Page 91 of The End of Summer

“Hi. May I speak to Gretchen Andrews please?”

“This is she.”

“Gretchen, hello. My name is Charlotte Fiore. I’m the director of after-school programming at Eastport Elementary.”

“Oh,” I say, clearing my throat. “Hi!”

“I’m calling in response to your application for a position with us,” she says. “We’d like to set up an interview with you.”

I shoot a fist up into the air but don’t emit the screeching sound that my body wants to send up with it. “That would be lovely,” I say, sounding like composure personified.

“How is next Tuesday? Say around 2:00?”

“Sure. I can be free then.”

“Great. You’ll be meeting with me and possibly the school principal, Mrs. Trout.”

“Sounds perfect. Can’t wait.”

“I’m looking forward to it. We’ll see you then,” she says.

We hang up the phone and I immediately text Brady with my good news. When he calls to tell me about his interview, we’re like the human version of a ping pong game at lightning speed, shooting information back and forth at each other. I’m excited about my new developments, and it sounds like his interview went really well. I’m a little bummed that he’ll be staying with his mom for the night, but also, I think it’s good. He never gets to see her and again, it seems like fate that she should be right in the middle of his trek home at some random writing conference on the East Coast.

Life is so good sometimes.

Tonight’s party should be pretty run-of-the-mill. 25 girls. The bride is from Watch Hill, Rhode Island and is filthy rich. Like, Taylor-Swift-is-her-neighbor rich. Her name is Sweden McFarlowe. The maid of honor is her sister, Vienna. Evidently, the McFarlowe family tree is comprised of airline industry titans. They name their family members after some of their favorite travel spots.

I cannot make this shit up.

Oh, to be of means like that. I felt like I was approaching baller status when I opened up a CD last week so I could put $2,000 in as an official “rainy day fund.” So, yeah. That’s not exactly the same level as the wealth we’re talking about here.

Anyway, this party that we’re throwing for Sweden is not evenherrealbachelorette. It’s just the first stop on a two-week bachelorettetrip.First stop, Cosmo, then the next morning a private jet will be flying the girls to Nantucket for the weekend, then on to Milan (ironically, that’s the name of Sweden’s brother), and then to Zaknythos, an island in Greece.

This party is literally the pre-game to the pre-game.

Anyway, no pressure. I feel like we’ll show them a good time and they’ll be on their way to bigger and better a few hours later. I just hope they tip us well. Sometimes, the wealthiest people are the ones who tip the worst. So, fingers crossed.

Me and the girls meet at Cosmo at 4:00 to make Jell-O shots and practice a new routine that we’ll be using tonight. We get the sense that this particular crowd has poled before, so we can’t slide by with dip turns and back knee hook spins. We need to teach at least a few advanced moves, so we opt for the Cradle, the Superman and the Stargazer for those of them who know how to climb, along with more basic moves for those who don’t. It should be fun, actually, since I’ve never taught these moves before. Iknowthem, but they’re hard to master, so teaching them will be a different story.

The other piece about this party that’s different is that each girl gets a pair of pole heels to keep as a souvenir. We’ve got a good amount of stock in the back room, and we normally charge $80 per pair, but the maid of honor was happy to throw down $100 per pair when she offered me an extra $2,500 plus the cost of the bill, so who was I to argue?

Arrow would be proud, I decide.

We arrange the heels by size – they’re all the same: black, patent leather booties with a zipper up the inside and rainbow flashing lights inthe clear platform heel. They’re the industry standard, eight inches tall.

They’ve ordered firefighters for the striptease, so Max, Billy, and Tommy are performing. Max is as good as they come, so it’ll be fun for the ladies. It’s not as much fun forme, since it’s not Brady, but these guys are really nice and very talented, so it should be smooth sailing.

8:00 p.m. rolls around and the ladies arrive in a caravan of pink Escalade limousines. Very subtle. Sweden is surprisingly sweet and funny – way more down to earth than I was expecting. She thinks the “shoe shopping” portion of our party is cute, although, she shares, she often has a tough time walking in heels, especially ones this high.

“Baby steps,” I advise her. “And if you keep a hand on the pole, you’ll be fine.”

Several of the girls havedefinitelypoled before. Once the music gets going and the shots are distributed, they start doing tricks, some of which are even better than I can do. Sweden has fun watching from the sidelines, cheering on her sister and her friends as they spin and flip.

The format of the night is the same as always: once the party settles in, we teach the moves and the choreo and then the small groups dance for each other until the strippers arrive. This group is a bit more wild, though. They decide tostripfor each other, which I’m guessing is maybe a touch more European than what we’re used to. But I try to remain calm. We’re all ladies here; it’s nothing we haven’t seen. I will say that I’m a bit shocked to see not only dresses and shirts go flying around, but also the occasional bra. The girls arenotwasted, though, which is really all that I care about after the last major disaster. My big goal is a vomit-free night. If these girls are comfortable dancing up on each other with no clothes on, who am I to judge?

Sweden is perhaps more conservative than some of her friends, so her dress is still on when it’s her group’s turn to perform. By contrast, Vienna might as well be naked, her thong is so tiny. Sweden should definitely be in a group with other beginners, but her sister has decided they must remain together, and as the beat drops to Cardi B’s classic,WAP, Vienna is ad-libbing all over the place, hands on her knees, twerking on the ground, doing pole splits and inversions galore while the rest of her foursome tries their best to do the moves we went over together.

Vienna is something of a show-stealer, I realize. It makes me feel almost sort of bad for Sweden, who clings to the pole for dear life in her new bioluminescent footwear. Their dance ends, and the crowd cheers, even though poor Sweden was definitely sitting up front on the struggle bus to Strip Town, USA.

---