“Why you don’t like you own natural color?” Not that I have any idea what that might be. But it’s sure not the brass-bel or the sickly white on
those cards in her hand.
“I think this Butterbatch is a little more festive, for the holidays and al . Don’t you?”
“If you want your head to look like a Butterbal turkey.”
Miss Celia giggles. She thinks I’m kidding. “Oh and I have to show you this new fingernail polish.” She scrambles in her purse, finds a bottle
of something so pink it looks like you could eat it. She opens the bottle and starts painting on her nails.
“Please, Miss Celia, don’t do that mess on the table, it don’t come—”
“Look, isn’t it the thing? And I’ve found two dresses to match it just exactly!”
She scoots off and comes back holding two hot pink gowns, smiling al over them. They’re long to the floor, covered in sparkles and sequins,
slits up the leg. Both hang by straps thin as chickenwire. They are going to tear her up at that party.
“Which one do you like better?” asks Miss Celia.
I point to the one without the low-cut neckline.
“Oh, see now, I would’ve chosen this other one. Listen to the little rattle it makes when I walk.” She swishes the dress from side to side.
I think about her rattling around the party in that thing. Whatever the white version of a juke joint hussy is, that’s what they’l be cal ing her. She won’t even know what’s happening. She’l just hear the hissing.
“You know, Miss Celia,” I speak kind of slow like it’s just now coming to me. “Instead a cal ing them other ladies, maybe you should cal up
Miss Skeeter Phelan. I heard she real nice.”
I asked Miss Skeeter this favor a few days ago, to try and be nice to Miss Celia, steer her away from those ladies. Up to now, I’ve been
tel ing Miss Skeeter not to dare cal Miss Celia back. But now, it’s the only option I have.
“I think you and Miss Skeeter would get along just fine,” I say and I crank out a big smile.
“Oh no.” Miss Celia looks at me al wide-eyed, holding up those saloon-looking gowns. “Don’t you know? The League members can’t stand
Skeeter Phelan anymore.”
My hands knuckle into fists. “You ever met her?”
“Oh, I heard al about it at Fanny Mae’s setting under the heating hood. They said she’s the biggest embarrassment this town’s ever seen.
Said she was the one who put al those toilets on Hil y Holbrook’s front yard. Remember that picture that showed up in the paper a few months
ago?”
I grind my teeth together to keep my real words in. “I said, have you ever met her?”
“Wel , no. But if al those girls don’t like her, then she must be…wel she…” Her words trail off like it’s just hitting her what she’s saying.
Sickedness, disgust, disbelief—it al wraps together in me like a ham rol . To keep myself from finishing that sentence for her, I turn to the
sink. I dry my hands to the point of hurting. I knew she was stupid, but I never knew she was a hypocrite.
“Minny?” Miss Celia says behind me.
“Ma’am.”
She keeps her voice quiet. But I hear the shame in it. “They didn’t even ask me in the house. They made me stand out on the steps like a
vacuum salesman.”
I turn around and her eyes are down to the floor.
“Why, Minny?” she whispers.
What can I say? Your clothes, your hair, your boobies in the size-nothing sweaters. I remember what Aibileen said about the lines and the
kindness. I remember what Aibileen heard at Miss Leefolt’s, of why the League ladies don’t like her. It seems like the kindest reason I can think of.
“Because they know about you getting pregnant that first time. And it makes them mad you getting knocked up and marrying one a their
mens.”
“They know about that?”
“And especial y since Miss Hil y and Mister Johnny went steady for so long.”
She just blinks at me a second. “Johnny said he used to date her but…was it real y for that long?”
I shrug like I don’t know, but I do. When I started working at Miss Walters’ eight years ago, al Miss Hil y talked about was how she and
Johnny were going to get married someday.
I say, “I reckon they broke up right around the time he met you.”
I’m waiting for it to hit her, that her social life is doomed. That there’s no sense in cal ing the League ladies anymore. But Miss Celia looks
like she’s doing high math, the way she’s got her brow scrunched up. Then her face starts to clear like she’s figured something out.
“So Hil y…she probably thinks I was fooling around with Johnny while they were stil going steady then.”
“Probably. And from what I hear, Miss Hil y stil sweet on him. She never got over him.” I’m thinking, any normal person would automatical y
fie on a woman biding for her husband. But I forgot Miss Celia is not a normal person.
“Wel , no wonder she can’t stand me!” she says, grinning with al she’s got. “They don’t hate me, they hate what they think I did.”
“What? They hate you cause they think you white trash!”
“Wel , I’m just going to have to explain it to Hil y, let her know I am not a boyfriend stealer. In fact, I’l tel Hil y on Friday night, when I see her at the Benefit.”
She’s smiling like she just discovered the cure for polio, the way she’s worked out a plan to win Miss Hil y over.
At this point, I am too tired to fight it.
ON BENEFIT FRIDAY, I work late cleaning that house top to bottom. Then I fry up a plate of pork chops. The way I figure it, the shinier the floors, the clearer the windowpanes, the better my chances are of having a job on Monday. But the smartest thing I can do, if Mister Johnny’s got a say in this,
is plant my pork chop in his hand.
He’s not supposed to be home until six tonight, so at four-thirty I wipe the counters one last time, then head to the back where Miss Celia’s
been getting ready for the past four hours. I like to do their bed and bathroom last so it’s clean for when Mister Johnny gets home.
“Miss Celia, now what is going on in here?” I mean, she’s got stockings dangling from chairs, pocketbooks on the floor, enough costume
jewelry for a whole family of hookers, forty-five pairs of high-heel shoes, underthings, overcoats, panties, brassieres, and a half-empty bottle of white wine on the chifforobe with no coaster under it.
I start picking up al her stupid silky things and piling them on the chair. The least I can do is run the Hoover.
“What time is it, Minny?” Miss Celia says from the bathroom. “Johnny’l be home at six, you know.”
“Ain’t even five yet,” I say, “but I got to go soon.” I have to pick up Sugar and get us to the party by six-thirty to serve.
“Oh Minny, I’m so excited.” I hear Miss Celia’s dress swishing behind me. “What do you think?”
I turn around. “Oh my Lord.” I might as wel be Little Stevie Wonder I am so blinded by that dress. Hot pink and silver sequins glitter from her
extra-large boobies al the way to her hot pink toes.
“Miss Celia,” I whisper. “Tuck yourself in fore you lose something.”
Miss Celia shimmies the dress up. “Isn’t it gorgeous? Ain’t it just the prettiest thing you’ve ever seen? I feel like I’m a Hol ywood movie star.”
She bats her fake-lashed eyes. She is rouged, painted, and plastered with makeup. The Butterbatch hairdo is poufed up around her head
like an Easter bonnet. One leg peeks out in a high, thigh-baring slit and I turn away, too embarrassed to look. Everything about her oozes sex, sex,
and more sex.
“Where you get them fingernails?”
“At the Beauty Box this morning. Oh Minny, I’m so nervous, I’ve got butterflies.”
She takes a heavy swig from her wineglass, kind of teeters a little in her high heels.
“What you had to eat today?”
“Nothing. I’m too nervous to eat. What about these earrings? Are they dangly enough?”
“Take that dress off, let me fix you some biscuits right quick.”
“Oh no, I can’t have my stomach poking out. I can’t eat anything.”
I head for the wine bottle on the gozil ion-dol ar chifforobe but Miss Celia gets to it before me, dumps the rest into her glass. She hands me
the empty and smiles. I pick up her fur coat she’s got tossed on the floor. She’s getting pretty used to having a maid.
I saw that dress four days ago and I knew it looked hussified—of course she had to pick the one with the low neckline—but I had no idea
what would happen when she stuffed herself inside it. She’s popping out like a corn cob in Crisco. With twelve Benefits under my belt, I’ve hardly
seen so much as a bare elbow there, much less bosoms and shoulders.
She goes in the bathroom and dabs some more rouge on her gaudy cheeks.
“Miss Celia,” I say, and I close my eyes, praying for the right words. “Tonight, when you see Miss Hil y…”
She smiles into the mirror. “I got it al planned. When Johnny goes to the bathroom, I’m just going to tel her. That they were over with by the
time me and Johnny started getting together.”
I sigh. “That ain’t what I mean. It’s…she might say some things about…me.”
“You want me to tel Hil y you said hi?” she says, coming out of the bathroom. “Since you worked al those years for her mama?”
I just stare at her in her hot pink getup, so ful of wine she’s almost cross-eyed. She burps up a little. There real y isn’t any use tel ing her now,
in this state.
“No ma’am. Don’t tel her nothing.” I sigh.
She gives me a hug. “I’l see you tonight. I’m so glad you’l be there so I’l have somebody to talk to.”
“I’l be in the kitchen, Miss Celia.”
“Oh and I’ve got to find that little doo-hickey pin…” She teeters over to the dresser, yanks out al the things I just put away.
Just stay home, fool, is what I want to say to her, but I don’t. It’s too late. With Miss Hil y at the helm, it is too late for Miss Celia, and Lord knows, it is too late for me.
THE BENEFIT
CHAPTER 25
THE JACKSON JUNIOR LEAGUE Annual Bal and Benefit is known simply as “the Benefit” to anyone who lives within a ten-mile radius of
town. At seven o’clock on a cool November night, guests wil arrive at the Robert E. Lee Hotel bar for the cocktail hour. At eight
o’clock, the doors from the lounge wil open to the bal room. Swags of green velvet have been hung around the windows, adorned
with bouquets of real hol y berries.
Along the windows stand tables with auction lists and the prizes. The goods have been donated by members and local shops,
and the auction is expected to generate more than six thousand dol ars this year, five hundred more dol ars than last year. The
proceeds wil go to the Poor Starving Children of Africa.
In the center of the room, beneath a gigantic chandelier, twenty-eight tables are dressed and ready for the sit-down dinner to
be served at nine. A dance floor and bandstand are off to the side, opposite the podium where Hil y Holbrook wil give her speech.
After the dinner, there wil be dancing. Some of the husbands wil get drunk, but never the member wives. Every member there
considers herself a hostess and wil be heard asking one another, “Is it going alright? Has Hil y said anything?” Everyone knows it is
Hil y’s night.
At seven on the dot, couples begin drifting through the front doors, handing their furs and overcoats to the colored men in gray
morning suits. Hil y, who’s been there since six o’clock sharp, wears a long taffeta maroon-colored dress. Ruffles clutch at her throat,
swathes of material hide her body. Tight-fitted sleeves run al the way down her arms. The only genuine parts of Hil y you can see are
her fingers and her face.
Some women wear slightly saucier evening gowns, with bare shoulders here and there, but long kid-leather gloves ensure they
don’t have more than a few inches of epidermis exposed. Of course, every year some guest wil show up with a hint of leg or a
shadow of cleavage. Not much is said, though. They aren’t members, those kind.
Celia Foote and Johnny arrive later than they’d planned, at seven twenty-five. When Johnny came home from work, he
stopped in the doorway of the bedroom, squinted at his wife, briefcase stil in his hand. “Celia, you think that dress might be a little bit
too…um…open at the top?”
Celia had pushed him toward the bathroom. “Oh Johnny, you men don’t know the first thing about fashion. Now hurry up and
get ready.”
Johnny gave up before he even tried to change Celia’s mind. They were already late as it was.
They walk in behind Doctor and Missus Bal . The Bal s step left, Johnny steps right, and for a moment, it is just Celia, standing
under the hol y berries in her sparkling hot pink gown.
In the lounge, the air seems to stil . Husbands drinking their whiskeys stop in mid-sip, spotting this pink thing at the door. It
takes a second for the image to register. They stare, but don’t see, not yet. But as it turns real—real skin, real cleavage, perhaps not-
so-real blond hair—their faces slowly light up. They al seem to be thinking the same thing— Finally…But then, feeling the fingernails
of their wives, also staring, digging into their arms, their foreheads wrinkle. Their eyes hint remorse, as marriages are scorned (she
never lets me do anything fun), youth is remembered (why didn’t I go to California that summer?), first loves are recal ed
(Roxanne…). Al of this happens in a span of about five seconds and then it is over and they are left just staring.
Wil iam Holbrook tips half his gin martini onto a pair of patent-leather shoes. The shoes are attached to the feet of his biggest
campaign contributor.
“Oh, Claiborne, forgive my clumsy husband,” says Hil y. “Wil iam, get him a handkerchief!” But neither man moves. Neither,
frankly, real y cares to do more than just stare.
Hil y’s eyes fol ow the trail of gazes and final y land on Celia. The inch of skin showing on Hil y’s neck grows taut.
“Look at the chest on that one,” an old geezer says. “Feel like I’m not a year over seventy-five looking at those things.”
The geezer’s wife, Eleanor Causwel , an original founder of the League, frowns. “Bosoms,” she announces, with a hand to her
own, “are for bedrooms and breastfeeding. Not for occasions with dignity.”
“Wel , what do you want her to do, Eleanor? Leave them at home?”
“I want her to cover. Them. Up.”
Celia grabs for Johnny’s arm as they make their way into the room. She teeters a bit as she walks, but it’s not clear if it’s from
alcohol or the high heels. They drift around, talking to other couples. Or at least Johnny talks; Celia just smiles. A few times she
blushes, looks down at herself. “Johnny, do you think I might’ve overdressed a little for this thing? The invitation said formal, but these
girls here al look like they’re dressed for church.”
Johnny gives her a sympathetic smile. He’d never tel her “I told you so,” and instead whispers, “You look gorgeous. But if
you’re cold, you can put my jacket on.”
“I can’t wear a man’s jacket with a bal gown.” She rol s her eyes at him, sighs. “But thanks, honey.”
Johnny squeezes her hand, gets her another drink from the bar, her fifth, although he doesn’t know this. “Try and make some
friends. I’l be right back.” He heads for the men’s room.
Celia is left standing alone. She tugs a little at the neckline of her dress, shimmies down deeper into the waist.
“…there’s a hole in the buck-et dear Liza, dear Liza…” Celia sings an old county fair song softly to herself, tapping her foot,
looking around the room for somebody she recognizes. She stands on tiptoe and waves over the crowd. “Hey, Hil y, yoo-hoo.”
Hil y looks up from her conversation a few couples away. She smiles, gives a wave, but as Celia comes toward her, Hil y
heads off into the crowd.
Celia stops where she is, takes another sip of her drink. Al around her, tight little groups have formed, talking and laughing,
she guesses, about al those things people talk and laugh about at parties.
“Oh, hey there, Julia,” Celia cal s. They’d met at one of the few parties Celia and Johnny attended when they first got married.
Julia Fenway smiles, glances around.
“It’s Celia. Celia Foote. How are you? Oh, I just love that dress. Where’d you get that? Over at the Jewel Taylor Shoppe?”
“No, Warren and I were in New Orleans a few months ago…” Julia looks around, but there is no one near enough to save her.
“And you look very…glamorous tonight.”
Celia leans closer. “Wel , I asked Johnny, but you know how men are. Do you think I’m a tad overdressed?”
Julia laughs, but not once does she look Celia in the eye. “Oh no. You’re just perfect.”
A fel ow Leaguer squeezes Julia on the forearm. “Julia, we need you over here a second, excuse us.” They walk away, heads
leaned close together, and Celia is alone again.
Five minutes later, the doors to the dining room slide open. The crowd moves