The makeover on Mulberry Lane

Turn 38 of 44

You then tell her that next is her nails which you pull out red nail polish and Paint Ruth's nails red, saying 'a gal's nails are her own business' just like every single housewife. She then asks about how to be a housewife. You then give her the housewife walk-and-talk lesson like Carol's downstairs. Soon, she’s moving like a 1950s housewife. The giggles and gossip continue.

"Now for the nails, honey," you say, and out of the little case comes the red polish, the same red as your own, as Carol's, as every mouth on the street. Ruth holds her small white hands out over the vanity paper like a surgeon's assistant, and you stroke it on — one, two, ten small red mirrors, the brush whispering down each nail while she watches cross-eyed and delighted.

"Ain't that the *prettiest*," she coos, waving them dry. "Red like my lipstick!" "Red like everybody's," you say. "A gal's nails are her own business." It comes out quick and flat, the way you heard it first, and Ruth nods like it's a verse she's known since Sunday school.

"But honey," she says, fingers spread, "I don't just want to *look* like a housewife. I want to be one. The walking, the talking, the — well, the whole shebang. How do you *do* it?" So you stand her up, petticoats swishing, and give her the lesson, the same thirty minutes you gave Carol, walking heel-to-toe with her chin level and her seams straight, hips carrying the skirt like it's a matter of civic pride.

"Swell," she says, crossing the bedroom and back. "Simply *swell*. And the voice?" "Honeyed, honey. Never sharp. Everything's 'lovely' and 'jolly good' and 'land sakes.'" She tries it — "Lovely! Jolly good! *Land sakes!*" — and giggles, and the giggle comes out dainty and bright and stays that way.

By the end of it she's moving through her own bedroom like it's a commercial — pouring imaginary coffee, smoothing a petticoat, dropping a dainty curtsy to a husband who isn't home yet. The gossip runs under it the whole time, easy as breathing: the trouser sister on Birchwood, the Delgados and their empty kitchen, how a gal's day runs — up at six-thirty, hubby's breakfast, casserole by two, fresh lipstick by five.

"Six-thirty sharp," Ruth repeats, pacing her polished floor, red nails flashing. "Margaret, I feel simply *born again*. How long till these curls are ready?"