Chapter 1
Lily sits in front of her laptop scrolling the internet looking for nothing in particular. From the outside she would seem to live a very carefree existence, floating form place to place going with whatever comes her way. She lives in a small efficiency on the edge of a posh neighborhood. It's the bottom level of an old row house, not quite a basement and not quite a first floor. The one big window she has that faces the front next to the doors looks out into a half sunken stairwell, her patio, and the manicured patch of grass that extends forward from about chest level when standing at the door. This is enough for her. She has a bed to sleep in, food to eat, a she place to escape to, and her laptop. Unlike her, her mother always dreamed of grander things for her daughter's life.
Swinging her legs out of bed she rises and walks to the dresser preparing to select some clothes for work. She works in a boutique owned by her neighbor. The shop displays a variety of eclectic clothing and handmade jewelry. It's the type of shop you might see in a row along a historically preserved, gentrified Main Street of an old timey town. It's a great statement piece for this type of strip but the owners would be lucky to get even a handful of sales in a day. Like many of these types of stores this shop is a passion project for her neighbor who is in no way in need of income outside of her extremely generous inheritance. Her neighbor inherited a fortune with the passing of her parents who made their money through morally questionable industries and towards the end of their lives invested in the arts buying and selling luxury pieces through auctions. The woman's name is Sophie, Lily calls her a Miss Sophie for an added level of professionalism while at work. She's a spinster age 65, she also lives in a row house in the neighborhood. Although she could afford much more luxurious accommodations she prefers to, 'live amongst the people', as as she puts it. Not only does this give her authenticity credit amongst the elite crowd associates with, but it also allows her the opportunity to invite her friends over for an experience on how the other half lives. It's akin to a sort of slum tourism, or maybe some sort of mission trip. On the days she has these gatherings she likes to conveniently invite Lily over for a late lunch that extends just past the time where an invited guest will arrive. Lily has no qualms with being a pawn in this game that she plays. In fact she quite likes to watch Sophie at work. This charade showcases how in touch she is with the community in which she lives. She allows Lily to answer a few guided questions about her her impoverished existence before scooting her out the door to refocus on the monologue she is about to impart upon her invited guests.
The title she was given at the shop is Retail Operations Manager, Sophie says it’s a great title to put on a resume. The title is not inaccurate so much as just slightly overblown. As Lily is the only employee in the store, and making 5 sales in a day is considered a rush it begs the question, what exactly is she managing? Her main duties involve dusting, dressing and undressing mannequins and moving the moving the A frame chalk board she writes in and out each day, once at open and once at close. She changes the mannequins daily and rearranges their positions and placements in the front window. She also drapes him with the jewelry that is for sale in the shop as well. Weekly she rearranges the furniture within the store displaying the items. The stock room also has an abundance of new items to rotate in to the stores displays. As most of the items are handcrafted and custom-made very few have duplicates. The One of a kind status of most of the pieces in her store earn them and exorbitant price tag. The main clientele of Boutique Sophie are Sophie's friends and acquaintances that enjoy making a gesture of a purchase when they visit, and the unsuspecting tourist who will spend way too much on a splurge piece from their vacation adventure. The other people who wander into the store are local residents and passers by. They visit but never purchase. The frequent redesign of the store is really for them. They are the ones most frequently inside the store, it creates the illusion of sales and gives the neighbors and activity to see what else is new in the store today.
The merchandise that fills the store is meticulously sourced from local artisans. One would think that it would be hard to maintain a fresh rotation of items based on how few sales they make. Unlike a usual boutique that consigns items from local people, only paying them upon the sale of their items, Sophie shops. The boutique is filled with items she has purchased outright from any artist or craftsperson she takes a liking to, promising that she needs product in quantity to satisfy her abundance of clientele. Sophie is the personification of hyperbole. To speak with her one would think she is an elite fashion critic supplying her refined and extensive customer base with all the newest and up and coming designers. In the summer months when school is out, she even employs a pre-teen or two calling the job of handing out flyers on the street corner to unsuspecting tourists, a paid internship in the high fashion industry. The business card she had made for herself even lists herself not only as the owner of Boutique Sophie, but also as the President of the Sophie Buchannan Institute of Fashion. Looking at the small storefront it may be confusing as to where this institute is in fact located. A small unused sewing room behind the shop is the official location. At current there is one registered ‘student’, his name is Jason. Jason does not pay for any type of instruction as his ‘tuition’ is paid by the Sophie Buchannan Foundation, a charity set up by Sophie herself, primarily to add the title of philanthropist to her business card but also as a cozy tax shelter. As for Jason’s education, he shadows Sophies every move acting as her personal assistant, dog walker, and general lackey. This is not a job, these duties are his coursework, and he does not earn a salary, he qualified for a student stipend through the foundation, thus pays no taxes. The cost to pursue such an elite program is quite steep, through his coursework he travels with Sophie extensively for fashion research. Although ridiculous, whole the Sophie Buchannan enterprise is quite precisely designed. Designed to allow Sophie to live her fantasy life barrier free until her last breath. To file legitimate paperwork, she needed board members. The members of her board are the owners of the other shops along the block as well as the landlord for the retail space they all lease. The relationship is peak symbiosis. The landlord is a man well into his 80’s who is little more than a name on a piece of paper when is comes to the business of being a landlord. She keeps the shops she wants surrounding her by advising him on tenant choice. She also advises him on rent prices, making them high enough to be occasionally our of reach of the current tenants, this allows her to keep the evictions at bay through some private business loans furnished through the profits at Boutique Sophie. On the surface she seems a aloof out of touch elitist, and that’s exactly how she designed it.
Jason, despite his Rocky early life has stumbled upon quite a bit of luck now. He is the abandoned child of a middle-income mildly Christian family. He was abandoned for the usual reasons, poor grades in high school, a disavowment of the Christian religion, an inappropriate haircut, and of course homosexuality. The abrupt nature of the beginning of his homelessness caused him a lot of mental distress. His bus fare got him as far as the very neighborhood where Lily and Sophie reside. With just enough money to purchase a cell phone and a bite to eat he began his search for gainful employment. Lily had seen him popping into each store along the road inquiring about openings. It just so happens that Sophie was in the store at the time of his arrival. His half grown out pink side swept hair covered his right eye. Wearing skinny jeans with a rainbow lanyard hanging from the back pocket and a strategically torn t-shirt he looked like a member of a gay punk band. He first perused the store admiring a piece of turquoise and silver jewelry. Sophie had come to the store that morning to chat with Lily about the institute. She was in need of students for her institute and was debating between asking a slightly removed cousins child to enroll or perhaps one of her usual interns. She has headshots of her candidates strewn across the table, this was her main way of deciding who would gain acceptance. They would have to be a photo shoot she needed someone who would enhance her own appeal, someone to compliment her. She was looking for the right person to hold their own in her shadow, to be comfortably second best without dreams of overtaking her at some point. She looked up as Jason rounded the corner of one of the displays. "You there, why are you here?"
Looking behind him and then side to side he responds, "Me? Oh are you not open?"
"We are open, of course. But I asked, why you are here." She repeated matter of factly.
"Well, I'm looking for a job."
"I saw you handling that piece." She stays nodding towards the turquoise bracelet.
"I wasn't going to steal if that what you are thinking."
A smug smile on her face she says, "you must be knew here! What are you, 18, 19? You are destitute aren't you?"
"How do you know that? What exactly are you trying to say?" He asks becoming concerned, his bottom lip being to quiver
"No need for all that darling. I have a proposition for you." And just like that Sophie had found her student.
