Josh had not bought any clothes since, we think, high
school. There was a blitz back in 1991 when we were shipping my older brother
off to college-during which he accumulated lots of flannel shirts, Levis and
woolly sweaters-but that was like completing a checklist for summer camp. It
wasn’t what I would call shopping. After graduating, he moved to Moscow where
he worked as a banker for a few years. That time, he packed some Brooks
Brothers standard-issue suits, the type my father wears, and actually pilfered
ties from Dad and our younger, more sartorially interested brother, Michael.
Over the last few years, so far as I could tell, Josh spent
the bulk of his time doing his best to look, well, Soviet. When he moved back
to New York in 1997 to go to law school it was obvious that all the clothes
he’d bought in three years were souvenirs.
There is a Mao suit from a trip to Vietnam, some strange
caftan-with-pointy-hat set picked up during a trip to Uzbekistan (“It’s a
khalat!” said Josh), a shiny disco shirt for exploring new Russian night life
and a pair of large, black, very Communist shoes.
Mostly, I noticed that
his wardrobe didn’t fit him. He’s much smaller now than he was when he swam in
high school and then rowed in college. His broad, athletic shoulders are gone,
and the waistbands of his khakis have become bunchy under his belt. We were
glad, my family told him, that he had not gone the ex-jock-gets-fat route. But
we were all getting sick of his Charles University in Prague sweatshirt and
purple Black Dog T-shirt, which seemed to be the only things left that fit.
Ever since I was 5, I’ve
been dressing my brothers. When my mother brought Michael home from the
hospital, I was distraught that I didn’t have a sister. I had been filling a
baby-wear trousseau in my head for months. At first I thought Michael would
just have to be a cross-dressing baby (a plan that didn’t go far). As I got
older, though, I realized that boys are even easier to dress. And I had two who
needed my help. Josh has sometimes been a little reluctant-he’s usually giving
advice-but at least he always asked my opinion of how to manage his enviably
thick and curly hair. (Japanese hair gel!)
At 26, Josh is afraid of
buying designer clothes in New York. “The thing is, I don’t want to be That
Guy,” he’d tell me when I begged him to let me make him over. Josh dreaded the
costumes of his banker friends who agonize over whether or not they are too
junior to warrant French cuffs.
You don’t have to be That Guy, I told him, or That Other Guy
in clinging rayon garments or plunging V-necks. Somewhere between expensively
and uncomfortably overdressed and
dandied up and cologne-heavy was a stylish type that Josh could pull off. Or,
at the very least, he could buy something in his size.
We started slowly: Banana
Republic, the middle of the road of copycat design chain stores. We
acknowledged that, well, he might be a medium now-instead of an XL-and that’s
O.K. And we figured out that Josh hates every shade of green, which is O.K.,
too.
Purchasing two oxford
cloth shirts was so time consuming and exhilarating that we next had to spring
for sandwiches. Over lunch we were unanimous: No J. Crew! We could do more than
relive what had been done eight years ago. In the back of my mind was a pair of
Nova USA pants, but I hesitated to bring it up-was Josh ready for drawstrings?
Looking across the table at his Patagonia top, I realized we were a long way
from drawstrings. We would ease into this.
We tried APC, but the neon orange and quirky camouflage
scared him off. I racked my brain. “We’re going to Agnès B.”
Hanging on the wall in Agnès B. Homme on Greene Street was a
shiny outfit with purple polka dots, punctuated by a fedora. My brother wheeled
around, heading for the door. “Look, you’re not getting a fedora. Just please
look around,” I begged him and set about filling my arms with knit tops and
well-cut pants. I shooed him into the dressing room and told him first to try a
pair of deep-gray, plain-front pants in a heavy twill with slit pockets-at $90
on sale, they were much more expensive than any other piece of clothing Josh
had ever bought. “I think these pants will be a bit small,” he complained
holding up the little waistband.
They weren’t. He looked in the mirror. He looked again. He
whirled around. He shook his butt around. He loved them. Breakthrough! Sure,
they were nice pants, but basically they fit him.
He became totally unstoppable. A black knit polo shirt, a
maroon V-neck sweater. He danced around the dressing room. My arms filled up
again.
“O.K.?” I said when I could barely see over the stack.
“O.K.,” he agreed, coming out of the dressing room in his
old clothes, looking like a clown.
We paid, headed to the door, and Josh looked back.
“Do you think I got enough?” he asked, and then he was at it
again.
After round two, I packed Josh, who was looking quite
pleased, onto the uptown train.
A few nights later we were having dinner with his friend, a
quiet midwestern guy. “Amy took me to this place,” Josh told him. “Agnès B.
Turns out”-and here he paused to look around-“I’m built like a Frenchman.”
“Really?” his friend said. Then he asked for directions.
The next time I saw Josh, he reported that his friend had
bought an Agnès B. shirt. I haven’t seen it, but Josh says it’s not dissimilar
to most of his friend’s other shirts. But it was the new designer shirt.
Now, his friend’s shirt is practically a legend. He met a
girl one night when he went out wearing it. The girl turned out to be a
dominatrix. Once a week she whips an old Brit while he wears his public school
knickers. It had to be the shirt.
I told my friend Rebecca about the phenomenon, and the next
weekend she packed her boyfriend, Marko, off to Agnès B.
“He did this dance in the
dressing room!” Rebecca said. I saw Marko at a party, wearing his new pants.
They were only slightly unlike the pants I’d seen Marko wear for four years
during college. But Marko lifted his arms and shook his butt. He swiveled
around. Marko loved these pants.
I don’t know if Josh will
ever buy clothes again, at least for another decade or so. He did buy a pair of
shoes, he said- without me -during a
trip to London with his girlfriend. I have yet to see the evidence.
He’s psyched about his
new clothes. He still wears his big, old khakis six days out of seven-or maybe
that’s just when he’s slumming with his little sister. But on that seventh day,
when he slips into the pants that fit-he’s not College Guy, or Banking Guy, or
Synthetics Guy. He’s just a guy whose pants fit.
