Strings Attached by Judy Blundell

strode forward and kissed me on the cheek, and for a moment we greeted each other like long-lost friends, words tumbling over each other, not giving each other a chance to answer —
What are you doing here, Well, I never, How absolutely lovely to run into you.
    We’d been in summer stock together, but she’d been the star ingenue and I’d worked in the box office and been in the chorus. I was surprised at how warmly she greeted me, but I’d also grown used to the fact that I’d joined a family when I’d joined the theater, and here I was, running into a glamorous cousin.
    “I’m just on my way to work,” she said, making a face. “My parents cut me off, the dears, so I’ve got rent to pay. It’s not bad — I start after lunch, so I can still make some morning rounds. I just came from the most
horrific
audition. What are you up to?”
    “I’m working at the Lido,” I said.
    “A Lido Doll?” Daisy whistled under her breath. “Nice going. Pretty soon we’ll be seeing you in Hollywood. Say, why don’t we grab some coffee and have a gossip? I have about twenty minutes. Did you hear Jeff Toland is making a movie with Jennifer Jones? Remember how we all thought his career was over? Including him?” She laughed.
    “My place is near here,” I said. “I just bought some coffee.”
    “Perfectly perfect. I’m yours.” Daisy followed me back down the avenue. “I’m over on the West Side. I have two roommates, and one is completely horrific, but she just got engaged, so she’s hardly ever there. Hey, do you miss it, though? I mean, the theater. You were such a great dancer. Isn’t the Lido mostly —” And she mimed walking, showing off a leg, and balancing something on her head at the same time. I burst out laughing. It wasn’t exactly true, but it made me realize that once I’d learned which way to dip and when to turn, it wasn’t exactly challenging.
    “Well, I’m still dancing,” I said. “Being a Lido girl is every girl’s dream, right?”
    Daisy snorted. “We get our dreams told to us. Girls. Every day. Life isn’t a Palmolive ad. Take my mother. Her dream is me, married, in Connecticut, with a baby on the way. Not mine, though. That’s why I’m selling dresses at Bonwit’s. The dresses are divine — I just wish I could afford them.” She gave my coat a critical look. “If I’m not mistaken, that’s one of ours. And from this season, too. Nice goods.” I could see the speculation in her eyes.
    Hadn’t Nate said the clothes were from a year ago? I remembered that he’d asked Sonia my shoe size, and the lie smoothly clicked into place in my mind. He had lied about the clothes; he had bought them himself. But why? So I could look good enough for his son? It gave me an uneasy feeling, which was made even uneasier when Daisy strode past me into the foyer of my apartment and whistled softly.
    “Nice,” she said. “You’re here all alone? Hey, if you ever need a roommate…”
    I walked back to the kitchen and started to make coffee. I could feel Daisy’s curiosity propel her around the kitchen, as she studied the china and silver. Just last summer I’d arrived in Cape Cod with a cheap suitcase and a wardrobe that I’d dressed up with cheap scarves and bracelets. How could I afford this? I bent over the percolator, blind with shame. I hadn’t thought about how it would feel to invite someone over, someone who knew me.
    Daisy’s parents had cut her off, and she was making her way alone, and she had found a way to pay for an apartment and still go on auditions. Nate had offered me an easy way, and I’d taken it. I’d been so afraid of failure that I’d taken the first hand held out to me. I had no one to blame but myself. I couldn’t even blame Nate, even though I wanted to.
    I could have said no. I could have found another way.
    And the worst part was, I wasn’t doing what I’d come to do. I didn’t care about Hollywood casting agents. I cared about the stage. I remembered