High Expectations Should Be Met

Word count: 1662
Status: Complete

    People wear leggings as pants and bras as shirts.  What happened to modesty?  Personally, I enjoy several layers: tall slipper socks, boot cut jeans, long sleeves, and a jacket or sweater to top it off.  There is no reason to walk outside naked.  I've always known I was born in the wrong era fashion-wise.  
    Since October of 2011, I wanted to visit Hong Kong Vintage, a shop full of old clothing.
Now February, I chose to go.  What was supposed to be a twenty minute bike ride turned into two hours.  My $99 Wal-Mart bike decided to throw its chain while I glided downhill by a tennis court.  Without a screwdriver, I violated my bike in the middle of the sidewalk to coax the chain back in line.  With my fingertips blackened with bike gore, I pushed off to find a restaurant sink.
    After leaving Bojangles with clean nails, I went back to my printed route.  After an accidental detour and U-turn, I passed the hospital district.  A gold car with two broads slowed down to laugh at me on my one-speed bike.  Why do people think all bikers are poor and license-less?  I have a car; it's just a state away.  And besides, I get good exercise.  Can't laugh at my well-toned buns and calves!
    The trip gradually got worse.  At the next intersection, I step off my bike to walk it across the wet red clay lining the sidewalk.  Even though I intended to jump, my knockoff Converses sank into anyway.  For the next few minutes, I scooted my shoes across the cement and the grass between the cracks.  I couldn't bring myself to rub my feet on someone's yard.
    Soon, I came to one of Charlotte’s stupidly arranged intersections.  The road across from me was offset by at least 12 feet and the main street intersected it at a diagonal.  To top it off, I had to stand next to some crazy lady screaming “Merry Christmas” and whooping as I waited for the Walk sign to light up.
    By now, I was getting concerned about which area of Charlotte I was in.  The pastel-colored houses were one-story and huddled next to each other, barely allowing a yard to part them.  The seediness of crossing the silent railroad track increased my fears.  The trees cradled the neighborhood in darkness.  The groaning in the dim tunnel signaled the presence of tons of speeding metal overhead.
    After leaving the tunnel, I’m right around the corner from Hong Kong Vintage.  The slim buildings were clearly old, taking the hint from the discolored bricks, the homey-looking doors surrounded by large display windows.  I turn the corner look for a place to chain my bike.  There was a sense of youthful energy from the many customers ducking in and out of shops though.
    I'm greeted with a single bike loop and a bike already attached to it.  “Is this the only bike rack?” I said aloud, not looking for an answer.
    An older woman rearranging antiques straightened and did a double take.  “Wow!  Cool bike.”
    I smile.  Every time I take my cream-and-teal Huffy Cranbrook cruiser out to Charlotte's sidewalks.  I proceed to Hong Kong Vintage's red and black store front.  The dusty windows don't look friendly and the solid door is windowless.  I hesitate in the doorway.  I checked the Hong Kong Vintage's website about a dozen, trying to see more of the store around the select pictured clothing and housewares. It was a mystery I wanted in on.
    As I crack the door enough to slip inside the uncomfortably warm room.  The first thing that hits me is the musty smell of stuff regularly brought out to air.  I imagine that's how my attic smells, since I've never been up there.  I don't venture into place that house many-legged mystical creatures called insects.  Then there was the music.  It was old school techno, back when they were figuring out how to make bleeps and blips.  Later, it would turn to boring slow songs they play in old timey school dances.
    The lady at the cash register turns and says hello.  I smile.  The lady was Caucasian.  Did I misread the store sign?  Where the Hong Kong at, ma'am?  I close the door behind me and search the store for the Asians I was promised.  Furniture and kitchen utensils were put on shelves on both sides of the entrance.  A few old board games like Bingo were tucked away in fading boxes.  I came for the clothes, so I didn't give them a closer look.  A quick glance at the cashier counter cases offered a display of gaudy jewelry.
    Fourteen large paper lanterns, the only thing vaguely Asian so far, hung from the ceiling, the main source of light besides the weak rays that filtered through the front.  The walls were “Attention!” red and the black floor, scuffed.  Two men, one tall and round and the other small and hip, walked in and soon walked back, clearly losing interest in the few jackets available.  Two women barely make it inside the shop before they leave, too good to shop here.  One single fan lazily pushed hot air around.  My Queens “There's an app for that” T-shirt clung to my skin.  The Asians must be in the backroom.
    "Is it okay if I asked you a few questions about Hong Kong Vintage?" I ask the cashier.
    She looks at me weirdly, slightly shaking her head.  "What type of questions?"
    "Silly question but, what puts the “Hong Kong” in Hong Kong Vintage?"
    She chuckled.  “I didn't want it to be called 'Someone's Attic.'”
    A strong sense of betrayal gurgled in my gut, like eating leftovers your mom forgets to tell you is old.  I stopped myself from walking out the door right then. "What is HKV's history?  Has it always been on Central Avenue?"
    "HKV has been in business for eight and a half years. Three years ago, we moved up three blocks for our previous location.  We spent six years there," she said.
    "What's a typical day here?  What kind of customers do you get?" I ask.
    By now, the cashier is more comfortable talking to me.  "Middle schoolers to city council members come to try on clothes for fun, Halloween costume, or wedding dresses.  They're all looking for something unique and one-of-a-kind."
    "Is it difficult to acquire quality goods?"
    "Yes, that's the point.  Condition-wise, lots of repairs and cleaning are needed. Everything in here is something I would wear myself."I ask her my final question.  "How often do you refresh your stock?  I imagine even vintage gets old?"
    Irritation flickered across her face but was quickly hidden.  “I put out new items three times a week,” she said.  “New” meaning pulling seasonal items in and out of storage.
    We exchange “oh thank yous” and “no problems” after which she gives her name. "I'm Elizabeth."
    Then we went about our businesses.  This was my second circuit of the room, since learning the Asians didn’t exist.  This time I focused on the clothes.  I could tell that some of these clothes dated back past the 1960s.  Few girls wear billowing skirts with floral prints anymore.  There were prom dresses, woolly sweaters, scarves, spy-worthy stiletto heels, winter jackets twenty-five percent off.  What really entertained me were the long handwritten names on the tags: $44 lime green and white beaded and sequined sleeveless dress, $36 Hukilan orange Hawaiian print max dress mid-calf , $30 DeLaru black velvet dress and jacket, $30 silver rainbow Lamé dress.  "Lamé" equals forcefully relieving a poor, defenseless piñata of its paper mâché.
    The floors beneath the hanging clothes were lined shoes of all kinds.  They reminded me of invisible sentinels forever at attention.  I squatted, lost behind the racks of clothes.  Purple high-heeled ankle boots caught my eye.  I rubbed a finger on the felt-like material as I flipped the shoe over.  Some company called Fashion Craft made them.  I recalled Elizabeth saying she’d wear all the items she puts on display.  These boots here were scuffed to grey on the toes.  Would she wear these out and feel proud?  None looked big enough for my mammoth feet anyway.
    At the back of the shop to the left of the agape dressing rooms, a testimony to the lack of customers, were a few clothes set apart from the rest.  It’s the black label section.  What does that mean?  A bright red outfit with fuzzy cuffs immediately grabs my eye.  Only hussies in movies wore things like that.  I didn’t touch it.
    I sit in a chair and eavesdropped.  A girl with yellow sports shorts asked Elizabeth about shoe sizes.  She was looking for a six.  I fume as Elizabeth points out that the sixes began halfway into the store.  No chance of finding modern day elevens here.  Yellow Shorts asks about clothing sizes too.  “I’d ignore the size tags in the clothes.  Just eyeball them for the fit,” Elizabeth said.  Size numbers have shrunken, but the amount of cloth needed has grown.  People want the illusion that their bodies are still slim.
    That is when I notice the low coffee table by my legs, directly in front of the dressing rooms.  Four magazines were splayed in a fan, their titles: Vogue, Elle, NYO, and Harper’s Bazar.  They were recent issues, too.  
Girls of the 21st century adore these magazines.  Those designers put their models in things that show every curve and just about every inch of skin their parents' bestowed on them.  Yes, these magazines were started as early as the 1900s, but the style has changed.  Modesty is no longer seen as a virtue.  Great way to support your vintage clothes, Elizabeth!