“You,” Gwynnie said, “do not yet know how to tuck in your shirt. You have no cummerbund and no suspenders.”
If George had not been taller than this strange creature, he would have been afraid of her. However, looking down, he could see how the wig was attached, and that the red blood was just a carnation beginning to wilt.
“Furthermore,” Gwynnie said, “your date is carrying dinosaurs instead of flowers.”
There was a difficult pause. Beth blushed. Gary grinned. Kip looked away. Mike moaned.
“I like you,” Gwynnie pronounced. “Would you come to my party afterward? You are interesting. Want to dance with me? What is your name? Or shall I make one up?”
“If you don’t mind, Gwynnie,” Beth Rose said, “he’ll dance the first dance with his own date.”
“Oh, is he with you?” Gwynnie said innocently.
“No, he’s with the dinosaurs.”
Gwynnie pretended to have a heart attack. She fell backward, assuming Gary would catch her as she fell. He really has to be on his toes with her, Beth thought. She has placed more demands on him in half an hour than I did in a whole year. And he likes that!
George was pleased. Maybe being tall wasn’t his one and only asset. Maybe he was truly interesting, as Gwynnie claimed—interesting enough for Beth Rose to step in and demand his attention back.
“Yeah,” George said loudly. “With my own date.” He put his arm around Beth. Gary’s eyes floated over them, and stayed on her. He said, “You look beautiful, Beth.”
She remembered her violet brocade, shirred and clinging. She knew that Anne was right: she was stunning. And she knew Gwynnie was right: George was interesting.
She met Gary’s gaze calmly, and turned away. What a power trip! First to turn away! Better things elsewhere.
George moved a few dinosaurs out of the way and suddenly kissed her. It was just the lightest pass over her lips, and Beth Rose knew instantly it was his first kiss. She let the balloons close in. For a moment their eyes locked, and then George, embarrassed, broke away.
How delicious to be the one with experience!
“Sunglasses, sunglasses!” Gwynnie called, producing a capacious bag of them.
George stole her show, Beth thought. She has to call her audience back.
“People coming to my party afterward may wear a pair to establish that they are among the lucky ones,” Gwynnie said loudly.
There were snorts from those who were not among the lucky ones.
People like Anne, who were going to the party but would not have been caught dead in sunglasses, drifted away.
George eagerly reached for two pairs. Mickey Mouse for himself and Betty Boop for Beth Rose, who had to laugh. “They match my gown perfectly,” Beth said.
“Anything would look great with that dress,” George told her. “That is some dress. That is—oh, gee, I don’t know what that dress is. But it is!” He adjusted her Betty Boop sunglasses. “Well? Are we going to dance or not?”
She was very aware that Gary was listening to every word, watching every gesture, following every move.
“We’re going to dance,” Beth Rose said.
She did not look back.
Astonishing, Molly reassured herself. I am astonishing.
Easy to forget sitting in the dumb dented Subaru instead of a real car. Molly’s definition of a “real” car was one that cost a lot and seated only two.
In the shop trying the dress on, she had felt glamorous. Now she wasn’t so sure.
Anne would simply look away. That was Anne’s specialty—looking away.
Kip would say something superior. Nobody could put you down as well as Kip.
Beth Rose would be sweet. Molly could hear Beth Rose now, saying, “My! What bright colors!” or maybe “Green and black! How unusual!” Molly loathed sweet people. You just knew underneath they were sour as pickles.
Gwynnie, though.
What would Gwynnie think?
“Here we are,” Christopher said. He pulled up at the front entrance where a doorman was keeping watch over the drifting snow. “You get out and keep warm here while I park the car.”
Behind them parents in a station wagon dropped off a couple. The girl wore a floor length gown of pale yellow and a puffy jacket in white. The boy was wearing an ordinary suit, and a heavy ski jacket.
As they dashed in, the girl slipped. When her white jacket flew open, Molly saw the top of the dress—pale green, like an inverted tulip. A Beth Rose type of dress.
They would all be like that. Molly would not be astonishing at all, but just weird. Molly felt sick. How could she take off her coat? “I’ll go to the parking lot with you, Christopher.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. There’s snow everywhere and it’s a long walk back.”
Inside the lobby, the tulip had taken off her coat. She looked like a May Queen. Molly wrapped her own coat tightly around her and entered The Hadley alone. She used the huge, dark windows as mirrors. Not much showed beneath her coat
“Hey, Molly.”
She kept her coat together when she turned.
Con!
Molly’s heart leaped. Tears pricked her eyes, she missed him so. Once he had even shoved her in a pool to teach her a lesson. It had. She learned she really, really liked Con because he was no fool.
She tried to cope with her emotions. He looked as if he had just fallen off a surf board. His skin was tan under a shock of dark hair, and his nose was slightly sunburned, and peeling.
“You look wonderful,” she said. “Where did you spend Christmas vacation?”
“The islands,” he said. As if anybody should know which islands he was referring to; as if he habitually flew to various tropical islands, or possibly owned one.
“Excellent tan,” she told him, and waited for the return compliment. Waited for him to say, How was she? How nice she looked! How much he had missed her!
He didn’t. Con could always control his expressions, passing out the occasional smile like a prize to the winners in school. Now he stood silently before her: the complete snob, too good to have a conversation with the girl he had dated on the sly. Instead, he turned his back.
Turned his back and faced the banks of elevators.
I’ll kill him, she thought. I’ll kill them all. Molly could not keep the hatred out of her voice. “So where’s the famous Jade?” Probably about to emerge from the ladies’ room. Probably went to “the islands” with Con. Probably had enough tan to color Easter eggs.
“Sick,” Con said.
Molly just bet. Sick? On New Year’s Eve? Listen, if Molly had a date for New Year’s Eve with Con Winter, she’d overcome any ten obstacles at once. “Must have been some argument.” She knew what it was like to argue with Con. If he sensed he might lose, Con simply walked away. It was perhaps his finest skill. Vanishing at crucial moments.
“I’ve never had an argument with Jade,” Con said stiffly. “She’s very ill. As a matter of fact, she’s in the hospital.”
“Dying of love, I suppose,” Molly said. “Uh-huh. Tell me another one, Con.”
Con did not have the features to look stern and harsh. The best he could do was a mild frown. His face was built for snobbery, not wrath.
“So, darling boy, you’re on your own, huh?” Molly said. “You can join Christopher and me.” Why had he come alone? To gaze at Anne? To hurt Jade? To pick up some other dumb girl who wouldn’t know any better?
“You’re going out with Christopher Vann again? That stupid drunk?” Con said contemptuously.
“You’re a fine one to talk,” Molly snapped. “You’re a parent, Con, and that definitely requires stupidity in this day and age.”
Con pushed the UP button again.
Nothing happened.
It was hot in the foyer.
She shrugged out of her coat and fanned herself slightly.
Con stared. “That is a dress? Molly, take my advice. Go home and change.”
“Con, take my advice,
” she shot right back. “Go to the hospital and stay by Jade’s side, maybe contract a fatal disease or two.”
It was good to be angry. Anger would carry her.
And anger might have lasted, except that Christopher joined them. “Hello, Con,” Christopher said politely, not knowing he had just been called a stupid drunk. He extended his hand, and Con shook it firmly.
An old rhyme came into Molly’s head. Liar, liar, pants on fire, steal a baby’s pacifier.
That was Con. If it suited him, he’d steal a baby’s pacifier. He had no morals. He did whatever made him come out on top.
Molly conveniently overlooked the fact that this also defined her own choices in life.
“I’m lost,” Matt said.
“How could you be lost!” Emily cried, sitting up and looking out into the featureless snow. “We just stay on the main road all the way to Lynnwood! Oh, Matt!” she scolded. It was so unlike him. Matt loved driving more than anything else, and his navigating skills were something he was very proud of. She peered through the windshield. She hardly ever knew where they were.
“How lost are we?” Emily asked nervously.
“Very lost,” Matt said, but he was grinning from ear to ear.
“What’s funny about it?” she demanded.
“The car isn’t lost,” he said to her. “It’s never been lost, it never will be lost. Where the car is concerned, I always know exactly where I am.”
She stared at him. She drew her eyebrows very close together and pulled her lips into a tiny knot. “Don’t be mysterious. What is lost, if it’s not the car?”
“Me.”
“Matthew.”
“Really. I’m lost.”
“Matthew. Don’t be annoying.”
“I’m not annoying. I’m in love.”
“You nut case. Lost in love, huh? A likely story. You’re just trying to butter me up. What do you want tonight, Matthew O’Connor? You have plans you didn’t tell me about? Huh?”
Matt grinned out into the snow and didn’t answer.
Chapter 9
THE HADLEY WAS HUGE.
Kevin had pictured the elementary school cafeteria and Lee standing by the door, taking lunch money or something.
The Hadley had many front doors. Behind them, the space just went on forever. As far as a city block.
Counters. Clerks. Ferns. Desks. Little shops. Little shop windows that did not seem to be connected to shops.
Uniformed bellboys. Suitcases piled on trolleys. Hallways. A bank of elevators.
Doors.
Doors that led to empty black meeting rooms.
Doors that opened into a party of people Kevin knew were too old for Kip and George and Lee to be there.
Doors that led to a dusky noisy bar.
Doors that were locked.
More elevators. Another choice of halls.
Jamie was happy. He padded behind his brothers, staring at everybody and everything. He barged into a wall. He tripped over a cord. He examined the cigarette butts in the urns of sand. Unused urns had The Hadley logo pressed into the flat sand. Jamie ran his fingers through all untouched logos and admired his hand prints. He waved at the grownups in the party that wasn’t Kip’s and said “Good evening” to a clerk in the very same dignified voice the clerk had said “Good evening” to him.
Kevin said nothing. He was lost. He was scared.
Pete watched Kevin.
He was having a sinking feeling that this was a bad idea. Kip was going to kill them. He was glad Kevin was lost. Pete did not want to find his sister anymore.
Anne couldn’t help looking at the glass doors where the latecomers were straggling in. When the floor rotated her away, Anne strained over Lee’s shoulder to catch a last glimpse. She would not rest until she had seen Jade. But she might collapse when she did. Then what would she say to Lee? Pardon me, Lee, I have to faint. I’ll be right back.
Jade.
“Shall we get something to drink?” Lee asked.
Yes, she was thirsty, so they got something to drink and that kept her hands busy and gave them a new set of people to talk to. Lee was the only college kid there, and that was nice. The seniors were applying to college now, or waiting for acceptances, and they all had questions.
“You won’t hear till mid-April,” Lee said.
“Where did you apply?” Lee asked her.
Kip rattled off the names of five colleges who would never even have opened Anne’s application, let alone accepted her.
“You’ll get in all of them,” Gary said. “I have faith in you, Katharine.”
They were all startled to hear him say, so easily, Katharine. It suited her: it was strong and formal. And yet she was really Kip: normal old, organizing old, Kip.
“Shall we dance again?” Lee said.
“Of course,” Anne said. It was a slow dance. Lee held her slightly away from him, and she made no attempt to control or guide. The floor moved, and eventually they were back where they started. She had not once looked out the window. We could be in somebody’s basement family room for all I know, Anne thought.
She had to see Con with Jade pretty soon or she would fade.
But Con, not knowing her inner schedule, did not arrive.
The evening dragged on. Anne obeyed every suggestion Lee had, and he had a lot, and time somehow passed.
Every moment of the evening Lee was aware that his was the most beautiful girl there. Stunning in black, she was light and feathery. It wasn’t like dancing with a person, though: it was like moving a fashion doll.
He had never understood very well what girls were thinking, but he knew exactly what the boys thought—a girl as lovely as that? Who had been around the way Anne had with Con? Who obviously belonged to Lee now?
Belonged.
He didn’t want a girl to belong to him. He didn’t want to belong to some girl either. He wanted to be two people who adored being together.
After all these months it still hurt that Kip chose Mike Robinson over him. Lee dated Anne for an excuse to stay in Kip’s crowd. He didn’t really care for Anne much. He was ashamed of himself.
Not once did Anne suggest a single action, or start a single conversation. She was slender and weightless, but her presence hung on him like a great burden. He looked continually at his watch.
But not as often as he looked at Kip.
All the way up to the twenty-second floor together Con talked with Christopher about going to school in Boston. Con hoped to go to B.U. “Boston’s a great town,” Christopher said, “you’ll love it.”
“Oh, no!” Molly exclaimed.
“What’s the matter?” her date asked.
“I left my bag in the car. Did you bring it?”
“No,” said Christopher. “I didn’t notice it.”
She had to have the bag. Without it there would be no revenge. She got panicky enough for the boys to notice. Con looked at her oddly. “Shall I go back and get it?” Christopher asked.
She could not risk Christopher glancing into the half open bag. “Oh, you’re sweet,” she said, nuzzling him, embarrassing both boys. “It’s all right, we’ll forget it.” She would have to get it somehow. Later. Con was probably right; Christopher would get pickled and Molly could go then.
The doors opened on the twenty-second floor.
The place was packed. There must have been five or six hundred there: the boys mostly in black, with bright red, hot pink, or royal blue bow ties and cummerbunds. A few wore ordinary suits, and one tall character was stunning in tails!
The girls were all dressed Beth Rose style. Sweet, boring sugar.
At the door a laughing chaperone was passing out helium balloons in jelly bean colors: red and green and yellow and hot pink. A few kids had balloons of their own shaped like—like dinosaurs? Others had noisemakers or confetti or goblets to toast each other with at midnight. The band was playing even louder than Molly normally turned up her own radio, and the dancers were packed as close together as
sunworshippers on a sandy beach.
She could not tell that anything was revolving except her own heart.
To the tulip girl ahead of Molly, the stout five o’clock shadowed chaperone gave two balloons: one hot pink and one green. “To make your garden grow,” he said, and laughed hugely, over and over, like a machine you wound up.
To Molly he gave three green ones, and she started to smile, but he said nothing about her dress or her balloons. To the girl behind Molly he gave a pink one and cried, “Sweets for the sweet!”
Christopher fastened one balloon close in to her dress, using the spaghetti strap on her left shoulder, and one slightly higher, and one at the full length of its white string, so that she had a rising bouquet of balloons.
Christopher wound through the crowd, calling hello to everybody he knew and everybody he didn’t. Molly followed him, green as grass with all her balloons. Everybody they knew and everybody they didn’t cried, “What color balloon did you get?”
“Happy New Year!”
“Oooooh, it’s so nice to see you!”
Nobody used her name.
Perhaps nobody knew it.
In all that light, in all that glow, not one person said one thing about her dress.
They danced hard, so close together that they did not seem to have partners at all, but were only molecules bouncing in their tiny-allotted space. She had eaten nothing for two days in order to be sure the dress fit perfectly.
Astonishing? She had not made an astonishing impression. She had made no impression at all.
Molly was dizzy with being nobody.
I’m not a person, Molly thought. I’m not real. They gave me three balloons to hold me up.
Christopher turned as he danced. With his back was to her, she was not sure which black tuxedo was his.
Kids flocked around Beth Rose who looked idiotic with a new haircut. They were laughing over stupid dumb Beth’s dinosaur balloons, as if Beth were a clever person. They were laughing over Kip’s stupid little brother, George, who couldn’t even keep his shirt tucked in. Anne, stunning Anne, danced like a blind woman. Molly danced right next to her and Anne never saw.
Molly gasped when she saw Gwynnie. What a wig, what clothes, what style! Molly maneuvered closer to Gwynnie, to show off her own dress, and to remind Gwynnie she had invited Molly to her party. That Molly was pretty astonishing, too. But Gwynnie did not scream for Molly. “Beth Rose!” Gwynnie screamed.