Chapter 1 #2
“Mentor?” I echo, then take yet another controlling breath.
If Greg keeps popping into my office, I’ll need a certified yoga instructor on-call to coach me through my rage-breathing.
“Greg, we can sit here and debate my leadership style all day. But cut the shit for a minute. That’s not why you’re really here.
What did you promise her when you hired her? ”
His expression shifts. There it is—the tell.
The slight flex of his nostrils, the way his shoulders creep toward his ears.
He’s not angry about my mentoring or design choices.
He’s angry that he got in trouble because I didn’t roll over.
Because I dared to have an opinion that contradicted something he’s personally invested in.
And I do mean personally.
“I promised Ms. Monroe that at least three of her designs would be featured in our fall/winter collection. There’s no time for her to work on a new set of ideas.
Surely there’s something in here that’s workable.
” He stops on a page of the portfolio and taps the simple white shift dress with the lace collar.
“How about this? Plain but it’s elegant.
In fact, all of the designs from this section have good bones,” he muses, leafing through the back half of the portfolio.
“Flip back, Greg. Did you read her marketing pitch for the spring line?”
“You’re talking about the ‘Only White’ slogan,” he surmises, like it’s supposed to be a gotcha. “I’m aware. She explained the concept. It’s about purity of design. Minimalism. The absence of color as a statement.”
“The absence of color.” I let out a thick scoff. “Please tell me you’re not that delusional. You realize how ‘Only White’ might be interpreted.”
“It’s fashion. It’s art. Context matters.”
“Context does matter. And the context is that we live in a world where launching a collection called ‘Only White’ would get us dragged across every social media platform in existence within approximately four minutes of the press release. And we’d deserve it for being tone-deaf and reckless.
” I shake my head. “I’m not tanking this company’s reputation because someone was too myopic to consider the optics. ”
“Or maybe you’re too old to understand the irony—”
“Careful.”
It comes out sharper than I intend. Or maybe exactly as sharp as I intend. Greg stops and recalibrates, a stroke of worry crossing his features as we approach the subject of my age.
“I’m just saying…” His tone shifts to something smoother, more patronizing, “…younger consumers understand nuance. They appreciate subversion. Perhaps it’ll take a younger designer to connect to their peers and encourage them to buy.
Your generation isn’t purchasing as much.
Hailey would whip out the credit card to purchase a twelve-hundred-dollar Dior. ”
“Technically that is my generation buying, seeing as Hailey is twenty-two and the only credit card with a limit high enough to finance her expensive clothing taste is Daddy’s…or yours, perhaps. Or is she calling you ‘Daddy’ yet?”
“Who I’m in a relationship with is none of your business.”
“Relationship? Oh, please. You’re plowing through twenty-somethings like Viagra is never going out of stock.”
“Celeste—”
“What?” I snap, my temper barely under control.
The microaggressions are crawling under my skin like fire ants and it’s taking everything in me not to leap out of my chair and snatch his stupid Adam’s apple that bounces up and down every time he swallows his words.
I know Greg wants to unleash his temper too, but he’s not a sociopath.
At times I see the guilt behind his eyes for how he ended our marriage.
He permanently lives in that damn doghouse he built two years ago.
“We have to stop letting our incompatibility as a couple interrupt our business partnership. We both want the same things.”
The shock renders me immobile for a moment.
We want the same things? No, that can’t be right.
Greg wants women with taut skin, full breasts, flat stomachs, and thick hair that has a fighting chance of recovering from all the chemical beauty treatments.
He wants something I can’t give him: the past. The only way he wants me is frozen, ten years ago, the time he still saw me as a woman he desired, and not simply the lynchpin of his company. As for me?
What do I want?
Maybe to stop being so bitter.
To stop focusing on what’s behind me and have hope that the best parts of my life are yet to come.
Or maybe I should do what Elphaba did and just embrace the dark side—broom and all. I could play the jilted, bitter ex and haunt this office with my snarky comebacks and not-so-subtle lip-syncing of Sabrina Carpenter songs. Greg is indeed the textbook definition of a manchild.
“Look,” he says, removing my sticky notes from one page in particular. The shift dress with white lace. Admittedly, my favorite of what Hailey created. “This is your taste and style. It’s pretty, right?”
Reluctantly, I nod. “It has potential.”
“Good. Then here”—he leans back in his seat and crosses his arms, gaze locked on mine—“I’m listening. How do we market this?”
I take one more deep breath, and this one feels less strained. “Air…light…simplicity…” I murmur mostly to myself, playing around with how the words feel on my tongue.
“What?”
I pull the folder closer to my side of the desk, reexamining the illustration I so quickly dismissed this morning.
Fueled with fresh perspective, I examine the dress as my old friend—inspiration—who has evaded me for weeks now, decides to enter the meeting.
“I like the neckline as is. Let’s pull out the midsection and re-layer this lace around the rib area so it’s sheer.
I want to see two versions. Hemmed above the knee and then one to the ankles with a high slit, filled by the lace. ”
Greg releases a small hum of agreement and I steal a glance in his direction, catching the look of pride on his face. “I like that.”
I reflect on my own disastrous sketch that’s going nowhere fast. All the sharp lines look rigid and angry. I want light, soft, curves, flow. I want the models to be able to…
“Breathe,” I say. “That’s the marketing angle. The tension in the world is suffocating right now. I want this line to feel like relief after taking a deep breath. That’s our inspiration.”
Greg nods. He understands my creative process, and so to him, this isn’t nonsense. It’s gold. “Genius.”
“Tell Hailey to sit with my notes. She has a week to deliver me new sketches—”
“A week?” he balks.
I narrow my eyes. “Three days if she works better under pressure.”
“A week it is,” he grunts, his gaze grazing the ceiling on its way back down. It was a nice moment of reprieve but our usual demeanors of casual resentment always quickly return. “Can I ask you an honest question?”
“Sure.”
“I realize she needs time under your tutelage, but do you think Hailey has what it takes to be a creative director one day?”
We stare at each other across my desk. Patrice watches from her corner, silently rooting for me to go feral.
“A creative director of what in particular?”
“I don’t know. I’m just thinking out loud about the future. Celeste, you can’t do it all by yourself. I know you’re protective over your brand, but it’s time for us to branch out. Home goods, fragrances, footwear, bags. You need a team—”
“I have a team,” I insist.
“That you never use. Outside of your once-monthly luncheons, do you even communicate with your other designers? They are all sitting around, taking paychecks for work you won’t let them do.
Our company could be valued in the billions, but you won’t let us scale because you refuse to take on investors and go public.
The business makes a lot, but it spends a lot too.
We’re not going to sustain the way we’re running. ”
“Your eyes are too big for your stomach. Isn’t that how the saying goes? You’re getting greedy. We should be grateful for what we’ve already built.”
Greg’s shoulders drop slightly—not surrender, just a tactical retreat. “All I’m asking is that you give the new designers a real chance. We need fresh perspectives if we’re going to stay competitive.”
I fold my hands together and place them in my lap.
“Okay, I’ll play ball. You want me to relinquish a little control?
Fine. But I’ll choose the designers working under me.
Not you. Stop promising these coeds fresh out of college that they will inherit my business by crawling up under you.
My design team will be built full of talent with experience, discipline, and culture. ”
“Hailey fits that. Start with her.”
“Draping Barbie dolls with tissue paper and paperclips is not considered experience. And I want all my designers over thirty, at least. That way I know they are safe from your advances.”
“Cheap shot.”
“For a cheap man.”
Greg’s mouth thins. “You know, this would all be easier if you’d just accept reality.”
“What reality is that?”
“That maybe…” He pauses, choosing his words like he’s selecting a weapon. “Maybe it’s time to let the next generation take the lead. You’ve had an incredible run, Celeste. Twenty years. That’s more than most people get. But you’re coming up on forty—”
“I’m thirty-eight.”
“—and the industry is changing. Getting younger. Faster. More digital.” He spreads his hands, a gesture of false reasonableness. “There’s no shame in stepping back. Taking an advisory role. Letting fresh talent carry the brand forward while you enjoy the fruits of our labor.”
The fruits of my labor. The labor he invested in with favorable terms that gave him controlling interest. The labor that made him rich enough to leave me for a succession of women young enough to be my interns.
“Women don’t just die at forty,” I say quietly.
“I didn’t say—”