I got my first signal from the Patricia Locke Cult last fall, the day I moved to Chicago. I was standing in the MCA gift shop, paying for a set of Mies van der Rohe postcards–something Chicagoan to send back to New York. As I was coaxing change from my purse, a pair of earrings trapped in the glass case below called me.
Weeks drifted by. I checked the phone book under L. I stared through the windows of jewelry stores. Was Patricia Locke just another Betty Crocker? I had been duped by that gimmick before. Finally, I gave in. Fuck the list. Fuck the price tag. I walked my credit card back to the MCA and took a sharp left into the gift shop.
A few nights later, sans jewelry, I arrived at a party. A woman I vaguely recognized caught my eye, then for no apparent reason strode across the room, commandeered a pen, and scribbled out an address. “Here–” she shoved the paper in my hand. “The sale’s Thursday from six to nine.” God, wearing divine earrings, smiled.
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Thursday at 5:30 a friend of a friend called. “I hear you’re going to the sale.” I asked if she needed a ride. “No,” she lowered her voice, “just the address.”
“This is cute, kind of Flintstone era.”
A friend of the ex-girlfriend arrived. So did the woman with the address. And a few people they knew. And some people their friends knew. The thing seemed like a frenzied cocktail party.
I turned them over, unclasped the clip, and squinted at the signature: P. Locke.
