For months, I could not get a glimpse of her feet, no matter how hard I tried. I started various discussions with other people in the office about shoes, and even mentioned a news story about how when your second toe is longer, it is a sign of aristocracy. Other women in the office would take off the occasional shoe, but with Julie, I had no success at all. Once when we were working late preparing for an audit, we were sitting across form each other at a folding and I accidentally kicked her dangling pump, but she recovered it before I could even look under the table. She was very shy, and without a doubt, the toughest prospect I have ever seen before or since. It appeared that I had met my match and in fact, I stopped trying.
One afternoon in February, I was coming back from downtown and six to eight inches of snow had fallen in the course of the day. No one else was returning to the office because more snowfall was in the forecast. I had sent the office staff home early, but Julie stayed because she did not have a ride home until her sister picked her up at 5:30. As I pulled into the empty parking lot in front of the office, I noticed that the snowplows had cleared the lot earlier, and there was already another inch or two of fresh snow on the pavement.
As I got out of my car, I saw Julie headed across the parking lot to the mailbox, wearing a long denim skirt, a sweater, and the usual low-heeled pumps. Our mailbox was on a post at the far end of the lot, and the snowplows had piled up a ridge of snow in front of the mailbox that varied from several inches in some places, to knee deep in others.
Julie carefully picked her way through the snow, stepping in the existing footprints the postman had made. She collected the mail from the box, and then suddenly lost her footing in the slippery snow, flailing her arms wildly, and scattering the mail before falling backwards into the fluffy snow.
I ran over to her as quickly as I could and pulled her up to her feet, surprised to find her laughing hysterically. My relief that she was unhurt lasted only a heartbeat, nearly my last. This beautiful girl was halfway into my arms, laughing uncontrollably, and balanced on a solitary black pump. I didn't even try to be discreet. After a moment, I looked down to see the object of my obsession, which I was sure would be the most perfect toes and highest arch I could ever have imagined. Impossibly, her toes were not visible at all. She had snow clinging to her bare stockinged foot obscuring her toes. Instantly, with her still clutching my arm and balancing on one foot, I bent down to brush the snow off of her stockinged foot. Unexpectedly, she let go of my arm and stepped back, again dipping her stockinged foot into the shallow snow, and then quickly rebalancing on her only shoe, with more snow obscuring her toes from my view.
For what seemed to me like minutes, I just stared stupidly at her snowy stockinged foot, really seeing no more than if she had both of her shoes on. I mumbled some apology figuring she was mad, and that I had been caught in the act.
"I'm really sorry," she said, and laughed nervously. "I can't stand anybody touching my feet. I hate them." "They're ugly," she added softly. There was another long uncomfortable moment as I stood there blankly. Finally she asked, "Can you please get my shoe?"
As I turned back toward the mailbox to find the missing shoe, feeling like an idiot, and truly unhappy. Julie stood forty feet behind me by the fence, holding a post for balance. I couldn't help it, I turned to look and even from a distance, I could see that her foot was perfect. She had brushed away the snow and stood with her toes dangling half a foot above the snow, unpolished, and perfectly aligned under the sheer wet nylon. I had to get a closer look, but how? Normally, I could just kneel down and place the shoe on her foot, but from her previous reaction, I wasn't sure. She might say, "Just toss it to me," or something likes that. Just as I was about to pick the shoe from the snow bank, the solution came to me.
"I don't see it here," I said, loud enough for her to hear, but still facing away from her. "Are you sure you didn't kick it off when you fell?"
"No," she said firmly, "I stepped out of it right next to the mailbox."
"I just don't see it here," I lied, nearly stepping on it.
Looking quite angry, she took eight or ten decisive steps in my direction, with half of them thrusting her stockinged foot into the icy snow. This was going to be bad. Even from ten feet away, the shoe was plainly visible, because it wasn't buried very deep. For the second time in the span of a minute, I had a great idea. I pretended to loose my balance and deliberately imitated the way she had flung her arms in the air. As I fell, I grabbed the shoe with my hand and pushed it deep into the snow bank, well out of sight. It was a perfect performance and once again, she was laughing hysterically.
As I got up from the snow, I brushed myself off and suggested that we take her back inside, and I would come back out to find her shoe. I asked if I could carry her, but she declined the offer, and walked through the snow with one stockinged foot for the eighty to ninety yards back to the front door.
Once inside, I went into the warehouse to find some rubber boots. As I sat down in the front office and buckled the boots, Julie walked over and stood directly in front of me. At a distance of about three feet, the view was spectacular. Her exposed nylon clad toes were polished clear, and very beautiful. Her toes were perfect in every way, and it was all I could do not to touch them. I fumbled with the boot buckles hoping the moment would last forever. After at least a minute of this exquisite show, I looked up to see that she was standing in front of me because she had brought us two cups of coffee.
I was completely mesmerized, and for forty-five minutes, we warmed up, drank coffee, laughed and talked. Julie did not seem overly self-conscious about her stockinged foot, but I noticed that she kept her other shoe on just the same. I tried not to be obvious about staring at her toes, and I kept rubbing my hands together like they were cold, looking at them, but actually looking beyond at her stockinged foot in front of me. It was one of the best times I ever had, and I felt like I could have sat there looking at her feet forever.
The spell was broken by a loud commotion out front. The plows had returned for another round. I quickly ran out and retrieve the shoe form the snow bank, but I knew Julie couldn't see me from the front window, so I went into the building trough the warehouse. Halfway back to the office, I removed the insole, which was shiny white with a perfect footprint. I slipped it into my coat pocket and cut the shoe in half with several snips of some bolt cutters that were in the tool crib. I brought the mangled shoe into the office and speculated that the plow must have run over it before I could find it.
Julie looked disgusted and removed her other shoe, dropping them both into the wastebasket. After more coffee and another twenty minutes of staring at her gorgeous feet, her sister called to say that traffic was terrible, and she might be late picking Julie up. Naturally, I offered to drive her home, and she accepted the offer. I suggested she wear the big rubber boots over her stockinged feet, but she said no, and strode out of the front door walking in her stockings across the newly plowed parking lot.
After a delightful twenty-minute ride, looking at her stockinged feet as much as traffic would allow, I pulled into her driveway.
She thanked me for the ride, opened the door, and put her stockinged feet into the knee-deep snow. She walked briskly for the hundred feet from the car to the porch. She turned and stood on the covered porch, shaking the snow off of her stockinged feet, and then waved before entering her house.
The next day, I was at work hours before anyone else arrived, to empty the trash, and save the black pump for a trophy. O my great delight, Julie showed up wearing snow boots, and I enjoyed seeing her feet that day, and many other days, as she removed them and changed into her new dress shoes.
Snowman