LITMIR.BIZ

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let it go to your head. They just build you up to tear you down.’ He shrugged and turned away. ‘See you on the slopes.’

      Karen sighed, but tried to keep her smile visible. There was professional jealousy in every business, but there seemed to be a little more jealousy in fashion. Karen wasn’t sure why that was. Belle, her mother, had once described politics back in the teacher’s room at grammar school by saying, ‘The fighting is so dirty because the stakes are so low.’ Perhaps the fighting in the fashion world had become so dirty because the stakes were so high. In the eighties, fashion had become global; the take was bigger than ever before, and it seemed as if the knives had been sharpened.

      ‘Well, that was a pleasant omen,’ Karen whispered. ‘I feel like Sleeping Beauty at the banquet when the Bad Fairy appeared.’

      ‘Oh, forget the Bad Fairy,’ Jeffrey told her. ‘No one pays attention to Tony anymore.’

      ‘Yeah. That was his point.’

      Karen realized all at once that this new visibility would also make her more vulnerable. Other designers could take shots at her now. There were those rare few who continued to go their own way. Bill Blass, probably richer than any other American designer (with the exception of Ralph Lauren), was always friendly, open, and noncompetitive. He’d been one of the first of the established fashion moguls to be nice to Karen. If his talent wasn’t huge and his clothes were sometimes uninspired, he’d be the least offended to hear it. Geoffrey Beene, a true original, was another who went his own way. His clothes were inspired, an example of true artistry, and perhaps that was one of the reasons he was an iconoclast and always above the fashion fray. In school, Karen had learned a lot by simply looking at Geoffrey Beene’s designs.

      Karen smiled and decided to shrug off the de Freise incident. Now she’d have to face the rest of the mob. She and Jeffrey walked into the ballroom and were engulfed by their own competitors and co-workers. There are nice people here, Karen reassured herself. Then she saw Norris Cleveland.

      Karen tried to spend most of her time and energy in the workroom, out of the gossip and back-biting arena. She also tried not to compare herself or her work to anyone else. But if there was one woman in the business she disliked, it was the one approaching her right now. Norris Cleveland was, in Karen’s opinion, worse than a bad designer. She was the kind of designer who gave fashion artists a bad name. She was lazy and derivative; the worst of her clothes were either dull or unwearable, but … The ‘but’ was that Norris had a genius for having friends in the right places and getting her parties, quips, nights on the town, and her newest line placed in all the right newspapers, magazines, and television shows. Of course, calling them her clothes was an act of charity: Norris stole a little from here and a little from there. Lately, it seemed Cleveland had been imitating Karen’s style. The worst part was that she even copied badly! But Karen was determined not to let anything or anyone spoil the night. She smiled at Norris, or at least she bared her teeth.

      Norris was as bad at business as she was at design, but a few years ago she had married Wall Street Money and her company had been saved by a new inflow of cash. If the word on the Avenue was true – that Norris’s husband was getting tired of both writing checks and of being referred to as ‘Mr Cleveland’ – it did not seem to have dimmed Norris’s smile tonight. She came at Karen with her arms open, revealing her painfully thin body encased in a sheath of yellow jersey. Now, as Norris made a kissing noise at each ear, Karen heard cameras begin to click. Somehow cameras always followed Norris Cleveland. Karen wondered if they were real press, or simply ringers on the society designer’s payroll.

      ‘Congratulations, darling,’ Norris said, in that breathy, exclusive-girls-school monotone that was so prevalent among the ladies who lunched – a sort of Jackie Kennedy Onassis with emphysema. Norris had always been pleasant to Karen, but on some deeper level, she could feel the woman’s envy and distaste. After all, Karen was nothing but an upstart. ‘I’m so pleased for you.’ Yeah, right. Norris then turned to Jeffrey and put her hand on his arm. ‘You must be very proud,’ she said to Jeffrey, and for some reason, when Norris said it, it sounded like an insult. Cameras flashed again, and Karen wondered if she’d be cropped out of the picture when it ran in Town and Country.

      Jeffrey just laughed. ‘Norris! What a dress!’ was all he said.

      She kept smiling. ‘Well, you’re not the only ones celebrating tonight. Have you heard? I’m about to launch my perfume.’

      God, how much money did her husband have to throw away? Karen wondered. A perfume could not be launched for less than ten or fifteen million dollars. A good launch cost triple that. And only the good ones lasted.

      Karen hated the perfume business. It was a cash cow for a lot of the fashion merchants, and had been since Coco Chanel invented the deal, but it was well known that it had brought only money and pain to Coco. Still, it would be perfect for Norris. Without feeling a moment’s guilt, she could sell packaging with her name on it to desperate people who vainly hoped for romance.

      ‘Best of luck,’ Karen murmured, and was delighted when Jeffrey moved her forward. ‘I hate her,’ Karen told her husband out of the corner of her mouth.

      ‘She knows that,’ he answered.

      Karen and Jeffrey moved smoothly through the crowd. It was wonderful, even hard to believe. Everyone said hello to her. She was definitely the Cinderella at this ball. And if she had spent most of her life on her knees in her workroom, tonight was the reward, the recognition for all that work.

      ‘Serious Money ahead,’ Jeffrey whispered, and nudged her. ‘A pillar of the community.’

      Bobby Pillar, the guy who had singlehandedly created a new television network and was now launching his own shopping channel, was moving toward them. Karen had met him once or twice before, but now, beaming, he approached her, his hand outstretched. ‘The It Girl!’ he cried, and instead of shaking her hand, he hugged her close. She was surprised, but after all, he was Hollywood. Always trendsetters, they’d given up air-kissing in the nineties – it was replaced with full frontal assault. Now Bobby surveyed her proudly, as if she was an invention of his own. ‘So? When are you going to create a line for me?’

      Karen shrugged, but smiled. There was something hamishe about Bobby. He was warm, familiar, and very, very Brooklyn. ‘Not tonight,’ she told him.

      Bobby laughed. ‘We ought to talk,’ he said. ‘You ought to see the kind of numbers I’m talking about.’

      Jeffrey said his hello, someone else greeted Bobby, and then Karen and Jeffrey were free to wander off. When they were out of earshot, Jeffrey turned to look back at Bobby. ‘Can you imagine?’ he said, outraged. ‘The guy is selling schlock jewelry and polyester pull-on pants. I don’t care if he’s desperate to upgrade, he’s not dragging your name down. Look what happened to Cher, and she just did an infomercial.’

      Karen shrugged. ‘Still, it’s nice to be asked.’ She certainly didn’t consider the attention an insult. Her husband was a cutie, but he was also a snob. Of course, he could afford to be – his family was wealthy, German Jews with more than enough money in Manhattan real estate. He’d gone to private schools and had always been part of a more glittering world than she had. He’d always been sought after while Karen was just a girl from Brooklyn.

      She wasn’t interested in socialites. The people in the room tonight – the ones who actually attracted her, who fascinated her – were the other designers. She wanted to talk with them. Yet those she respected always made her feel shy. And although tonight she was being recognized by them, there was not a lot of camaraderie in the fashion world. While she admired Valentino’s gowns, and sometimes appreciated the exuberance of Karl Lagerfeld, she couldn’t imagine hanging out with them. They spoke at least four languages, knew all the best restaurants in all the best cities, owned palazzi and villas, and went to the opera for fun. Karen couldn’t imagine them seeking out her company to split a Diet Coke and a rice cake.

      Three of the fashion

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