wouldn’t call myself lucky.
I found myself back at the entrance to The Manses of Castlegate three days later. The twangy troll at the gatehouse was gone, replaced by a large-boned black woman named Shaunette, so identified by the Hobby Lobby name tag that she’d apparently forgotten to take off after her shift. Shaunette was working more than one job, and I mean
working
. Nothing was going to get past Shaunette.
While Shaunette grilled me about my business on “the property,” I wondered whether her mother had been counting on a boy and had tacked on the “ette” after an exhausting labor. I hoped Shaunette’s zeal for security would save me from spending the next hour or so at an impromptu tea with Caroline that would probably involve a stilted conversation about Impressionism and God knows what else. I debated saying no on the phone yesterday, but Caroline cast her spell of charm and guilt and suckered me in. It is tricky turning down a Southerner. I was going to need to get better at it.
No lucky break from Shaunette. She handed me a forty-percent-off coupon for Hobby Lobby, and waved me through. “We just got some good ceramic roosters in,” she imparted confidentially.
So now I stood under Caroline’s arch, studying its careful geometry, thinking how I would sketch it. I tugged up the front of my sundress, which was sliding down provocatively. I had let a relentless saleswoman in one of the local maternity boutiques convince me that cantaloupe-sized black, white, and yellow polka dots provided a pleasant optical illusion for a woman inthe second trimester. I paid $258.97 to look like a pregnant beetle emerging from the rain forest.
The door opened before I could knock, revealing a pretty Hispanic woman in traditional black and white maid garb. I remembered her moving silently through the background at the Bunko party.
“I’m Maria,” she said, all shyness and obedience. But as she led me a few feet down the hall, her swaying hips said something else entirely. She stopped abruptly in front of a lacquered black door marked by an intricate pen-and-ink drawing, which I had passed by without noticing the other night.
It was the first thing that set me slightly on edge.
A Chinese girl lounged on a couch like an exotic bird, provocatively offering a tiny foot to the man bowed and kneeling on the floor in front of her. A crown of pearls rested on her head. Her hands were bound behind her back by black string. The image was bluntly asking:
Who holds the power?
Maria twisted the doorknob and nudged me into a mahogany-paneled, windowless room. It was dimly lit by the red and yellow prisms of a Tiffany floor lamp and the orange glow from a gas log in the fireplace. A weak stream from the air-conditioning vent in the ceiling blew the idea of winter on my bare shoulders.
I was not the only guest. Three other women, two of whom I recognized from Caroline’s party, sat stiffly like posed mannequins in chairs placed in a careful semi-circle. Tiffany was closest to the fireplace, pressing a glass of iced tea to the sweaty sheen on her cheek. Three chairs stood empty. One for me. One for Caroline, who had risen and stepped toward me with a tight smile and an outstretched hand. One for someone else.
“Hello, dear.” Caroline’s grip was perfunctory. A purple silk shift draped her slender body like a Grecian statue. Her lipstick matched the brilliant square-cut ruby nestled on a gold chainin the hollow of her delicate neck. The whole effect was bold, simple, and stunning. She gestured to the straight-back chair beside hers. “Please have a seat. You remember Tiffany and Holly, right? And this is Lucinda Beswetherick. I don’t believe you’ve met.”
Frozen smiles from the three women, like Best Actress nominees waiting for someone to rip open their fate. It reminded me of another room, a long time ago. A room I hadn’t escaped. I had wanted to run then, too.
“Super-cute dress.” Tiffany was staring at my
I found myself back at the entrance to The Manses of Castlegate three days later. The twangy troll at the gatehouse was gone, replaced by a large-boned black woman named Shaunette, so identified by the Hobby Lobby name tag that she’d apparently forgotten to take off after her shift. Shaunette was working more than one job, and I mean
working
. Nothing was going to get past Shaunette.
While Shaunette grilled me about my business on “the property,” I wondered whether her mother had been counting on a boy and had tacked on the “ette” after an exhausting labor. I hoped Shaunette’s zeal for security would save me from spending the next hour or so at an impromptu tea with Caroline that would probably involve a stilted conversation about Impressionism and God knows what else. I debated saying no on the phone yesterday, but Caroline cast her spell of charm and guilt and suckered me in. It is tricky turning down a Southerner. I was going to need to get better at it.
No lucky break from Shaunette. She handed me a forty-percent-off coupon for Hobby Lobby, and waved me through. “We just got some good ceramic roosters in,” she imparted confidentially.
So now I stood under Caroline’s arch, studying its careful geometry, thinking how I would sketch it. I tugged up the front of my sundress, which was sliding down provocatively. I had let a relentless saleswoman in one of the local maternity boutiques convince me that cantaloupe-sized black, white, and yellow polka dots provided a pleasant optical illusion for a woman inthe second trimester. I paid $258.97 to look like a pregnant beetle emerging from the rain forest.
The door opened before I could knock, revealing a pretty Hispanic woman in traditional black and white maid garb. I remembered her moving silently through the background at the Bunko party.
“I’m Maria,” she said, all shyness and obedience. But as she led me a few feet down the hall, her swaying hips said something else entirely. She stopped abruptly in front of a lacquered black door marked by an intricate pen-and-ink drawing, which I had passed by without noticing the other night.
It was the first thing that set me slightly on edge.
A Chinese girl lounged on a couch like an exotic bird, provocatively offering a tiny foot to the man bowed and kneeling on the floor in front of her. A crown of pearls rested on her head. Her hands were bound behind her back by black string. The image was bluntly asking:
Who holds the power?
Maria twisted the doorknob and nudged me into a mahogany-paneled, windowless room. It was dimly lit by the red and yellow prisms of a Tiffany floor lamp and the orange glow from a gas log in the fireplace. A weak stream from the air-conditioning vent in the ceiling blew the idea of winter on my bare shoulders.
I was not the only guest. Three other women, two of whom I recognized from Caroline’s party, sat stiffly like posed mannequins in chairs placed in a careful semi-circle. Tiffany was closest to the fireplace, pressing a glass of iced tea to the sweaty sheen on her cheek. Three chairs stood empty. One for me. One for Caroline, who had risen and stepped toward me with a tight smile and an outstretched hand. One for someone else.
“Hello, dear.” Caroline’s grip was perfunctory. A purple silk shift draped her slender body like a Grecian statue. Her lipstick matched the brilliant square-cut ruby nestled on a gold chainin the hollow of her delicate neck. The whole effect was bold, simple, and stunning. She gestured to the straight-back chair beside hers. “Please have a seat. You remember Tiffany and Holly, right? And this is Lucinda Beswetherick. I don’t believe you’ve met.”
Frozen smiles from the three women, like Best Actress nominees waiting for someone to rip open their fate. It reminded me of another room, a long time ago. A room I hadn’t escaped. I had wanted to run then, too.
“Super-cute dress.” Tiffany was staring at my
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