Red Shoes

Red Shoes

By Laura Schiller

She keeps them in the bottom drawer of her nightstand: a pair of bright red, high-heeled shoes. Now and then she goes to look at them, an old woman with thin silver fuzz covering her head. She walks across the pale beige carpet and she sits down slowly on the edge of the bed, which creaks just like her seventy-year-old bones. She opens the drawer and takes them out, just to feel the silky smooth texture of them, see their rich color and sheen, the once white, now yellowed fabric inside, and the name of a long dead designer printed in flowing black letters.

Her eyes wander up to the photograph on the nightstand, a black and white photograph in an ornamented silver frame. There she is wearing a floral print dress, with her hair – it was brown and glossy as a ripe chestnut then – curling wildly past her shoulders. And the red shoes are on her feet, calling attention to her slim white calves. And there is a man standing next to her, wearing an army officer’s uniform, with an Elvis hairdo and a smile that cannot quite reach his eyes. Those eyes had seen too much of war to really smile, even before he was brought home wrapped in the Star-Spangled Banner.

They first met in a dance hall. She remembers, as clearly as if it had happened yesterday, how she and her friends used to scope out the coat racks to see if they could spot any army coats. How one day a boy, almost a man, came to their table, bowed to her and asked her to dance. He was so short that she nearly refused him, but once he took her hand and whirled her across the floor, their feet flying and hearts pounding together, she never again had any second thoughts.

Nice shoes, he told her, watching them shimmer on her feet, his gaze traveling up her legs, across her figure and onto her blushing face. Five months later, they were married.

Now when she runs her hands over her red shoes, it’s as if she is there again on that smooth wooden floor, with the music thumping through her veins, his cologne in her nose, his arms around her. The stiff scarlet fabric has precious memories rising off it like steam from a teacup. She smiles, feeling him around her, watching over her.

My darling, she whispers. Let’s dance.

She puts on a vinyl record full of swing dance music, takes off her faded, fuzzy pink slippers and slides the red shoes onto her feet. With the help of a shoehorn, they still fit. She looks down at them, clashing absurdly with her faded grey housedress, and smiles.

One last time, her heels click loudly and slide across the floor as the music swells louder and louder. She lives alone, so there is no one to interrupt. She dances with the ghost of her lover, eyes shining, knowing in her heart that they will soon be together again.