Free Wish Upon a Star by Goldsmith Olivia Page A

Saks card,’ Claire said. It actually was her mother’s, but at this point she owed Claire something over a couple of thousand dollars. And Claire would pay the bill when it came in.
    ‘Well, that’s different!’ Tina said. She lived on her credit cards. ‘Let’s go.’
    Two hours later, after cruising the third and fourth floors at Saks, Claire had on a cream silk blouse she was at last ready to buy, despite the price tag of two hundred and ten dollars. ‘You’re nuts!’ Tina told her. ‘This was thirty-nine dollars. On sale at Banana Republic.’ She pointed to her own top and Claire looked at the two of them in the three-way mirror. That decided her. The blouse she had on looked as if it cost five hundred dollars more than Tina’s. It was something Katherine Rensselaer might wear.
    Getting the black T-shirt, thank god, was easy and so were shoes. In fact, two pairs. It was pleasant in the shoe department, a relief to be sitting down, to be served by a polite older man and easy to give him her size without blushing. She didn’t have to fight a zipper to get into a high heel. She selected backless black ones with beige stitching that were comfortable enough for walking and a pair of navy courts with a little leather bow—in the back. ‘They are something,’ Tina admitted. ‘And everyone’s wearing heels with pants now.’
    ‘Really?’
    ‘Absolutely!’ Tina assured her. Though Claire didn’t totally trust Tina’s taste, a mannequin near the shoe department was dressed in narrow slacks and four-inch spikes. That inspired her to go back to the fourth floor and get a pair of navy pants with side slits to show off the shoes. To her delight, she fit into an eight.
    ‘They run a little big,’ the saleswoman told them.
    ‘So does her ass,’ Tina said.
    Claire ignored the laughter and bought the slacks, though the wisecrack made her think about getting undressed in front of Mr. Wonderful.
    Next, Claire and Tina went to the lingerie department. As Claire had feared, Tina kept managing to find the few things that were trampy or in bad taste or both. ‘I can’t picture myself in that,’ Claire told her as she held up a black lace bodysuit with underwire cups and a minuscule thong string.
    ‘It’s not what you picture,’ Tina said. ‘It’s what he pictures. And sees.’ She waggled her fingers through the crotch of the transparent lace.
    After the remark about her butt, Claire certainly wasn’t wearing a thong. She just shook her head and finally selected a blush pink satin nightgown with lace across the bodice. It could be seen through but only just. ‘And you might want the matching robe,’ the saleslady suggested. Claire did.
    It was only when they got to the raincoats that she had a crisis. Most of them were six or seven hundred dollars. She looked at her mother’s card and simply couldn’t do it. She’d have to wear her green coat, though now it seemed tacky and wrong. She sighed. ‘These are ugly anyway,’ Tina said.
    On the ground floor, on the way out, Claire’s eye was caught by a string of irregularly shaped pearls. They weren’t real, but the luster was beautiful and they were strung on a gold cord with space in between each one. ‘Oh no!’ Tina said. ‘Why don’t we just go to Tiffany’s?’
    ‘Because they sell real pearls and these are just fakes.’
    ‘What’s the diff? You can’t afford this stuff either,’ Tina told her. But though they were a hundred and five dollars, Claire decided she could, along with the matching earrings.
    ‘But they’re so plain,’ Tina complained. ‘Everything you got is beige. Are you a beige person?’
    ‘I guess so,’ Claire said as she took the cute little bag from the sales clerk.
    ‘They do look lovely against your skin,’ the clerk said. ‘Enjoy them.’ Claire promised her she would.
    As she and Tina walked through the thinning crowd on their way to the subway Claire refused to think about the total she’d spent. ‘What