CHAPTER TWENTY
STACY
WHEN I SAY THAT I made prototypes from my new sketches, Hampton almost smiles. It’s the delight when the subject is business. I feel guilty. Because I’m peeking around the corner, my out-of-sight hands holding the hangers.
I know what he’s about to see. I know that the prototypes are failures, and how disappointed I’m about to make him. Perhaps worse, I know how pleased I am by these disappointments, once I set Expendable Chic’s expectations aside. I have to admit, looking at them now, they’re two of my proudest accomplishments. This is how clothing should be made. The dress and shirt are both fat middle fingers to fast fashion. They walk up to stores like Expendable Chic and poop on their doorsteps.
I don’t know why I let myself make these things on Hampton’s dime, if not to spite him.
And despite the surprising amount of pleasure I’ve gotten from our afternoon together — Hampton being a man, rather than an arrogant industry titan — I can’t help but feel that I’m inches from offending him. He’ll see what I’ve done, and how transparently I’ve done it.
Look what I used your money to create. These clothes aren’t just not what you wanted. They’re what you can never produce, designed to show you just how shitty your rags are.
I might as well be about to show Hampton a sign that reads, Fuck you and all you stand for.
“Let’s see them,” he says, smiling wider.
“They’re not really to specifications.”
“I know. We already talked about this, with the last round you gave me.”
“This is different.”
“Different how?”
“They’re less to specifications.”
“What do you mean?”
I sigh, then pull the shirt and dress into view.
At first, Hampton seems excited. He comes forward. Then he slows halfway, stepping up to take the shirt’s sleeve between his thumb and fingers.
“These don’t look like what you showed me before.”
“I know.”
“They don’t look like Expendable Chic at all.”
Sigh. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“You made these for me?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know?”
“They got away from me.”
“What does that mean, Stacy? They’re clothes. They don’t design themselves. You must have realized, after making the sketches on paper, that—”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
He says nothing. He regards the fabric, then the construction. Even the fabric is a huge fuck-you. It’s a gorgeous broadcloth, tightly woven with a simple over-under weave and very little sheen. Pure white, slightly transparent. It’s phenomenally expensive even in bulk, and I only have a bolt of it because an assembly plant somewhere burned down, and one of my friends was in charge of liquidating an enormous shipment when the customer couldn’t take delivery. Expendable Chic could never afford even a shitty shirt made of this, and I’ve hand-crafted a fantastic one. Forget about stretching what Hampton’s disposable clothing shops can sell. I’ve obliterated it.
His face is hard. Unreadable. He scans the seams, then moves to the dress. “Tell me what you’ve done here.”
“Screwed up,” I say. “Wasted your money.”
“More specifically, Stacy. Explain to me how this happened.”
I want to meet his eye, if for nothing else than to apologize. But he’s staring so hard at the thread work that I can’t pinch an iota of his attention.
“Explain?”
“I want to know every detail.” Finally, he looks up. “Educate me.”
“It’s not really about educating so much as—”
“No,” he says. “It is. You’ve basically told me I’m an idiot about craftsmanship. I guess I am because I don’t know what I’m seeing here. So, tell me. Teach me some lessons.”
My skin feels as cold as his tone. I want this over yesterday. We should never have continued. This tragic deal should have died a week ago, right there on my shameful couch.
“Are you serious?” I ask.
“I’m serious.”
I eye him again, but Hampton doesn’t budge. He’s furious with me. He’s mentioned some of his plans for the new line over lunch — enough for me to know how much he’s counting on it. Now here I am, knocking it all down.
I wonder if he’ll just replace me. If he’ll take my first-round designs and have someone else make them. He can, easily. He owns the patterns if he can reverse-engineer them from the whole-garment sketches. He bought them off me fair and square, that night in the rain.
“Come on, Stacy. Tell me what makes these articles so amazing.”
So I tell him. I lay the garments open, showing him all the precision interior seam work. I show him the places I hand-stitched, where I concealed and protected the raw edges, and how I sewed the buttons and constructed the shanks. I explain all of the notions and why they’re a step above. I turn the shirt collar over, pointing out the narrow pockets for the stainless steel collar stays. I explain how I reinforce the placket to keep it from sagging. I bunch the fabric in my hand, then show him how easily it relaxes on its own. I have him feel the weight. Have him heft it. I even show him the needles I used and demonstrate the hand-stitching on the buttonholes.
“Why did you hand-stitch the buttonholes?”
“It seemed better.” It’s an imprecise answer at best. The truth is I don’t know why. I worked in a fugue.
“But it can be done by machine,” he says.
“By … yes, I’m sure it can.”
“How would that impact the quality and durability?”
“Why are you asking?”
“Because I want to know.”
He’s looking right at me, his mouth a line. Is he asking to torture me? He already knows he can’t make these clothes at scale for a decent price. So why not just dress me down, storm out, and be done with me?
But Hampton doesn’t flinch, so I give him all the details, and answer every one of his thousand questions.
He takes the shirt and dress. He removes the hangers and walks to the small window that looks out onto the alley. There’s nothing to see, but Hampton looks anyway. He’s holding both garments over his arm. He raises them to his chest, then lifts them to his face. Maybe rubs them on his cheek, or inhales. I can’t tell and don’t understand.
“You’re completely transparent,” he finally says.
My head tips. Hampton turns, then speaks again.
“When writers write, they expose themselves. Same for singers singing or actors acting. I learned that in high school. I used to be quite creative. I stopped when it became obvious that people who saw what I made knew me better through my creations than they knew me through life.”
He holds up the shirt and dress.
“I see every bit of you in these. We could never use them the way they are. Do you know why?”
“Because—”
“Because they’re you, naked. I can see you in every stitch. I can feel you in the touch of the fabric. In every choice that went into these, your face is as plain as day. They have your look. They have the smell of your skin. They’re like your children. They’re too intimate, Stacy. Too close to the bone. If I sold these, I wouldn’t be selling shirts and dresses. I’d be selling you to whoever was willing to pay.”
He shakes his head. Looks out the window. His emotion is impossible to read. He seems angry and forlorn. Disappointed and sad. Furious and aroused.
“Why did you show me these?”
“I—”
He turns. “You’ve been thinking about me.”
“Of course I have. You asked me to make—”
“Make what? Not these. How do you expect me to respond to this?”
“I thought you’d be angry.”
“So why, then?”
“Because I had to. Because they’re what came out of me.”
“You had an assignment.”
“And I did it wrong. I already said I’m sorry.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
But he won’t look at me.
“I don’t understand. Hampton, tell me what’s wrong!”
One more time, he turns back to face me. There’s something new in his eyes.
“What’s wrong? What’s wrong is that they’re perfect. The amount of attention you gave these — the amount of care you put into them? It’s as obvious as the sun during the day. What’s wrong is that you made …” he sets the dress aside and shakes the shirt with a fist. “… something intimate. I don’t have to try this on to know it’s not just a shirt. It’s my shirt. You wrote down my sizes, didn’t you? From the jacket.”
I didn’t write his sizes down. But I know them. I know them from working his fabrics, from cutting his jacket’s lining. I know them from putting my arms around him. From feeling the breadth of his chest against my bare breasts. I didn’t realize I was cutting the shirt to fit him, but he’s right. He doesn’t have to try it on for me to see the fit will be better than perfect.
“What does this mean, Stacy?”
“It doesn’t mean anything.”
“Bullshit.”
“I …”
“You have been thinking about me. It’s obvious. You asked me what’s wrong? What’s wrong is that you made me a goddamn shirt. A shirt with your heart on its sleeve. You’ve made me something I could never put my arms through without feeling like I’m inside you.”
“I just did what you asked!”
But now he’s tucked the shirt under his arm. He takes two steps forward and reaches for the buttons on his shirt.
“What are you doing?”
As the top button opens. Then the next, and the next. It happens faster and faster, and in the frantic fumbling, the second-to-last button rips the fabric. It’s a shoddy shirt. Expensive, probably. Quality? Not like what I’ve made him.
“Trying it on.”
“It’s only a demo,” I say.
But his shirt hits the ground, and he picks up the new one. He slides one arm into the hole, and when he does I feel a shiver.
Then the other.
“Like a glove,” he says.
“Hampton, I—”
He steps forward. “Like a lover.”