McIntosh handed Jule a ruffled black apron. “Studies show that in single-sex schools, girls take more nontraditional courses like advanced science. They worry less about how they look, they’re more competitive, and they have higher self-esteem.” She recited it like a speech she had given a thousand times. “Today we expect a hundred guests here for music and passed hors d’oeuvres. Then a sit-down lunch upstairs in the parlors on the third floor.” McIntosh walked Jule into the ballroom, where tall tables were being covered with white cloths. “The girls come here for assembly on Mondays and Fridays, and in the middle of the week we use it for yoga and visiting speakers.”
Oil paintings decorated the walls of the ballroom. There was a strong smell of furniture polish. Three chandeliers hung from the ceiling, and a grand piano stood in one corner. It was hard to believe people went to school here.
McIntosh pointed Jule to the catering supervisor, and Jule gave Lita’s name. She fastened the apron over her dress. The supervisor set her to folding napkins, but as soon as he turned his back, Jule went across the hall and peeked into a classroom.
It was lined with books. There was a Smartboard against one wall and a row of computers against another, but the center of the room felt old. There was a rich red rug on the floor. Heavy chairs circled a wide old table. On the chalkboard, the teacher had written:
Free write, 10 minutes:
“The important thing is this: to be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become.”
—Charles Du Bos
Jule touched the edge of the table. She would sit at that seat, there, she decided. That would be her regular place, with her back to the light from the window and her eye on the door. She’d argue over the Du Bos quote with the other students. The teacher, a woman in black, would loom over them, not threatening but inspiring. She’d push them to excel. She’d believe that her girls were the future.
There was a cough. The catering supervisor stood in the room with Jule. He pointed at the door. Jule followed him back to the pile of napkins and began to fold.
A pianist arrived in the ballroom, bustling. He was scrawny, freckly-white, and redheaded. His wrists stuck too far out of his jacket. He unpacked sheet music, checked his phone for a minute or two, and then began to play. The music was punchy and somehow classy. It made the room feel bright, as if the party had already started. When she finished the napkins, Jule walked over. “What’s the song?”
“Gershwin,” the pianist said with disdain. “It’s an all-Gershwin luncheon. People with money love Gershwin.”
“You don’t?”
He shrugged while still playing. “It pays the rent.”
“I thought people who played grand pianos already had money.”
“We have debt, usually.”
“So who’s Gershwin?”
“Who was Gershwin?” The pianist stopped what he was playing and started something new. Jule watched his hands run over the keyboard and recognized the song. Summertime, and the livin’ is easy.
“I know that one,” she said. “He’s dead?”
“Long ago. He was from the twenties and thirties. He was a first-gen immigrant; his dad was a shoemaker. He came up through the Yiddish theater scene and started out writing poppy jazz songs for quick money, then did music for the movies. Then, later, classical and opera. So he ended up high-class, but he came from nothing.”
How amazing to be able to play an instrument, Jule thought. Whatever happened to you, whatever else went on in your life, you could look down at your hands and think, I play the piano. You’d always know that about yourself.
It was like being able to fight, she realized. And being able to change accents. They were powers that lived in your body. They would never leave you, no matter how you looked, no matter who loved or didn’t love you.
An hour later, the catering supervisor tapped Jule on the shoulder. “You have cocktail sauce on you, Lita,” he said. “Sour cream, too. Go fix yourself up and I’ll give you another apron.”
Jule looked down. She took off the apron and handed it over.
There was someone using the bathroom nearest the ballroom, so Jule climbed the stone staircase to the third floor. She glimpsed a pair of elegant parlors. The tables were decorated with bursts of pink flowers. Guests shook hands and suffered introductions.
The women’s room had a lounge. It was papered in green and gold and had a small, ornate couch inside. Jule walked through and opened the door to the toilet. There, she took Lita’s shoes off. Her feet were swollen at the toes and bleeding at the heels. She blotted them with a wet paper towel. Then she wiped at the dress until it was clean.
She stepped back into the lounge barefoot to find a woman in her fifties sitting on the couch. The woman was pretty in an upper-Manhattan way: tan skin with careful rouge and dyed brown hair. She wore a green silk dress that made her seem as if she belonged on that green velvet couch with that green-and-gold wallpaper. She had bare legs and was applying bandages to her blistered toes. A pair of strappy heels lay on the floor.
“The heat makes my feet swell,” the woman said, “and then there’s no end to the suffering. Am I right?”
Jule answered in an accent that matched the woman’s: general American. “Can you spare a Band-Aid?”
“I have a whole box,” the woman replied. She dug into a large handbag and produced it. “I came prepared.” Her finger-and toenails were polished a shade of pale pink.
“Thank you.” Jule sat down beside her and doctored her own feet.
“You don’t remember me, do you?” said the woman.
“I—”
“Don’t worry. I remember you. You and my daughter Immie always looked like two peas in a pod, in your uniforms. Both so petite, and with those cute freckles across the nose.”
Jule blinked.
The woman smiled. “I’m Imogen Sokoloff’s mother, sweet potato. Call me Patti. You came to Imogen’s birthday party freshman year, remember? The sleepover where we made cake pops. And you and Immie used to go shopping down in SoHo. Oh, do you remember, we took you to Coppelia at American Ballet Theatre?”
“Of course,” said Jule. “I’m sorry I didn’t recognize you right away.”
“No worries,” said Patti. “I’ve forgotten your name, I have to tell you, though I never forget a face. And you had that fun blue hair.”
“It’s Jule.”
“Of course. It was so cool that you and Immie were such friends, that first year of high school. After you left, she went around with these kids from Dalton. I never liked them half as well. There are only a few recent grads here at the benefit, I think. Maybe no one you know? It’s all old girls like me.”
“They sent me the invitation and I came for the Gershwin,” said Jule. “And to see the place after being away.”
“How great that you appreciate Gershwin,” said Patti. “In my teens I was all punk rock, and in my twenties it was Madonna and whoever. Where are you in college?”
A beat. A choice. Jule threw her Band-Aid wrappers in the trash.
“Stanford,” she answered. “But I’m not sure I’m going back in the fall.” She rolled her eyes comically. “I’m in a war with the financial aid office.” Everything she told Patti felt delicious in her mouth, like melting caramel.
“That’s unpleasant,” said Patti. “I thought they had great financial aid there.”
“They do, generally,” said Jule. “But not for me.”
Patti looked at Jule seriously. “I think it will work out. Looking at you, I can tell you’re not going to let any doors shut in your face. Listen, do you have a summer job, an internship, something like that?”
“Not yet.”
“Then I have an idea I want to talk to you about. Just a crazy thought I’m having, but you might like it.” She took a cream-colored card out of her handbag and handed it to Jule. It had a Fifth Avenue address. “I have to get home to my husband now. He’s not well. But why don’t you come to dinner at our place tomorrow night? I know Gil will be thrilled to meet one of Immie’s old friends.”
“Thanks, I’d love to.”
“Seven o’clock?”
“I’ll be there,” said Jule. “Now, do we dare put our shoes on?”
“Oh, I guess we have to,” said Patti. “It’s very hard to be a woman sometimes.”
FIRST WEEK OF JUNE, 2016
NEW YORK CITY
Sixteen hours earlier, at eight p.m., Jule got out of the subway in a dodgy Brooklyn neighborhood. She’d spent the day looking for work. It was the fourth time in a row she’d worn her best dress.