I really hate shopping. I know I have mentioned this before. I like having new clothes, but the actual shopping process always leaves me feeling irritable. Part of the problem is that I am short. Jeans and skirts that are not in petite sizes usually have about four inches of fabric hanging off the bottom of my feet, which require wide shoes. Sleeves hang over my hands, and straps are always two inches too long. Finidng something that looks good usually requires me to spend lots of time trying on things that look awful, and that does not generally make me cheerful.
So, though I've known for months that I'm going to a wedding in December, I completely avoided worrying about a dress, hoping that perhaps something would magically appear in my closet, or perhaps a personal-shopper-fairy-godmother would come out of a pumpkin and create one out of thin air, and I would avoid the process of trying things on and making decisions.
Finally, however, I realized I had to get it over with, and I went to Macy's and tried on three dresses. At this point, A Miracle Occurred. Three dresses fit me, and looked pretty nice. Not one, three. I actually left the store feeling good, and the whole process didn't take more than an hour. I decided I wanted the red halter dress, but I thought I would look for it online at a cheaper price before I went ahead and purchased it.
And then my sister, home for Thanksgiving, entered the equation. My sister loves to shop. She can spend hours agonizing over small purchasing decisions. When I explained that I was planning to buy a dress, she insisted that we depart on a long shopping journey, spanning two and a half miles of Upper West Side storefronts and countless images of garments on the internet.
"I think I'm going to buy the dress at Macy's," I told her repeatedly.
"No!" She exclaimed every time. "Look at this one, with the nice flowery pattern on the skirt, and it comes in petite sizes..."
"I think I'm going to buy the dress at Macy's," I repeated.
"Halter tops have been done," she told me. "Look at that one!"
"I'm going to buy the dress at Macy's." I announced. "But oh, all right, I'll try it on."
This was my mistake.
We were at the Banana Republic, and the dress was a little red strapless dress, suitable for weddings and other formal occasions. Because they didn't have my size, I chose the next size down and began looking for a fitting room. After about five minutes of poking my head into various corners, I found one, all the way across the store, by the men's sweaters. I didn't see any store employees about, so I just chose a room and tried on the dress.
It was one of those dresses that's tight in all the wrong places, and loose in the wrong places, and I did not trust it to stay up. Some dresses fit, and some dresses are too big, or too small, and some just don't fit. They were formed for someone else's body. This was one fo those dresses. Plus, it would leave an awful lot of myself exposed to the Iowan December, and trust me, that's a bad idea.
I stepped out of the dressing room and displayed the awkward dress to my sister, who was satisfied. She left, and I went back inside to put my clothes on once again.
Unfortunately, this did not go as planned. I unzipped the dress as far as my waist, and then it stopped. I mean, I kept pulling, but the zipper was not going anywhere. I yanked. I tugged, I begged, I cursed, and I tried again. It was stuck solid.
I tried pulling up, and that worked. I could zip myself into the dress again, but once the zipper hit my waist, it stopped working. Something was stuck, or broken, or otherwise malfunctioning, and I hadn't a clue what the problem was. I tried wriggling the dress over my head, but it wouldn't fit. It wouldn't slide down over my hips, either. The feminine figure has some serious disadvantages.
"Hayley?' I asked, hoping my sister would come to my aid. "Hayley!" She didn't answer. I continued to tug the dress downwards. It wouldn't budge. The zipper had managed to become stuck at a very inconvenient spot.
"Hayey!" I howled again, and again. "Hayley!" Eventually I gave up trying to be discreet and let out a long wail of "Haaaaaaaaaayyyylllllleyyyyyyy!" that would have made Marlon Brando proud. There was no answer.
I slipped my t-shirt back over my head and opened the dressing room door. I found myself face to face with a Banana Republic Employee, who was regarding me with a bemused expression.
"Who's Hayley?" he asked.
"My sister," I answered.
"Oh!" he said brightly, as though this explained why a young woman in a t-shirt, half a cocktail dress and bright blue socks would be howling like a cat locked in a bedroom. He turned and walked out into the store.
"Hayley!" I heard him yell. "Hayley!" There was no answer.
"Sorry," he shrugged.
"No problem." I went back into my dressing room cell and continued to pull on the dress. What would happen if I tore it? I wondered. Would they charge me for it? Would I have to pay one hundred and sixty-eight dollars plus tax to get out of this thing? It was an unsettling thought.
I was approaching frenzy mode when I heard on a knock on my dressing room door.
"Emily!" my sister exclaimed. "What the hell is going on in there? I've been waiting, and waiting, and I kept thinking, well, I'm not going back in there-"
I yanked her inside the dressing room cell.
"I'm not going back in there," she continued. "Because I realized that something. Actually, this is the Men's Dressing Room. But then you didn't come out."
"I'm stuck." I showed her the zipper. "This is the what?"
"Well, it didn't have a sign," she said as she tugged on my zipper. "But it is in the Men's section. The women's dressing room is on the other side. What is wrong with this thing?"
We spent several more minutes yanking and cursing, but that little metal thing just would not move. It didn't appear to have anything wrong with it, it just would not yield to any external pressure whatsoever. It was definitely the Fidel Castro of zippers.
"Should we ask someone for help?" I wondered. I was thinking of a store clerk. I wondered if I should dare to venture past my cell, and just hope there were no men in their boxers hanging around.
My sister decided to try a different tactic. "I'm calling Mummy," she announced.
"OK, " I sighed.
My mother was informed of the situation via cell phone, despite the fact that she and my father were off somewhere in the wilds of Connecticut, driving home from a weekend trip. I don't know exactly what my sister expected her to do, exactly, but I guess calling your parents is just one of those things you do sometimes when you're in a tight spot. I called home when I realized I was going to end up in Romania unexpectedly, and Hayley called home when she realized her sister was caught in a strapless dress unexpectedly. Why I'm always the trapped one is another question.
My mother informed my sister that she should retrieve a store employee. The store employee, a tall young woman with green shoes, spent the requisite few minutes tugging before she announced "Shit. I'm going to get the manager." At that point I decided it might be prudent to put my pants on under the dress, just in case it was removed publicly.
Luckily, the store manager declared that all necessary measures should be used to remove the dress, including the breaking of zippers and ripping of seams. A pair of scissors were retrieved, seams were chopped open, and I was finally emancipated. I celebrated my freedom by marching out onto Broadway and announcing that I was definitely, definitely going to buy the dress from Macy's.
"No!" My sister exclaimed. Then she paused. "You know Emily," she remarked. "That's exactly the kind of thing that would happen to you. I mean, I know it wasn't your fault, but it is exactly the kind of thing that would happen to you."
I can't really deny this. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to buy the goddamn dress from Macy's.
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