Wednesday dawned bright and clear. Nancy was mildly thankful, since she wasn't sure Imogene's car could climb their hill if the road was wet. She bathed and washed her hair, and switched the TV on to watch Jerry Springer, while she shaved her legs and her nail polish dried. She fixed a Screwdriver with just a light splash of vodka to sip on while Jerry roasted a couple of fat cousins, who, for no readily apparent reason, were fighting over some grungy, deadbeat, scrawny twerp, who, it turned out, had been fucking them both and a boy who worked in the detail shop in the garage under his apartment. The vodka made Jerry's guests tolerable and made her feel laid back and mellow. Around eleven, the van from the Galloping Gourmet catering company pulled up and the delivery boy brought lunch to the door. She had ordered a shrimp and crab salad with honey glazed croissants and a raspberry compote desert. She unpacked the plates from the white delivery boxes and put them into the refrigerator, thinking as she did so, that they were lovely to look at, but it was questionable whether she and Imogene would actually get down to eating lunch. She smiled, thinking about the upcoming audition and figured that she and Jerry could enjoy the lunches later in any event.
She dressed in a relaxed, uptown casual style, in a white, long sleeved, silk blouse with mother-of-pearl buttons and a snug but reasonably modest, pleated, navy, wool skirt with a hemline that hit her just a few inches above the knee. She slipped barefooted into a pair of high heeled, navy pumps, and stepped to the mirror for a quick look at herself just as the doorbell rang on the precise stroke of noon. She fluffed her hair with her fingers, giving herself just a hint of disarray, and quickly loosened the top two buttons of her blouse to expose some cleavage.
Nancy opened the door and, giving her guest a lingering lookover, smiled appreciatively. Imogene was standing on the porch anxiously massaging her handbag with black-gloved hands, and looking a little like a deer caught in the headlights. She was wearing a short-waisted, chinchilla jacket over a black satin cocktail dress, which was slit up one side nearly to her waist. A cascade of pink and red roses had been embroidered exquisitely onto the front of the dress beginning just below the plunging neckline and continuing uninterrupted to the hem. That hemline probably would have been low enough on someone not quite as tall as Imogene, but on her, Nancy observed with interest, it was obviously going to make sitting modestly very difficult.
"Imogene, darling," Nancy said warmly, her mild twang betraying her Arkansas origins. She extended her hand, "You look absolutely wonderful. Please do come in."
"Thank you," the young woman answered, taking Nancy's hand hesitantly, "I hope I'm not overdressed."
"Not at all, honey. You look pretty as a picture. Here, come on in and let me take your jacket."
"Thanks," the girl replied stepping into the foyer and turning to allow Nancy to help her remove the jacket. While Nancy hung up her coat, Imogene glanced around the formal, marbled entryway and into the living areas beyond. A pair of massive white pillars rising from intricately carved, green, travertine plinths gave definition to the entry and dramatically framed the view through the living room to a wall of arched, multi-paned windows overlooking the town in the valley below. Nancy had been emphatic when describing what she wanted to the architect Jerry had brought up from Memphis to design their house; she wanted a room just like the Jungle Room at Graceland, but with windows and a view, and he fulfilled her requirements admirably.
"OhmyGod," Imogene gasped when her eyes adjusted to the change in light. "This place is fantastic."
"It is a nice view, isn't it," Nancy responded modestly, "but let me look at you, honey." Nancy lifted the girl's hand above her head and led her in a slow, full circle pirouette. The skirt flared slightly as she turned, exposing a shapely, tanned, bare thigh to well above the pantyline, and Nancy guessed that she was either wearing a thong or nothing at all. A single band of black satin began at the waist in the front of the dress, gathered in a pleated satin cup to partly cover one breast, then continued up, around her neck and back down to another pleated satin cup and then on to the waist on the opposite side. It was an ingeniously fashioned halter-top, which looked like an hourglass with the narrow neck, which separated the opposing halves, passing behind her neck and the globes at opposite ends just covering the swelling mounds of her breasts in front. Her back was completely bare just to the point where her buttocks began to slope outward and the cleavage of her backside was only barely revealed. "Wheweeee, honey, that's some dress," Nancy whistled appreciatively, making a mental note to give Maxine a special thanks at the next bridge club meeting, "Does Rufus know you're going out in daylight dressed in that outfit?"
"Rufus hasn't seen it yet," the girl blushed. "Do you really like it?"
"Honey," Nancy began solicitously, placing her arm around Imogene's shoulders, "on you, with your figure, it looks spectacular. I always admire a woman who can wear a dress as sexy as that one and still carry herself with style."
"It's too sexy?" Imogene declared anxiously, screwing up her face with concern and self-consciously covering the bare expanse of skin below her throat with her hand.
"Nonsense, my dear. It's perfect." Nancy gently pulled the girl's hand away from her bosom. A mantle of crimson colored Imogene's neck and bare chest and was creeping up her face. "Now, shame on me, I've promised you a cocktail, and all I've done is make you blush. Come on with you; let's see if I can get to the liquor cabinet and make amends."
Nancy took the woman's hand and led her into the living room. "Here," she said, gesturing toward a gigantic curved couch covered in pearl white damask with pink, tasseled antimacassars aligned at precise intervals along the back cushions and on the arms. "Have a seat, and I'll fix you up in a jiffy. How does a Martini sound?"
"Hmmm," the girl hummed enthusiastically, trying to sound worldly beyond the reach of her experience. In truth, she hadn't tasted a Martini in her life. "I would love a Martini."
She settled into the soft cushions of the couch and crossed her legs at the knee. The hem of her skirt rode up dangerously, and she tugged at it ineffectually and glanced nervously in Nancy's direction.
"Martini it is, then, my dear. I'll make it a double ‘cause you deserve one since I embarrassed you so badly a minute ago."
Imogene struggled to master her growing feeling of inadequacy as her eyes swept the sumptuous surroundings. Gone-with-the-Wind lamps with beaded shades in a rainbow of hues and Venetian glass blended with teak and oak and a myriad of other imported woods, and converged on an immense Italian marble fireplace in the corner beside the wall of arched windows, which she had glimpsed from the foyer. A set of matching Eames chairs flanked the hearth, and to one side, in a pool of light from a series of spotlights recessed in the ceiling high above, there stood an alabaster replica of the statue of Aphrodite, who seemed to be beckoning to an equally imposing statue of David across the room. Three enormous, stunning, Persian rugs stretched out across the expanse of hardwood flooring, and Imogene squirmed uncomfortably and prayed that Nancy had not seen the tatty imitation she had bought for Rufus' office.
"Here we are darling," Nancy interrupted her inspection. "Shaken, not stirred, and dry too, barely a whisper of Vermouth; just the way Double "O" Seven liked them."
Nancy handed her the drink and sat down on the couch at some distance around the curve from Imogene, so that they were more or less sitting at right angles.
"Oooo, thanks," Imogene answered accepting the goblet of clear, chilled gin. She eyed uncertainly the red plastic sword skewering three marinating, pimento-stuffed olives, which was resting against the side of her glass, and was relieved when Nancy fished a similar sword out of her own glass and stripped the olives from the blade with her teeth. She imitated her hostess and immediately the tart tang of olive commingled in her mouth with the faint flavor of juniper from the gin making her grimace.
Nancy smiled knowingly and leaned slightly toward the inexperienced woman, extending her glass toward her, "Cheers, darling; here's to a long and happy friendship and to the first of what I hope will be many memorable luncheons."
