The Dinner Party 💃🏾
The Dinner Party 💃🏾
Curio Fiction | 2,448 words
This is one of a collection of curio-fiction short stories that will release in print form in 2024. It is unedited but I welcome any corrections and constructive criticism you may have. Please leave them in the comments below. Enjoy!
I didn’t want to go to this party but my next promotion depended on my presence. I needed to make nice with my co-workers whom I am gladly willing to step on as I claw my way to the top and pretend to care about the expensive lives of the executives I long to be one day. The mission, as laid out to me by my immediate supervisor, if I played my cards right today I was all but guaranteed a seat at the next board meeting. Having a seat meant I earned my way to an executive position with better pay, better benefits, and above all, more freedom. Don’t get me wrong. I love my job, but the hours are grueling and I’m not getting any younger. As my mother always used to remind me when she was alive, my biological clock will tick all the louder the longer I try to go on ignoring it. I work to drown out the silence.
Although, at this dinner party the music was doing a better job than I ever could at drowning out even my thoughts. So, I grabbed a long stem glass of champagne from the bar where the bartender stared at me a bit longer than I liked, almost as if he knew me once, and attempted to maneuver myself to an unoccupied corner of the room.
This was the annual anniversary party thrown by the CEO of the company, on his yacht. He throws one every year and every year since I started working here I declined to attend. Actually, it was more like I pretended I was going, knowing full well everyone would be too drunk to confirm or deny if I had actually been there the following day at work. But this time was different. This time I had to make an appearance. A real one. This time my supervisor made it known to me that he would be looking for me and I quote, “better be there.”
As supervisors go, Trevor wasn’t all that bad. Sure, he tended to drink a bit more than he should during office hours and he got the job because he’s the nephew of the former CEO, now retired. But even I can’t find fault in his work. He’s good at it, even though he’s drunk most days.
“Ah, there you are, I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” said Trevor. His voice sounded much too sober for a man who’d likely been at the yacht before anyone else arrived. He grabbed my elbow before I had a chance to even say hello and began to lead me through the throngs of fellow employees to the other side of the room. “There’s some people here I want you to meet. They work on the…”
The champagne must’ve been stronger than I thought or we were getting closer to the live band playing because I swear I couldn’t quite make out what Trevor was saying to me as we inched closer to a pair of older gentlemen, each nursing what I assumed to be glasses of gin and tonic.
Trevor whispered something in my ear, smiled at the two men and was gone almost as quickly as he’d just dropped me off. One of the gentlemen stared with wide eyes at me. I looked down at my front to make sure I didn’t have something spilled on me I wasn’t aware of.
“You must excuse Jim, here. It’s just…we thought you died last year.”
“What?!” I said a bit louder than I had intended and dropped the empty glass I was holding on the floor. It took less than a second for a waiter to appear at my feet, fussing to clean up the mess. I took my eyes away from the two gentlemen to try and get the man on his hands and knees to move out of my way. But, by the time I raised my eyes they were gone. I searched the room frantically for them but they were nowhere to be found. The room was much too crowded now.
I know, I would just find Trevor and he could explain to me what kind of joke he had set me up for. Whatever it was, it didn’t work. I walked past a line of women waiting to use the bathroom and suddenly my bladder reminded me of the champagne I just had. I stepped onto the line just ahead of a woman far older than myself.
“Oh, I am sorry. Would you like to go ahead of me? I can wait,” I said to her. She choked on her words as she looked up at me with large blue eyes that seemed as familiar to me as those of the bartender I saw earlier.
“Why, Joanne, I didn’t think you’d be here in a million years. After you retired I was sure you were done with us for sure!” she said, all smiles and a slight chuckle.
“NEXT!” A rather large woman with an apron barely making it around her front stood in front of me and shouted. She had a scarf wrapped around her head holding her hair back, a mop in one hand, and a rag in the other. “Watch your step inside, mum. Had a leaker in the third stall there,” she said, addressing me. I turned to ask the older woman who was behind me a question but she was replaced by a much younger woman.
“Where’s the lady who was just here?” I asked.
“What?” she said, pointing to the air and her ear like she couldn’t quite hear what I was saying. “Are you gonna go, or what?”
There would be plenty of time for me to seek out the three people who seemed to think they knew me from a different time and find out what this was all about. But first, I really had to pee. I stepped past the rather large guard woman at the door and entered the bathroom. One stall was occupied, the middle had its door hanging open, and the third had a sign hanging on it that read “OUT OF ORDER.” I walked towards the middle stall, turning briefly to look at myself in the mirror and nearly screamed in fright. Who was that elderly woman staring back at me in the mirror? I touched my hand to my face and pulled it away like my face was on fire. Wrinkles. There were wrinkles on my face. And my hands. I could clearly see varicose veins on my hands. What mirror trickery was going on here? Maybe I was more drunk than I thought. But off of one glass of champagne?
I walked over to the sink and splashed cold water on my face then looked at myself again in the mirror, hoping to see myself again, but at the right age this time. I didn’t. The occupied stall door banged open and a woman stepped out, clutching a cane in one hand to steady herself as she attempted to maneuver past me. The look she gave me was that of hatred. I had never seen her before in my life.
“I can’t believe you have the nerve to show up here after what we both know you did to me. That position would’ve been mine if you hadn’t pushed me down the stairs. While I spent a year in rehab learning how to eat and walk, you got the promotion.” She washed her hands, spit at my feet, and walked out before I could defend myself against whomever she had mistaken me for.
“Ma’am, your car is waiting for you out front whenever you’re ready to go,” came a timid voice behind me. I swear I should’ve been the only person in the bathroom. It was as if she came out of nowhere. And she was clearly talking to me. I looked past her at the mirror, my wrinkles were almost all gone and my gray hair was short and clearly dyed dark brown. I hate the color dark brown. It’s something my mother would’ve wanted if she were alive. “Oh, and you told me to remind you about your breakfast engagement with your mother in the morning, in case you need an excuse to duck out early.”
“Excuse me, what did you just say?”
The young woman cowered slightly before repeating herself. “Your breakfast? The one you have every Monday with your mother? You told me to remind you—”
I raised my hand and she flinched as if expecting me to strike her, something I would never do. I simply wanted her to stop speaking. “My mother is dead.” I could feel the tears building up in my eyes so I turned and ran out of the bathroom to get some air. Whatever was happening. Whatever practical joke someone was playing on me it had now gone too far. Trick with mirrors is one thing. But bringing up my dead mother was more than I was willing to accept. I needed to find Trevor now and quit.
I found double doors that led to the deck outside of the large main ballroom where fellow employees I barely recognized were partying and laughing and drinking as if at my expense. Like they were all in on the joke except for me. Once outside the cold air hit my face and I suddenly felt more awake than I had felt in a long time. Clearly I was not drunk from just one glass of champagne. In fact, I felt as if I could have two or three more and still feel fine enough to show up for work at 7am the next morning.
“I am so proud of you.” That voice. I knew it all too well and my knees gave way for a second. I grabbed for the railing in front of me to steady myself. That voice. It couldn’t be. I shook my head vigorously to try and correct whatever was happening. “To think my baby girl is going to get her promotion in front of all these people. I knew you could do it.” She put her hand on my shoulder and I nearly collapsed from the weight of it. “And don’t you worry anymore about that stupid girl who fell down the stairs. No one blames you for that and anyone who does you can just fire tomorrow.” Her laughter just then clued me in that it was her. No one could mimic that laugh. But how? She died shortly after I got this job. Didn’t she?
“What on earth are you doing out here? Is this how you plan on making me look good to the higher-ups?” Trevor?
I turned around and sure enough, there he was in the doorway I had walked through earlier to get some air. Except, he looked slightly different. Younger, somehow. Yes, there was more hair on his head. And that suit. I remember that suit. I bought it for him back when I first started working here, when I was just his assistant. No way!
“I need a mirror,” I said, trying to get past him but he blocked my way.
“A mirror? There’s no time for you to care about how you look now. My father is about to announce his retirement and we both need to be there when he does it. Though why he insists on both of us being there, I’ll never know. Now, come on.” He grabbed me by the elbow again. Same way he did when I first arrived, though how long ago that was, I couldn’t say. He drags me in the direction of the live band still playing loudly. We get separated and I’m just standing in the middle of the dance floor while people dance around me.
“What are you doing standing around? You’re needed in the kitchen,” said a waiter in my ear. I pulled away from him, surprised that he would be addressing me. Then I looked down at the tray I was holding in my hand. Someone who passed me must have handed it to me without my knowledge. Clearly I was not a part of the staff catering this party. I tried to explain that to him but he raised a hand in the air and snapped his fingers. Suddenly, the bartender, at least, I think it was the bartender, put his arm around my waist and led me away. His touch felt familiar to me.
“Are you nuts or something? You know better than to talk back to him. Do you want to lose your job and your mother’s job in one night?” We walked past the throng of people towards a side door that was used for the staff. Waitresses with empty trays walked through one side and waitresses with trays of food and champagne glasses walked out of another.
“Jimmy?” I said, unsure I was right as I never heard the name until I uttered it just then.
“Good. Yes. I am Jimmy, your boyfriend of two years. Now, quick, who’s that in the mirror?” He spun me around towards a mirror on the wall and there I was, all of sixteen years old. I knew it instantly because of my hair. It was my hairspray era, when bigger was supposedly better. After all, it was how I got Jimmy.
Wait, I had a boyfriend in high school? That’s impossible. I was the ugly duckling. I didn’t even go to prom. He must be confusing me for someone else too. And yet, there was no denying my smooth, golden brown skin. How was it possible for a mirror to add years in the bathroom and take years away in this one?
“Mom, are you back here?”
There was no loud music now. I know because I could hear the sound of my heart beating and my grade school issued shoes as they hit the floor. Something deep down inside me said my mother was here somewhere. I just had to find her. I wanted nothing more than to go home.
I could hear loud voices. Arguing. One voice was loud and stern. A man. The other was sweet and soft. A woman. Mom. I walked faster towards the voices.
“She’s yours whether you want to admit it or not. And if you don’t do right by her I’ll make sure your wife knows all about it.”
“Mommy, I wanna go home.”
“Yes, darling,” she said, lifting me up into her arms and swinging me around to see the tall white man sitting behind a large desk. “Four year old girls shouldn’t ever be up this late.”
THE END