Sophie At The Auction

The television flickered into life. From the screen, Sophie could hear the murmur of the crowd in the auction room.

She sat, nervously excited. She had barely slept the night before, scared of missing this. A once in a lifetime event. The newspapers and magazines had been full of the details for weeks beforehand. Internet forums were full of messages debating the amount to be raised. It was on such forums that she had first heard about the auction, when she had logged on to discuss her favourite film star. She had discovered that her most famous dress, the dress she had worn when she had attended the premiere of her most lauded film, some thirty years earlier was to be auctioned. And Sophie had resolved then to buy it. This was until an examination of her finances informed her that would be impossible. So she had to settle for watching it on the television.

She saw the bidders who had assembled for the auction wait expectantly for what they had come to see. Film stars were there, bringing their glamour to the salesroom.

A different outfit, worn by a different celebrity was the first item to be auctioned. It was beautiful but the actress who had owned it was not that famous. And everybody in that auction room wanted something owned by a true star. They wanted the gloss to rub off on them. The bidding for this was not that frenzied and Sophie didn’t even register its final selling price. She was waiting for something much more important.

And then finally The Dress. There was an intake of breath from the salesroom as it was unveiled. At home, in her small sitting room in her small town in Norway, Sophie did the same. The bidding started. Sophie twisted a loose thread hanging off her T-shirt, around her index finger, as the figure grew higher. It rose and rose as memorabilia junkies threw in their bids, raising their hands in the air as if the money was nothing. Surrounding the salesroom were disembodied heads on TV screens and unseen callers ringing in their bids from far away places.

Her friends and family had never understood her obsession with faded film star Regina Diamond. And Sophie had never bothered to explain it to them. Regina was everything Sophie wanted to be, exquisite, talented, rich and famous. She had watched every film that Regina was in and read every book and read every book about her.

She watched now as the bidding within the auction room grew more and more frenzied. And then-

The phone rang.

In frustration, Sophie picked it up, not bothering to mute the television.

“Yes,” she answered abruptly, one eye fixed on the television.

It was her best friend Mandy. She wanted Sophie to meet her and some other friends in a cafe in the centre of town. Maybe they’d do some shopping.

“Can you come?” Mandy asked her.

“Umm, maybe, I don’t know,” answered Sophie vaguely.

“Well,” said Mandy, and Sophie felt a pang of remorse as she heard a tone of melancholy in Mandy’s voice, “you’ll know where we’ll be if you want to join us.”

Sophie terminated the call quickly and returned her attention to the television. The bidding for the dress was continuing, the tension was palpable. She couldn’t miss a second.

And as Sophie watched, the bidders appeared to her like vultures, fighting over the last pickings of a corpse. And the auctioneers, well Sophie felt the nausea rise in her watching them. To her they became master puppeteers and the bidders were their puppets, dancing to the tune. And Sophie came to the sudden realisation she was one of these puppets.

It came clearly to her now. These people thought that by buying the dress, their own lives would magically become transformed. And Sophie knew she thought it too. As if somehow the Hollywood glamour would rub off into her own life. But she knew that would never happen. She had to embrace her own life.

Quietly, Sophie stood up and switched off the television. The picture faded away to a tiny dot in the centre of the screen. Sophie picked up her coat and left the house to meet Mandy.