Slightly Single by Wendy Markham

Author:Wendy Markham
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Publisher: Red Dress Ink
Published: 2002-03-25T16:00:00+00:00

Eleven

“You’re Tracey, right?”

I nod at the pleasant-looking African-American guy who greets me as I step off the elevator and find myself in the entryway of a penthouse apartment on Central Park South.

“I’m John Wilson with Eat Drink Or Be Married,” he says. “Milos asked me to train you.”

The security guard who escorted me up in the elevator—after my name was checked off a list in the lobby and telephoned ahead to the penthouse—heads back down to his post.

It’s all I can do not to look around with my jaw hanging open as John leads me through a vast sitting area to a room he calls the “atrium.” Three walls are made of glass, and there’s an incredible view of Central Park sprawled twenty stories below. But if you don’t look at that, you can almost convince yourself that you’re on some tropical terrace. Terra cotta, plants galore, antique-looking wrought-iron furniture, a trickling fountain. Several men are moving a grand piano through the wide double doorway from the living room.

The entire apartment is filled with bustling people, all of them more attractive than I am, and all of them wearing gray Nehru jackets and black slacks like mine. At least I’m getting some use out of this boring pair of gabardine dress pants I bought more than a year ago for my great-aunt’s funeral. And at least they still fit—although they might not have, at this time last week. The waistband is snug, proving that I probably gained at least ten pounds since college—and that it’s a good thing I lost five or more of it this past week.

I get a quick tour of the spectacular apartment as John tells me about the event. It’s a cocktail party in honor of some guy’s fortieth birthday, thrown by his wife. I glimpse a prominently framed portrait of an attractive couple over the mantel, and assume they must be the birthday boy and spouse.

I wonder what they do to be able to live in a place like this. We’re talking Trump meets Vanderbilt. I want to ask John if they’re celebrities or foreign royalty or something, but that’s so…Brookside. So I try not to gape as he shows me around, pretending I’m totally accustomed to the trappings of vast wealth.

Priceless paintings? Private gym off the bedroom? Walk-in dressing room twice as big as my apartment?

No big deal.

Right.

John shows me how to carry trays and offer appetizers to the guests. How hard can it be? I wonder, until I practice with an empty silver tray and realize that it’s heavier than it looks.

I’m told to be polite and personable.

“Remember,” John says, “the guests aren’t here to talk to the wait staff.”

“Are you sure?” I ask gravely. “Because I was practicing some new knock-knock jokes earlier and—”

He looks horrified.

“Relax, I’m kidding!” I say, laughing.

“Oh!” He’s obviously relieved. “I thought you were—”

“Some kind of nut?”

“Well, we’ve gotten some nuts, believe me. People who don’t know how it works. A lot of catering people are in show business.

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