The waiter was back again, bending, putting his face close to each woman’s cheek as he took orders for drinks again. There was something faintly offensive, wrong, about the way he acted, his—was it fatherliness? No, more like seduction. As he put his face close to Diana’s, Selena saw suddenly that her sister was beautiful. Had she always been beautiful? No, surely she hadn’t been, or Selena would have seen it before. In the company of all these women, Selena thought Diana was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. So tall, so richly-coloured, like a flower herself. Wasn’t there a goddess named Diana? A huntress, wasn’t she? You’d never know to look at her, that she’s the mother of two children, a woman long used to the ways of the marriage bed. She looks like a … virgin.
Embarrassed by her own thoughts, she dropped her eyes. A virgin, she said to herself disdainfully. I must be getting drunk. But in that moment with her head down, a scent she had not smelled before crept into her nostrils. She tried to sniff discreedy and it rose, filling her head, a sweet, heavy smell, rich and beautiful. Puzzled, she turned to Selma, but Selma and Laverne were talking, apparently noticing nothing strange.
“I always thought I might have made a good nurse,” Selma was saying. “I always liked looking after sick people, doing things for them. Mother said I was good at it.” She sighed.
“Why didn’t you go into nursing?” Laverne asked.
“You know how it is. I got married right after high school. Mother couldn’t talk me out of it. First thing I knew, I had a baby, and then another one.” She looked down at her place, touching the ends of her knife and fork, straightening them. Laverne sighed, too.
“I was raised in a time when you just got married, you didn’t think about it. Just got your MRS and that was it. I used to play school when I was a kid, pretending I was a teacher.” She laughed. “Yes,” she said, sighing, “I wanted to be a teacher.”
“Are you sorry?” Selma asked, watching Laverne with sympathetic eyes.
“Not really,” Laverne said, after a minute during which she stared at the flame of the candle in front of her, her eyes having turned soft with sadness. “I raised my family. They all turned out okay, and now …” She shrugged. “John and I are ready to retire … And we had it a lot better than our grandmothers,” she pointed out, her voice becoming brisker.
“Still, it seems a shame,” Selma said, sounding as if she were speaking to herself. “There’s a lot of thwarted hopes in this room,” Selma said, glancing around.
Soft music had begun to play over the public address system.
“I don’t suppose it’s any easier for the men,” Laverne said.
“It isn’t the same for the men,” Phyllis broke in. “They get to run things—the ranches and the farms and the businesses—none of us do.” She sounded angry, and raised her drink to her mouth, holding it there for a second without drinking.
Rena said, “Look at Carmen Harris. She’s been running that ranch of hers since her husband died, must be forty years ago.”
“Yeah,” Lola said, setting down her glass. “You’d think she was a man if it wasn’t for her front. She dresses like one, cuts her hair like one.” Selena laughed.
“She even talks like one. I heard her talking with Joe Ewan in the service station one day when I was buying camper fuel. I had to laugh she sounded so much like Kent.”
“She’s nothing!” Phyllis said. “I heard about that woman in Montana—my aunt knows her—she isn’t even five feet tall, and the men came over one day and found her with a horse stretched out in the corral, cutting him.”
“No kidding!” They were all surprised, and a little disapproving.
“That’s not a word of a lie,” Phyllis said. “She was all by herself and she had this stallion stretched out, ready to cut him.”
“Is she married?” Rena asked.
“Yes, but he lets her do whatever she wants. She was raised on the place, rides, breaks the horses, everything. She told my aunt how when she was young on the big ranch next to theirs, they used to hire convicts from the state prison to work the place. One time she was out riding a long way from home and she saw this convict coming on horseback straight for her, just as fast as that horse would take him. And she saw right away that she was in big trouble, so she spurred her horse and rode maybe five miles as fast as her horse would go, with him right behind her. But she was better on a horse, and finally, he gave up and turned back. She told my aunt she still got scared, thinking about it.”
“That reminds me of a story about my mother’s cousin,” Lola said. “They settled out here in the homesteading days, used to raise horses, blood horses, you probably heard about them. Anyway, Cousin Emma wasn’t afraid of anything and she used to ride all over the place, even after she got married, even after she had kids. Sort of a wildness in her, I guess. Anyway, one time there was a horse sale maybe ten miles from where their place was and she rode over with her husband. But after a few hours, she decided to go home, so she started out by herself on her horse. Just as she was riding out from that sale, she looked back, and she saw this Indian, he’d been at the sale with some of his people, a young, good-looking guy, I guess; she saw him mounting his horse. It made her a little nervous, so she started out trotting, and when she looked back, he was trotting too. So she picked up speed, and when she looked back, he’d picked up speed too—well, they rode like that, him following her, most of the way home. When she got close to home, she just rode full out that last mile or two, and that Indian was right behind her. She said she rode into that yard so fast, she could hardly get the horse to stop, and when she looked back, that Indian was gone. Just disappeared.”
“The things that happen to people,” Laverne said, shaking her head.
“Funny, isn’t it,” Rena said. “Remember when you were young. Horses bucking all the time. You never thought anything of it. Just got on and did what had to be done, but now, if you knew a horse was going to buck, you’d sure think twice before you got on him.”
“Getting old,” Selma said. “It’s sure no fun.”
Lola said, “I leave all the cutting—calves, horses—up to Doug. I ride with him, but I sure don’t cut things.” She shuddered.
“It goes to show what you can do if you want to,” Diana said.
“Who wants to?” Phyllis asked, her voice filled with loathing, so that everybody laughed, looked at each other, then laughed some more.
It occurred to Selena to think how different the evening would be if their men were with them. They wouldn’t talk so loudly, they’d speak only to each other, not to the men, and the men would monopolize the conversation. And they would make jokes about the flowers on the table, and how they couldn’t see without the lights on, and imply how silly the whole thing was. No, she was glad for once the men weren’t with them.
Shrieks of laughter came from the table behind Diana and they all craned their necks to see what the cause of the commotion was. Diana leaned over to a young woman sitting directly behind her.
“What’s so funny, Darlene?” she asked. The woman beside Darlene was laughing so hard tears were trickling down her cheeks. Darlene pointed to their waiter, who was walking away, his face red.
“It’s that crazy Sheila,” Darlene said. “She pinched him!”
“What did she say?” the others asked, unable to hear over the music and the laughter.
“My mascara’s going to run if I don’t stop laughing,” Darlene said, wiping her eyes carefully with the edge of her hand. She was quite drunk. In fact, here and there around the hall, a number of women had had too much to drink.
While Diana explained about the cause of the laughter, the kitchen doors were propped open, the smell of cooking food rushed out into the hall, and the waiters began to carry out plates of food and to serve them.
Selena said, “It feels funny to be served by men.”
“Doesn’t it, though?” Rena agreed.
“I’m just going to enjoy it,” Phyllis said, but she giggled nervousl
y.
The noise in the hall was lessening now, dropping to a steady, low buzz, as everyone was served and began to eat. The waiter came again, carrying wine, and filled each glass. Selena’s head was light, she could feel a warmth in her cheeks, it felt good, and she sighed happily. But someone at the next table was in tears. Too surprised to even point this out to anyone, she watched. It was Nadine Tomas, a woman a little older than she was, a farmer’s wife, someone she hardly knew, although she had known of her all her life. The women on each side of her were comforting her, and gradually, dabbing at her eyes with a tissue, and sniffing, she got control of herself.
Somehow Selena wasn’t surprised to see someone in tears. It was all too beautiful, it was all too different from the way things usually were for them, she could almost cry herself.
When dessert came, they all oohed and aahed over it, the first strawberries of the season to arrive in town. They rested on sponge cake and were smothered in whipped cream.
“The cake’s a little dry,” Laverne remarked, poking at it with her fork.
“Coarse, too,” Rena said. “They must have bought it.”
“Farm cream, though,” Phyllis pointed out, and popped a forkful into her mouth.
“Yummy,” they all said, and cleaned their plates, even the best cooks, who were disdainful of the efforts of others, ate everything, if only because someone else had cooked it.
One of the waiters had rolled down his sleeves and put on a sports-coat. He stood at the front now, tapping at his microphone to make sure it was working.
“It’s time for a little entertainment, ladies,” he said, standing too close to his microphone so that his t’s popped and slurred.
Selena looked around the hall at all the faces turned toward him: at her sister in her scarlet dress, at Rhea, big and powerful-looking, the roses on her shoulder glowing and casting their scent down the table, at Phyllis and Lola, so young, and Laverne, stout and growing old, and at Selma and Rena, a few years older than her, and into the first stages of menopause.
Thinking that without meaning to, she was startled. Of course, that was what was coming next. She thought back to her first menstruation. She wasn’t sure how old she had been, but she remembered the occasion of it, the sensation, the shock and awe as she stared at the blood staining her panties, followed by a surging sense of well-being, of things being right. And now it was almost over. All those years passed like so much breath, come and gone. One day she had been a shy virgin, and then she was a woman, one whose life was rich and full, and all that blood, years and years of monthly bleeding, had brought her her children, her husband, a house full of things that spoke of the moments of her life.
At the centre of the hall three men appeared, dressed like women. They wore ridiculous wigs—platinum blonde, carrot red, and black—and their faces were painted like rag dolls—exaggerated red lips, rouged cheeks, swaths of green and blue eyeshadow, and foundation cream that barely covered their five o’clock shadows. They wore shiny, sequined dresses that came to their knees, leaving their hairy legs exposed, and their big feet were stuffed into high-heeled shoes. Their bare, muscled arms and hairy chests looked ridiculous emerging from those flashing dresses, as did the big fake bosoms and fat fannies made out of pillows. They were pretending to sing, miming a recorded top forty song that all the young women in the hall seemed to know. Some of the women were laughing, swaying in time to the music, some had dropped their heads as if they were embarrassed by this display, and a few were watching, holding their faces very still.
How many times had she seen men dress up like women? At mock weddings, at Hallowe’en, during Christmas skits and in parades, and at private parties. It seemed for every occasion some of the men dressed up like women, and now, suddenly, she wondered why.
Is that how men see us? she wondered? All bodies? All wigs and paint, all phoniness and artificiality? Are they ridiculing us? No, she said to herself. No, that’s not it. Maybe it’s a kind of admission of our beauty, a tribute.
The three men were almost at the end of their song. They rocked back and forth in unison, did a few, careful, mincing steps forward, then turned, wagging their behinds, and finally stepped back and threw their arms out in each other’s face to the last notes of the song. All the women began to clap and shout.
“Didn’t you like it, Selena?” Diana asked, an amused smile on her face.
“I don’t know,” Selena said, staring back at her, wanting to say something, but not knowing what.
“I don’t see what everybody thinks is so great,” Laverne said.
“They really had to practice to get that right” Lola said, a trifle indignantly to Laverne.
“It’s just a joke,” Phyllis said, although she wasn’t laughing.
“But if we dressed up like them,” Laverne said, “they wouldn’t think it was so funny.”
“It wouldn’t be funny,” Rena said. “There’s nothing funny about men. Ask Ruth.”
“You could imitate their deep voices,” Phyllis suggested, grinning. She was having trouble separating her words. Too much wine, Selena noticed. “And the way they walk. That would be funny. I’ve seen people do it.”
“Maybe they envy us,” Diana suggested. Everyone stopped talking and stared at her.
“Envy us!” Lola said. “Are you kidding?”
“Well,” Diana pointed out, “they’re always dressing up like women. At twenty-fifths, every time we put on a skit, at Hallowe’en, in the parades. I can’t even remember all the times.”
“They mean it as ridicule,” Rhea said, but her voice lifted at the end of her sentence as though she wanted to hear what this would evoke from Diana.
“They may think they mean it as ridicule,” Diana responded immediately, “but you only ridicule people if you secretly envy them, or if you’re secretly afraid of them.”
“Oh, who cares,” Laverne said, lifting her wine glass and drinking. “This is a party, a celebration, it’s for us women, and we shouldn’t waste it talking about men.”
The women laughed uneasily, their eyes thoughtful, and Diana murmured, “They’re up to something, even if they don’t know what it is themselves.”
The fashion show was beginning, and everyone set their chairs in new positions to see it better. One of the women who had organized the evening took the microphone and began to talk about the dresses as the models paraded slowly by, pirouetting now and then so everyone could see all the details of each garment. The waiters, husbands of some of the models and guests, leaned against the bar, sipping drinks, watching quietly, their work done for the time being.
The models weren’t wearing high fashion clothes, just dresses from a local women’s clothing store, and the models were not beautiful, only attractive, slim local women, but the men watched silently, deferentially. Selena wondered what they were thinking. It touched her to see them like that, she thought suddenly, how good men are, how strong and honourable.
“Oh, I like that one,” or, “That’s too young for her,” or “That would look great on you, Diana,” the women remarked, and clapped as each dress passed by, enjoying all of it, even though most of them wouldn’t think of buying, much less wearing one of the dresses.
When all the dresses had been shown, the woman took the microphone again and announced that they had managed to persuade a furrier from the city to bring a selection of coats and jackets to their Ladies Night Out celebration. Everyone began to clap. This was almost too much. Fur coats! The very best of the models had been selected to show the coats and they began to parade up and down the hall, twirling and holding the coats open to show the rich satin linings.
There were classic dark minks and light minks, foxes, fashionable wolf coats. “Looks like coyote to me,” Laverne whispered, and coats made of two kinds of fur or trimmed with leather. The music was louder now, and the women were almost stunned into silence by the noise, the liquor they had drunk, and the riches they had seen. Finally the last coat was shown and the furrier
announced that all the coats were available for trying on backstage immediately after the program was over.
“And that marks the end of the evening, ladies,” the woman said, back at the microphone. “Thank you all for coming, and don’t forget those coats are for sale, and you can try them on now.” Everyone clapped, then began to stand and move around to talk to each other.
“Should we try them on, Lola?” Phyllis asked, grinning. Lola giggled.
“There’s no way I can afford one,” she said, “but let’s. Come on,” she said to the others. Selma shook her head, no, and began to talk to a relative who had been sitting at another table. Rena had already left.
Rhea said, “I’ll wait here,” and Laverne said, “Me, too.”
“Come on, Selena,” Diana said. “We came all this way, we might as well get our money’s worth.” Selena rose and followed her to the stage door.
“I’ll never in my life be able to own one,” she said to Diana’s back, “I can’t imagine why I should bother to try one on.”
“You’ve got the height to wear one,” Diana said. “It’ll be fun just to see how they feel.”
In the crowded space backstage the furrier stood protectively by his rack of expensive coats.
“Gently, ladies, gently,” he said, as one by one they were peeled off their hangers and women helped each other put them on. There were squeals of pleasure, and murmurs of awe.
“Here, Selena,” Diana said, and before Selena could protest, Diana had taken the full-length dark mink off its hanger and was putting it on Selena. She began to protest, but as the cool satin slipped over her bare arms and the thick fur of the collar settled against her hair, neck and chin, her words slowly died, and she was left standing by herself, feeling the weight of the coat, its scent, the silkiness of the fur. She felt as though she had never known such softness, such luxury, or been so close to such a world of grace. For a second, all the things she would never have, would never even know about, all the spoils of the feminine world came flooding over her and she felt loss, and sorrow at that loss.
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