That Summer(34)

“It’s spooky,” Casey whispered to me, and I nodded.

A woman in front of me said loudly, “She looks like she’s on drugs or something. Damn good example to set for the kids here. She shouldn’t even be on the stage.”

“Hush,” her friend said.

“I’m just saying,” the woman replied, shifting in her chair. “And look at that hair.”

We were all looking.

The emcee next to Gwendolyn stood on tiptoe and whispered something in her ear, but Gwendolyn’s face never changed. She cleared her throat again, and we waited.

“Thank you for having me,” she began slowly, and we all relaxed a bit. Things were going to be okay. “It’s a real treat to be here overseeing a new generation of Lakeview Models.”

The emcee began applauding, looking nervous, so we all joined in. Gwendolyn was still staring at the back of the mall.

The silence had gone on too long now. I wished for words to come from her mouth, any sound that might get her through this. Her hands were gripping the sides of the podium, the tips of her fingers white from the strain. It was as if the Gwendolyn we all knew and expected had been left behind on those glossy magazine pages—or had never existed at all. She opened her mouth, took in a breath; I closed my eyes until I heard her voice echo around me.

“So without further ado, let’s begin this year’s show.” Her voice was flat, even, and as the woman ushered her off the stage to her seat of honor in the front row, Gwendolyn ran her fingers over her long, stringy hair, obscuring her face as she passed by. Once seated, her head stuck up above the crowd, and I watched as the people behind her, no longer charmed, grumbled and rearranged themselves.

Suddenly there was a burst of music, so loud that a woman behind me actually shrieked. It was disco, a fast beat and lots of technological-sounding blips and beeps along with the occasional loud panting of a woman’s voice. We all stared up at the stage, waiting for something while the music pounded on behind us. Then, the partitions slowly parted (with the help of Sumner and some other guy in a uniform, who tried hard to stay out of sight), revealing the leaves I’d seen before. Now, however, there were lights spinning across them, blue and green and red and yellow, catching bits of glitter that I hadn’t noticed until now. It was all a bit overwhelming, a definite change from the show of last year, which consisted of one lone ficus tree that the models walked by, posed around, and then pulled to the edge of the stage for the big finale, where they threw its leaves on the audience to symbolize fall. That fashion show had been the most innovative, until this year.

Suddenly, the music stopped, and the lights fell steady on the leaves, each a different color. The disembodied voice came again. “Ladies and gentlemen, please join the Lakeview Mall Models as we journey into fall. A fall of expectations... of new ideas... and of potential. Come, come with us ...”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” someone behind us said loudly.

“... to a world of color and style, of tweed and tartan, of reality and imagination. Close your eyes and feel the cool air, the sharp colors of the leaves, and the dreams of winter. Come, come, and journey with us ... into the Fall of Fashion.”

The lights started swirling again, the music came on full blast, and suddenly the models began to walk up on stage, each of them smiling big toothy smiles and vamping like nobody’s business. The first was a girl in a beret who flounced out on the runway, tossed her hat in the air Mary Tyler Moore style, and just let it fall on some woman in the second row who looked like she wasn’t quite sure whether to throw it back or keep it. Beret girl was replaced by a girl in a long tweed jacket who took it off and dragged it dramatically down the runway with such abandon that someone behind me began to speculate about the cost of dry-cleaning it. The next girl clomped down the runway in torn jeans and combat boots, tossing her hair and gyrating suggestively, grinning out at us. A group of older women, probably remembering the tame ficus-tree show of the previous year, made a big fuss of leaving in disgust.

It only got worse. The music switched to just a woman moaning, over and over again, and one girl actually came out in hip-length black leather boots, which sent a flurry of exclamations down the crowd and another set of people packing up and leaving. The models were oblivious, most of them making a point of playing specifically to Gwendolyn Rogers as if to prove they were just like her, real models. Gwendolyn’s head, however, bowed forward, as if even watching was too much for her.

For the grand finale, which was always a showcase of evening wear for Christmas balls and dances, the models came out in tight black dresses and spike heels, with their hair pulled straight back and lips bright red, the rest of their faces white and pale as if they were very sick. They stopped to pose, waiting for the applause to thunder down upon them.

We applauded, those of us who were left, and watched as the director of the show, a young guy in a purple suit with a walkie-talkie in his hand, came up for his bow. I wondered if he realized that the entire board of the Lakeview Mall was probably waiting for him offstage, ready to wring his neck. When they brought Gwendolyn back up to address the models there weren’t that many people left in the audience, which was probably a good thing.

They stuck Gwendolyn in the middle and the models giggled and panted and shuffled around to get closer, their lips red and bright. As the photographer took pictures, she was pale in the center, towering above them all with their black dresses and pulled-back hair, their pale skin and scary Halloween lips, looking down at them as they crowded in around her. And then, just as they were all saying cheese once more, smiling for the camera on their big day, Gwendolyn Rogers burst into tears.