Free Lovers by Judith Krantz Page A

glasses off.
    “Why are you smiling at me like that?” David demanded, wondering how his private life could be put on hold for a decade when the only private life he’d ever want was sitting right there in the office with him.
    “Because I’m trying to drive you crazy—sir.”
    “You don’t really give a shit about swimsuits, do you?”
    “No team spirit, sir, that’s always been my problem.”
    “It’s a seven-million-dollar account, small for some people but major for a boutique like us. And Indigo Seas is a solid company with terrific growth potential.”
    “Oh, wow!”
    “You have the vocabulary of an eight-year-old.”
    “Seven million, hey, that’s almost enough to make areally cheap movie,” Gigi teased. The poor benighted guy was just too serious. She owed it to him to make him smile.
    “Gigi, we’re still wasting time.”
    “On the contrary, we’re getting to know each other, getting the personal stuff out of the way, as Archie suggested. Or was it Byron?”
    “I don’t want to hear how you lost your virginity, Gigi, I’ve changed my mind. I
never
want to know.”
    “Ah, gee, that hurts my feelings. If you won’t listen now, you’ll just have to go through it later. It’s not a subject we can skip, like third grade. But okay.” She grabbed a yellow pad and a pencil.
    “Davy, you keep calling the target customer for this client ‘large.’ I know and you know that you really want to say ‘fat.’ We probably agree that ‘fat’ is not a word that will sell this product. Even ‘plump’ won’t do. So could we think of our customers as ‘abundant’? Abundance is a lovable concept, lots of good things to eat and drink, plenty for everybody, joy and comfort all around.”
    “Sure. I’m just the art director here. Never large, always abundant, as far as I’m concerned.”
    “At Scruples Two we sell tons and tons of dresses for abundant women. We call them ‘Dolly Moons.’ ”
    “How the hell did you manage to use Dolly Moon’s name? Her last movie with Dustin Hoffman was the best!” David sat up straight.
    “As usual, Dolly was trying to lose weight, so she decided she’d be motivated to diet by wanting to stay
out
of wearing Dolly Moons, and gave us permission to use her name. And she’s Billy’s best friend, that helped. A lot.”
    “We obviously can’t get her for Indigo Seas.”
    “No. But my point is that in the catalog we didn’t shoot the Dolly Moons on thin models, we used real abundant women. Abundant women know damn well they’re abundant. They’re deservedly suspicious, and get infuriated when they’re being shown size-six models wearing clothes meant for them. There’s nothing wrong with being abundant, some women naturally are, some not. In any othercentury—even early in this century—it was a non-issue. Many men, a surprisingly large group, have no objections at all to abundance. You can
never
underestimate the charms of abundant women. But when they buy swimsuits they’re gritting their teeth and hating the idea, so they put it off as long as possible. In order to merely get them into the stores we have to make swimsuits at least a somewhat
desirable
purchase—but yearning is out of the question.”
    “I’m listening.”
    “The Nina Blanchard Agency has a whole list of former models who grew too abundant to work. That’s where we found them for Scruples Two. Why don’t we show the product on the most proudly abundant and prettiest model we can find? Make her our Indigo Seas poster girl?”
    “Well … yeah … maybe,” David said slowly. “It’s never been done, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be.”
    “Maybe a guy with her?” Gigi wondered.
    “No, I see her alone in a pool, a lush Venus in lush turquoise water … she’s … she’s not floating … she’s bursting up out of the water, straight up from the bottom of the pool, lush sparkles of water flying through in the air all around her, lush shoulders, lush hair