Danielle Steel: Big Girl

She rushed to her computer and formulated a letter, telling them that she’d be delighted to come to New York. She printed out the letter, signed it, stuck it in an envelope, and put on her coat to run to the mailbox. She had given them her cell phone number and e-mail address as well. She could hardly wait to go to New York. If she got this job, it was her dream come true. This was what she wanted. New York, not L.A. She had spent four years at Northwestern dreaming of going to New York. She was thankful for the teacher who was going on maternity leave and hoped she’d get the job. Just hearing from them was cause for celebration, and she went out and got a pizza after she dropped the letter in the mailbox, and then wondered if she should have called instead. But they had her phone number now, so they could set up the meeting, and she could be on a plane to New York the next day. She took the pizza back to her dorm room, and sat smiling at their letter. Just having a shot at a teaching position in a private school in New York was the happiest day of her life.

They called her back three days later on her cell phone, and gave her an appointment for the following Monday. She promised to be there, and then decided to spend the weekend before in New York. It occurred to her that the appointment she had just made with them was on Valentine’s Day, an ignominious day for her ever since fourth grade. But if she got the job, it would change her opinion of Valentine’s Day forever. She hoped it was an omen of some kind. She booked the reservation as soon as she hung up, and then lay on her bed in her dorm room, smiling, trying to figure out what she’d wear to the interview. Maybe a skirt and sweater with high heels, or slacks and a sweater and flats. She didn’t know how fancy she should look for a job at a private school in New York, and she had no one to ask. She’d have to wing it and just guess. It was all she could do to keep from running up and down the hall screaming with excitement. Instead, she just lay on her bed, grinning like a Cheshire cat.

The Madison School on East 76th Street, near the East River, was one of the most exclusive private schools in New York. It went from ninth through twelfth grades, and was a preparatory school for college. The school was expensive, had an excellent reputation, was coed, and its students were from among the elite in New York, with a handful of scholarship students who were lucky enough to qualify. Once accepted, the students had every possible academic and extracurricular opportunity. They got into the best colleges in the country, and it was considered one of the finest private high schools in New York. It was heavily endowed so their science and computer labs had state-of-the-art equipment that competed with any college. Its language department was exceptional, offering Mandarin, Russian, and Japanese as well as all the European languages, and its English department was outstanding. Several of their students had become successful writers later on. And their teaching staff was exceptional as well, with degrees from important universities. And typical of most private schools, the teachers were severely underpaid. But the opportunity to work there was considered a real prize. Just getting an interview was a major coup for Victoria, and getting the job, even temporarily for a year, was beyond her wildest dreams. If she had to choose one school she would have given anything to teach at, this was it.

She took a flight after her last class before the weekend, and arrived in New York late Friday night. It was snowing, all the flights had been delayed by several hours, and they closed the airport right after she landed; she was grateful they hadn’t been rerouted somewhere else. And people outside the airport were fighting for cabs. She had booked a room at the hotel where she’d stayed before, in Gramercy Park. It was two A.M. when she finally got there, and they had saved a small ugly room for her, but the price was one she could afford. She rapidly got into her nightgown, without bothering to unpack, brushed her teeth, got into bed, and slept until noon the next day.

When she woke up, the sun was shining brightly on two feet of snow, which had continued to fall throughout the night. The city looked like a postcard. And children outside her window were being pulled on sleds by their mothers; others were having snowball fights, ducking for cover behind cars buried in snow that would take their owners hours or days to dig out of. Snowplows were attempting to clear the streets and spreading salt on the ground. Victoria thought it was a perfect winter day in New York, and fortunately had brought a pair of the snow boots she wore almost every day at Northwestern, so she was prepared. And at one o’clock she set off on foot toward the subway, which she had taken every day to work when she lived there. She got off at East 77th Street and walked east toward the river. She wanted to look at the school before she did anything else.

It was a large, beautifully maintained building with several entrances, and could have been an embassy, or an important home of some kind. It had been recently remodeled and was in pristine condition. A discreet bronze plaque over the entrance said only “The Madison School.” She knew that just under four hundred students were enrolled. A rooftop garden provided open-air space during lunch and recreation. And they had recently built a state-of-the-art gym for all sports activities in what had once been a parking lot across the street. The school offered every possible amenity and opportunity. It stood solid and silent on the snowy sunny afternoon, while a lone janitor cleared a path through the snow outside the school. Victoria smiled at him as she stood looking up at the school, and he returned the smile. She couldn’t even imagine being lucky enough to work there in her favorite city in the world. As she stood looking at it, she was wearing the thick white down coat her mother had given her, and felt like a snowman herself. The coat was unflattering but warm. She felt like the Michelin Man or the Pillsbury Doughboy when she wore it, but it had served her well, and was the warmest coat she owned for the arctic temperatures at school. And she was wearing a white wool hat pulled down to her eyes as a wisp of her blond hair peeked out over her brow.

Victoria stood for ages looking up at the school, and then she turned and walked away and went back to the subway to go to Midtown. She wanted to go shopping for something to wear on Monday. She wasn’t happy with the outfits she had brought with her, and one of them was too tight. She wanted to look perfect when she interviewed for the job, and she knew how unlikely it was that they would hire her fresh out of school, and they must have had many other applicants, but her grades and recommendations were good, and she had all the excitement and enthusiasm of youth for her first teaching job. She hadn’t told her parents that she had come, because her father still wanted her to look for something in another field, with better pay and more possibilities for advancement in the future. Her dream of a teaching career didn’t meet their standards as something they could brag about or that would enhance their image. “My daughter is a teacher” did nothing for them, but working at the Madison School in New York meant everything to Victoria. It had been her first choice when she sent out inquiries to the best private schools in New York, and met all her criteria for dream job, no matter how low the pay. She would manage to live on it somehow if she even got the chance.

Victoria walked back through the snow to the subway, got off at East 59th Street, took the escalator upstairs to Bloomingdale’s, and began looking for something she could wear. The clothes she liked frequently didn’t come in her size. She was wearing a size fourteen at the moment, although they were a little tight. She sometimes let herself get heavier, without meaning to, in the winter, and then had to wear her size sixteens. The pressure of wearing fewer clothes, showing her body in bathing suits and shorts, and not being able to hide everything under a coat usually helped her bring her size down in summer. She wished she had been more disciplined about it recently. She had already promised herself to lose weight by graduation, and particularly now if she got this job in New York. She didn’t want to be at her biggest when she started her first teaching job.