NOT OUTED

SPOTTED: Which fashion mag icon was seen swanning around Donatella's soiree in a dress matching her sexy, much younger, assistant's? And it was no accident, cherubs, for she brought her as her date. Could it mean a Sapphic sensation is about to unfold? The entranced room watching the drama certainly thought so. Will there be a Hers and Hers bridal registry in the future? We'd love to suggest more but the Devil's got our tongue.

Miranda slapped Page Six down on her desk so hard her glass of Pellegrino rattled. She glared. She had NOT just been outed by tawdry members of the fourth estate. For starters, there was nothing to out. If she and Andrea had … reached a certain understanding … that hardly meant they were in one of those ridiculous lesbian relationships involving U-Hauls and underarm hair and trucker caps.

And bridal registries?! Good grief. She scowled.

"Andrea," she hissed through the office glass. "Get my lawyers on the phone."

"Yes Miranda."

There was a pause as Miranda glared ferociously at the page again. "The Devil's got our tongue?" She'd take more than their tongues.

"Miranda, I have Lewis."

"Lewis, darling, it's been too long," Miranda purred into the phone and leaned over her desk with a predatory gleam. "Now then, how do you feel about earning your retainer? You've seen Page Six today? Yes, yes, total nonsense, of course. What? No, well, I suppose some could argue we did appear in similar gowns, but it's purely coincidental.

"No, don't be ridiculous, she was NOT my date. Where do they get these idiotic notions? Was their journalism degree acquired from the back of a cereal box? What? Oh, well, she was there as my plus-one. YES, there is a difference! What iswrong with everyone today?"

She rubbed her forehead.

"No! How could I know what she was wearing just because she was my date? I mean my plus-one? Must I vet every outfit my staff appears in? Am I to somehow psychically divine what the woman I escorted to the event was wearing?"

Her eyes narrowed.

"What do you mean, 'Don't you have eyes?' Of all the … Lewis Baratz, you might have parted my last two ex-husbands from everything they hold dear, but you are on thin ice. I suggest you consider your next sentence very carefully."

She waited with thin lips and listened, then frowned. And then frowned some more.

"I find your level of incompetence truly frightening," she whispered. "Doing 'nothing' is not an option. Hoping it will 'blow over' is not an option. 'Chalking it up to free speech' is not an answer. Can't you, oh I don't know, challenge the Constitution or something? No, no, just the First Amendment. Now come on Lewis, really, you think so small!

"Well? Fine then, pay attention - I want it known that Miranda Priestly is not to be outed. I absolutely won't have it. Do your job, Lewis, I mean it. That's all." She slammed down the phone.

"Miranda?"

The fashion editor looked up into the concerned brown eyes of her shapely assistant and her lips curved. "Hmm?" she said, taking in the perfectly clingy Jayson Brundson dress and delightful 5in Jimmy Choo heels.

"Um, what are you telling people about …" she waved her hands between them. "Because I've had my friends, Lily and Doug, on the phone asking if it's true and I don't know what to say."

Miranda peered at her over her glasses. "Say? What on earth is there to say?"

"Well," Andrea said and reddened. "Um… that Page Six story seemed to imply…"

"Andrea," Miranda huffed, "Page Six is soon to be a bloodied red smear of roadkill on the newsprint highway. They shall not dictate anything to do with our lives."

"Yes, Miranda, but, ah, see I've been fielding questions all day from media outlets asking me to comment. I can only pretend to be Emily and say 'bollocks' over and over for so long. Sooner or later someone's going to ask me what a crumpet is and I won't know!" Her voice rose in panic. "And my parents left me, like, six messages, and I've been too scared to check them because they sound really mad and…"

"Andrea," Miranda sighed heartily. "If anyone can remove that absurdly open slather Free Speech amendment from the Constitution, it's Lewis. Have a little faith. Did he not get me Stephen's collectible LBJ golf clubs in the divorce settlement?"

"Faith," Andrea repeated dumbly. "Constitution? Huh? Wait, what? You play golf?"

"Don't be ridiculous. What a ghastly sport. Fat men squeezed into plaid. Now whose bright idea was that?"

Andrea blinked stupidly at her.

"Well?"

"Um."

"Try not to worry, Andrea. We have not been outed. We shall not be outed. That's all."

Miranda said it more forcefully than she'd intended and watched as her skittish assistant suddenly appeared to be mimicking a guppy. Well, that would not do. She softened her voice and her eyes flicked to the empty outer office.

She whispered: "Come here."

She enfolded her in her arms and whispered soft, sweet kisses down her assistant's creamy neck. "Andrea, there is nothing to out," she said gently against that perfectly soft skin and then gave a small groan against it. "Nothing at all."