Confessions of the Sullivan Sisters (9 page)

A FEW DAYS AFTER WALLACE’S FUNERAL, I GOT A SYMPATHY
note in the mail from Robbie. It said:

“He didn’t sign it ‘Love,’” Jane pointed out, not helpfully.

“He didn’t have to,” Sassy said. “Just the fact that he sent the note shows his love.”

“You should show it to Almighty and Ginger,” Jane said. “They’d be so pleased to see a young man who actually communicates by U.S. mail instead of texting. The etiquette of bygone days and all that. I don’t see any notes from Brooks lying around.”

“His father sent one,” I said. “From the whole Overbeck clan.”

“Still,” Jane said.

“Yeah, still,” Sassy said.

I went to Speed Reading on Tuesday night. How could I not? I was dying to see Robbie. I wanted to see how I’d feel about him now that he was probably a predatory jerk, according to Sully and St. John.

I got to class a little late and slid into the back row, right next to him. He inspected my face for traces of sadness. I’m sure he found some there. He laid one hand over mine and turned his attention to the teacher, who was discussing skimming techniques.

I hate skimming,
I wrote on his notebook.

Me too,
he wrote back.
If it’s worth reading, I want to read every single word.

The moment I was in his presence I knew Sully and St. John were wrong. Maybe I was naive. Maybe I was kidding myself. But I decided if I was going to get hurt, then I was going to get hurt. How else would I figure out how to tell the difference between a good guy and a jerk? My instincts shouted that Robbie was a good guy, and if my instincts were that wrong, I had a lot to learn.

After class, Robbie took my hand and we walked across campus to a café. “I have to tell you something,” I said over mint tea.

“What, girl of mine?”

“There’s this thing coming up, in a few weeks, called the Bachelors Cotillon. Have you ever heard of it?”

Robbie shook his head. “Is it a debutante ball?”

“Yes,” I said. “I’m supposed to go. With my dad, and my brother, and this guy named Brooks. My grandmother will be very upset if I don’t go. And ever since Wallace died, she’s been even touchier than usual. I just thought you should know.”

“When is it?”

“December twenty-first.”

“The shortest day of the year.”

“And the longest night.”

“I hope you have a good time.”

“I won’t. Don’t worry, I won’t.”

“No, I want you to.”

“You don’t understand,” I said. “This boy Brooks…he’s, like, picked out for me.”

“Does he like you?”

“I don’t know. It’s hard to tell. He’s very dutiful. He knows he’s supposed to like me so he acts like he likes me. Maybe he really does.”

“Do you like him?”

“He’s nice,” I said. “But I don’t like him the way I like you.”

“That’s good to know.”

“But I’m a dutiful person too,” I said. “I guess that’s why I’m going to the ball in the first place.”

“There’s nothing wrong with keeping your family happy, as long as you’re happy too.”

“That’s the thing,” I said. “I feel so funny lately. Restless and impatient and crazy and pissed off. I want to
run away
. Just leave and go go go go go—with you. Anywhere with you, anywhere there are no cotillons and no bossy grandmothers and no school uniforms or nuns or hockey games or lacrosse players or good girls or bad girls. Just us.”

His mouth flatlined, his face neutral. “Yeah. That’s crazy. You can’t do that.”

“You wouldn’t run away with me?”

“I don’t want to run away. I like it here. Besides, I’ve got a thesis to write.”

See how responsible he is?

But my heart cracked, a hairline fracture. I was disappointed. More than disappointed. I’d expected him to say he’d go anywhere, do anything, as long as he could be with me. But instead, he’s practical. He likes it here. He wants to get his degree.

He’s grown up.

Two can play that game,
I thought.
I’ll be grown up too
. “All right. I’ll do what I have to do and you can do what you have to do. Right now I have to go home, do some homework, and go to bed. Well, good night.”

I hurried out of the café. I was tempted to look back to see if he was following me or at least watching me. But I didn’t, because I knew it would ruin the effect of my dramatic exit. Still, I listened for footsteps as I walked to the car. At last, at the car, I turned around. No one was following me.

SULLY WENT BACK TO DARTMOUTH AND ST. JOHN WENT BACK
to New York, and things started to settle down again. You didn’t invite anyone to tea that week. We assumed you were sad and missed Wallace. Sassy was still shaken up by his death. She went to school and hockey practice, and once a week she went downtown to tutor the student she was working with, but the rest of the time she stayed shut up in her room. She didn’t come up to the Tower for sessions with me and Jane, even when I invited her.

A week went by and I didn’t hear from Robbie. So when it was time to go for the final fitting of my Cotillon dress, I went along quietly. It was Ginger’s idea to invite Claire and her mother along with us. She thought that might perk me up, I guess.

I was checking my phone for messages from Robbie the whole time we were in the Seville Shop. You had no idea. In the dressing room, before I tried on my dress—no messages. After I put on the dress and zipped it halfway up—no messages.

I stepped out of the fitting room and stood on the platform before the three-sided mirror. Diane zipped me the rest of the way up. I furtively checked my phone again—no messages.

I stood very still while Diane pinned and unpinned the silk at my waist. I’ve never stood so still in my life. My core had turned to stone. I felt like a ballerina in a little girl’s jewelry box, the kind that spins around while a music box plays the Sugar Plum Fairy theme from
The Nutcracker
. I couldn’t move if I’d wanted to, not unless somebody wound up the music box and made me spin.

“Are you happy with the length, hon?” Diane asked. “I could shorten the hem a little if you think you might trip over it.”

I shook my head. “The length is perfect. Thank you, Diane. I’m very happy with it.”

Back into the dressing room to take the dress off. No messages from Robbie. Nothing.

Why wasn’t he calling? Had I done something to scare him away?

I heard Sully’s voice in my head:
Told you—he’s an asshole.

He’s not,
I replied.
He’s not.

When the fitting was over and we all stopped at Petit Louis for lunch, finally my phone beeped. I had a message. I know how you hate texting at the table so I tried to be as inconspicuous as I could, but I just had to see who the message was from.

It was from Shea. She wrote: N I have 2 talk 2 u important.

“Who is it?” Claire snatched the phone from me. “What could she have to say that’s so important?” The next thing I knew, Claire’s thumbs were flying over the keypad.

“Claire, what are you doing?”

“I put her in her place. You’re too polite.”

I took back my phone but all it said was MESSAGE SENT.

“What did you say?”

“I told her to leave you alone. I said you don’t want to talk to her. She’s got nerve.”

“Claire!”

“What? It’s not like you’re friends with her, right? That’s what you keep saying….”

I started texting Shea but you caught me with the phone.

“Norrie, put that contraption away this minute. For heaven’s sake, we’re in the middle of lunch.”

I put away my phone. I tried texting Shea later to explain what had happened, but she didn’t respond. Whatever Claire wrote her must have really hurt her feelings.

What was so important that she had to tell me?

“Forget about it,” Claire said. “She was just trying to stir up some drama.”

Meanwhile, I still heard nothing from Robbie.

I refused to make the first move. I had my pride. If he didn’t like me anymore, he didn’t like me anymore. There was nothing I could do about it. Maybe my brothers were right. Maybe everyone was right. He was a bad choice for me. I was too young, and he was too old, and lots of girls liked him and he was probably keeping us all dangling like puppets.

But I knew that wasn’t true. He was a good man. He was mine. I felt it.

Dear Almighty, I don’t know any other way to explain my actions.

I knew my duty and I had no intention of shirking it. I planned to go to the Cotillon. I had every intention of being the best debutante I could.

I know it didn’t turn out that way. But I want you to know that I tried.

COTILLON DAY: THE PHONE KEPT RINGING. THE DOORBELL KEPT
ringing. Miss Maura was running around clucking like a chicken, and the house was an asylum. Every time the doorbell rang more flowers arrived. Daddy-o struggled to get into his tailcoat, and Ginger spent the day with her hair in curlers, while Takey and a playdate held a water gun turf war with the entire downstairs at stake.

Amid all this furious activity, I sat on my bed in the Tower and stared out the window. It was a frigid, cloudy day, and the bare trees scraped the pewter sky. My dress hung on the closet door. I had already been to Carl’s and had my hair and nails done. I heard the bells ringing and the doors slamming and the frantic people of the household shouting. Ginger buzzed me several times from her room but I ignored it. I was just trying to breathe.

Jane and Sassy knocked on the door, which was ajar.

“You knocked,” I said. “That’s unprecedented.”

“You should see all the flowers downstairs,” Sassy said. “The whole living room smells like perfume. And Daddy-o bought you a special present—in a blue Tiffany’s box!”

“She doesn’t look very excited about her big night, does she, Sass?” Jane said.

“Don’t talk about me as if I’m not here,” I said.

Sassy curled up next to me like a kitten. She wrapped her arms around my waist and lay her head in my lap. For some reason this made tears spring to my eyes. I stroked her hair.

“I kind of get why you can’t back out now,” Jane said. “But think of it this way, Nor—it’s only one night. And then it’s over. It’s not like you’re getting married.”

“And it won’t be too unpleasant,” Sassy said. “Not like going to jail or boot camp or SAT prep. You’ll wear your beautiful white dress and eat crab imperial and drink champagne, and dance with Daddy-o and Sully and Brooks, and curtsy…”

“And then it’s done,” Jane repeated. “Brooks will probably try to kiss you, but you can always say you’re getting a cold sore.”

Jane is disgusting but she makes me laugh.

“Then tomorrow you can call Robbie and tell him that the Cotillon is over and everything can go back the way it was,” Sassy said.

I teared up again. “I don’t think that will happen. I haven’t heard a word from Robbie for two weeks. I think he thinks I care more about money than I care about him.”

“But that’s not true at all!” Sassy said. “Doesn’t he know you the least little bit?”

“He doesn’t want me anymore,” I said. “Ball or no ball. There’s no other explanation.”

“Then you should forget about him, Norrie,” Jane said. “Who is he? Just some guy. Some stupid grad student—in
film
. Please.
What is that? It’s not like he’s saving the world or reforming society or anything.”

“He’s a good person,” I said. “I know I met him too early, but I had such a strong feeling…” Sassy squeezed my waist. “I guess I was wrong.”

Jane and Sassy helped me dress. I checked my phone every ten minutes for a message from Robbie, but nothing came. How could he give up on me so quickly? He’d just vanished. Something was wrong.

I put on my pearl earrings, and Sassy pinned a white gardenia in my hair. “There,” she said. “You’re all ready.”

“I’m not doing this next year,” Jane said. “But if Almighty finds some diabolical way to force me, then I’m going Goth.” (You’ve been warned.)

The Ginger signal buzzed again.

“She won’t stop until you go downstairs and see what she wants,” Jane said.

“Why can’t she ever come up here herself?” I grumbled.

“You’re lucky she doesn’t,” Jane said, lighting up a cigarette. “Think about it.”

“I guess it’s time to go.” I pulled on my long white gloves and picked up my silver clutch purse. The three of us paraded down the stairs, passing Ginger’s room on the second floor. She sat at her dressing table in a white slip, pawing through her jewelry box. “Are you ready?” I asked her.

“Not even remotely,” Ginger said. “Which earrings should I wear—the diamonds or the rubies?” She held one of each up to her ears for us to inspect.

“Rubies.” I helped her fasten her bracelet.

“Tell your father I’ll be down in a minute. It’s an utter lie but tell him anyway.”

The living room was flooded with flowers. The scent was almost overpowering. I stopped to read the cards that came with them, congratulating me and my parents on my debut. A huge arrangement from the Overbecks, of course, and an even bigger one from you. Thank you for the beautiful flowers, by the way.

In spite of the fact that it was the darkest day of December, all the flowers were in light springy colors like white and yellow and pale blue—all except one bouquet of a dozen blood-red roses.

I slipped the card from its envelope. They were from Robbie.

My insides, which had felt sluggish all day, immediately woke up. What did he mean, I was ignoring him? When had he tried to reach me?

I thought of Shea and her mysterious text. Had Robbie seen her somewhere and asked her to give me a message?

Could she have gotten angry at Claire’s text and taken some kind of revenge on me? Like telling Robbie not to contact me?

Anyway, he’d reached me now. I slipped the note into my purse.

The hotel dressing suite stank of hair spray. You were waiting for us with the chattering girls and their mothers, but you sat apart, watching. Your diamond brooch was the biggest jewel in the room—it lasered blinding beams of light like apon, and seemed to create a kind of force field around you.

Claire dropped her brush and ran to me. “Thank God you’re here. You’ve got to save me from Lily! She’s being such a bitch. She said she saw my dress on sale at Wal-Mart.”

She clutched at my hands. I tried to shake her off. I wasn’t in the mood for debutante dramatics. “Don’t listen to her. She’s obviously making that up.”

“I know, but now my dress looks cheap to me. Why didn’t I see how hideous it was when I bought it? For the rest of my life I’ll be remembered as the deb in the Wal-Mart dress.”

“You’re crazy,” I said. “No one is going to remember any of this for the rest of their lives.”

“Moron, people post their deb pictures online and they stay there forever,” Claire said.

Mrs. Shriver clapped her hands for attention. “Hello, girls and chaperones! Are you ready for your big night?”

“Yeah!” the crowd of demure debutantes screamed.

She went over the evening’s procedure one last time: Receiving Line, Cocktails and Hors d’oeuvres, Introduction of Cotillon Members, Presentation of the Debutantes—walk to the center of
the ballroom floor with your father, curtsy, and get escorted off the floor by the young man you’ve chosen for your escort. Then Dinner and Dancing. Line up from smallest to tallest and march into the ballroom. We’d all practiced it. We were ready.

The girls and their mothers cheered and clapped. Mothers kissed their daughters while the daughters flinched. I heard more than one girl snap at her mother, “You’re smudging my makeup!”

I found a patch of space in front of a communal mirror and stationed myself there for one last check. I looked pale except for my cheeks, which were pink with rouge. I opened my purse and took out my lipstick. There was Robbie’s note, glowing like plutonium, chiding me.

He’ll be waiting at the train station,
I thought. All I had to do was show up, and we could run away from all these flowers and swishing satin dresses, the perfume and hair spray and the fusty old dances that whirled girls around in the same patterns year after year.

I took my place in line with the other girls. You stopped to kiss me on your way out to the ballroom. I looked you right in the eye—remember? And you said something that surprised me:

“My dear sweet granddaughter, you’ve inherited my eyes.”

You’d never said anything like that to me before.

The suite door opened and we paraded into the ballroom to the sound of the orchestra. Ginger and I joined the receiving line and waited to greet the bachelors as they entered the ballroom. Daddy-o wore his top hat and kissed me with wet eyes. Sully pinched my waist and whispered, “Welcome to hell, little sis,” then laughed to show he was just kidding, sort of. Brooks’s parents
heartily wished me well, and Mamie said, “Any family would be thrilled to have you, thrilled!” Last came Brooks, who kissed my hand and said with mock formality, “Good evening, Miss Sullivan.”

When the line broke up for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres, my stomach felt knotty and I couldn’t eat. I sipped ginger ale and tried to make small talk with the overdressed old ladies and oddly flirtatious, red-faced men. Every time I opened my mouth, my brain chanted,
Robbie, Robbie, Robbie,
like a drumbeat. Soon it began to drown out the conversation, drown out the music, drown out everything until I was afraid I’d lose my mind right there at the ball.

Brooks was not to blame for anything that happened that night. He was a perfect gentleman. He took my arm and walked me around the room as if he sensed that I needed to calm down. “Have you practiced your curtsy? I’ve heard the judges are taking off points if your nose doesn’t touch the floor.”

I pretended to laugh. I thought his joke was funny; I just wasn’t in a laughy mood.

“I’m very intimidated by those navy guys.” He whooshed me past a row of cadets from the Naval Academy. “Can you imagine the discipline it takes to keep those white uniforms clean?”

My mouth said, “No,” but my brain said,
Robbie, Robbie, Robbie.

I glanced at Brooks’s watch. 8:35. I wondered when Robbie would get to the train station. I pictured him standing by the gigantic Christmas tree, people whizzing past him, a spot of stillness in a blur of holiday travelers.

“Would you like some champagne?”

“Not now, thanks,” I said. My head was already fuzzy, and I needed it clear. I felt bad for being such a drip but I couldn’t help it.

Mrs. Shriver threaded through the room, quietly tapping each girl on the elbow and whispering that it was time for our presentation. We disappeared one by one, lining up behind a large screen at one end of the ballroom. I spotted Daddy-o in line with the other fathers, waiting to present us. He winked at me and I gave him a little wave.

“Take your seats, please,” a man said. “Everyone, please take your seats.”

Chairs scraped and glasses clinked as the guests found their places at the tables surrounding the dance floor. The orchestra went quiet, and a hush fell on the room. Mr. Ferguson greeted everyone and talked about the charity the ball would benefit. I tuned him out and searched my purse for a pen. I found a tiny pencil, the kind you use for keeping score in miniature golf, tucked away in a fold at the bottom. My heart was speeding, rushing all the blood from my head and around my limbs like a car on a racetrack, making me dizzy. But I was thinking clearly. The whole room around me blurred but the voice in my head was clear as pool water:
Robbie, Robbie, Robbie.

I slipped Robbie’s letter out of its envelope and tucked it back in my purse. Then I scribbled a note on the empty envelope. I dropped the pencil into my bag, clicked it shut, and gripped the envelope in one of my gloved hands.

The orchestra started playing “Stardust.” Mr. Ferguson began to read the names: “Mr. John Preston Ames and his daughter,
Caroline Leslie Ames.” Caroline Ames took her father’s arm and made her entrance and curtsied. I watched her father walk to his table while her younger escort, a college boy, led her to the side of the dance floor to wait for the first dance.

“Dr. Thomas Cochran and his daughter, Mary Elizabeth Cochran.”

I inched closer to the front of the line. Was I really going to do this? I wasn’t sure I had the courage. The girl I used to be might daydream about running away, but in the end she would have chickened out. She would let herself be swept along with what was easiest, what caused the least trouble, what everyone expected her to do.

I felt different now. But was I really?

“Mr. Martin Mothersbaugh and his daughter, Claire Barton Mothersbaugh.”

I leaned forward to watch Claire stride into the ballroom on her father’s arm, beaming at the applause. I caught a glimpse of you reigning over the proceedings, front and center with Mamie, grimly clapping for each new girl.

And there on the dance floor stood Brooks, eagerly waiting his turn among the line of bachelor escorts. Could I really do this to him? Would he ever forgive me?

Did I really care?

“Dr. Philip Riggs and his daughter, Marissa Leah Riggs.”

I was very close now. Only two girls in front of me. Daddy-o rubbed his palms together in nervous, delighted anticipation. Poor Daddy-o. He’s such a darling, as Ginger would say. I hated
hurting him most of all. But I believed that, when it was all over, deep down he’d secretly side with me. He wants me to be happy.

“Mr. Andrew Morton Stewart and his niece, Amalie Caton Stewart.”

I was next. I stepped forward, took Daddy-o’s arm, and slipped the pencil-scribbled note into the pocket of his trousers, under the pretext of brushing away a bit of lint.

“Ready, dear daughter?”

“I’m ready.”

Mr. Ferguson announced us—“Mr. Alphonse Sullivan III and his daughter, Louisa Norris Sullivan”—and we stepped out into the spotlight. A flash from your brooch blinded me for a second. Daddy-o kissed me and stepped aside as I collapsed into a deep curtsy. I nearly lost my balance, but saved myself at the last minute, and rose.

Brooks stepped forward to take my hand and lead me away. The old Norrie would have gone compliantly with him. But the new Norrie surged forward and took over.

With one apologetic glance at Brooks I broke free and ran. I ran down the aisle that separated the rows of round tables to the ballroom door. Behind me I heard the startled, delayed gasps of surprise and confusion. I didn’t stop to look back. I pushed out the door and ran down the stairs, all thirteen stories. I ran through the lobby crowded with holiday partyers, ran past the liveried doorman and the idling limos, out into the cold December air.