Petty in Pink

by Compai

  In the corner of the room, on a polished pink grand piano, Miss Paletsky performed. Not that anybody heard. All around her people laughed, confided, flirted, and schmoozed—the more pink grapefruit martinis they drank, the louder they got. She didn’t mind. Seedy Moon had already stopped by to thank her, a beaming smile on his face. Unthinkingly, she thanked him for thanking her, and he laughed, his eyes settling briefly on her face. “You look…” He laughed again and left without finishing, walking close to the piano, keeping his hand on it until, at last, he let go. He’s drunk, she surmised. He put his hand there for balance. And yet, and yet… something in the gesture, the slow slide of his fingers, felt like a caress. Stop fantasizing, she chastised herself, and sternly resumed her playing. But every time she looked up from the board, the memory bubbled back, and she found herself blushing with happiness.

  Of all pinks in the room, that was the purest.

  Charlotte Beverwil’s was the pissiest.

  “Tell me this isn’t happening,” she breathed, on the opposite side of the crowded room. “Jules,” she snipped, shooting darts that put Cupid’s to shame, “is that piano woman wearing the same dress as me?”

  Her ponytailed paramour glanced up from his plate of miniature raspberry tarts and swallowed. “She is,” he concurred, shaking his slick raven head in disbelief. If he and Charlotte had one thing in common, it was following fashion code. “But she”—his lovely, full lips turned down in distaste—“she is like a cheap rhinestone on a child’s dirty Barbie shirt. You,” he stressed, “are the ruby.”

  “I don’t believe you,” Charlotte hissed. “It’s humiliating and you know it.”

  With a reluctant cringe, the handsome exchange student nodded. He knew.

  “I’m going over there to get a better look,” she groused, chlorine green eyes still riveted to the enemy, and handed Jules her half-empty champagne flute. “I’ll be right back.”

  It took eighteen excuse me’s, thirteen thanks, and seven sorry’s to make it through the crowd, and only one word—no!—to identify her enemy. First, she froze, eyes wide with disbelief, and then, coming to, turned frantically to escape.

  “Charlotte!” Miss Paletsky stopped her in her tracks. The French wench cringed, composing herself, then turned around with an air of surprise.

  “Miss Paletsky!” she sang, click-clacking toward the polished pink Steinway grand. “I didn’t see you.”

  “Oh.” The teacher squinted, reached for her octagon eyewear, and slipped the glasses on, snapping Charlotte’s dress into focus. “Oh,” she murmured in a different tone, the smile wobbling on her face. At least they were wearing different shoes, she noted—her student’s small feet flaunted the fuchsia lizard-embossed platform Dior pumps Mr. Pelligan had insisted she wear. Thank God, she’d refused. She could only play piano comfortably in flats, a point Mr. Pelligan finally, after a long, bitter struggle, conceded.

  “I know!” The sixteen-year-old brunette laughed, valiantly pushing through the awkwardness. “Isn’t this funny?”

  “Poor Charlotte,” Miss Paletsky clucked with sympathy, recovering her smile. “You must know, it was Mr. Pelligan who insists I wear. Even though, I know… on me it looks so stewpid. But on you!” She sighed her happy approval. “Beautiful.”

  “Oh…” Charlotte breathed, melting with affection. “Thank you.”

  At her student’s charming immodesty, the young teacher laughed.

  “I meant, thank you for talking to Mr. Pelligan,” Charlotte quickly clarified with a blush. “That other stuff, I mean, thank you, but, you know… you look pretty too!”

  “Enough,” Miss Paletsky shook her head in embarrassment, but Charlotte could tell she appreciated it. And the thing was, she thought, discarding Jules’s rhinestone critique, it was true. Without the distraction of so much old pleather and cheap polyester, Miss Paletsky had a pretty hot bod goin’ on. Her chestnut hair, customarily clipped back into a frayed pony, shone from its stylish trim and expensive blowout, dropping cleanly from a deep side-part, and swinging to her bare shoulders. Her makeup was flawless, her pink pearl pendant faultless. If only we could do something about those glasses, the budding style maven sighed. And the please-like-me smile.

  “So, what do you think of this party?” she asked, sliding in next to her teacher on the bench. “If you ask me,” she confided, “it’s a little gauche.”

  “I know, isn’t it wonderful?” Miss Paletsky sighed to Charlotte’s deep astonishment. Did she seriously not know the meaning of gauche? Wasn’t that, like, not knowing the meaning of apple? Or me? “Did you get your gift bag?” the oblivious teacher continued to gush, indicating the shiny magenta bag just above her keyboard. “There are so many things, and a pink nano!”

  “Seriously?” Charlotte replied, managing to shake off her Socratic spell. But she could only feign enthusiasm for a nano for so long. “So,” she smiled, and deftly changed the subject. “Do you think you’ll have an engagement party?”

  “Oh…” Miss Paletsky gripped her face with one hand, covering her mouth, and stared down at her lap. Briskly, she shook her head. “No.”

  “Oh,” Charlotte swallowed, flushing at her social gaffe. God… how does Janie do this all day? “It’s just, I thought…”

  “Oh, I was,” the Russian pianist assured her, glancing up and endeavoring a brave smile. “Just not anymore.”

  “Oh,” she nodded, searching for the right words. “I’m sorry.”

  “No, no!” Miss Paletsky pushed some air from between her lips, waving her garishly manicured hand. “Is good thing, don’t worry.” She smiled, patting her student’s jacquard-covered knee. “You should never be with someone you don’t love,” she advised, still smiling. But her brown eyes were glassy. “There is never a good excuse. Never.”

  Charlotte solemnly nodded, both wondering at her teacher’s words and allowing them to sink in. And then, just beyond Miss Paletsky’s glossy chestnut hair, and seated on a low white couch by the window, she saw him—flanked by female admirers. They tugged at his pink terry sleeve and demanded his attention, dissolving into peals of spastic laughter every time he opened his mouth. And even though he looked slightly bored (his admirers were, after all, six years old), Charlotte had to admit.

  She was beside herself with jealousy.

  “I’ll be right back.” She excused herself from Miss Paletsky, rising in a stupor from the lacquered pink bench. Her heart pounding, she pushed through the crowd without speaking. She didn’t need words; sensing her urgency, people simply parted, watching her with amused, unsympathetic eyes. When, at last, she spotted Jules, he was exactly where she left him. He’d set her champagne flute on the mantel by a candle and was running his hand through the flame with unflagging, childlike interest. The flickering light imbued his face in gold.

  He was more beautiful that ever.

  “Jules,” she spoke, surprising him, and he flinched, burning his finger.

  “Yes?” he turned, sucking the burn, and she paused. She couldn’t break up with him now. Not with his finger in his mouth. Not when he looked like a hamster at the waterspout. It wasn’t right.

  At last, he removed the holdup and frowned, examining the damage.

  “The thing is…,” she began carefully. His finger drifted upward, headed once more for the mother ship, and in a burst of panic, she blurted, “I can’t be with you anymore!”

  He froze—amber eyes wide, full mouth agape—his wounded fingertip just touching his lower lip. He looked less like a hamster than a cover girl, coyly posed to push a new lip-plumper. But then his finger fell, his mouth clapped shut…

  And he looked like a just-been-dumped boyfriend.

  “I’m sorry,” she exhaled, touching his elbow. And she was.

  But more profoundly, she was free.

  The Ghost: Janie Farrish

  The Getup: None of it matters now

  It would go down in history as the most humiliating night of her life. She knew that much. It would go
down in history as the most humiliating night. In life. Period. She wanted nothing more than to get the hell out of there, to crawl into bed and never come out again—but she couldn’t. Jake had the keys, and Jake was inside, and she… she was outside, crouched against the large wall behind a thick camellia hedge. Filmy gray cobwebs clung to the leaves, some of them dark and glossy, most of them dusty and dull. A few feet away, a garden hose hissed at the wall, leaking water into dirt that smelled metallic and cold, like pennies. Every two minutes, wobbling in place, she uprooted her heels from the dampening soil, and thought: This is what it’s like to be buried.

  It was an odd kind of comfort. Unless she thought she was dead, it was like… she seriously wanted to die. If she was alive, not only had it happened (the look on his face, the look on her face, stricken, then scornful, confused, then suspicious; and God, her own face, ugly, unhinged, blotchy, and sputtering) but continued to happen, the toxic black fallout of her little white lie. How could she ever explain it? Even to herself, it was unexplainable. Except that of course she’d wind up like this; she was that kind of person, miserable because she deserved it, and mystifying in the worst possible way, like dirty underwear left in the street. Oh, but if she was dead! Then it was over. She was but a kindly spirit now, gazing through the sepulchral leaves and smiling at the living—their exaggerated joys, their petty sorrows! Does anybody realize what life is while they’re living it? Every, every minute?

  But something always wrenched her back, unearthing her from the grave like a bulldozer. The bad thing about hiding: it protects, but also traps. At one point, Paul and Petra walked outside, and oblivious to the swarming crowd of guests, talked intensely on the lawn. At another, Gabrielle pulled Evan by the hand, leading him to the pool. But when Paul and Petra made up, kissing—literally—in the moonlight, she had nowhere to run. When Gabrielle kicked a splash of pool water, shrieking with delight as Evan, his pant leg soaked, chased her back inside, she had no choice but to sit there, alone with her heartbeat, and cry. She wasn’t dead at all, she realized. She was alive.

  Horribly, painfully, absurdly alive.

  By the time she lifted her face from her snot-slicked knees, half the deck had cleared. For whatever reason, the raucous party chatter had reduced to a polite, low-level murmur, and people were heading inside. She gulped down her sobs and sniffed, watching with interest, startling now and then when stiff petticoats brushed against the bush. A few moments later, she heard a snap—the glass door sliding shut—and held her breath, waiting for another sound, her ears pricked and alert. Nothing. She counted to thirty. Still nothing. Her heart pounded. Had everybody left? Was she stuck here? Why hadn’t Jake looked for her? Why? What would she do? Stay here until morning to be sniffed out by Emilio Poochie? Until Melissa came down in her silk Prada pajamas?

  In a burst of panic and crackling twigs, she scrambled from the hedge, briskly brushed her naked knees, and staggered a short distance across the lawn. Maybe Jake was waiting for her out front? Then, at the deck, she stopped, gazing into the bright glass windows. Inside, the rosy pink room was packed, full of beaming, laughing faces. All at once, they lifted their arms, champagne flutes in the air. Voices swelled, but she couldn’t make out the words.

  Whoops.

  Still, now that she was out, the hedge held less appeal. Trusting no one would notice her, she tugged off Georgina’s pink satin Yves Saint Laurent heels and crept across the slate-tiled deck, sitting beside the pool. Her designer dress was so short and tight, she had no choice other than to sit sidesaddle, knees bent to one side, propped up by one palm. Brushing her knees more thoroughly, she gazed into the midnight water. Rather than dip below a border, like most pool surfaces she’d seen, this surface brimmed to the top, as if the deck itself had gradually turned to liquid. Because the pool was built on a cliff, the effect was particularly breathtaking on the opposite side. The pool didn’t end so much as vanish—dark water dissolving into the huge night sky. If not for a sudden smattering of stars, you could imagine it went on forever. Wouldn’t that be nice? If she could just slip into the water and swim out to the stars? If all she had to do to leave this party, this glass house, these dark hills, was plunge into the cool, opaque water and swim, only occasionally rising for breath, until finally she’d check behind her shoulder and the earth would be far away, bobbing behind her like a bright blue buoy.

  A sudden burst of chatter wrenched her from her thoughts. Reluctantly, she looked up and her heart, which had finally mellowed into something approaching peace, rattled awake and careened against her chest, urging her to flee.

  But like an elephant in a tar pit, she was stuck.

  “Hey,” he called from the open door, his hand still gripping the handle. “You’re missing the toast.”

  “It’s fine,” she told him, surprised at her voice. It sounded exhausted. And mean. “I’m fine,” she waved a bit, attempting a different tone. Nope. Just as bad.

  Evan nodded and stepped forward, sliding the door shut behind him. She blinked, confused.

  He was coming toward her.

  “Nice night,” he commented, thrusting his hands into his pockets. Blood rushed into her face, and her ears throbbed shhhhhh, like the sound of static or the inside of a shell. He was standing right beside her. Oh God, he was sitting right beside her, displacing the air, which was both warm and cold. “Cool pool,” he noted, training his chlorine green eyes on the horizon. In her restricting dress, Janie awkwardly rocked forward to hug her knees. He knew. Of course he knew. Was that why he was out here? To gingerly tell Janie Farrish, girl psycho, he was longer in need of her tattoo services? Or perhaps to clarify, in case her particular brand of crazy extended past Paul Elliot Miller to include other boy innocents, like himself, that they’d definitely never dated? In fact, he’d inform her, he was dating Gabrielle Good. In fact, he’d confess, they were in love.

  “Where’s Gabrielle?” she asked, and inwardly cringed. So much for aloof, breezy interest.

  “I don’t know.” He shrugged as if he couldn’t care less.

  “She seemed cool,” she added, hoping to push him to admit what she already knew: They were perfect for each other. “Don’t you think?”

  “I don’t know,” he repeated, running his hands through his mop of sandy gold-brown hair. “What about you? Where’s your boyfriend?”

  Janie stared, overcome by the miraculousness of his ignorance. She’d just assumed everybody knew. And if everybody didn’t know, then—at the very least—Evan did. Wouldn’t Charlotte have said something? She considered responding, “Oh, we broke up,” and then flinched, appalled for even thinking it. There’s only one way out of this, she told herself, squeezing her eyes shut. A short breath later, she spat it out.

  “I made him up.”

  He looked at her with a hesitating half-smile, like a person who thinks he recognizes someone only to realize nope—not who he’d thought. All she could do was shrug. Then, to her astonishment, he laughed. It wasn’t the best laugh in the world—more wow, you’re freakin’ weird than aren’t you a card—but a laugh nonetheless.

  “So…” Unable to look at him since confessing her pathetic lie, she leaned forward, drawing a line in the tepid water. “Did you decide which tattoo you wanted?”

  “Nah,” he said, hugging his knee. She could hear his clothes crease, shifting on his skin. “I actually think tattoos are kind of dumb.”

  “What?” She started to laugh and stopped, startled by the sound. Behind the hedge, she’d believed so intensely she’d never laugh again that, having done so, she felt ashamed. “So, then,” she continued in a more blasé tone, “why’d you ask me to design one?”

  “I don’t know.” He shrugged, picking at his dark coral flip-flop. His sandy blond hair swept across his eyes; when he blinked, it twitched. “Just wanted an excuse to chill with you, I guess.”

  She searched his profile—was this some kind of joke? He glanced up from his foot and smiled, but she only stared, too stunned to re
turn it. With an exaggerated bob of his eyebrows, he returned to his flip-flop, and her stomach flopped, fluttering with regret. She was vaguely aware of an opportunity lost, but what? Desperate to recapture the moment, but why?

  “You have attached earlobes,” she blurted. Noooo! Her dignity howled its last, dying breath. First the I-made-upmy-boyfriend confession, now this? Seriously, what was wrong with her? “It’s a recessive trait,” she blathered on like a mental patient. “Attached lobes are recessive and unattached lobes are dominant. Like my lobes.” Her eyes glazed. Something about referring to your own lobes. Something about the word.

  Lobes.

  “Yeah, I understand the genetics,” he assured her. “It’s just…” He tugged his ear and frowned. “You’re sure mine are attached?”

  Double-checking felt way too intimate. Staring at his calloused thumb, she adjusted her super-short hemline and slowly nodded. “Yeah.”

  “Man,” he sighed, sitting back on his hands. He shook his tousled head, blowing some air between his perfect rose-wax lips. “I’m recessive.”

  She laughed. “You make it sound so serious.”

  “It is serious,” he insisted. And then, in a tone meant to communicate both anguish and acceptance: “My earlobes are pussies.”

  “What?” she shrieked. He was trying his best not to smile, and failing. “You’re earlobes are not”—despite herself, she lowered her voice, kind of like her mother when she said “diarrhea”—“pussies.”

  “Ah, man. Don’t…” He winced in mock distaste. “Don’t patronize me.”

  “I am not patronizing you,” she beamed.

  “You are,” he insisted, and turned to face her more closely. “And you know why? ’Cause you know you’re dominant.”