Window Dressing. Nikki Rivers

get a job,” I said as I opened a cupboard door and searched for a baking sheet. “But I need time to find one, Mother.”

      “Right. You’ve only had ten years,” she answered.

      That my mother disapproves of my choices in life is no secret to anyone who has ever seen us together. But, just in case I might have forgotten, she was kind enough to take this opportunity to remind me.

      “I honestly have never understood why you didn’t finish college. You weren’t raised to be dependent on anyone, Lauren. Certainly not a man. I’ve been taking care of myself since I turned sixteen. I’ve—”

      I found the pan I needed and slammed it onto the counter top. “Just because you programmed yourself to be the woman you wanted to become when you were twelve years old and first discovered that you had cheekbones doesn’t mean—”

      She didn’t let me finish. “Oh, you think that isn’t exactly what you’ve done?” she asked.

      I gasped. “That’s nothing like what I’ve done!”

      She shrugged. “Keep your little delusions, Lauren, if it makes you feel noble. At least I have the consolation of knowing you aren’t trying to win back that jerk you married.” She stood. “That said, I hope you intend to do some grooming before Roger gets here. It wouldn’t hurt to have him feel sorry that he screwed up for a change.” She picked up her enormous purse. “Take a look at what’s in the shopping bag,” she said. “And don’t be stubborn about it.” She came over and kissed my forehead—easy since she was about five foot eleven, even without the mules, and I was five foot six—murmured disapprovingly over my hair for a few moments, then clicked her way back to the front door. “Good luck with Roger,” she yelled before the door slammed.

      “That woman drives me nuts,” I muttered to the dough as I started to shape it into dinner rolls. Face it, we drove each other nuts.

      I’d always suspected that my mother had “career girl” stamped on her birth certificate. It wasn’t that she didn’t like men—there had been no shortage of men over the years to take her to dinner, the theater, New York—she just didn’t want to be married to one. She certainly hadn’t wanted all the things that came with marriage in the fifties and early sixties. I was obviously an accident. She’d stayed married to my father just long enough to give birth to me. Gorgeous and irresponsible, Daddy had set out for the Florida Keys before I’d learned to talk, but I still heard from him every Christmas and on my birthday. And I still kept a picture of him, wearing swim trunks and a tan George Hamilton would envy, on my bedroom dresser.

      I finished shaping the rolls, covered them with a gingham linen towel and went to the sink to wash my hands. I kept glancing over my shoulder at the shopping bag Bernice had left in the breakfast nook. Curiosity finally got the better of me and I wiped my hands on a towel and went to investigate.

      Another little black dress. I drew it out of the bag and held it in front of me. Not bad. Maybe I’d wear it tonight. If it fit. I looked at the tag and was surprised to see that it was actually my size. Maybe Bernice had finally gotten it into her head that I was never going to be a size eight. I grinned. If that was the case, then anything was possible.

      CHAPTER 3

      For a few minutes I almost forgot.

      As I started down the stairs, wearing the dress my mother had delivered earlier, the scents from the kitchen took me back to evenings when the sound of music had come from Gordy’s room upstairs and the house had felt cozy and safe. That’s how I’d felt in this life I had built for Gordy and me. Home safe—like a kid who’d been playing kick the can and had rushed out madly from the shadows of dusk to hit goal. But I’d forgotten something about how the game was played. The win was always only temporary. You never knew what was going to happen in the next round.

      I was bending over the open oven door, basting what I’d hoped was going to help me win the next round, when I heard the front door open and Moira’s voice loudly purr, “Yum-mee—something smells good enough to eat. And look at that table,” she said as she came through the dining room. “And look at you, girlfriend!”

      I shut the oven door while Moira stood in the kitchen doorway and studied the dress I was wearing.

      “Donna Karan?” she asked.

      “Right,” I answered.

      “Bernice was here,” Moira said.

      “Right again.”

      She grimaced. “How did it go?”

      “It was typical Bernice. First she cut me down at the ankles and then she wished me good luck.”

      “Good luck? Don’t tell me you’re expecting a man for dinner!” Moira put her hand to her chest and slumped dramatically against the wall. “Oh my god, you’re dating and you didn’t tell me!”

      “I am expecting a man for dinner. But it’s not a date. It’s strictly business.”

      Suspicion brought her upright again. “Business with whom?” she asked.

      “Roger,” I answered as I walked past her to check on the table one last time.

      Moira scurried after me, her arms outstretched. In the fringed peacock-blue cashmere shawl she was wearing over a matching V-neck sweater, she looked like a horrified exotic bird. “Cloth napkins and a Donna Karan dress! I had no idea you were this desperate.” She swept me into her arms. “Sweetie, don’t you know Stan and I would never let you starve? You don’t have to resort to this!”

      It took me a moment to disentangle myself from her shawl.

      “Resort to what?” I demanded once I’d spit fringe out of my mouth.

      “To trying to woo the shirt back into your life,” Moira stated like the answer was obvious.

      “Damn it, does the entire world see me as that pathetic? Bad enough that my mother jumped to the same conclusion. I expected more from you, Moira. Give me a little credit, will you?”

      Moira flapped a hand at me. “Simmer down, hon. I mean, it’s a gigantic whew that I was wrong, but why the big production if there’s gonna be no seduction?”

      “Well, I didn’t exactly say there wasn’t going to be any seduction,” I said demurely as I fluffed the giant mums in the short amber color vase in the middle of the dining room table. “But not,” I added before Moira could erupt again, “sexual seduction. I’m using food to have my way with the man, true,” I admitted, “but only so I can convince him to let me stay in the house for a few more months.”

      Moira digested this information for a few seconds. “Hmm, shrewd,” she said, nodding sagely. “Very shrewd.”

      “I’m glad you approve.”

      She pulled a pout. “Well, I am a little hurt that I wasn’t consulted since you know how I love mischief, but it’s a solid idea, sister. Roger was always a sucker for your cooking. That dress isn’t going to hurt, either.”

      I looked down at myself. For once, my mother had gotten it right. The dress fit like it was tailored for me. Made of something black and soft, it had a wide V neckline and hugged my body to the waist where the skirt flared gently to just above my ankles. It made the most of my flat midriff and decent waist-line while it hid my slightly generous hips and backside. I looked good and I knew it.

      “Thank you,” I said.

      Moira followed me back into the kitchen and plucked a crumb of topping from the apple crisp cooling on the counter. “I could easily be bribed into something for a dish of this stuff.”

      “Come over for leftovers later. You can dry the dishes.”

      “I’ll dry the dishes as long as you dish the dish. I want to hear every little crumb of what goes on between you and the shirt,” she said.

      I assured her that I would spill