Being Audrey Hepburn

Bumping my way through the closing doors, I sprinted up the stairs to catch the bus to the Met. I checked the time on my phone. I could still make it by eight.

I got off the bus and made my way toward the employee entrance of the Met on the left side of the building.

“Here !!” I texted, but rounding the corner at a sprint, I slammed into a wall of people crowding the sidewalk in front me, so I stepped out into the street. I heard a screech and turned to see a limo skidding to a stop behind me. I jumped.

“Sorry,” I said. The limo driver drove by, yelling at me. A real New Yorker would have flipped him the bird. There was a flash of light, and I was startled as cameras flashed everywhere around me. I was wearing my favorite jeans and a plaid boyfriend shirt from American Eagle because I don’t have one, so I knew I wasn’t the focus of their attention.

Through the blinding flashes, an unbelievable vision of wealth and fashion rose up before me. A perfect Bergdorf-blonde trust-fund baby, wearing a short gold shift dress with a plunging neckline and puff sleeves, posed for the cameras. Was she wearing Roberto Cavalli or even Christian Siriano? No matter, the Met was having a huge gala, and I was standing smack in the middle of a photo op. The perfect blonde was followed by a Tory Burch sequin tunic dress on a girl with the ski

He flashed a megawatt smile with this amused twist like he was laughing at everybody for admiring him. He spun around to find someone and turned to look at—me. I couldn’t pull myself away. My heart slowed, thumping louder and louder. Time seemed to shift into slo-mo. He seemed oddly alone. I was so close, I could see that his eyes were hazel green with gold flecks. He was at least six feet tall, and his di

A long pale leg, and one spectacular stiletto (Louboutin, judging by the red on the bottom) stepped out of the limo, followed by a low-cut V-shaped formal dress exposing almost every part of a lithe, tan young body. Was she wearing Versace? Mr. Underwear-Man reached down and helped her out of the car. It was Dahlia Rothenberg, the princess of all celebutantes, totally famous mostly because she was ski

The cameras went crazy as she posed with Mr. Underwear-Man, then alone. God, I couldn’t stop staring at her body. I bet she never ate. Linking her arm in his, they sauntered down the red carpet, smiling and chatting as they moved toward the museum entrance with the other young fashionistas. Dahlia made her way up the museum steps in those sky-high heels with elegant, tiny steps. If it were me, I’d have tripped and fallen already.

I said a little prayer that Mr. Underwear-Man would look back at me. Of course, he didn’t. He disappeared inside the museum doors. Turning to leave, I found myself blinded by a bright light that beamed steadily in my eyes. It was the light from a camera crew. A scruffy, unassuming guy held the camera as a slick Ryan Seacrest type in a tux with a microphone searched for people to interview. The cameraman noticed me shielding my eyes and moved the light away, and I could see again. He shrugged an apology, and I nodded thanks.

Ohmygod—Tabitha Eden stepped out of another car! Yes, the Princess of Pop, the fave of teenyboppers everywhere. And despite my being way older than her audience, I LOVED HER! She was wearing a supershort silver dress. Completely awesome, by the way. She was totally going to make FabSugar’s best dressed. And she managed to get out of the car looking like the star that she was without pulling a Britney.

Every minute I kept watching made me feel like a lowly tourist in a country of fabulousness, but I couldn’t tear myself away. The women were stu

Limousines, personal shoppers, and weekends in the Hamptons—these kids were just so not like me with their thousand-dollar handbags, designer drugs, and life options. It was sick—just another club that I’d never get into, waiting at the ropes as usual. They had all the wealth and glamour in a world where a lot of people I knew were forced to choose between groceries and rent, where kids graduated college with crippling student loans and no job prospects, and where my greatest opportunity in life was to be a nurse-practitioner. I felt like a troll. You’d never know my world existed while gazing at these beautiful and carefree creatures.

I glanced at my watch and realized I had been standing there for over ten minutes. Jess was probably a

Being a good girl, I opted for the street and made my way up Fifth Avenue. Another limo (or was it the same guy out of spite?) nearly clipped me as I stepped off the sidewalk. Walking halfway up the block, I crossed back to the museum.

“Where r u ?!” Jess texted

Ru

At the door, Jess gave me a quick hug. She looked her usual cool—short Halle Berry hair dyed dark blue tucked behind her ear with a pencil and her museum key card hanging around her neck. She wore five or six chunky necklaces, one made of dozens of weird old antique buttons and a black Ramones T-shirt over a tiered skirt with a sort of iridescent blue lining. It must have been one of her own creations—it was way too cool to be off the rack in our price range.

“What took you so long?” she asked.

“You know, the paparazzi were blocking my entrance as usual,” I said.

Jess laughed. “Happens to me all the time, dahling.”

“What’s going on here tonight?” I asked, images of Mr. Underwear-Man on the museum steps wistfully replaying in my mind.

“It’s the Mille

As we walked through the back entrance, Joe, the security guard, buzzed us in as Jess nodded and I waved. Following Jess down a series of hallways and up the stairs to the large, very cold room where she worked, I wished I’d brought my hoodie. Even though it was summer, I was shivering. Jess said that the reason it was so effin’ freezing in there all the time was that it helped preserve the artifacts. After ten or twenty minutes, I felt like a frozen turkey—so I guess it worked.

The long metal tables were always covered with whatever project Jess had been tasked with. That night, fragments of an Egyptian sculpture—hundreds, maybe thousands of pieces of noses, ears, faces—were everywhere. Jess was wearing a pair of blue nitrile gloves and threw some my way.

“Jeez, did a tourist go nuts and smash up one of the pharaoh statues?” I asked, putting on the gloves.

“Yeah, didn’t you hear?” Jess asked. “It was a big deal—three-thousand years ago.” She chuckled.