CHAPTER 2 NORA
Everyone has interpreted “masquerade ball” a bit differently.
Bea’s getting low in a floor-length black satin dress.
Brendan has leaned hard into the Phantom of the Opera aesthetic, pulling goofy faces behind the white mask, made sillier by the fractalated light thrown off by the numerous disco balls and chandeliers above us.
Faraz and Judith look like they would have been guillotined during the Reign of Terror.
Deepti spent way too much money on a Cinderella-esque ball gown complete with black velvet choker and “glass” slippers but has no mask to speak of.
Josh just wears a gray suit, passing out drinks and belting out the (wrong) words to whatever song the band is playing.
Despite the discount Bea got us, the tickets were still a hundred bucks each and drinks cost more on top of that, but no one seems to mind that we’re not back at my house, in cheaper clothes, with cheaper food and as many drinks as we brought ourselves.
Plus, the new venue and the masqueradeness of it all means I’ll be able to leave whenever I want.
It’s far more difficult to Irish goodbye at your own house.
I feel underdressed, even though I’m in a shimmering, gold-sequined tassel minidress with an open back and deep neckline that gives the illusion of breasts I don’t actually have.
I got it on sale on Boxing Day, and the discount nature of it combined with the not quite matching Venetian mask gives the outfit a thrown-together quality in comparison to my friends.
But that’s what I love about us; there’s no pressure to be the same.
“Where is everybody?” Bea shouts. It’s been at least fifteen minutes since they left us on the dance floor.
“I think they’re waiting in line for drinks,” I shout back.
It’s so loud I can barely hear myself think.
My feet hurt in these shoes, and the sequins, while fun, are starting to rub under my arms. This is better than my house in a lot of ways, but I’ve also thought, more than once tonight, that I’ll never leave my house for New Year’s Eve ever again.
The only saving grace is we gathered at my apartment for a tightly packed pregame, so at least I’ll still get to continue my New Year’s Day house-cleaning tradition.
“There they are,” she shouts as Faraz puts his arms around my shoulders and Deepti passes around drinks and Josh continues to sing the wrong words to the song.
We’ve formed a circle, the kind that makes it clear we’re a unit, and I dance, laugh, drink enough champagne that I can ignore the ache in my pinky toe but not so much that I wouldn’t notice if my boob fell out of my dress.
Bea taped me in here pretty good, but I don’t know how much longer the tape will hold up against dance-induced sweating.
Between the disco balls and chandeliers, the balloon covered ceiling and bunting draped down the walls, the generic hotel ballroom has been transformed into something I might be inclined to call fun, if I liked New Year’s Eve parties. Which I do not.
Eventually, the band is replaced by a DJ who announces the countdown will start soon and I cheer with the rest of them, and if I don’t look at him across from me, it’s not because I’m avoiding him.
In fact, I’m not not looking at him. I’ve looked.
At the way the dark roots of his hair have turned darker from sweat, at the shape of his body through the sheer black material of his pleated button-up shirt, at the satin sheen of his black, high-waisted tuxedo pants, and if my gaze has lingered on the curve of his ass in those pants it’s for research purposes.
How Does Almost A Lifetime of Competitive Hockey Shape One’s Ass: A Case Study.
What I have not looked at is his mouth, the plump curve of his lower lip or the slice of his smile; I’ve definitely not looked at his eyes, how the blue seems somehow brighter behind his plain black mask, but no less playful or teasing.
I’m not not staring. So when Finn catches me, he smiles. Teeth white, mouth generous. Cheeky. Pleased.
He was late to the pregame at my apartment, breezing in like October wasn’t the last time I’d seen him as we were putting our shoes on and trying to organize cabs and ride shares to get here. His lateness something all of us should have foreseen as an issue, but didn’t.
“I’m getting some air,” I say to Bea.
“Huh?” She bumps her hip to mine in time with the music, arms up, face serious because this is serious to her. Dancing.
I point to the doors across the ballroom. “Getting air.”
She looks pointedly from me to the digital countdown timer hanging above the where the DJ is set up on stage.
“I’ll be back on time.”
She kisses me, a hard press of her lips to my cheek that has undoubtedly left a red imprint. “Just in case,” she scream-spits into my ear. “Happy New Year.”
Happy New Year, I mouth as I back out of our circle of friends.
The main mezzanine outside the ballroom might as well the be the moon the way there’s no one out here.
The quiet on this side of the doors is startling, almost unsettling.
My ears have been begging for relief for the last three hours but now that they’ve received it, the silence is disorienting.
I drag my fingers along the dark paneled wood on the outside of the ballroom, the vibrations from the music on the other side beating up my arm.
Without the press of hundreds of moving bodies, my skin goose bumps in the relative cold along my arms and legs, the back of my neck.
My nipples are pebbled and hard. And maybe if I tell myself enough times that’s from the cold, too, I can believe it.
I lean against the wall at the end of the hallway, the mezzanine turning deeper into the bowels of the hotel, tip my head against the wood and close my eyes. The image of his nipples, visible through his sheer black shirt—obscene!—is imprinted on the backs of my eyelids.
No one said anything about it tonight. Perhaps Bea gave them all a good stern talking-to. Don’t mention Nora and Finn’s midnight kiss. Or maybe they’ve all forgotten; a far more likely scenario.
Maybe he has forgotten. Rude. Even though part of me wishes he has. Or that I could.
Because no one has said a word, and yet. It’s been a presence all night, made worse when he finally arrived, late and beloved. That kiss is here, an accessory I can’t unclip from my wrist.
It’s in the tug on my ears from the same small gold hoops I wore last year.
The smell of the candle he gifted me that day, the one I didn’t open, that I forgot about completely until the next morning.
There was no card in the bag, just two tall green taper candles and a square of hand-printed board attached to the wicks: Bayberry candles are traditionally gifted from a friend on New Year’s Eve.
They’re meant to be burned down to the end to bring joy and good tidings for the new year.
I saved the candles all year, specifically for tonight, and the scent of them clung to us as we piled into the rideshare.
I’ve only now just realized. I never thanked him for the gift.
For a moment, the quiet of the hallway is interrupted by a blast of music as the ballroom doors are opened and closed again. I keep my eyes closed. The carpeted hallway mutes every footstep, but I know, or maybe I stupidly hope that I know who it is anyway.
“You okay?”
Finn stands out of arm’s reach, as if he is a stranger cognizant of approaching a potentially drunk woman. He holds out an unopened water bottle and I close the distance between us to grab it.
“Thanks,” I say.
The water is room temperature, but since my body hasn’t yet acclimated to the cold outside the ballroom, it’s almost warm against my tongue, down my throat.
“Thanks,” I say again.
Finn watches me, my mouth, and I pat at the corner of my lips with my ring finger in case I’ve smudged my lipstick.
“And thanks for the candles.” It’s best if I get it out of the way now, so I don’t have this IOU hanging between us.
Finn frowns, forehead creased.
“The candles you gave me last year,” I prompt. “I never said thanks for them. I just remembered.”
He nods, holds out his hand, and I pass him the water bottle.
Finn puts the bottle to his lips, tips his head back, and chugs the rest of the water.
His eyes closed, his jaw a strong, sharp angle, his throat working with each swallow.
He drinks and drinks and when he finishes, the bottle empty, the plastic crumpled in one large hand, there’s a little bit of water dribbled down his chin, a splash of it on the sheer silk fabric on his chest.
“I almost didn’t come tonight,” he says, quickly, almost whispered, as if it’s an admission he doesn’t want to make. As if I’ve torn it out of him.
And for a stomach dropping moment, for the time it takes a drop of water to glisten along his plump bottom lip and disappear into the abyss of his blouse, I wonder if it’s because of me.
Because I never said thank you. Because I told him he wasn’t nice.
Because I’ve been too me, grumpy, judgy, annoyed Nora.
Or worse, because of the kiss. Because he didn’t want to give me any ideas about another kiss.
My cheeks flush in premortification at the thought of him practicing how to let me down gently, to tell me he doesn’t want to kiss me again, ever again. At all.
My face flames hotter and my stomach warms, a pool of disappointment that doesn’t quite belong. Because it shouldn’t matter whether Finn wants to kiss me at all.
You don’t want to kiss him, Nora, I remind myself.
“It’s just,” he says, wiping the back of his hand across his mouth. “Too loud.” He gestures toward the ballroom doors behind us. “You know?”
“Oh.” Oh.
Duh. Of course, it has nothing to do with me. Or with our kiss. As it should be!
“I don’t mind when it’s just us. The group of us. But the older we get, the parties get bigger, louder.” He shakes his head, then gathers his hair in one hand, holding it off his neck.