Aftermath of Dreaming by DeLaune Michel Read Free Book Online Page B

above. Three aquariums, each a different letter of “ROX,” hold languid blue angelfish. As I wait for the salesgirl to get Roxanne, it is hard even for me not to be overcome by the extensive color-coding, especially when it strikes me that the shirt I changed into matches.
    Emerging from the depths of the store, Roxanne glides to the counter where I am waiting, puts her overly manicured hands on her hips, and says, “Let’s see what you got.”
    No “hello” or “nice to meet you,” so I quickly decide to forgo all that, too. I read somewhere once that mirroring the other person’s behavior in a business meeting helps you establish a rapport—I just never thought that would mean being curt, but it’s her store; I’m only selling to it.
    I lean down, unzip the fake Vuitton travel bag, and start taking the black trays out. I bought the bag when I began going to women’s homes to show my jewelry for private commissions and sales. I needed something large enough to carry the trays in, and I realized that with the amount of gold and gems (semiprecious, but still) coming out of it, the women would assume the bag was real, and the implied fiscal success might make them feel better about the prices they were going to hear.
    â€œThese are the earrings, bracelets, and rings I told you about on the phone.” I have set three trays on the counter side by side. Straightening a ring in one of them, I glance at Roxanne to see which pieces have caught her eye, then unhook a bracelet since her attention is on the earrings, and lightly blow imaginary dust off it, turning it this way and that, as if to check its gems, but really to give her time to see everything without me staring at her or off into space. I put the bracelet back, wait a long moment, and then bring the last tray out.
    â€œAnd these are the pins, though they can also be worn as pendants on a chain. See this…” I pick one up and turn it over to reveal a small loop on the back. “But I prefer them for what they are.” I have jumped in, my words escaping in an air-bubble rush, like a sea diver adjusting his mask. “The whole idea is a further personalization of our clothes. That simple black top we all have, well, you put one of these on, or two really, and the odds of someone else…I mean, how many parties have you been to where thank God for different hair or we’d all look just alike.”
    Roxanne sees me see her blow-dried, dyed-blond, appears-everywhere hair. “Plus,” I say, trying to fix my gaffe, “being pinned.”
    â€œPinned?” Roxanne’s eyes swim over my body, as if trying to find this new form of piercing that somehow slipped past her au courant antennae.
    â€œIt’s an old-fashioned promise thing. A guy would pin his sweetheart with his fraternity pin before she got the ring. Of course, this is 1998 L.A. so the concept is pinning yourself instead of waiting for someone else to do it.” I silently bless Momma’s stories of Daddy’s Sigma Chi days for this immediate inspiration.
    A fish in the X is staring at me from one eye while his fins silently keep him in place. I have a sudden image of each fish in the alphabet tanks sporting one of my pins, yet still swimming—a mobile hydrodisplay.
    â€œAnd the prices are?”
    The make-or-break moment has arrived. I pull out a price sheet from the bag and place it on the counter in front of her. Every item in the trays is on it: listed, described, and priced. I figured out a while ago that a piece of paper is much better than pointing to each piece of jewelry while saying a number, then sometimes having to go back and repeat a price since people couldn’t remember so many at once. And a tangible sheet of paper makes it seem as if the prices exist separately from me, so if a customer is teetering, I can drop the amount a bit, instantly becoming good cop to the price sheet’s