In Polite Company

by Gervais Hagerty

  “Let’s do this.”

  In the distance of the inky winter night, his truck looms like the eighth wonder of the world. It’s massive—a tank with wheels the size of hot tubs. A small thrill leaps through my body. This is not the kind of vehicle to announce your arrival at a ball. But I’ve got a prom-date corsage and prom hair to match, so fuck it, let’s have fun.

  Clay extends a hand to help me up the truck’s running board. We thunder down Meeting Street, Clay revving the engine at every red light. A few tourists stop to gawk at his truck. Clay doesn’t acknowledge the attention, but I detect a smirk of pride. He hooks a left onto Chalmers, a cobblestone street paved with the ballast from eighteenth-century trading ships. We bounce up and down in our seats until he rumbles into a parking place. The engine shudders to a stop.

  Clay links our arms, and together we cross Meeting Street to Hibernian Hall. The giant 1840 Greek Revival building has an elegantly straightforward structure. Its facade is a square with a triangle on top; six massive columns support the weighty pediment. The building is imposing and classical, like something out of Athens or Rome. No windows face the street. Colossal wooden doors guard the entrance, opening only on special occasions, and only to those who are invited.

  Inside, our heels click audibly on the checkerboard marble floor. A towering arrangement of white roses dominates a table in the great hall’s center. A pair of identical staircases—one on the left, one on the right—sweep in sinuous arcs from the black-and-white floor to the entrance of the second-story main hall. I crane my neck to admire the impressive rotunda soaring overhead; its tiers make me feel as though I’ve crawled inside a hollow wedding cake.

  Clay drops off our winter coats at the coat check. We ascend the left staircase, the one with fewer people. I lift the hem of my navy dress—the hush-hush gift from Mom—to avoid tripping.

  We join the guests in the receiving line. It’s a march of penguins. Men wear formal black tails, white ties, no exceptions. They do, however, find ways to sneak in personal flair via their choice of cuff links. The men of Battery Hall will wear theirs stamped with “BH.” Clay’s are in the shape of mallard ducks.

  Both men and women are required to wear gloves. Men’s gloves are wrist-length. The women’s gloves extend past the elbow, necessitating sleeveless dresses. (Women can wear any dress as long as it’s formal, floor-length, and sleeveless.) These kid-leather gloves are increasingly harder to find and often must be purchased in Italy. When Louisa Lachicotte traveled to Rome the summer before Weezy debuted, Mom had her pick up four pairs.

  The gloves have slits at the wrist; the openings allow a woman to free her hands without entirely removing her gloves—helpful when using the loo, for example. Kid leather, I note, is not all that durable; with use, and a few champagne spills, mine have stiffened and yellowed at the fingertips.

  So have Mrs. Prioleau’s, the ball’s grand matron. Her wrinkly bosoms cascade over her dazzling, sequined neckline. Bedecked in her diamond necklace, multiple bracelets, a brooch, and sapphire earrings, she looks like she emptied her jewelry box for the occasion. She stands at the head of the receiving line, gloved arms outstretched, trilling welcomes to all the guests.

  The nine debutantes, all in white ball gowns—which are essentially wedding dresses—stand in an alphabetical row to Mrs. Prioleau’s right. Caroline is seventh in line. She chose the dress with the mermaid cut. Her aquamarine eyes shimmer like Laudie’s swimming pool. She gestures to Laudie’s pearl necklace, as if to signal to me that she’s here with us tonight.

  My sister is hands down the prettiest of the debutantes, but Bennett is a close second. I watch Bennett shake her head with laughter, flipping her glossy mane over her bare shoulders like a Kentucky Derby thoroughbred.

  I’m jealous—not of her, but of her hairdo. What a relief it would be to remove these torturous bobby pins. Maybe I can do it after the Grand March.

  The line moves quickly. Clay and I say our hellos to the hostess. I give Caroline a big squeeze, careful not to touch her hair or leave any red marks on her back. I say a polite hello to her friend. Clay high-fives and fist-pumps his way through the receiving line.

  In homage to our ancestors, the evening’s schedule is the same as it’s been for 173 years. The ball starts at 8:00. Guests greet the debutantes, enjoy cocktails, and dance the foxtrot, waltz, and maybe even a tango. The receiving line ends at 9:00 so that the debutantes have some time to enjoy the formal portion of the evening before dinner.

  There are rules for this first half of the night. Perhaps due to secrecy and discretion—but also due to decorum—photography is banned. Frankly, I like this rule; I don’t like interrupting a conversation to huddle with a group for a photo. Selfies be damned.

  Another rule: men are forbidden to spin their partners before dinner. At my debut, unaware of this embargo, Trip and I twirled and spun as we had many times that year in his apartment kitchen. A few days after the ball, a letter arrived at Mom’s, politely reminding the Smythes of the committee’s expectations of the evening. Mom had handed me the letter with a tiny shake of her head. “Simons, honey. It’s not too much to ask.”

  Just before 10:00 p.m., the grand marshal and grand matron lead the whole assembly in the Grand March. As the band plays, the several hundred guests parade in couples to the seated dinner held in the downstairs hall. There, the debutantes and their dates will feast at a long table in the room’s center. Each debutante has two escorts—usually one is a boyfriend and the other a brother or cousin.

  The rest of us will dine at the round tables. We’ll be seated male-female-male-female. Or as Mom always says, no matter if speaking of octogenarians, “Boy, girl, boy, girl.” I’ll likely be placed between Clay and Dad or Clay and Ashley.

  At once, the waiters will serve our dinners—probably filet mignon, mashed potatoes, and asparagus. They’ll top off our glasses so frequently it’s impossible to tally how many drinks we’ve had for the night. Dinner will likely conclude with a choice of strawberry sorbet or crème brûlée. And coffee. And more champagne.

  After dinner, we will return upstairs for the informal dancing. The men will unbutton their tails; some women will switch from heels to flats. Having spent the first part of the evening playing waltzes, the band will let loose with songs by James Brown, Aretha Franklin, and Earth, Wind & Fire. We’ll dance the Lindy Hop—the dance we adored in cotillion, the one I danced with Trip—and we’ll all twirl as much as we want. It’s a grand time.

  Clay and I enter the stately ballroom. Massive windows stretch from floor to ceiling. Three golden chandeliers, each hung from the center of an ornate plaster medallion, cast a warm, honey-colored glow. Tall monochromatic flower arrangements—masses of white roses, white orchids, white lilies, and white peonies—anchor the room, dividing it into six sections: two oversize bars and four food tables. On one table, clusters of grapes tumble from a huge sweetgrass basket. Wedges of Brie and chunks of Gruyère spill out of a horn-shaped cornucopia. Another table is laden with seafood: mounds of cold peeled shrimp, oysters on the half shell, and slabs of smoked salmon.

  Onstage at the far end of the ballroom, the band plays a waltz. The drummer sweeps a metal brush on the snare, hits the drum head. It’s a swirling noise, then a flat one—like the swoosh of a dress and the tap of a shoe—and establishes the rhythm for the first dances of the evening. The musicians wear matching tuxes with white stripes running along their lapels. The stage is decorated with garlands of magnolia leaves and ivy.

  In this space of beauty and abundance—a room stocked with oysters, silver, friendship, silk, shared histories, and champagne—everyone stands taller, smiles bigger, and laughs harder. Although I came here with reservations, I can’t help but feel enchanted.

  For an instant, a ping of regret stops me in my tracks. If I were to marry Trip, I’d attend these dazzling affairs multiple times a year. Single women stop getting invitations after a while; it’s just the way it is. My chest tightens. My dress feels
two sizes too small. But then I think, Francie will probably debut, albeit twenty years down the road. I’ll at least get invited to her ball. Plus, I can’t spend my night thinking about what I will miss instead of enjoying it in the moment. Ridiculous.

  I take a step forward, into the night. “Let’s get a drink.” Clay follows me to the bar. He gestures for me to get ahead of him in line. “You have to order for me.”

  “Seriously?” Clay tosses his head back. “That’s hilarious.”

  While almost two centuries have passed since the founding of the ball, and many of today’s debutantes become doctors and lawyers, formality is rooted in the traditional values that inspired these balls in the first place. The whole point was, after all, to find a husband for a daughter. Requiring the sons of Charleston to fetch drinks ensured at least some sort of interaction with the debutantes. Not to mention that it was considered unladylike for a female to approach a bar. Nowadays Caroline and other debutantes find their partners like anyone else—through a friend or online. The ball today is mainly an excuse to party.

  I watch Clay cluster among the other men at the bar. I vaguely recognize most people here, but one man looks particularly familiar. He’s in his fifties with thick blond hair brushed back into a modern pompadour. It’s the state planning director who approved the Wildcat Acres project. When he reaches to get his highball from the bartender, I strain to see his cuff links. Sure enough, a “BH” winks back at me. God, Charleston is small.

  “My lady,” Clay says in a British accent as he hands me a pinot grigio. We park our drinks on a tall cocktail table and watch a handsome couple in their sixties foxtrot. They move as one unit. They probably have been dancing together for decades.

  “Clay. Looking sharp.” It’s Ashley.

  Beside him, Weezy looks even more svelte than she did at Caroline’s cocktail party. She wears an emerald-green velvet dress. Her breasts, plump with milk, spill over the neckline. She looks fabulous. She moves away from the brothers, close to me. “Hey, Sims. I think your dance card goes on your right arm.”

  “I couldn’t fit it over this,” I whisper back. I show Weezy my corsage.

  “Aw. That’s sweet. But you look like you’re going to prom.”

  “That’s what I was thinking.” I say with a laugh.

  Ashley joins us. “Is your dance card full?”

  I hold out my arm; the miniature booklet dangles from my wrist. Ashley pencils in his name for the next song, another foxtrot, then guides my arm over to Clay, who scribbles down his name for the following dance number—a waltz.

  Weezy points to a pin on her dress. It’s the gold jaguar with the ruby eyes. The cat’s back is encrusted with emeralds.

  And Caroline is wearing her pearls. And I have her watch. It almost feels like she’s here. In a way. “I feel like Laudie is with us,” I say.

  Weezy squeezes my hand in agreement. “What was in the envelope?”

  “What envelope?”

  “The one in the safety deposit box. I thought she deeded you her car or something. She always liked you best.”

  The letter. “Where is it?”

  “Mom didn’t tell you? She’s been looking for you.” Weezy stands on her toes to scan the ballroom but soon gives up. There must be three hundred people here by now. “She told me Tito pretty much forced his way into the bank today to get the lockbox open.”

  “On a Saturday?”

  “You know Tito . . .”

  “Ready?” Ashley whisks me to the dance floor.

  My brain lags behind, hovering over the cocktail table, wondering what on earth the letter could say. Is it a love letter from John, imploring her to return to Atlanta? Could it just be the title to her car? What is it?

  It’s hard to concentrate on dancing, but the muscle memory drilled deep during my years of cotillion tells me what to do. We fall into position: my left hand rests on Ashley’s right shoulder; he holds my right hand in his left. He steps forward with his left, I step backward with my right; it’s the standard for the start of this and every formal dance. Women move backward. Step, touch, side, close. Step, touch, side, close. Ashley steers us through clusters of guests, around the flower arrangements, and into a fleeting pocket of space on the dance floor.

  And that’s when our eyes meet. My mouth goes dry, and my stomach recoils at the invisible blow my ex-fiancé delivers by just being at the ball. It’s Trip, standing alone on the sidelines. His jacket is buttoned shut; he’s lost weight. A beard coarsens his jawline. I had always thought he might look handsome in a beard. His broad shoulders look strong beneath his fine tailcoat. He’s handsome, well-mannered, and on his way to being rich. He’s a twenty-point buck, a royal flush. I can’t help that I’m programmed to be attracted to him. He’s a catch. When our eyes meet, he coolly raises his highball in a toast.

  I’m at Ashley’s mercy. He’s steering us closer and closer into Trip’s orbit, totally unaware that he’s dancing me nearly into the arms of the man I was supposed to marry . . . might still marry?

  We’re also closer to the hall entrance, where I observe Mrs. Prioleau dismiss the debutantes, freeing them from the receiving line. The string of debutantes breaks like a snapped pearl necklace. The nine young women whirl into the crowd. Just before I’m spun away, my eye tracks Bennett as she floats toward Trip and plants a kiss on his cheek. What?

  Ashley leads me back to the middle of the dance floor. He remains on beat, but I’ve completely lost my footing. I step on his shoe and bump into two different couples. I’m more of a Ping-Pong ball than a lady at a ball.

  In a zippy flourish, the song ends, and Ashley escorts me back to the table. We’ve stopped moving, but the room spins. I focus on Weezy, partly to see if she saw Trip, too, but mostly to slow the commotion in my brain. I need to focus on something external, find a spotting point like a pirouetting ballerina does.

  “Weezy?” Ashley extends a gloved hand to his wife and bows like a courtier.

  “Honored,” she says, cupping her gloved hand in his. They head to the dance floor.

  Shit, don’t leave me, Weezy!

  Clay downs his drink, playfully straightens his bow tie. “I guess I’m up.”

  “Mind if we sit this one out?” I can barely say the words. I thought I had moved on. But seeing Trip here, looking so handsome, the object of another woman’s affection, guts me. And totally overwhelms me.

  “Sure thing.” Clay shakes the ice in his glass. “I need to refuel, anyway.”

  I dart around the flower arrangements and slink between the food tables, keeping my eyes down to avoid conversation and escape the ballroom as quickly as I can.

  The ladies’ room is luxurious and spacious. Two debutantes primp in front of an immense mirror, which is wreathed in a gilded frame of carved acanthus leaves. A pair of antique chairs painted gold are positioned along the back wall. They look like thrones.

  I’d like to sit in one of the chairs to think a minute. Take some deep breaths. Maybe have a good cry to clear the confusion from my brain. But I don’t want to decompress out in the open. I check the stalls; both are occupied. I walk up to the mirrored vanity above the sink and silently interrogate my reflection. A dolled up version of me glares back. Why is Trip here? Is he dating Bennett?

  My hands grow hot in the gloves. My sequins may as well be little solar panels on Mercury. The bobby pins on my scalp feel molten. But why am I melting over a man I left cold? Pull yourself together, Simons. Make a plan.

  My thoughts begin to gel, starting with the most mundane. First plan of action: remove torturous bobby pins. I take off my corsage and unbutton my gloves to free my hands. One by one, I lay the bobby pins on the sink’s rim. My hair springs wildly from my head in exaggerated curls, like a clown’s hair. With the pain gone, the next clear step appears in my mind’s eye: get the letter.

  The door swings open. Winter air from the checkerboard-floored foyer creeps into the bathroom, curls around my ankles. In the mirror, I see Bennett. She freeze
s. “Oh,” she starts. The door behind her swings shut, enclosing us in the room together. The two primping debutantes have left, but four pretty shoes can still be seen from beneath the stalls. “I guess Caroline didn’t tell you.”

  Turning, I survey her from toe to head. Her dress is hemmed exactly an inch above the floor, to make it look like she floats. She actually does appear to hover. Her skin is perfect, like poured, molded plastic. When our eyes meet, she lifts her chin slightly.

  I’m not sure what to say to the person who could very well be dating my ex-husband-to-be. It occurs to me that I don’t have to say anything. I walk past her and out the door.

  Caroline must have been grabbing the outside handle just as I open the door; she nearly falls on top of me. She’s wide-eyed and apparently speechless.

  “How come you never told me?” I say, and walk past her before she has a chance to answer. Maybe I don’t want to know the answer.

  In the ballroom, the grand matron crosses the stage. With a gloved finger, she taps three times on the microphone, clears her throat. “Ladies and gentlemen, please find your partner for the Grand March to dinner.”

  Shit. One thing you don’t do at a ball is abandon your date. In fact, this rule is so ironclad that it isn’t even expressly stated in the rulebook. Guests march in pairs. Heterosexual pairs, it goes without saying. Heterosexual Caucasian cisgender Protestant pairs. I hurry back to the bathroom to find Caroline and her friend huddled in discussion. I place my hand on my sister’s shoulder. “Caroline, can you tell Clay I’ve got to leave?”

  She looks back apologetically. “I’m sorry, Simons. I didn’t say anything about Bennett dating Trip because I didn’t know if it was going to go anywhere. I didn’t want you to get hurt.”

  So that’s how Trip knew Laudie was in the hospital—through Bennett. Caroline told her, but what does it matter? “I just need to leave.”

  She grabs my arm, tears forming in the corners of her eyes. “Really! I’ve been caught between a friend and a sister.”