The Lark: Vol 3, Issue 5, August 2023

Night Fever

By Tina Hass

Sweet sixteen. My parents arranged a small party for me. It being June, we were outside with cake, friends, probably a few little gifts, though I don’t remember that part. We continued our celebration later that day and into the evening at Jenny’s house where there was a big pool, some boys, secrets and chatter and a sense that life was at its pinnacle. And it was, in our eyes, because we were young and had all the time in the world and so many things to look forward to. But it was June, and summer vacation and there were boys and girls together, and we were happy and time stretched out and out and out.

Not long after this day, my father sat me down, or maybe it was in passing, it could have been either. Tina, he said, now that you’re 16 your mother and I expect you to find a part time job, this summer, and then after school and on the weekends, to earn a little money and learn a sense of responsibility. I swallowed this news not without regret, as my dreams of a summer lounging around Jenny’s pool were not to be. I shouldn’t have been surprised. My older brother was given this edict when he had turned 16 two years before. I had watched him, we all had, rake in the cash on weekend nights as first a busboy and then a waiter at a local fish and clam restaurant in town. He would come home late, tired and smelling to high heaven of fish, and sit under the dining room table stacking his one-night earnings into piles of 5s 10s, 20s, sometimes a few 50s. All the while permeating the house with the stinking fish smell and counting his very large amounts of money. He was kind of blasé about it all, and the money piles resembled the Monopoly game we liked to play.

I didn’t want to work in a restaurant and smell like food. I wanted to work in a store. We had a downtown full of sweet little stores and I would occasionally see a Help Wanted sign posted in a window, though I thought it would never be me inquiring about it. At 16 one feels a sense of entitlement perhaps, as if the whole world belongs to you and life will always be charming. And like a lot of 16-year-olds, I was too self-conscious and insecure to do this job hunt alone. I needed back up, support, encouragement, a friend. Jenny’s parents were content for her to have a babysitting gig an afternoon or two a week; so, she didn’t qualify for pavement pounding with me.

But Dana did. Dana: a free spirit, a sprite, the most non-conformist person in my circle. She needed a job too said her mother. Her mother, a single mother, always entangled with Dana over everything; her choice of clothes, her promiscuity, her interest in smoking pot. Dana was the most creative friend I had and being with her was potent and fun and dangerous. She was mercurial and our times together were either sheer joy or sheer terror. Dana was a willing contender to join me in our job pursuit.  One day we did- Dana dressed in peasant shirt, peasant skirt, high twisty sandals, bracelets up and down both arms and always that mop of golden hair cut in a long shag.

We started off together, walking down Main Street, ducking into stores, asking, until it became quite obvious that shopkeepers had no interest in hiring two teenagers, especially friends. And I came to the quiet realization that no one wanted Dana-- me maybe, but she was a handful. Employable, but not employed by the end of the day. After we split up, I ventured up the Post Road and went into the small department store called Franklin Simon. I was hired on the spot. Seems like they were looking for more help so I mentioned my friend. I called Dana that night to tell her of my victory and her potential. She donned her same costume the next day, went to Franklin Simon and was hired on the spot. We would start our retail career together, which brought me small comfort and lots of angst.

This was no ordinary department store. There were departments, but it was a small space where shoppers could easily drift between shoe shopping, jewelry buying, makeup trying, sport clothes, and cocktail attire. All right there, a one stop shop, with no escalators, not much walking and one giant cash register perched in the middle of the store where the manager and her assistant would eye customers always on the lookout for shoplifters or unsavory characters that might cause trouble. They were mean women, with perpetual scowls on their faces, and no time for employees who slacked off, even for a minute.  I was afraid of them, but not Dana as she created her own aura, a film of her own eccentricities that made her impervious to others. It all ended very abruptly for Dana a few weeks into our new employment. It was a Saturday afternoon and I was behind the jewelry counter efficiently taking earrings and necklaces out of the cases for customers. I looked over, to my right, and there was Dana, sitting cross legged on the floor, in the hosiery section, with about 30 packets of stockings and socks scattered all about creating a gigantic mess. She was sort of braying with exasperation, with her golden mane flapping up and down. The managers saw and descended. She was fired. Dana was not meant for containment and order. She was far too creative for that.

I, on the other hand, thrived. They liked me. They promoted me. I became a cashier; big responsibility for a young me. My tenure there was long- all through high school, that stretched into college when I was home for breaks and the long summers. My earnings were my spending money, and I learned financial satisfaction at a young age when my bank passbook reflected my hard work.

It was December 24, 1977. I always got the Christmas Eve shifts. We were closing early, 5:00 rather than the usual 9 pm. I was a bit giddy and tired from the whirlwind season of shoppers and wrapping and messy dressing rooms, and lines, and Christmas carols on repeat. The mean manager, who became not so mean over my course of years with her, was headed towards the front door jangling her keys to lock up. Whoooosh, in stormed 3 huge young men, with baseball caps low over their eyes, and a determination about them that shouted last minute shoppers. Aware of their late intrusion, one went right to the perfume counter, while the other 2 beelined it towards sportswear, where I happened to be stationed. “She looks about her size,” said one huge man to the other. The huge man turned to me and said, “Would you mind trying on that blazer? That would be so helpful.” I did. They loved it. I took it up to the cash register, along with the perfume the other one had picked out. I was all of a sudden aware of a twittering amongst my work mates. Whispers, furtive looks, painstaking kindness towards the three hulks. I asked the one with the credit card if he would like any of these wrapped. “Would you mind, I know you want to close, so sorry,” he sincerely, at least to me, said. I took the 2 items to the back to gift wrap where my managers followed me and screeched quietly in my ear “That’s John Travolta.”

His visit to Franklin Simon coincided with the same month the movie Saturday Night Fever was released. I remember seeing it soon after and sort of smiling to myself knowing that I tried on a blazer that was “her size” and wrapped his packages and sent him off on Christmas Eve satisfied with my prowess.