Eligible

by Curtis Sittenfeld

  Jane returned to the room an hour later, accompanied by Anne Lee, two makeup artists, and a wardrobe stylist. “How’d it go with the Bingleys?” Liz asked, and Jane said, “Great. His mom does a lot of yoga.” Jane was visibly mic’d—the mic pack was behind her back, and the actual mic was clipped to the inside collar of her shirt—but if there was some coded, contradictory message she wished to send Liz, Liz saw no evidence of it; Jane’s happiness seemed genuine.

  While her sister’s makeup was retouched in the bedroom, Liz applied her own in the bathroom, with the door closed, before rejoining the others. Jane’s beautification process was still under way when, as scheduled, a production assistant and an audio guy knocked on the door. The audio guy mic’d Liz, and the assistant escorted her to the entrance of the lodge. Two film crews and a black limousine waited in the driveway, and when Liz entered the limo—she was purposely wearing fancy jeans rather than a skirt—she took care to angle herself into the car in the least buttocks-displaying manner possible. Inside the limo, she discovered yet another camera crew waiting, though she was the first guest. Addressing the man holding the camera—he was a forty-something guy with gray stubble and a baseball cap—she said, “Are we going to a restaurant tonight or more of a nightclub?”

  After a pause, the guy said, “We’re not supposed to talk about the show with you. If you have questions, ask a producer.”

  The production assistant who’d escorted Liz from her room had vanished. Glancing among the camera guy, a guy who wore thick black headphones, and a third guy whose role seemed to be related to lighting, Liz said, “Do you all work for Eligible full-time?”

  “I do,” the camera guy said. He nodded toward the other men. “They don’t.”

  “How long have you—” Liz began, but she didn’t finish the question because Caroline Bingley was climbing into the limo. In those first few seconds of their seeing each other, Liz could have sworn Caroline’s nostrils flared with distaste. “Hello, Liz,” she said in a cool tone.

  “Hi, Caroline.” Liz was highly conscious of both the camera crew and her mic pack; she could feel the pack between her back and the seat. She said, “I guess none of us would have found ourselves here if you hadn’t nominated Chip to be on Eligible way back when, huh?”

  “Your family must be thrilled,” Caroline said, and Liz tried to infuse her voice with extra friendliness as she replied, “And yours even more so.”

  Liz’s acting experience had begun and ended with a chorus role in a Seven Hills Middle School production of Oliver! And yet as the evening proceeded, Liz had the odd sense of once again participating in a play, of being obliged above all not to break character, with her character in this case the kind and supportive sister of the bride. Caroline and Liz were next joined by Mary, then Kitty and Lydia appeared together, then Chip’s older sister, Brooke, whose existence Liz had been unaware of until the moment she entered the limousine. (She was the eldest of the three siblings, apparently, the married mother of an eight-year-old and a ten-year-old, all of whom lived near Mr. and Mrs. Bingley in the suburbs of Philadelphia.) At last Jane materialized, to applause that at least on Liz’s part was heartfelt. As the limousine pulled away from the lodge, the tinted window separating the driver from the passengers descended, and Anne Lee grinned and held up two bottles of champagne. (Of course Anne Lee was there, and of course she was holding up two bottles of champagne.) “Who’s ready for the best bachelorette party ever?” she called out.

  THEY ATE DINNER in the private room of a restaurant, where at first the conversation was highly stilted; when Liz went to use the restroom, Anne Lee, who’d been standing behind a camera, intercepted her and asked in her untrustworthily normal way, “How do you think it’s going?”

  “Fine,” Liz said.

  “You don’t feel like things are awkward?”

  “We don’t know Chip’s sisters that well,” Liz said. “I just met Brooke tonight.”

  “And there’s that tension between you and Caroline.” Anne’s expression was one of eminent sympathy. “Maybe it’s better to speak your mind to her before the wedding. Like, clear the air and come out closer, you know?”

  Liz had decided in advance that she’d consume no more than two drinks; after champagne in the limo, a vodka cocktail upon arrival at the restaurant, and a glass of wine with the meal, she’d already exceeded this limit. But she still found Anne far from convincing. She smiled with her mouth closed. “I told you I have no problem with Caroline.”

  It was shortly after the entrées had been cleared that a knock sounded on the door of the private room; Liz guessed it would be Chip, but when the door opened, it was a cop and a firefighter, or, as Liz soon discerned through her fourth drink, male strippers wearing cop and firefighter uniforms. Liz wouldn’t soon forget the sight of them gyrating around pregnant, sober Jane—she was the only one not drinking—their oiled pecs displayed as they removed their clothing, save for a pair of briefs each plus, in the firefighter’s case, a helmet, suspenders, and boots, and in the cop’s case, a peaked blue cap and handcuffs that dangled from one wrist. The strippers proceeded to dance with some of the other women to Beyoncé’s “Single Ladies”: Lydia and Kitty swiveled their hips and wiggled their bottoms with particular enthusiasm, Liz shimmied around enough to seem (she hoped) like a good sport, and even Brooke took a turn grinding the firefighter, which made Liz like her significantly more; but both Mary and Caroline watched with disdain and shook their heads when beckoned to join.

  The strippers had just left when there was another knock on the door, which, once again, was not Chip; this time, it was Rick Price, Eligible’s host. Among the women, a spontaneous cheer went up, which Liz was surprised to find herself joining, and this was when (she was on her fifth drink) she realized both that she was completely drunk—not just tipsy, not merely buzzed—and also that she was much happier than she’d been an hour or two before. She felt a retroactive remorse for all the Eligible contestants she’d deemed trashy and idiotic from the comfort of her living room; apparently, like teriyaki pizza and bee venom facials, getting wasted on a reality-TV show was not to be knocked until tried.

  “I hear there’s been lots of craziness going on,” Rick Price said in a teasing tone, and the women cheered again. “I’ve just come from seeing the guys, and they’ve issued you a challenge. They want you to join them at this super-cool club for a game we’re calling the Not-Yet-Wed Game. Are you girls in?” There was even more cheering, and as it wound down, Liz heard Mary say, “Can I go back to the hotel?”

  When they were all in the limo again, however, Mary was next to Liz. “This sucks,” Mary said. “It’s exactly how I thought it would be.”

  “At least you’re getting paid.”

  Presumably, the acknowledgment that money was changing hands would never be aired; but in case there was any doubt, and also just for kicks, Liz looked directly at the camera and smiled grandly.

  The club was empty except for Chip’s entourage. The game was to occur in a lounge area that contained orange and red sofas and chairs; even before she’d entered the lounge proper, Liz saw Darcy sitting between Shane and Chip, holding a glass of what looked like Scotch, his expression grim. The other men present were Ham and Chip’s brother-in-law, whose name was Nick, and Liz abruptly thought that if the women’s dinner had been awkward, the men’s must have been almost unendurable. Because truly, Shane and Ham were practically strangers to everyone present, including each other.

  It was disagreeable to observe Caroline heading straight for Darcy. The two of them spoke, and as they did, Darcy’s eyes met Liz’s. Was Caroline denigrating her? Liz looked away.

  The game required Jane’s and Chip’s respective wedding parties to take turns guessing how the bride and groom would complete sentences such as “I first knew I was in love when ——”

  Rick Price, who was asking the questions, stood at the front of the room; Jane and Chip sat in thronelike chairs on either side of him; the male and female
teams faced each other; and on a low table between them were lined up what Liz estimated to be no fewer than a hundred shot glasses filled with liquids of varied hues. Initially, she was under the impression that you did a shot for getting the answer wrong, but it seemed perhaps you took one for getting the answer right as well.

  Was it surprising, or not surprising, that the game was tremendous fun? Certainly it compared favorably to Charades in Cincinnati, or maybe it was just that this time around, Liz was the best player. Whether it was “Our first date was at ——” or “The place we got engaged was ——” Liz hardly hesitated. Although Rick Price encouraged her to confer with her teammates, she was soon simply shouting out answers, but by then a general chaos had taken over: Lydia was sitting on Ham’s lap, and Brooke had vomited in the corner, then wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and cheerfully rejoined the group. (“You guys are awesome!” she’d said to Liz, and Liz had barely restrained herself from saying, I’m so glad you’re not horrible like Caroline!) Rick Price frequently reminded them all not to interrupt one another, and for a few questions, the camera guys had to do additional takes because too many people had been talking at once. As, for the fourth time, Liz called out, “Their first date was at Orchids!” she wondered if it was possible she deserved a Best Supporting Actress Oscar.

  Then she was in a different part of the club, and she and Kitty were dancing to a rap song they both knew all the words to, and Kitty was wearing a thin plastic headband with antennae off of which wobbled life-sized sparkly pink penises. How marvelous this headband was! Even more marvelously, Kitty pointed out that Liz was wearing an identical one. Truly, it was a magical night. Liz had lost track of Darcy—he wasn’t dancing—but she couldn’t remember a time when she’d more thoroughly enjoyed the company of her sisters.

  As Lydia joined her and Kitty on the dance floor, Lydia put her mouth close to Liz’s ear and yelled over the music, “Do you know who Chip’s best man is?” Though their faces were inches apart, Liz could only just make out what her sister was saying.

  “It’s Darcy!” Liz yelled back.

  “It’s Darcy!” Lydia yelled. “I hate him! He’s the one who told Mom that stupid shit about transpeople and birth defects.”

  “You mean the stuff she keeps saying about cleft palates?” Liz yelled. “That’s from Darcy?”

  Lydia nodded. “He just left, but when I see him tomorrow, I’m telling him to stay out of other people’s business.”

  “But you have to admit—” For multiple reasons, a dance floor didn’t seem like the place for this conversation; nevertheless, Liz forged ahead at the highest volume she could manage. “Don’t you think that gave Mom a framework for understanding Ham?”

  “Mom understanding Ham is her problem!” Lydia yelled. “He’s not asking for her permission to exist!”

  “But isn’t life better when you’re on speaking terms with your mother?”

  Lydia smirked. “Hard to say.”

  “Why did Darcy talk to Mom?” Liz yelled.

  “Because he thinks he’s the smartest man in the world and he likes when other people listen to him.”

  “No!” Liz yelled. “I mean, how did he know there was a need for him to intervene?”

  “Exactly!” Lydia yelled back. “There wasn’t!”

  LESS THAN AN hour later, Liz lay in her spinning hotel room bed in the dark while poor Jane stood in the courtyard below, still being interviewed in front of blinding lights; although Liz had experienced one of the superlative nights of her life, surely by now Jane had to feel some doubt about the manner in which she’d decided to get married. Abruptly, and somewhat nausea-inducingly, Liz sat up, turned on the nightstand lamp, rose from bed, grabbed the plastic card that was her room key, and hurried down the hall.

  After Liz had knocked on the door, Mary opened it with a toothbrush in her mouth, a foamy outline of toothpaste around her lips. “What?” she said.

  “That time you ran into Darcy at Skyline,” Liz said, “did you tell him Mom still wasn’t speaking to Lydia?”

  Suspiciously, Mary said, “Why?”

  “I think he ended up talking to her afterward.”

  “Oh,” Mary said in a slightly friendlier tone. “He did.” She turned and walked toward the bathroom, and Liz followed her. Mary spat into the sink and rinsed off the toothbrush’s bristles. “At Skyline, he asked if he should. Because of his job, he thought he could explain the trans stuff in terms of Ham’s brain.”

  “So he told her it’s like a birth defect?”

  “I wasn’t there for the conversation, but that seems to be Mom’s one and only talking point.”

  Meaning Darcy had salvaged her family’s happiness in not one but two ways; in addition to bringing Jane and Chip back together, he had facilitated the reconciliation between Lydia and Mrs. Bennet. But why? For whose benefit? Neither situation affected him directly, and in neither case had he sought credit—indeed, Liz suddenly recalled Darcy deflecting the question when she’d asked at their dinner in New York how he knew Mrs. Bennet and Lydia were no longer estranged—yet his efforts far exceeded basic kindness.

  Mary turned off the faucet, and the sisters made eye contact in the mirror. “In case you don’t realize it,” Mary said, “you got superdrunk tonight, and you reek right now.”

  HAM LED A CrossFit workout in the courtyard at nine in the morning; he had told Liz the night before that anyone was welcome, including parents, and that he’d modify the exercises to be compatible with the participants’ current fitness regimes or lack thereof. But no workout could have been modified enough to accommodate the dry-mouthed, head-pounding state in which Liz awakened. She didn’t attend the class; she didn’t attend the midday lunch for the two families; and it was only a short while before the rehearsal dinner, which also was to happen in the courtyard, that she forced herself out of bed. The rehearsal dinner was supposed to be casual; even bathing suits, the producers had mentioned a number of times, were acceptable.

  Liz applied makeup, drank a cup of black coffee she brewed in the bathroom, and was visited by the same production assistant and a different sound guy from the previous night.

  That the rehearsal dinner functioned both as a real rehearsal for the wedding and as an event that was itself being recorded for the entertainment of an audience represented a brain-hurting conundrum, but Liz’s brain hurt for other reasons, and she was mostly preoccupied with which hair-of-the-dog beverage she’d consume as soon as the walk-through of the ceremony concluded. While making chitchat with Mr. Bingley, she acquired from a passing tray a glass of white wine. Having learned of her job, Mr. Bingley was confiding that he’d always yearned to write a novel. With wine in hand, Liz’s prospects for the evening improved greatly.

  Though Liz wore a sundress rather than a bathing suit, Lydia, Kitty, Ham, Shane, and Caroline all swam. (Liz attempted not to stare at Ham’s chest, but insofar as she did, she noted that it was impressively, masculinely defined; a trail of hair ran above and below his navel, and the only evidence of his previously female body were two thin red scars beneath male-looking nipples.) The women all wore bikinis that Liz assumed were courtesy of their own welcome baskets; Caroline’s was white, and at one point, she emerged from the water, approached Darcy—he wore khaki pants and a long-sleeved button-down shirt open at the collar—and was clearly trying to convince him to join her in the pool. He shook his head; she shivered sexily; he still shook his head.

  Jane, who was standing next to Liz, said, “Are you planning to go in?”

  “I’m afraid I’d accidentally become the role model for American women who shouldn’t wear bikinis but do.”

  Jane pointed at her belly. “Then heaven help me.”

  “Oh, please,” Liz said. “You get a free pass.”

  There was a multitude of topics Liz wished to discuss with Jane, and no way of broaching them with any confidence that they wouldn’t later be broadcast. Was Jane having a horrible time or did she find this whole spectacl
e funny? Did she actually like the Bingleys or was she just pretending? Were their parents behaving, and had their mother yet delivered any on-camera rants? To Liz’s amusement, Mr. Bennet and Mr. Bingley had discovered a shared fondness for cribbage and cigars and apparently had spent most of the day at a table in the courtyard, puffing and playing.

  A chicken fight commenced, with Lydia on Ham’s shoulders and Kitty on Shane’s, as Liz said to Jane, “Are you nervous about tomorrow?”

  Jane smiled. “I’m ready to start living the rest of my life.”

  Because she found it difficult not to, Liz again looked directly at the camera and audio guys standing five feet from them. “You’re welcome,” she said.

  SHE WAS CROSSING the lobby with Mary and Mr. Bennet, all of them headed toward the elevators to return to their rooms after the rehearsal dinner’s conclusion, when Liz heard her name being called. As she turned, she was surprised to see Caroline Bingley walking briskly behind her. “Go ahead,” Liz said to her father and sister, and, warily, she waited for Caroline. The other woman had changed from her white bikini into dark jeans and a fitted gray hoodie sweatshirt that looked to be cashmere.

  When Caroline was still a few feet away, Liz said, “What do you want?”

  “You’re completely wrong for Darcy,” Caroline said.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Don’t play dumb with me, Liz. It’s obvious you’ve had your sights set on him since that awful Fourth of July barbecue. But he wasn’t available then, and he’s not now.”

  “Okay.” What on earth, Liz wondered, had inspired this confrontation?

  “Your sister is lucky to be marrying Chip,” Caroline said. “Very lucky. Don’t let it give you any ideas. I know your family thinks of itself as, like”—Caroline made air quotes—“ ‘Cincinnati high society.’ But that’s an oxymoron. And Darcy and I go way back. There’s always been an understanding that we’d end up together. We have this intense chemistry, and the moment is finally right for us to be serious.”