Nicky Hart trudged down a Milwaukee sidewalk, the wire basket that held her laundry clattering behind, its rubber wheels bouncing over faults and cracks formed by the ice of a dozen winters past. Mid-century apartment buildings rose to enclose her in a concrete canyon verdant with spring flowers, trees, grasses and weeds. A storm threatened, its dark clouds tumbling across the sky, a cold wind driving it from Lake Michigan. Nicky's skirt and shirt billowed and bloomed in the wind, and she could feel its icy fingers play along her legs and bare arms. She wore her Catholic school's uniform: white oxford shirt, gray wool skirt, penny loafers. She hadn't changed since the morning, when she'd dressed for a warm promise of summer, not a sudden spring storm. She pulled a hooded sweatshirt from the dirty laundry and zipped it up to her chin, but she could still feel the chill air dance around her calves and thighs. Laundry day was one of Nicky's many family duties, but unlike most of her chores, she looked forward to this one. There was a television at the laundromat, which offered her a sneaky way to watch TV, technically forbidden on a school night. Even more exciting was the fact that the laundromat had cable, and therefore MTV, which her strict parents never allowed her to watch at home.
Thunder growled and the sky lit up with sheet lightning. Nicky swore to herself and tried to pick up her pace. The laundromat was less than a block away. But then the growls turned to roars and the sky opened up. By the time she pushed through the laundromat's swinging glass door Nicky felt like a drowned rat. Her clothes were soaked, her white shirt transparent, her gray skirt heavy, and both sticking frigidly to her skin. Nicky began to shiver as she loaded the laundry machine, and her teeth were chattering by the time she slammed shut its door. Rubbing her arms in an effort to warm herself proved pointless since the cold damp of her clothes sucked the heat right out of her. Nicky eyed the tumble dryer covetously, imagining how warm and comfy her oxford would feel after a few minutes in the machine.
Nicky moved up and down the aisles, peering down each one. She was alone. What harm would it do? Her bra was like a bikini top, and anyone watching could see it under her soaked white shirt, anyway. It was still pouring rain, so it was unlikely that a stranger would walk by. Nicky unbuttoned her blouse, stripped it off her shoulders, and fed it to the dryer.
She bounced in place, arms crossed over her chest, and rubbed her shoulders in an attempt to get warm. She hopped over to the television set mounted on a counter corner and pulled out the on button. The black screen buzzed to life as Martha Quinn introduced the next music video. Nicky's heart leaped: it was "Bette Davis Eyes," one of her favorites. As Kim Carnes lay on her stomach singing to the camera, Nicky started to dance. She matched the moves of the mysterious shadow that cavorted behind Carnes' reclining figure. Like that shadow, Nicky ran her fingers through her dirty blonde hair, pulling off her scrunchy and shaking out her wet ponytail. She swayed her hips, and the wet skirt followed her every move a half beat behind. She spun, hair and skirt suddenly rising up to defy gravity and sprinkle glittering droplets of water like sparkles. "She's ferocious/ and she knows just/ what it takes to/ make a pro blush," Nicky sang along to the music video, her voice as smooth and intoxicating as single malt scotch. She reached under her skirt where she'd hidden a pack of cigarettes. Still moving her feet and swaying her hips, she clamped a smoke between her lips and flicked her Bic. "She'll tease you/ she'll unease you/ just to please you..." The cigarette danced between Nicky's lips. She raised her clenched hands, fingers out like they were a pistol, "...she's got Bette Davis Eyes!" Nicky spun and blew on her fingers, cigarette smoke billowing over them like gun smoke.
Then Nicky froze. A man was standing outside the window, staring at her. He was protected from the pouring rain by a wide black umbrella, and despite the cloudy darkness he wore huge white-framed sunglasses. Long gray hair shot out in every direction, forming a halo that glistened in the streetlights. His baggy coat and trousers rustled in the wind.
It only took a moment for Nicky to recover from her shock. She was too pissed off to bother hiding her bra or bare midriff. Instead she put one fist on a cocked hip and pulled her cigarette from her lips with the other. "Take a picture, it'll last longer!" she yelled at the man through the window.
The man pulled a big polaroid camera out from under his billowing coat and raised it one-handed to his right eye. The machine flashed and whirred and spit a black photograph out from under its lens.
"What the fuck?!" Nicky was outraged. She ran to the door, pushed it open, and flung her lit cigarette at the guy. "Give me that fucking polaroid you perv!"
The man let go of the camera, allowing it to dangle on a shoulder strap, so he could use his free hand to shake the quickly developing photograph, all without letting go of his umbrella. "I'll give it to you under one condition," he said.
Is that a woman's voice? And now that Nicky's vision was no longer blurred by the rain-smeared window, she could tell it was a woman wearing a man's coat and trousers. "Oh yeah?" she asked cautiously, "what kind of condition?"
The woman finally let go of her umbrella, propping it between her chin and shoulder in order to free her hands. She produced a pen as if by magic, and quickly scrawled an address on the back of the polaroid. "I manage a local band that needs a new singer," she explained. "I'd like you to audition."
"Me?" Nicky was flabbergasted. "Why me?"
"Isn't it obvious, darling? The woman held out the now-developed polaroid. Nicky looked at herself on the photo film and saw someone she'd never seen before. The girl staring back at her was defiant, cocky and sassy. Even if she wasn't wet and half naked in nothing but a bra and schoolgirl skirt, she'd still be more alluring than this month's cover of Vogue.