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Authors: L. Alison Heller
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walk down the stairs and catch up with Lillian, Roger and Rachel.
__________
E very year, Bacon Payne holds its Christmas Gala at one of the grand New York hotels. This year, one of the ballrooms at the New York Palace has been taken over by the party-hungry lawyers of Bacon Payne.
The room is extremely dark, but after a few minutes, my eyes adjust enough to see the outline of a buffet in one corner of the room. People are lined up waiting for what I imagine is the usual ballroom fare—slightly soggy chicken Marsala, overcooked new potatoes and rice pilaf.
The gala is never about the food, though. The bar, the
axis mundi
of all Bacon Payne events, commands the opposite corner, already crowded even though it’s still early. In a third corner of the room, a DJ in an all-white suit and dancing enthusiastically blares ABBA’s “Dancing Queen.”
The whole event is a dangerous trap: there’s a river of alcohol and music with great beats. You have to participate, but if you indulge too much, you will be the star of your very own Bacon Payne legend and the whole firm will snicker about your foibles until the following summer, when some tanked summer associate will do something to take away your title.
Last year, Anthony Cooper, a young tax partner, did the worm on the dance floor for thirty minutes, after which he puked on the head of the litigation department, after which he passed out. And don’t get me started on the dirty-dancing older lawyers, usually married, who feel no compunction about grinding on female employees decades younger than they are. The wisest strategy is to lie low and blend in.
I am still feeling the effects of my Kir royales. Lillian andRoger have disappeared to schmooze and Hope and Liz are nowhere to be found. Rachel pulls my arm. “Let’s go to the bar,” she shouts, pointing exaggeratedly to it, in case I have missed her meaning.
I order a whiskey sour and Rachel and I clutch green and red cocktail napkins, sip our cocktails and scan the dark room. The DJ has worked up to “Brick House” and more people are dancing.
“Who’s that with Henry?” He’s ushering an attractive woman toward the buffet, his hand on the small of her back.
Rachel shakes her head, indicating she didn’t hear me, and pushes her ear toward my mouth.
I repeat the question and gesture toward them.
She looks and nods. I miss a lot of what she says but hear “Julie.”
“What department is she in?”
Rachel laughs, shakes her head and shouts directly in my ear, “JULIE. Henry’s GIRLFRIEND.”
I give her a surprised look, which Rachel correctly interprets as a request for more information.
“Glamour job. Something at a gallery.”
Henry has a girlfriend? It’s hard to picture. I try to imagine them brushing their teeth together. “Julie, you forgot to floss,” he’d say with an eye roll, pushing the container in front of her and stalking out of the bathroom.
And how on earth does Henry act when deciding how to spend a Sunday off? “Sure, let’s see that Bruce Willis movie with all the other idiots,” I can imagine him saying in an expressionless monotone, absorbed in his BlackBerry. “And then wait on a long line for overrated brunch. You go right ahead. Yep. Right behind you.”
Poor Julie. Well, on the plus side for her, she probably gets to leave work at five o’clock and do things like exercise, go out during the week and have standard mani/pedi appointments. I watch as they navigate the buffet. She doesn’t look bored and miserable.She’s clutching his shirt and whispering something to him. He laughs in response.
Rachel grabs me and shouts in my ear, pointing wildly to the left. “Oh my God—Kim’s doing the robot. Let’s go.”
“I’ll meet you.” I see Kevin, my former office mate from the corporate group, across the room, animatedly telling a story to a group of corporate associates, and make my way there. We hug as though we haven’t since each other in months, even
__________
E very year, Bacon Payne holds its Christmas Gala at one of the grand New York hotels. This year, one of the ballrooms at the New York Palace has been taken over by the party-hungry lawyers of Bacon Payne.
The room is extremely dark, but after a few minutes, my eyes adjust enough to see the outline of a buffet in one corner of the room. People are lined up waiting for what I imagine is the usual ballroom fare—slightly soggy chicken Marsala, overcooked new potatoes and rice pilaf.
The gala is never about the food, though. The bar, the
axis mundi
of all Bacon Payne events, commands the opposite corner, already crowded even though it’s still early. In a third corner of the room, a DJ in an all-white suit and dancing enthusiastically blares ABBA’s “Dancing Queen.”
The whole event is a dangerous trap: there’s a river of alcohol and music with great beats. You have to participate, but if you indulge too much, you will be the star of your very own Bacon Payne legend and the whole firm will snicker about your foibles until the following summer, when some tanked summer associate will do something to take away your title.
Last year, Anthony Cooper, a young tax partner, did the worm on the dance floor for thirty minutes, after which he puked on the head of the litigation department, after which he passed out. And don’t get me started on the dirty-dancing older lawyers, usually married, who feel no compunction about grinding on female employees decades younger than they are. The wisest strategy is to lie low and blend in.
I am still feeling the effects of my Kir royales. Lillian andRoger have disappeared to schmooze and Hope and Liz are nowhere to be found. Rachel pulls my arm. “Let’s go to the bar,” she shouts, pointing exaggeratedly to it, in case I have missed her meaning.
I order a whiskey sour and Rachel and I clutch green and red cocktail napkins, sip our cocktails and scan the dark room. The DJ has worked up to “Brick House” and more people are dancing.
“Who’s that with Henry?” He’s ushering an attractive woman toward the buffet, his hand on the small of her back.
Rachel shakes her head, indicating she didn’t hear me, and pushes her ear toward my mouth.
I repeat the question and gesture toward them.
She looks and nods. I miss a lot of what she says but hear “Julie.”
“What department is she in?”
Rachel laughs, shakes her head and shouts directly in my ear, “JULIE. Henry’s GIRLFRIEND.”
I give her a surprised look, which Rachel correctly interprets as a request for more information.
“Glamour job. Something at a gallery.”
Henry has a girlfriend? It’s hard to picture. I try to imagine them brushing their teeth together. “Julie, you forgot to floss,” he’d say with an eye roll, pushing the container in front of her and stalking out of the bathroom.
And how on earth does Henry act when deciding how to spend a Sunday off? “Sure, let’s see that Bruce Willis movie with all the other idiots,” I can imagine him saying in an expressionless monotone, absorbed in his BlackBerry. “And then wait on a long line for overrated brunch. You go right ahead. Yep. Right behind you.”
Poor Julie. Well, on the plus side for her, she probably gets to leave work at five o’clock and do things like exercise, go out during the week and have standard mani/pedi appointments. I watch as they navigate the buffet. She doesn’t look bored and miserable.She’s clutching his shirt and whispering something to him. He laughs in response.
Rachel grabs me and shouts in my ear, pointing wildly to the left. “Oh my God—Kim’s doing the robot. Let’s go.”
“I’ll meet you.” I see Kevin, my former office mate from the corporate group, across the room, animatedly telling a story to a group of corporate associates, and make my way there. We hug as though we haven’t since each other in months, even
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