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Authors: Beth Harbison
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other shoppers, and whoever was going to hear the story second- and thirdhand—that it wasn’t really a misunderstanding at all.
Home was hardly a safe refuge. Jim wasn’t there, and Teresa, the maid, was coolly courteous, as usual, when Helene came through the front door.
She’d gone upstairs to her bedroom. Jim called it her boudoir, but they both knew it was her space and he had his.
She’d taken off her clothes, put them away, gotten into a hot shower, shampooed, conditioned, shaved her legs and armpits, and rinsed thoroughly, allowing herself the brief luxury of hot water pounding down her back.
Afterwards, she put on her robe, combed and dried her hair, changed into a nightgown, brushed and flossed her teeth, put La Mer moisturizer on her face, and put everything away before finally allowing herself to sit on the edge of her bed.
And cry.
She allowed herself a good ten minutes to let it all out, to feel everything as deeply as she needed to before pulling the reins in on herself. When ten minutes passed, she straightened herself up, splashed her face with cold water, reapplied her moisturizer, and went back to her business as if nothing had ever happened.
Hopefully, the news wouldn’t have gotten out. She brought her laptop computer to the bed, booted it up, and sat down in front of it. She typed in all the local news sites, Washingtonpost.com, Gazette.net, UptownCityPaper.net, and so on, entering her name in each search bar and waiting to see if there were any recent stories.
Fortunately, there were not. Not in any of the venues she could think of, even the obscure ones.
With considerable relief, she signed on to Gregslist.biz and pursued one of her other favorite online pastimes: looking up apartments in her favorite areas. She often fantasized about getting a little place all her own, where she could escape from Jim and her duties as “wife of.” And maybe, somehow, someday it would happen.
Perhaps if she could do something innovative by herself, something that could gain her money without compromising Jim’s station in society.
She typed in “Adams Morgan,” one of her favorite D.C. neighborhoods; then “Tenleytown”; “Woodley Park”; and finally “Bethesda.”
The usual apartment and town house offerings showed up in all the areas, and she’d seen a good percentage of them before, but this time when she typed in “Bethesda,” something came up that she’d never seen before.
Shoe Addicts Anonymous .
The irony of it struck her immediately, and her first impulse was to go back and recheck the news sources to make sure they hadn’t picked up the story of her shoplifting. But that was silly. This had nothing to do with that. It was just a coincidence.
Helene was a skeptic when it came to voodoo and fortune-telling and omens, but this time it was hard to deny: this had to be a sign.
And the fact that the ad had given her her first honest laugh in about as long as she could remember made her think she should at least write the information down before it disappeared forever into the dark recesses of Gregslist’s archives.
It wasn’t that she was going to join. Helene had always been a loner. But she would keep the information handy.
Just in case.
Maybe Helene was jaded, but she felt White House functions were always a bore. But they were nothing compared with the tedium of the post–White House Function parties she and Jim always had to make the rounds of.
They were on their way to Mimi Lindhofer’s soirée in the heart of Georgetown when Helene’s glass slipper flew off and left her flat on her ass on her karmic sidewalk.
“Got an interesting call today,” Jim said, as if he were going to tell her his broker thought he should invest in pork bellies.
“Oh?” she asked absently, watching the quaint landscape of Georgetown pass by outside the window. She often wondered what it would be like to live in one of those cozy gingerbread town houses.
Then again, one
Home was hardly a safe refuge. Jim wasn’t there, and Teresa, the maid, was coolly courteous, as usual, when Helene came through the front door.
She’d gone upstairs to her bedroom. Jim called it her boudoir, but they both knew it was her space and he had his.
She’d taken off her clothes, put them away, gotten into a hot shower, shampooed, conditioned, shaved her legs and armpits, and rinsed thoroughly, allowing herself the brief luxury of hot water pounding down her back.
Afterwards, she put on her robe, combed and dried her hair, changed into a nightgown, brushed and flossed her teeth, put La Mer moisturizer on her face, and put everything away before finally allowing herself to sit on the edge of her bed.
And cry.
She allowed herself a good ten minutes to let it all out, to feel everything as deeply as she needed to before pulling the reins in on herself. When ten minutes passed, she straightened herself up, splashed her face with cold water, reapplied her moisturizer, and went back to her business as if nothing had ever happened.
Hopefully, the news wouldn’t have gotten out. She brought her laptop computer to the bed, booted it up, and sat down in front of it. She typed in all the local news sites, Washingtonpost.com, Gazette.net, UptownCityPaper.net, and so on, entering her name in each search bar and waiting to see if there were any recent stories.
Fortunately, there were not. Not in any of the venues she could think of, even the obscure ones.
With considerable relief, she signed on to Gregslist.biz and pursued one of her other favorite online pastimes: looking up apartments in her favorite areas. She often fantasized about getting a little place all her own, where she could escape from Jim and her duties as “wife of.” And maybe, somehow, someday it would happen.
Perhaps if she could do something innovative by herself, something that could gain her money without compromising Jim’s station in society.
She typed in “Adams Morgan,” one of her favorite D.C. neighborhoods; then “Tenleytown”; “Woodley Park”; and finally “Bethesda.”
The usual apartment and town house offerings showed up in all the areas, and she’d seen a good percentage of them before, but this time when she typed in “Bethesda,” something came up that she’d never seen before.
Shoe Addicts Anonymous .
The irony of it struck her immediately, and her first impulse was to go back and recheck the news sources to make sure they hadn’t picked up the story of her shoplifting. But that was silly. This had nothing to do with that. It was just a coincidence.
Helene was a skeptic when it came to voodoo and fortune-telling and omens, but this time it was hard to deny: this had to be a sign.
And the fact that the ad had given her her first honest laugh in about as long as she could remember made her think she should at least write the information down before it disappeared forever into the dark recesses of Gregslist’s archives.
It wasn’t that she was going to join. Helene had always been a loner. But she would keep the information handy.
Just in case.
Maybe Helene was jaded, but she felt White House functions were always a bore. But they were nothing compared with the tedium of the post–White House Function parties she and Jim always had to make the rounds of.
They were on their way to Mimi Lindhofer’s soirée in the heart of Georgetown when Helene’s glass slipper flew off and left her flat on her ass on her karmic sidewalk.
“Got an interesting call today,” Jim said, as if he were going to tell her his broker thought he should invest in pork bellies.
“Oh?” she asked absently, watching the quaint landscape of Georgetown pass by outside the window. She often wondered what it would be like to live in one of those cozy gingerbread town houses.
Then again, one
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