Chapter One
Melody
Opening my shop on a Saturday morning satisfied me in a way I’d never experienced until I became a business owner. Even the grunt work made me happy. Dusting the racks and making sure the mirrors in the dressing room were smudge-free held more meaning than anything I’d ever done while living a supposedly charmed life in Pittsburgh with my family.
Most people, including almost all my extended family, would think selling lingerie wasn’t important. Wasn’t a meaningful way to spend your life. But they didn’t understand the joy it brought me to have someone find the perfect piece to wear on their anniversary, or the satisfaction I felt when a hard-to-fit customer found their first comfortable bra. My store brought me happiness and fulfillment, much more than I would have gotten using my business degree to enter the corporate world my family worked in.
Once the cleaning was done, I puttered around, straightening lace, and checking to see if any sizes needed restocking. Saturday usually ended up being my busiest day of the week, though sometimes Sunday beat it depending on what events were taking place in town.
I’d chosen to open my store in a ski resort town in the Southern Tier of Western New York. My family had often come here to ski during my childhood, and I fell in love with the small town. With streets filled with small shops, day spas, bars, and restaurants, all locally and independently owned, the town focused on providing visitors with a high-end, but still fun and relaxing, vacation experience. At first my family wanted me to open my business in Pittsburgh, but I chose a place I associated with happy memories to fulfill my dreams.
My watch beeped, letting me know there were only fifteen minutes left before opening. I took a final look around the floor, confirming everything was neat and organized, at least for the moment, then headed to the back to retrieve the cash drawer from the safe. Once the register was set up, I took a few minutes to use the bathroom and make sure my ponytail was straight and makeup still intact. I never knew how the day would go, so I made sure to take care of personal business before opening. The place could be empty for hours after the doors were unlocked, or I could have an entire bridal party in here at 11:15 in the morning. It had happened before.
I confirmed my hair was secure and no flyaways had escaped. Always maintaining a neat appearance had been drilled into me since birth, and now that I was a business owner, that lesson served me well. My brown waves liked to throw a wrench in that plan, but for the time being, I had them under control.
Today probably wouldn’t be a busy day due to the snow lightly falling outside. Weekends during the winter in a ski town were spent on the slopes as a rule generally. Casual skiers might come to town for lunch after getting in a few runs in the morning, but anyone who really enjoyed skiing stayed out on the hills as long as they could. On a day like today it was quite possible the town wouldn’t see many visitors until dinnertime. Based on my prior experience, I expected the afternoon to be boring, but that didn’t mean I would delay opening. Whether or not anyone came in, I always tried to stick to my advertised hours of operation. Angering a customer who came to your shop during open hours only to find the store closed was a good way to lose their business forever.
To my surprise, the bells on the door jingled twenty minutes after I turned the lock and three women walked in, a blast of cold air following. The first lady looked familiar, but I hadn’t seen the other two before.
“Good morning, ladies. Welcome to Sweet and Sassy,” I called out from my spot behind the register.
“Good morning, Melody. I don’t know if you remember, but I was in here before the holidays while in town with my husband.”
I did remember the couple, distinctly. She and her husband lived in Southern Ontario and owned a ski chalet just outside of town. She spent over a thousand dollars on gifts and items for herself while her husband sat in a chair by the dressing room on a business call the entire time she shopped.
But I didn’t say any of that.
“Yes, of course I do. Thanks for coming back.”
She waved off my gratitude with a flick of her neatly manicured hand. “George and I are here with our friends this weekend, and while the boys are skiing, I had to bring the girls into town to see all the shops. Yours is our first stop.”
The three women browsed while we talked, fingering lace and satin as they circled the room. The store was large enough to hold everything I wanted, but not so big that I couldn’t see almost every square inch from the register. Of course, there were also two security cameras recording at all times to cover the corners out of my line of sight.
“Did all the items from your last trip fit well?”
She laughed at my question. “They fit perfectly, and George practically ordered me to come in here and buy more… if you know what I mean,” she said with a smile.
I didn’t even blink at the reference to her sex life. That was mild for my shop, and nothing compared to what I indulged in in my free time. Thankfully, I’d restocked with all new items last week, so she had plenty of options to choose from. I hopped off my stool and came around to the front.
“Let me show you a few new things I think might appeal to you and George,” I said with a wink.
She laughed again before following me over to the display of teddies. I spent the next hour measuring and fitting the other two women, helping all three find the perfect items to take back to Canada with them.
A large part of my success was due to my interactions with customers. Custom bra fitting, suggesting things that would flatter their body type, and basically waiting on them hand and foot were what made people come back. I didn’t carry the most exclusive brands or the trendiest styles. I focused on classic items from manufacturers that produced consistent quality, and I stocked those items in a wide range of sizes. I wanted anyone who walked in the doors to find something that fit.
The ladies were finalizing their choices as I rehung the pieces they didn’t want when the bells over the door jingled again.
“Oh, my goodness!” my newest customer exclaimed, drawing everyone’s attention. And then, with all eyes on her, she squealed. “Eeek! Everything in here is so prettyyyy!” She dragged out the last ‘y’ for so long I began to worry she might pass out from lack of oxygen.
The Canadian ladies looked at each other and then back at her in shock, or maybe awe. I was stuck somewhere between the two.
She embodied the epitome of feminine perfection, at least from a man’s point of view. Early twenties, at the most, with long, sleek blonde hair and a tall, fit body that I’d kill to have. She wore high-end ski gear, from the top of her perfectly placed hat, that didn’t dare mess up a single hair, to her form-fitting parka, to her far too expensive boots. Everything was top-of-the-line and fit her as snuggly as the leather gloves she wore.
“Good afternoon. Welcome to Sweet and Sassy. Let me know if I can help you find anything or if you’d like to be fitted.”
“Ohhhh, yes. I need a fitting. Daddy told me to come down here and get whatever I wanted, but to make sure it fits. He gets mad when I buy things without trying them on, and then we have to return them. We’re from Buffalo, so it would a pain in the booty to drive an hour back down here.” She rambled on while taking off her hat, gloves, and jacket, carefully putting the gloves inside the hat and the hat inside one of the sleeves, then hanging the jacket on the coat rack by the door. She smoothed out her hair, which miraculously didn’t even need it, and began wandering through the shop, oohhhing and aahhing along the way.
The Canadian ladies approached the counter with an armful of items each, and I barely contained my glee as I began ringing them up. What I thought was going to be a slow day spent reading turned out to be anything but, and it wasn’t even one o’clock.
“I’m so glad you all found things that worked for you,” I said as I swiped the first one’s credit card.
“You have such lovely items that it was so hard to pick, but my husband gave me a five-hundred-dollar limit,” one of the first-time visitors said.
“Daddy said the same thing to me,” the ski bunny said, causing the women to turn around and face her. “But I think I may just go over that limit and deal with the consequences. He can’t be too mad when there’s so many things he’d love to see me wearing.”
My mouth dropped open for a second before I slammed it shut, but my customers turned back to me with wide eyes and gaping jaws. Luckily, the young woman wasn’t paying any attention to the four of us while she flipped through racks of nighties.
“Let me just cash these ladies out, and I’ll be right over to help you,” I called as I hurried to scan the next order.
“No problem, I’m not in a hurry,” she replied before spotting something on the other side of the store that made her squeal and rush over to check it out.
I focused on neatly folding each item as the Canadian women muttered to each other under their breath.
“At first, when she said daddy, I thought she might be eighteen or nineteen and she was talking about her father. But I don’t think that anymore.”
“Oh, she might be eighteen or nineteen, but I definitely don’t think her ‘Daddy’ is her father.”
They tittered and grinned at each other. It didn’t seem mean-spirited, but I kept an eye on the young lady in question to make sure she didn’t overhear. I didn’t want to tell them to shut up, but I also didn’t want their words to cause offense.
“I read about that in a book one time, and in the story, the man punished the woman and spanked her.”
“She said she’d face consequences for going over her spending limit, so I bet she probably gets into lots of trouble.”