August 20, 1988

Carrie

The shoes were the most beautiful Carrie Bradshaw had ever seen. As she examined the fine leather and the perfect stitching and workmanship, she literally forgot to breathe for a few seconds. She thought that this is how Daisy Buchanan must have felt as she lightly ran her fingers over Jay Gatsby's silk shirts. "They're so beautiful," she sighed.

"They're yours," Paolo said.

"I have like no money. I couldn't possibly…," she said with regret.

"Of course you can," said Paolo's partner and his partner, Stanford Blatch chimed in unison.

"When I saw you going out last Saturday, working those tired Candies for all they were worth, I told Paolo that he must snag these for you. Kim is wearing them on the cover of the September Vogue. They aren't even in the stores yet," Stanford said.

"Put them on," Paolo demanded.

They fit perfectly. Paolo and Stanford could see the utter look of bliss on Carrie's face. She walked a few yards down the hallway and turned, imitating the runway walk she had seen on Elsa Klensch's show on CNN.

Carrie's wrestled with her conscience. She didn't know how much the shoes would cost, but she knew it was a lot more than she could possibly afford. She also, knew that Paolo, as a representative of the line, could probably get them for next to nothing. She had certainly never owned any shoes that came anywhere close to being comparable. Nor had anyone else she had ever known for that matter.

She brushed her fingers over the graceful lines of the stiletto heel of one shoe and appreciated the buttery-soft leather. No one in the world would love these shoes the way she did. They must be hers. Something burst in her heart. A shoe lover was born.

Then suddenly she brightened. "I know what I can do. One of the editors at the Star gave me free passes for a new club that's opening tomorrow night. I want the two of you to come with me as my guest."

A few hours later, Carrie tried to take twenty dollars from the ATM. It felt like a violent blow to her heart when the machine spat out a slip of paper saying her transaction was being denied to insufficient funds. She would have sworn she had enough in her account. She hastily went through her handbag looking for cash. She found eight dollars and change.

She headed down the street to McDonalds for a Big Mac and small fries. It was going to be tough to make it through the weekend. She had grown up in a working-class home and was used to worrying about how to make ends meet. She had assumed that it would all be easier than this when she graduated from college.

All summer long she had been sending out her clippings from her college newspaper to any and every publication she could find. So far her job search had borne no fruit. Her only paying work had been writing a few articles for the New York Star on a freelance basis. If only they would hire her on a permanent basis. As nice as it had been to see her byline in the paper those four times, if the Star or some other publication didn't hire her on a permanent basis, soon enough she would have to return to her hometown in the Midwest. If she was lucky, the local paper would hire her and she could write articles that would be published next to the ads for tractors. No. She couldn't let that happen. She had to stay here. She had fallen in love with New York at first sight.

Being unemployed had left her plenty of time to explore the neighborhood where she lived and the greater city. She loved everything about New York. She loved the small second-hand clothing stores. She loved the way the gruff guy from Brooklyn who ran her favorite hole-in-the-wall pizza place snarled at his customers. She loved the museums. She loved the huge buildings – the Chrysler building, the Empire State Building, the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center. She loved that she could live in New York for a million days and never run out of places to explore – a new neighborhood that was suddenly emerging as the new hot spot, a new shop, a new artist. And, like all great loves, she loved the way she felt when in the company of this great city. New York City was where the whole world converged, the beginning of it all. She loved feeling a part of all that.

Late next afternoon, Carrie exited the glorified broom closet that was her apartment wearing the very same pair of Candies that her neighbor Stanford had mocked the day before. They were over five years old now. She had bought them on a school trip to Chicago her senior year of high school. Until yesterday, they were the nicest pair of shoes she had owned. Today they seemed to mark her as a rube among the fashionable New Yorkers.

As she passed the newsstand, she saw the new issue of Vogue on the racks. She stopped and flipped through the magazine. If she bought it, she wouldn't have enough money even for another Big Mac. She put the magazine on the counter and fished the money out of her bag. Vogue would feed her spirit. On the way back to apartment, her stomach growled. "I hope they have lots of food at the club tonight," she thought.