THE GOLD FISH: Business (2.10)

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Long before the monkey had climbed onto his back, and long before a standard operating procedure had cost him his job, Don had won a sales contest. His prize? A portable Singer sewing machine.

Actually, Don had been given the choice between a lawn mower and a sewing machine. Some choice, he had thought at the time. Neither held any appeal. For him, anyway. He’d never use the mower, and what was he going to say to Joan, here you go honey, a brand-new lawn mower! Just for you! Not that Joan, of course, couldn’t have used it. But why rub her nose in it?

Don chose the sewing machine.

Joan didn’t sew, but there was a chance, albeit small, he reasoned, that she’d appreciate that he chose something for her as his prize. That he put her needs first. The icing on the cake? He imagined it might imply that he believed Joan was capable of something... well, creative. That he saw her as more than just a cooking and cleaning machine. And damn, how he had congratulated himself for his forward thinking. He really was a modern man. If he had been physically capable of patting his own back, he would have done it.

But naturally, no good deed -- or sly deed -- goes unpunished. Joan had been furious. She didn’t know how to sew, and besides, something was definitely fishy in Denmark. Why would a car dealership reward their “Top Salesman of the Quarter” with a sewing machine?  She suspected -- and rightly so -- that there was more to this story than met the eye. “Seriously,” she had pressed when he’d presented her with the sewing machine, her eyes fixing him in place, “that’s what they offered you?”

Cheese and crackers, thought Don. Sometimes it was nice to have a smart woman for a wife, but sometimes it was a real nuisance. Of course, Joan would guess that he’d been given a choice. His mind raced for an answer. Anything manly -- like a lawn mower -- would shine a light on his lack of husbandy interests, so he grasped at the first straw that came to him. “Well... they offered me a new Hoover vacuum cleaner. But I figured there was no way you’d want that.”

The look on Joan’s face said otherwise. “You’re a goddamned idiot.”

But even as she shook her head at the loss of a brand-new vacuum -- her current one was as heavy as a piano and on its last legs besides -- the idea of a sewing machine did strike her as intriguing. Joan did, in fact, fancy herself as a creative, can-do kind of woman. And as luck, or fate, would have it, only the week prior she’d been thinking that sewing might be handy skill to possess.

She and Don had been invited to a Hawaiian luau at the home of their friends Shirley and Russ, and while she had a floor length flowered dress that would be perfect for the occasion, Don had nothing suitable to wear. And where on earth could she be expected to find a Hawaiian shirt in Baltimore?!  She had actually thought to herself -- hand to God -- that if only she had a sewing machine, she could make him one. Well here was her chance. And honestly, how hard could it be?

“Oh alright,” she’d said to a dejected Don, who was slinking out the door, machine in hand. “I might as well keep it.”

A week later, she was once again cursing her husband to high heaven. The venture had started swimmingly enough. She had pinned the tissue thin sections of a Simplicity pattern onto blue and white flowered fabric -- both recent acquisitions from Joanne’s Fabrics -- and had expertly, if she did say so herself, cut out the pieces. Threading the machine had been an exercise in frustration, but after a careful re-read of the instruction guide, she had managed it. But once the actual sewing began, things went to hell in a hand-basket. She’d incorrectly connected two of the wrong pieces together, and in an attempt to tear out the seam and start over, had stabbed herself painfully with the seam ripper and stained one of the fabric’s white flowers with a big splotch of blood. And that was before the soul crushing discovery that the flowers on the back of the shirt had somehow ended up upside down. The afternoon had ended with Joan throwing the half-finished shirt to the ground and stomping on it, an echo of her father’s coat hanger tantrum years before. The apple doesn’t fall far, and all that.

She was just about to stuff everything, pattern included, into the trash when she recalled her next door neighbor, Dot -- this was before Mr. Charles had moved in -- was an expert seamstress. Rather than return to square one with no outfit for Don, she threw herself on the mercy of Dot, who graciously agreed to complete the shirt for her. Thank you, Jesus!, Joan had thought to herself, as she stuffed the sewing machine into the back of the basement closet, where she hoped to never again lay eyes upon it. And good riddance!

The machine remained there, unattended and unloved, among the old encyclopedias, discarded toys, and surplus Afghan blankets. Until, that is, Barbie accidentally unearthed it. She had been searching for an old pair of roller skates, the metal kind with tabs that fit over your shoes. A kid down the street had flattened the tabs of a similar pair with a hammer, nailed them to the underside of a plank of wood, and presto-chango, had a skateboard. Barbie thought she might like to have one too. She had found one skate and was searching for its twin when she came across the mysterious rectangular case with the name Singer emblazoned across it. Curious, she had dragged the case out into the middle of the basement floor, unlatched the top, and nearly gasped at the shiny mechanisms within.

Roller skates and skateboard forgotten, Barbie had taken to that machine like a... well, like a fish to water. She was soon banging out tote bags and boxy crop tops -- basically anything constructed with rectangles and the cheap fabric supplied by her grandmother, Hazel. Hazel worked for Lombard Industries, a company which manufactured nurse’s uniforms, and therefore had unlimited access to remnants of thin, polyester fabric in pastel colors. Hazel couldn’t see any real downside to encouraging Barbie’s new dressmaking interest as long as her granddaughter promised to never wear her amateurish, strangely antiseptic creations in Hazel’s presence. Barbie had gratefully taken the deal, and despite a marked lack of sartorial sophistication, had become a whiz on the machine.

Now, a few years after the Hawaiian shirt fiasco, she sat cross legged on the basement floor at the sewing machine, her right knee working the control pedal like a pro, the Hefty bag of Karen’s old clothes beside her.

In 1972, every girl, including Barbie, wanted to wear hip huggers, those skintight, bellbottomed pants worn as low on the hips as humanly possible, the only hedge against gravity a big leather belt and a prayer. Barbie had been right in claiming her sister’s clothes were unlikely to fit her, but with her trusty Singer, she could fix that.

She had just turned a pair of Karen’s old dungarees inside out, and was running an extra seam up the inner side of one pants leg, across the crotch, and down the other leg to achieve the desired tightness and lowness in one go, when the sound of clomping clogs made her look up.

Descending the stairs were Karen and her best friend, Shayleen, younger sister to THE Wesley Sullivan and older sister to Bridge.

Karen slunk over to the TV, snapped it on, and turned the channel to ABC. The opening credits of Kung Fu were starting to roll.

“Hey!” Barbie cried.

“Hay is for horses,” replied Karen before flopping down on the basement’s black Naugahyde sofa next to Shay, who giggled at Karen’s bon mot.

“I have stuff to do. And I’m trying to concentrate!”

Karen shrugged. “So are we.”

The recap of Caine’s training at the hands of Masters Kan and Po was now playing, and the teens watched spellbound, their jaws slowly working wads of Bazooka bubble gum like cows chewing their cud.

Barbie narrowed her eyes at her sister. “Why do you always have to be so mean?”

Karen answered distractedly. “Why do you always have to be a goody two shoes?” She glanced quickly at Barbie, then back at the show. “You know, no matter how good you are, nothing’s ever going to change.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Caine was now approaching a hot iron stove with dragons emblazoned on the sides and was about to lift it with his forearms. Karen’s eyes went wide.

“Karen! What’s not going to change?”

“Nothing! Never mind! Just watch the show. You’ll like it.” She turned towards Shay and they screamed in unison. “It’s so good!”

An hour later, Barbie, who hadn’t been able to resist Kung Fu’s allure, was on the sofa with Karen and Shay. She was dumbfounded. The show defied categorization. It was like a western -- which was her favorite kind of movie of all time -- but also kind of... religious maybe? It had really made her think. And the fighting? She wasn’t sure if it was karate or something else, but she thought she might like to try it. But that would have to wait until after her gold (pause) fish was stuffed. She needed to stay focused.

She grabbed the dungarees off the sewing machine, stripped down to her underwear, and as a bemused Karen and Shay watched, tried them on for size. They were a perfect fit, riding low on her slim hips and clinging to her legs like a second skin. She patted herself in satisfaction. “Right on.”

Her interest piqued, Karen asked “where’d you get those pants?”

Barbie grinned. “The attic.”

“Ha! Thought they looked familiar.”

“I’m going to do some embroidery down the legs next.”

Karen nodded in appreciation. “Alright. Maybe I’ll let you do that to a pair of my pants.”

Barbie smirked. “Already did.”

“Har-de-har-har. You’re such a jerk.”

Shay finally piped in. “You can do it to my pants too!”

A lightbulb in Barbie’s head went off. Maybe this was her next money-making venture.

“Yeah, sure. I’ll do it for both of you. For a price.”

Karen answered first. “The price is we don’t bash your head in.”

Shay waved Karen’s comment away. “How much?”

Barbie’s mind raced. What was fair? What was possible? “How about a dollar to make them low and tight, and another dollar for embroidery? You choose what you want.”

Karen was outraged. “That’s 2 dollars!”

“But no one else will have a pair like them. You’ll be different. Groovy. Cool.” She snuck a glance at Shay, then back at Karen. “You know, the kind of girl a boy like Wesley likes.”

Karen rolled her eyes in Shay’s direction, and forced out what she hoped was a dismissive laugh. “Who cares what he likes, right?” She shot Barbie a warning glare. “$1.50 for both. But no dumb fish.”

“Fish?” asked Shay, but both Ward girls ignored her.

Barbie pondered Karen’s counteroffer. “Okay. But for $1.50, you’ll have to bring me more business.”

“More business?”

“Yeah. From your friends. Grace, Sherry, Stacy... whoever would want cool pants...”

Another lightbulb went off in Barbie’s head. “Hold on. I have another idea. You guys pay me the original $2 per pair to make them low and add embroidery AND we’ll charge your friends the same BUT for every $2 in EXTRA business you get me from your friends, I’ll give you 50 cents back. Which means, if you bring me $4 worth of business or two more pairs, you’d get a dollar back. So you guys would really only pay $1.00 for the pair I do for you! AND if you bring me four pairs, or $8, you’d get back two dollars more! You’d be getting your pair for FREE and making money off your friends! See what I mean? I give you a cut. The more money I make, the more money YOU make.”

Karen blinked. “I have no idea what you just said.” She turned to Shay. “Do you know what she just said?”

Shay shook her head.

“Okay,” sighed Barbie. “Never mind. It’s too complicated. I’ll do your pants for $1.50 each IF you also promise to try to get more business off your friends.”

Shay nodded eagerly, but Karen’s eyes narrowed. “What a minute. What happened to me making money off my friends? I liked that.”

“That’s only if you pay the original $2.00 each. And you work really hard to get me more business.”

Karen scoffed. “Forget it. We’ll just pay the $1.50.

“That’s what I thought.”

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