Sellevision - Augusten Burroughs [60]
Peggy Jean opened the front door and looked outside.
Then she screamed, slammed the door shut, and called 911.
“T
hat’s fantastic, Max. I mean it, congratulations.”
“Well, it’s not official yet. But I have a really good feeling about it, you know?”
Leigh took a sip from her iced tea, then lowered her head. “Shit, I think it’s a reporter. Don’t turn around.”
They had gone to the darkest, most unhip place they could find for lunch, but even here, she wasn’t safe from the tabloids. Leigh seemed a little strung out by the whole thing, but Max found it kind of exciting.
She peeked up, surveyed, then raised her head. “False alarm.”
“I can’t even imagine what it’s been like for you.”
“I’ll tell you how it’s been. It’s been worth it.” She gave Max a kick under the table. “I feel so much better now, it’s amazing. I mean, I never thought I was a vengeful person, but you really made me feel I could be.”
Max laughed. “So this is all my fault now?”
“It was your idea,” Leigh teased.
“Yeah, but you actually did it.”
“God, what kind of monster have I created?” she asked, taking another sip from her iced tea. “I mean, you would not believe the amount of people calling me, the talk shows, the magazines, it’s fucking insane. I had no idea it would have had such an effect. I was on the Internet last night, and there are all these sites about it, talking about how many selfish bastards there are out there.” She raised her chin in the air. “I’ve become something of a modern feminist icon.”
He dipped his fingers in his water and flicked them at her face.
She laughed, wiping her chin. “You’ll become this big celebrity voice-over and I’ll have my own little woman’s show on CNN or something. What a riot.”
“So when are you going to write a tell-all book?” he teased.
The waiter set the check down on the table, and she snatched it up before Max had a chance. “Don’t joke, five New York literary agents have already called me.”
“You’re kidding,” he said, wondering what he could ever do that would draw so much attention.
She placed a $20 bill on top of the check, and then set the salt shaker on top as a paperweight. “Thanks for coming out today. I really needed to be around somebody who wasn’t holding a camera or microphone.”
They stood up from the table and walked through the restaurant, each taking a mint from the dish beside the cash register on their way out the door and into the unknown.
S
itting at her desk, Bebe opened her latest American Express bill. A mistake, it seemed, had been made. It showed the amount due as $19,287.64. How, she wondered, was that possible? What had she purchased in the past month besides a few basics from the catalogs and a couple of early Christmas presents? She spread out all seven pages of the itemized bill on the desk. Nothing unusual: shoes, sheets and such, hair products, projection TV, restaurant charges, etc.
Oh. She had forgotten about the bronze gong from eBay. But of course, that was really more of an investment.
Still, the amount due on her American Express card was, in fact, correct. It seemed clear that she was on the verge of having a shopping problem.
She’d always been a shopper. When she was a girl and feeling a little blue, her mother would say, “Let’s go shop ’til we drop.” Shopping was her form of therapy, a relaxing thing to do.
It seemed obvious to Bebe that she needed to remedy the situation, curb her spending. So she put away the bill and logged onto Amazon.com to look for a book on the subject. She did a search and found ShoppingStoppers: The Breakthrough Bestseller that Can Help You Curb Your Compulsive Shopping. She clicked on it. The book jacket appeared on her screen. Beneath the book jacket the text said, “Customers who bought this book also bought . . .