thought she was ill, so I checked on her,” I said. “But guess what?” I changed the subject with a grin. “
I
just asked a guy out. And the best part? He said yes!”

“Well, Happy Birthday to you, indeed!”

“Yeah, and
that
woman, she treated me like I was some kind of celebrity just for asking a guy for his number. It was weird. She looks nothing like me, yet she reminded me a little of me last year. Kind of timid. Kind of sad. Anyway, I feel like my confidence is really growing. I think I am ready to be a Guide. Here,” I said, reaching in my bag for my pledge. “Signed, sealed and delivered.”

“Thank you for this,” she said, putting away my pledge. Her expression was suddenly thoughtful. “I wonder if
perhaps we’re looking at a possible S.E.C.R.E.T. candidate.”

“You mean that woman?”

Matilda nodded.

“I don’t even know if she’s single.”

“That’s easy to find out.”

I felt my nerves fire up. “You think I should approach her? What if she thinks I’m crazy?”

“Everyone’s entitled to their opinion. You look great, by the way.”

I looked down at my outfit, nothing too “out there”—slim jeans that rested on my hips and a grey tank top under a cream corduroy jacket. I was never going to be one of those dolled-up babes who crammed Frenchmen on a Thursday night, drunkenly navigating the pocked street in treacherous heels. And I couldn’t for the life of me understand why I should put on mascara to go grocery shopping. But a year of being told I was beautiful and desirable by some of the best-looking men I’d ever laid eyes on made me want to put my best face forward.

“After lunch let’s go next door, talk a bit with that woman.”

“Today? Now?—” It was happening so fast. Why was I so nervous?

“Don’t worry, Cassie, I’ll take the lead, you follow,” Matilda said, scanning the menu.

Oh dear. Here we go.

I COULD NOT
get away from Ignatius’s fast enough. Back at the store, I darted past Elizabeth to my office and slammed the door behind me, lifting my sunglasses to peer into the makeup mirror on my desk. My cheeks were red from my encounter with that dark-haired woman on the patio. For the first time, I spotted tiny wrinkles forming around my eyes, my mother’s frown lines etching into my cheeks. Was I fading? Was my desirability leaving me for good? Mark had sat with her, not me. He had flirted with her, given his number to her, not me.

“You merely have the ‘sads,’ darling. They’re from your father’s side of the family,” I could hear my mother drawl. This was a particularly Southern take on depression, one that felt more like the burden of inheritance than anything to do with serotonin levels.

I fell into my chair and looked around my office. I had too much stuff, I knew that. But I told myself that because I was obsessively neat and obsessively organized I couldn’t
be a hoarder. Everything was in its place, everything had a label, right down to the paper punch. And yet I couldn’t let go of a thing. What if I lost weight and finally fit into that one-of-a-kind purple pantsuit? What if I put together the perfect outfit for a customer but didn’t have that owl pendant that would pull it together? What if I absolutely needed something and it was longer there? Hence the six filing cabinets and wall-length closets, all filled with “marvelous finds” I could neither bring myself to wear nor bear to sell.

Shake it off, Dauphine. Shake it off.

Elizabeth stuck her head into the office.

“Okay. Store’s empty. I quickly threw it on. Be honest,” she said, walking into the frame to reveal her long body in a black jumpsuit and white go-go boots that I had set aside for her anniversary date. “So?”

She was a teenager when I hired her part-time on weekends. She was twenty-four now, studying psychology part-time at Tulane, practicing some of her theories on me. She told me I was fear-based and rigid. I told her, while picking up five sugar grains on the glass countertop with the very tip of my index finger, that she sounded a lot like my mother.

She stood now in front of the mirror looking absolutely lovely, head to toe.

“Amazing,” I said.

“You think?”

“I do. You need a Pucci scarf. And pale lipstick,” I said,
fetching both. And I was right. We moved towards the full-length mirror behind the door. I stood behind her, my chin on her shoulder. “Yes. A home run.”

“Are you sure I don’t look like a go-go dancer?”

“No! You’re breathtaking.”

“You should be the one wearing this, Dauphine,” she said, squirming. “You put it away for so long, and you have the curves for it. You keep talking about getting back out there. When is that going to happen?”

“I’m fine. And
you
are almost set,” I said, pulling out a lint brush from a drawer labeled “Lint Brushes.”

“I’ll wear it for the rest of the day, if that’s okay,” she said, while I finished rolling over her legs.

“Yes. Now go. I’ll be out front in a minute.”

As I watched her trip back to the front of the store I felt a maternal flush of pride. In the years I’d known her, I had helped her polish no less than ten online dating profiles, styling her for most of the pictures and some of the dates. Her current boyfriend, Edward, was no dreamboat, but they were clearly smitten with each other. Elizabeth had a vitality about her that she attributed to incredible sex. She and Edward were celebrating one year together with dinner at Coop’s that night, followed by live music on the patio at Commander’s Palace. Elizabeth, with her short blond hair, too-close eyes and gangly limbs, was not traditionally beautiful, yet she was never single for long. Eight-year gaps between serious boyfriends would be unthinkable for her. Life was too short for that kind of nonsense.

I looked at myself in the mirror, loosening the belt of my blue dress. Maybe I should change too. I could try on that green sundress now hanging from a coat rack, waiting to be labeled and stored. I could have Elizabeth pin the hem. Nah, too much trouble, and I’d never wear it anyway. Then why was I keeping it? I forced myself back out to the floor, passing an overstuffed rolling rack of outfits, some to be sorted, some priced. It was a quiet Sunday afternoon, but Elizabeth was occupied with a couple of customers near the display case. As I approached them, I realized she was helping the two women who had been sitting next to me at Ignatius’s, the one who stole Mark Drury from me, and the attractive older woman with red hair a shade or two lighter than mine—the one I had smashed into. The redhead dressed crisply and professionally, like my mother, and didn’t look like the type that scoured second-hand racks. The dark-haired woman dressed a little too plainly to be a Funky Monkey shopper, let alone a musical genius’s future girlfriend.

“There you are!” said Elizabeth, making it difficult for me to duck into the men’s side of the store to avoid them. “These two ladies were gushing about my outfit and I told them you picked it out for my date tonight. They were very impressed.”

“Hi,” said the redhead, her hand jutting towards me. “Great taste. Love the boots. I’m Matilda.”

“Hi. Dauphine,” I said, smiling stiffly.

“And I’m Cassie,” the dark-haired woman said, seeming
a lot shier than the woman who had snagged Mark Drury’s attention half an hour ago. She could barely meet my eye.

“It’s a charming store,” Matilda said, looking around. She was definitely the chatty one. “Nicely curated. Secondhand stores can be such a hodge-podge.”

“Thank you. I like to think we know what we’re doing,” I said.

“And your name. Is it like the street?”

“My parents came to New Orleans for their honeymoon and named me after the street.”

“Oh? Where are your people from?” she asked, using the word
people
as in “tribe,” tilting her accent to signal that she was not only Southern but knew Southerners were obsessed with geography and lineage.

“Baton Rouge. Mostly Louisiana, with some Tennessee stock thrown in.”

“Ah. A bit of ‘cotton in the roux,’ as they say. Cassie’s from the north,” she added. “She has no idea what we’re talking about.”

Matilda yanked out a sparkly blue, floor-length, strapless number and a yellow, more diaphanous gown from the formal rack.

“I’m going to try these on,” she said, looking directly at Cassie. “Cassie, I believe you are looking for something special too. Perhaps Dauphine can help you?”

“I’ll take you back there,” Elizabeth said, gathering up the dresses.

After they left, I stood awkwardly for a few seconds with Cassie, feeling like we were two school kids forced to play together.

“So you’re from the north,” I said.

“Michigan. Yeah. But I’ve been here almost eight years, so I feel more and more like a local.”

Her eyes landed on the glittery tower of clip-on rhinestone earrings on the display case.

“
Those
are what I’m looking for!” she said. “I have this
thing
to go to.”

She removed a heavy pair of clip-on clusters, almost tipping over the whole tower.

“Oh, sorry. I’m so clutzy.”

I could not picture this woman being invited to the kind of event that would require these earrings. She was too casual, too down-to-earth.

“This is a really nice store,” she said, struggling to center the earrings on her lobes. “Do you own it?”

“I do. Almost ten years now. Here, let me help.”

“Wow. Ten years.” She moved her hair back so I could clip the earrings into proper place, one then the other.

I stood back.

“So do you have a business partner or is it just you?”

“Just me,” I said, turning her around to look in the mirror. I quickly changed the subject. “What else are you wearing to your event?”

“I … don’t think I’ve decided yet … It must be hard to run a business all on your own.”

“I have Elizabeth and a few part-timers.”

Her questions were inching to places where she wasn’t invited.

“You’re doing things a little backwards,” I said. “You shouldn’t start with the earrings. Start with the dress. Bring it in and I’ll help you find the right jewelry.”

“I didn’t mean to offend you when I asked if you were running your own business. I’m sure you’re quite capable of operating on the planet without a partner. I certainly have.”

“Yes, but that could change,” I said. “That guy from the patio? He was cute. Maybe that’ll turn into something.”

Should I tell her who he was? Can she sense my jealousy?
I did mean it as a compliment, but I seemed to have alarmed her. Oh god, I
was
coming across as peculiar!

“Trust me, talking to cute guys is not a skill I was born with. I had to learn how to do it. And frankly, I’m still quite new at it. When you’ve been single for a long time, like I have, you forget how to approach men, you know? But it’s really just muscle memory. I just needed a little … boost.”

I felt her words slice right through me.
Yes. That’s exactly it
.
That’s what I need. A boost.

She lowered her voice. “I had to get some help in the ‘men’ arena. Big-time. That’s how I met Matilda.”

I could hear Matilda and Elizabeth laughing and chatting at the back of the store.

“Is she a dating coach or something?” I asked.

“You could say that,” Cassie said, spinning the earring rack, examining a pair of gold hoops that seemed more suited to
her. “She has a lot of confidence, a lot of knowledge about this stuff.”

“Well, sign me up for the next round of lessons,” I said, laughing.

“I will!” she said, as though it were a real thing, these lessons, this kind of coaching.

Matilda and Elizabeth returned from the dressing room, triumphant.

“I never knew I looked so good in yellow,” Matilda said, the gown draped in her arms. “You can find out all sorts of things about yourself in a place like this.”