A Pair of Silk Stockings

A Pair of Silk Stockings is a short story written by Kate Chopin. Published in 1897, the story follows Mrs. Sommers who, rather than spending a windfall on her children, chooses instead to fund an afternoon of indulgence with it.

Mrs. Sommers comes into the small fortune of $15. After a few days of reflection, she decides to use the money to purchase clothing for her children so they may look "fresh and dainty and new for once in their lives." That narrative suggests that Mrs. Sommers had been before her marriage a wealthy woman, but now "needs of the present absorbed her every faculty."

An exhausted Mrs. Sommers rests at counter where she will begin her shopping adventure. There she finds a pair of silk stockings for sale and is entranced by their smoothness. "Not thinking at all," she disregards her plans of procuring clothes for her children and instead spends her money and her afternoon for herself. She purchases boots to go with her stockings, gets fitted for gloves, reads expensive magazines while lunching at a high-class restaurant, and ends her day sharing chocolates with a fellow moviegoer.

After the movie ends, she boards the cable car to return home with "a poignant wish, a powerful longing that the cable car would never stop anywhere, but go on and on with her forever."

Excerpt from Wikipedia, ‘A Pair of Silk Stocking’