Very Valentine

Gram has a look of complete satisfaction on her face. Nobody messes with Gram when it comes to shoes. She is the expert.

  “These are size sevens,” Debra says, looking inside the shoe. “How much do we owe you?”

  “I’m afraid we never sell the samples.”

  “Well, you have to.” Debra’s smile disappears. “This is an emergency.”

  “Actually, maybe you could just loan them to us? We would fully acknowledge your services in the film’s credits,” Julie offers.

  “That would be fine.” Gram shakes Julie’s hand.

  “Megan, wrap them up and meet us at the costume trailer,” Debra commands. “Mrs. Angelini, we’ll need you to come to the set, too, of course.”

  “Me? Why?” Gram is confused.

  “We’re shooting the scene now. If there are any problems, you’ll need to be there to address them. I can’t take a chance with that”—she points to the Fougeray—“happening again.”

  Gram looks at me. “May I bring…”

  “Bring, bring,” Debra says impatiently. “Megan will show you the way.” Debra pulls on her coat as they move to the door. They go as quickly as they came, like the lightning from the storm that pierces the room in a flash and then is gone. I grab Megan’s sweatshirt out of the dryer. She pulls it on.

  “I could find Our Lady of Pompeii with my eyes closed.” Gram throws her hands up. “Grab my kit, Valentine. Let’s go.”

  There’s always some television show or movie filming on the streets of Greenwich Village. The forty-seven versions of Law and Order are shot in Manhattan, so it’s rare when there isn’t a crew somewhere, filming something. We’ve become accustomed to waiting on corners until the cameras stop rolling, then tiptoeing over snakes of cables and wires, past trailers as crew members talk into headsets and check their clipboards.

  When Gram was young, there was a magical place called Hollywood where movies were made. Now, movie stars walk our neighborhood streets like ordinary people. It ceases to be magic when I see Kate Winslet three people in front of me in line at the Starbucks on Fourteenth Street, so close I can see she wears Essie’s Ballet Slippers nail polish. They’re not icons when you can bump into them while running errands. Gram never saw Bette Davis at her bodega or Hedy Lamarr at the hairdresser’s.

  “Follow me,” Megan says, motioning to us as Gram and I enter Our Lady of Pompeii Church. She turns and smiles shyly. “I forgot. You guys know this place better than me.”

  The scent of spicy incense hangs in the air from last Sunday’s High Mass. The polished marble floor is covered by boxes of lighting instruments and wheels of cable. The table where the Sunday bulletins are fanned is filled with bagels, plastic coffee urns, and heaps of snacks. How strange to see the old Gothic church so out of context. Its rich carved pews, stained-glass windows, and baroque altar went from being a house of God to being a movie backdrop in no time.

  “I can’t believe Father Prior let them use the church,” Gram whispers.

  “Even the Catholic Church likes good publicity,” I whisper back. “And a hefty rental fee.”

  I pick out the star of the movie because she’s wearing a wedding gown.

  “That’s Anna Christina,” Megan tells us. “She’s an unknown until this movie comes out, then she’s Reese Witherspoon after Legally Blonde.”

  Anna Christina appears to be barely twenty years old. She is tiny, with an hourglass figure. Her oval face is framed by waxy black curls that create a startling contrast against her flawless skin. Her lips are cherries in the snow, a true red that says 1950. Debra is on her knees next to her, fussing with the shoes.

  “They’re too big.” Debra stands, looking like she’s about to blow. Standing next to me, I can practically feel Megan’s blood pressure skyrocket.

  “Let me see.” Gram sails through the chaos toward the actress, but needs to grip Debra’s arm in order to kneel down. “Damn knees,” I hear her say as I thread through the crowd and kneel next to her. Gram presses the toe and the vamp of the satin mule then gingerly slides it off Anna Christina’s foot. Gram looks at Debra. “Which shoe comes off in the scene?”

  “The right one.”

  “Give me the cotton batting,” Gram says to me. “We’re going to sew it in.”

  Gram unspools the cotton and cuts a square gently with a small pair of gold work scissors. I thread the needle and make a quick knot. Gram places the batting in the toe of the shoe and slips it back on Anna’s foot. It’s still loose. Gram takes another square of cotton batting and makes an arch in the vamp of the shoe. After another quick fitting, Gram hands me the shoe and the batting. “Sew it.”

  I push the delicate needle through the fabric and into the cotton from the vamp to the toe. I stitch a tiny seam anchoring the cotton. I do the same on the other side of the shoe, in essence, making a shoe within a shoe. Gram takes the slipper and places it back on the actress’s foot.

  “Now it’s too snug!” Debra cries. “It will never fall off.”

  “We aren’t done,” Gram says in a tone of voice I haven’t heard since she caught Tess and me drawing on her bedroom walls when I was five. The set falls into a hushed silence. I look up and see the director, a young man in a baseball cap and a down vest, pacing as though he’s awaiting the birth of quadruplets. Gram hands the shoe back to me. “Make a gusset on the left side.”

  I sew a seam, tightening the fabric over the instep. I hand it back to Gram.

  “Give me the wax pencil, Val.”

  I give Gram the pencil from the kit. She slides the wax over the interior of the insole, softening the leather and making it pliable. Gram slips the mule back on Anna’s foot. “Now, Anna, when it comes time to lose the shoe, just lift your toes and pull your foot out. It should slide right off. Try it.”

  Anna does as instructed, lifting her foot off the floor and pressing her toe against the top of the vamp. The shoe slides off. “It works!” Anna says, smiling, her relief as palpable as my own.

  Suddenly, the crew, who were standing around sending poison rays of worry our way, spring into action. They move to their positions, shouting orders, as the director settles into his seat and stares into the monitor.

  Megan pulls Gram and me back into the shadows. We watch Anna Christina as she pushes the mahogany church doors open with two hands, then runs in her duchess-satin wedding gown through the vestibule, and outside, onto the landing of Our Lady of Pompeii. On cue, she loses the rigged Gilda mule as she steps onto the top step.

  “It’s a tracking shot,” Megan explains. “One continuous movement.”

  In what seems like the tenth time they film the sequence, the shoe falls off on cue, as it has every time. Gram and I breathe again. A man standing next to the director hollers, “Cut. Moving on.” The crew fans out, toting, lifting, pushing equipment all around us. Debra goes to the director, who has a few words with her. “You saved our asses,” Megan says, smiling. “He’s telling her he got the shot.”

  Debra pats the director on the back and comes over to us. “Fougeray out, Angelini in.”

  4

  Gramercy Park

  I SPRITZ SOME CLASSIC Burberry cologne (a gift from my mother during one of her Brit literary benders) on my neck then pump some into the air overhead where it settles on me in a fragrant peach-and-cedar mist. I lean into the mirror over the dresser and check my makeup. The gold-leafed mirror in my bedroom is so old the paint behind the glass has peeled into swirls of sepia, which gives my complexion an alabaster sheen. This magic mirror is my Restylane on the wall. Roman Falconi’s business card rests in the crook of the mirror, and for whatever reason, I tuck it in the pocket of my evening coat. Maybe I’ll get hungry enough to check out his restaurant sometime.

  I grab my evening bag off the bed and open it, checking for my wallet, MetroCard and my emergency makeup trifecta: mauve lipstick, pale pink lip pencil, and concealer. I pass Gram, in her room, slipping out of her work clothes and into her housedress.

  “Gabriel’s waiting for you
,” she calls after me as I go down the stairs.

  “Gram says you know Roman Falconi,” Gabriel says as I enter the living room. Gabriel is a compact version of Marcello Mastroianni with the coloring of Snow White. We met on the first day of college, waiting in a long line to sign up for theater-arts courses. The first thing he said after introducing himself was, “I’m gay.” And I said, “That won’t be a problem.” We’ve been best friends ever since. “How about a glass of wine before we go?”

  “I need it,” he says.

  I go into the kitchen and pull a bottle of Poggio al Lupo out of the wine rack. “So do you think you can get us into Ca’ d’Oro?” Gabriel sits down at the counter.

  “You’ve heard of it?”

  “You really don’t get out much, do you?”

  “Only when you invite me.” I pour Gabriel a glass of wine, then one for myself.

  “New York magazine called it the season’s hottest Italian debut. I’ve been trying to get a reservation since he opened. Will you please call him?”

  “I’m not calling him.” I toast Gabriel. “Salute.”

  Gabriel toasts me. “Why?”

  “I came home from grocery shopping and he was sitting here at this table speaking Italian to Gram, who was completely besotted with him. Let her call him.”

  “You can trust a man who reveres women of a certain age.”

  “I don’t know about that. He wasn’t here to relive Gram’s memories of postwar Manhattan. He wanted to meet the woman he saw naked on the roof.”

  Gabriel’s eyes widen. “He’s the guy who saw you?”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah. He probably thinks I’m an exhibitionist.”

  “Well, he must have liked what he saw.”

  “You will do anything to get a table at his restaurant.”

  Gabriel puts his hands in the air. “I’m a foodie. It’s serious to me. Okay, so—what’s he like?”

  “Attractive.”

  “What a tepid word.”

  “Okay. He’s tall and dark and straight on, he could even be considered handsome. But from a certain angle, his nose looks like he’s wearing Groucho Marx glasses, the ones with the plastic nose and the eyebrows.”

  “The Italian profile. The occasional curse of our people.”

  “How do I look?” I ask Gabriel, revealing my dress under my coat in a Suzy Parker pose.

  “Appropriate,” he decides.

  “And you thought attractive was a tepid word! Appropriate is worse!”

  “That is to say, you look just right to see an ex-boyfriend whom you almost married who is now married to someone else. I like the ruching.”

  “This is Gram’s dress.” I straighten the rosettes of silk ruffled across the hem.

  “She looks better in it than I ever did,” Gram says as she comes in from the hallway. “What’s this fancy party you’re going to?”

  “Bret Fitzpatrick’s company party on the roof of the Gramercy Park Hotel.”

  Gabriel smooths his thick bangs off to one side. “It’s a private club now. I’m glad Bret figured out how to wheel and deal to become whatever it is that he is. What is he again?”

  “Some fund-management thing.” I place a small canister of mints into my evening bag. I have two reasons for going to this party tonight. First, I’m still thin from Jaclyn’s wedding. Second, I need Bret’s help figuring out how to finance my future. I don’t trust my brother to have my best interests at heart as he restructures our debt. Bret could be a big help. “Bret is a vice president of something. To be honest, I don’t understand what he does.”

  “Why would you? You’re a cobbler and me, I’m the maître d’ at the Café Carlyle. Let’s face it. We’re service people, while your ex-lover Bret…Sorry, Teodora.”

  “Gabriel.” I stop him before he can dig himself in any deeper. I pour Gram a glass of wine and give it to her.

  “I’m happy to hear that my granddaughter is a woman with a full life.”

  “Do you need anything before I leave?” I ask.

  “No, thank you, I’m going to heat up the penne, drink this wine, and watch Mario Batali on the food channel.”

  “Did you know your boyfriend Roman Falconi has a hot restaurant?”

  “He knew all about tomatoes,” Gram says proudly. “And he spoke beautiful Italian.” Grams folds her hands gratefully, as if in prayer. “I thought he was wonderful.”

  “You’re a sucker for an accent,” I remind her.

  “So am I,” Gabriel says longingly.

  “I just wish you’d be careful about who you let into the house.”

  “Valentine, relax. Roman is Barese. I knew his great-uncle Carm a hundred years ago. He was a regular at Ida De Carlo’s, on Hudson Street. And I’ll bet you weren’t nice to him, were you?”

  “Nice enough to get a dinner invitation.” I give Gram a quick kiss. I follow Gabriel out the door and down the stairs.

  The roof of the Gramercy Park Hotel is a posh indoor/outdoor living room, with glazed walls filled with immense, colorful paintings; thick Persian rugs; low, lacquered furniture; and a fireplace, blazing in the cool autumn night. A chandelier of green glass foliage and twinkling white lights hangs over the aerie like a canopy in a fairy forest. The cityscape seems to fall away in the distance, and from here, the skyscrapers look like black velvet jewelry boxes strewn with pearls.

  This isn’t old New York, where club hopping included the Latin Quarter and El Morocco. This is brand-new New York, where hoteliers are impresarios, and their elegant salons compete for a wealthy, connected clientele to adorn their whimsical yet priceless settings. We’re in the thicket of new posh. My ex-boyfriend Bret Fitzpatrick holds court as the Chrysler Building looms behind him like a platinum sword. How appropriate, as this man was once my knight in shining armor.

  “Valentine!” Bret excuses himself and comes right over to us. He kisses me on both cheeks. Then he gives Gabriel a big hug. “It’s a reunion!”

  “Don’t use that word.” Gabriel gives Bret a good slap on the back before letting go of him. “We sound old when you use that word.”

  “Well, I’m older than you, so I can call it whatever I want,” Bret says, smiling. “It’s great to see you guys. Thank you for coming.”

  “Who are all these people?” Gabriel looks around.

  Bret lowers his voice, “Clients and their friends. One of our partners in the hedge fund is a member here.” He looks at me. “I thought you’d get a kick out of this.”

  “It’s something else,” I tell him.

  “You look great, Valentine,” Bret says as Gabe heads to the bar to get us each a drink.

  “So do you.” And he does. Bret looks like a successful Wall Street financier who has earned his place at the top. His custom-made suit shows off his height, while his Ferragamo dress shoes show his good taste. His light brown hair is thinning, but it doesn’t matter. He has eyes the color of gray flannel, the expression in them full of warmth. He has a face you can trust. His self-confidence is apparent, but not in any way arrogant. Bret is self-made, and he carries himself with the grace of a man who has earned it. The stoop of the shoulders of his youth is gone now, replaced with an upright military posture. He has acquired the thing that children born of privilege seem to possess at birth, and the rest of us must develop—it’s called polish.

  When I first met Bret, he was a brilliant working-class kid from Floral Park, with a burning ambition to make it. He used to mow the lawn for a big Wall Street broker who promised Bret a job if he went to college and got a degree in finance. Bret did even better. He was valedictorian of his class at Saint John’s and then went to Harvard Business School. In ten years, Bret shed the old life and slipped into a new one, which fit him like a tailored shirt from Barneys. There’s a lot of history between us, but it’s never awkward. Bret excuses himself as he is pulled away by a distinguished-looking older man in a suit.

  Gabriel returns with my drink. “It’s a hee-toe,” he says, giving me the glass.
br />   “What’s that?”

  “I don’t know. Mow, glow, flow, something—hee-toe. Everything you drink now is a hee-toe.” Gabriel takes a sip.

  “Or a teeny. A Gabetini, Valentini. Brettini.” I try the drink. “This hotel is not as I remember it.” I look over the edge of the roof to the treetops of Gramercy Park, a deep green island filled with beams of gold light from the old-fashioned streetlamps. The park is enclosed by a wrought-iron fence, and is placed in the center of a square composed of traditional brownstones and grand prewar apartment buildings. “I remember when my friend Beáta Jachulski got married here. It was before the Europeans bought it. It used to be so cozy and the food was delicious. That was before the Age of Enlightenment. Did you see the paintings in the lobby?”

  “If you think this hotel has changed, how about our Bret?” Gabriel whispers.

  “He had to.” I lean against the wall enclosing the roof and look out over the crowd. “These are the people Bret has to impress. It can’t be easy.”

  “You’re so forgiving.” Gabriel takes a sip of his drink. “It makes me sort of sick.”

  “I’m really just proud of him,” I say. Gabriel looks at me with a mixture of understanding and suspicion. Five years have come and gone since Bret and I broke up. Tonight is proof that he would never have fit into the new life I cobbled together, like patches of leather from the workshop floor. He was destined for this.

  “Well, maybe I’m just hurt because the three of us were always us, and now Bret is a them. He’s the only them I know.” Gabriel fishes a maraschino cherry out of his drink. Two more roll around the bottom of his glass.

  “How’d you get three cherries?” I want to know.

  “I asked.”

  I watch as Bret moves from his clients over to the corner of the roof where three pretty girls in their early twenties sip cocktails and smoke. It’s chilly out, but they wear no stockings on their tanned legs, and their feet are stuffed into pumps revealing toe cleavage and a slight gap on the buttress that supports their four-inch heels. These girls buy shoes for fashion, not fit.