introduce Leah to one of the two ways to keep warm on such nights in such settings (the other way being evidenced by the few unlit cars scattered around the clearing, the heads of the occupants ducking out of sight when the station wagon’s lights swept past). After turning off the car, Brooke had reached under the seat and pulled out a small bottle. She unscrewed the cap and took a long drink, gasping then coughing quietly as she lowered the bottle from her lips. She offered the bottle to Leah across the seat. In the dark Leah could only see her sister’s profile in silhouette, but that was enough to tell that it was taut in a wince of discomfort when she swallowed. Nonetheless, Leah grasped the bottle, raised it to her lips, and took a long swig—too long a swig. Her mouth was suddenly on fire. Somewhere beneath the fire there was a sweet, peppermint flavor; but that was little comfort or defense against the flames enveloping her mouth and consuming her tongue. Bright lights flashed in front of her eyes and something like a storm raged inside her skull. Brooke saw or sensed her sister’s distress and quickly leaned over and opened the passenger door. Leah leaned out and spat the liquid fire on the broken asphalt then gasped for breath, still felt the flames, spat some more.
That was Leah’s first, and last, sampling of peppermint schnapps. Brooke apologized for not better preparing her by suggesting a small sip—“I didn’t think you’d drink half the bottle!” she said in the dome light’s glow after Leah had somewhat recovered—but seemed to find no end to the humor prompted by her sister’s volcanic, and uncharacteristic, reaction. Leah had scowled and moped for a few minutes but recovered when Brooke suggested she drive home. Leah was still on her learner’s permit (which she carried at all times in her wallet in the back pocket of her jeans) and Brooke was too young to be her accompanying instructor; but in typical fashion Brooke shrugged off that prohibition with the comment, “If we get stopped, I’ll sweet talk the cop” and Leah proudly drove home while Brooke disposed of the rest of the schnapps along with the bottle out the window then played with the radio, singing along in songs Leah heard through her sister’s effusive gestures. And they weren’t stopped, didn’t see a single patrol car.
They didn’t need the warmth of peppermint schnapps this night. Spring had arrived a few weeks earlier and the air was warm and thick and fragrant beyond their open windows. It was early in the night and they were the only car in the lot. Leah switched on the battery-powered camp lantern they’d borrowed from the garage to save draining the car’s battery by using the dome light (didn’t want to get stranded with a dead battery out here!). Leah set the lantern on the hump in the floor at the middle of the seat then leaned back against the passenger door (Brooke had driven out here, but promised Leah she could drive back—in the full dark). She leaned her head out the window and closed her eyes and took in a long breath of spring. She hated winter and all parts of her basked in this pregnant warmth and the promise of summer it intimated. She only reluctantly opened her eyes and pulled her head back inside the car.
Brooke smiled at her. “I wish you could hear how loud the night is.”
Then show me, Leah signed, pointing at her eyes then gesturing toward the massive night beyond the broad windshield.
Brooke shrugged. “O.K.” She puffed out her cheeks then spread out her arms, opened her hands wide, and slowly pulsed arms and hands in and out around her head, the sounds of the night. Then she grabbed Leah’s near hand, pulled forward her index finger, and rubbed the fingernail against the stippled metal of the dash in rhythmic beats—scrape, scrape, scrape. The grating hurt her ears but she hoped it somehow duplicated for Leah the tree frogs’ resonant chirp.
Leah looked confused.
Brooke leaned forward, pressed her mouth against Leah’s ear, and forced her breath into that cavern, mixed those pulsing breaths with the clucking of her tongue against the top of her mouth and lighter bursts of air constrained into a shrill whistle.
Leah pushed Brooke away, her eyes flashing a sharp rebuke. O.K., I get it—lots of noise.
Brooke nodded sadly. “Lots of noise.”
They rested in that noise a little while, each in her own way.
“They’re going to make me go, aren’t they?” Brooke said.
Leah nodded. Short of running away from home or locking herself in an underground bunker, Brooke was going to the ball. The only question was how much pain she and everyone around her would suffer in the process.
Brooke sighed. “It’s hard enough to get Danny to put on a clean T-shirt. I’ll never get him in a tux.”
Leah grasped the full meaning of this remark. Brooke had never brought Danny to the house, never introduced him to Momma and Father. She was pretty sure they knew of Danny’s existence, as a rural friend of Brooke’s somewhere out there on the periphery. Momma might’ve sensed more, with her feminine intuition. But clearly Brooke had no desire to make this rogue relationship official. She knew if she did that would be the end of it. Leah raised her eyebrows—Anyone else?
Brooke frowned. “I’m not going to two-time Danny. What kind of girl you think I am?”
Leah laughed. She understood that what Brooke really meant is that any boy willing to escort her or anyone to the deb ball was a dork, not worth the trouble or association. Leah raised a single finger then made it disappear in a burst of both hands—One night; it’s only one night.
“It’s the Debutante Ball, Lee! Rehearsals, pre-parties, dinner, after-parties. Might as well get married!”
Leah shook her head then played her trump card, rolling her eyes in a familiar gesture—Matt?
At first Brooke was shocked but then took a moment to consider her sister’s suggestion. Matt was away at school but would be home for the summer by the time of the ball. And there was precedent for it—she’d heard of other girls using their brothers as escorts. Flo Robinson did it just last year with her brother Steve, though that was because he was a lieutenant in the Army and headed to Vietnam—a gesture of loving farewell for the whole family and their insular community. To get Matt to agree, she’d have to use every favor she’d ever earned and about a decade’s worth into the future. Still, it was a possibility. “What about those lame classes?”
Leah pondered this. The ball organizers offered eight weekly classes to prepare the debs, giving instruction in how to walk, how to curtsy, how to smile, and of course how to dance the signature waltz. The escorts were expected to attend the last several classes, focused on the waltz; but only the debs attended the early classes. It was rumored that those classes also included instruction about birth control, but Leah figured that was a modern legend. In the old days (till three years ago) attending all classes was a prerequisite for inclusion in the ball. But now the debs could opt out of the dance classes if they also opted out of the waltz itself, and that chance to shine before the assembled society. Do you want to dance? Leah signed.
“Hell no! Why would I want to learn to waltz?”
Leah held up four fingers—Then it’s only four classes to placate Momma and Father.
Brooke shook her head. It wasn’t near as simple as Leah was making it seem. She looked up, stubbornness setting her jaw.
Leah responded with a slight tilt of her head and gentle uplifting of her eyes, hinting but not exactly asking—For me?
Brooke heard the request and at some level buried deep inside understood it as coming not only from Leah but on behalf of the whole family, peace in the household at all cost—in this case at her cost. She grit her teeth and wanted to scream a curse—at the ball, its high society sponsors, her parents for buying into that farce, Leah most of all for her patient good sense. Damn Leah! O.K.—so she did curse, but not out loud. “Can I listen to the radio?” she asked finally.
Leah nodded a ready acquiescence.
Brooke started the car then turned on the radio and immediately joined in the lyrics of the pop song pouring forth.
Leah watched Brooke, knew her sister had turned the radio’s volume to the max, her shrill response to the pulsing dark, knew it through the bass
notes throbbing from the car’s tiny speaker, those notes backed by the steady purr of the car’s engine reverberating through the station wagon’s frame, their shelter this spring night.
So Brooke agreed to go to the ball, telling Momma the next day, “I’m expecting an MG convertible as payment for pain and suffering!” She left it for her parents to persuade Matt, figuring they had more leverage over him than she ever would. And she said in no uncertain terms, “I’m not dancing!” knowing that her parents would have to pay for all the classes whether she attended the dance sessions or not. She realized this stipulation wouldn’t be a deal-breaker but wanted Momma to know she wasn’t going to be the only one paying a hefty price for this descent into mindless pretense. Momma nodded acceptance of these terms with a simple “Thank you, Brooke” accompanied by a grateful glance over Brooke’s shoulder to Leah, to which Brooke muttered in disgust, “Leah’s not the one going to the stupid ball!” and stormed out of the kitchen.
The classes began two weeks later, held at the same studio where Leah took her dance classes and taught by her dance teacher, Mrs. Stafford, a former deb herself (May we present Jacqueline Raquel Williams, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Walter Williams!) and well-ingratiated to and in