Life Without You. Liesel Schmidt

      The warm glow of the store’s interior seemed something like a hug, and a welcoming waft of scented air greeted me as I entered the retail ode to lady-dom.

      “Welcome to Victoria’s Secret,” a voice chirped as I passed a table of artfully arranged panties and bras, a colorful wash of neatly folded fabrics whispering suggestions of romance and self-confidence.

      Honey, she doesn’t have any secrets left. The words tickled my tongue, begging to be let out to play.

      “Hi,” I heard myself say instead, meekly glancing around the store as I got my bearings.

      First things first, I needed to find the lotions. Then I would be free to explore and find what I really wanted in here: another pair of sparkly panties. They didn’t have to be pink, but I definitely wanted them to be sparkly. The pair I had found with Charlie had been perfect, and now I had my sights set on something equally special to add. I had a gift card from Bette and strict instructions to buy at least one more pair of pretties while I was here, and I was going to make the most of my unexpected trip to this palace of panties.

      “Are you looking for something in particular?” The girl in front of me looked to be about twenty, dressed head to toe in the store’s strictly mandated black, though she wasn’t letting corporate dictates box her in—she wore a lacy black bustier top peeking out of a black blazer, a cropped specimen that hit her at hip level and showed off an hourglass figure and hiked her boobs up like a car on jacks. Leather leggings were capped off by patent black leather heels that appeared to add six inches to her height; and her bleached blonde hair had an unexpected shock of purple in it, cut into a pixie that displayed high cheekbones and bright green eyes. If she hadn’t seemed so friendly, I might have hated her.

      “No, not really,” I said noncommittally, not wanting to be trailed around the store. “Just looking to see what’s in.”

      “My name’s Erin. Just let me know if you need any help,” she bubbled.

      “Great, thanks,” I bubbled back.

      She toddled off, heels clacking over the floor’s slick tiles as she went.

      When she was out of sight, I set about my wandering in earnest, scoping out each table and rack to search for something that fit the “sparkly” category.

      It didn’t have to be pink.

      Heck, it really didn’t even have to be sparkly; but I really wanted something sparkly.

      Wear sparkles, feel sparkly, right?

      And then, I saw it: a bright teal stretch satin and sequin thong that hung with glorious deliciousness from the clips on a hanger on a wall display, right below a coordinating bra with padded cups generous enough to fit my head.

      True, I could never hope to wear a bra like that, but the panties were definitely in my wheelhouse.

      They were decadent.

      They were divine.

      They were something that belonged nowhere in a sensible woman’s lingerie drawer.

      They were the antithesis of the white granny panty.

      And I had to have them.

      “My George would have loved those,” a voice quipped behind me.

      A guilty ripple of shock ran up my spine, and I snatched my hand away.

      “George had a wicked streak, that’s for sure,” the voice continued. While the voice bore distinct traces of age and years of a cigarette habit, it was still melodic. There was feistiness and spunk, and I could imagine the speaker, even as I turned around.

      I tried to arrange my face into a confident smile rather than a guilty, self-conscious grimace to face this person, this interrupter of my hunt for the perfect panty.

      The face that greeted me bore no resemblance to the image I had conjured in my head.

      I was expecting to see Shirley MacLaine but was greeted, instead, by someone whose features seemed a strange mash-up between Estelle Getty and Ellen Albertini Dow, that weird little old lady who played the rapping grandma in The Wedding Singer. Needless to say, I had to shift my gaze down to meet her eyes—so short was she.

      Not that I’m all that tall, but still.

      She was positively itty-bitty.

      “And boy, could we make some trouble together,” she said, reaching up, up to stand on tiptoe and trace over the sequins. “George would have loved these,” she said again.

      “George sounds like quite a guy,” I murmured, not quite sure how else to respond. I’d never met this woman before in my life, so the randomness of this encounter—while it certainly had all the components of an interesting story—was something I felt unprepared for. I don’t generally start up conversations with women who are obviously pushing ninety in the lingerie store, and the fact that I’d been fingering a pair of such racy underwear felt a bit…taboo?

      “Oh, he was,” said the aged little woman who stood before me, her eyes crinkling in a smile. “We shocked everyone when we got married. It was quite the scandal,” she tittered.

      By that point, I couldn’t help the smile that crept across my lips. There was no way around it. In the two minutes we’d been in one another’s company, I had no choice but to be absolutely fascinated by the impossibly impish little sprite in front of me, and the writer inside of me was dying to know more.

      “Really? Why?”

      “Because he was already engaged to someone else, and we ran off together and eloped!” she stage-whispered, leaning closer to me and widening bright green eyes that were positively vivacious.

      “You stole him from his fiancée? How did you do that?” I marveled.

      She simply smiled. “A lady has to have some secrets, now doesn’t she?”

      “That’s what my grandmother always said; not that you’d have much to worry about if you told me. I’m not even from here—I’m here from Pensacola, visiting.”

      “Oh, that’s nice,” she replied sweetly. “Do you have family here?”

      I nodded. “My mom’s family is all here. My grandmother died about six months ago, so I thought I’d come and spend some time with my grandfather.” It was true, but it wasn’t the whole truth. Not that I owed her the whole story, but I still felt a little guilty at the spin I was putting on things: dutiful, loving granddaughter on a trip to comfort her grieving grandfather. Again, partially true, but to get into the details of my own need for the trip would have taken too long. And been a little too personal, really. Better to keep it all simple.

      “That’s a shame,” she tutted, her previous smile replaced by a look of concern. “What was her name? I might have known her. When you’re as old as me and you stay in one place your whole life, you know everybody.”

      “Meredith Samuelson. Everybody called her Merry, though.”