To the right, three suited kinder loiter around an endtable splashed with a pinch of glitter, strewn with straws gnawed twisty white and soiled linen napkins, a surface used only to hold drinks both empty and not quite, interred glassware, alcohol displaced, discarded on the way to a drink ever fresher, a thirst new and on the rocks; sipping the remnants, they forsake the cold buffet for the hot microphone and into it mouth greetings foul to their hosts, private profanity, injokes; their younger brothers wave, make scrunched faces, make the twofinger alien ears devil horns antennæ sign, a resourceful panoply of other obscene gestures directed at the embarrassed bashfulness of their older sisters, half, a Shanda not their names but their very selves or at least their bodies, that they dance a dawdling shame with a number of older, balding menschs whose wives have already seated themselves at their assigned seats at their assigned tables and pout, moan, fight amongst themselves for possession of the plastic party favors, the Taiwanese novelty giveaways, grabbags’ swag, oversized sunglasses, glowing wizard wands. Favorite single uncles glide halfdistracted, smooth receding hair, combover, brusharound, pick at wedgies, loosen the knots of their neckties so as to give enough slack to hang themselves from the fans and fixtures in the event of extreme lonlieness or their paid escorts’ extravagant duress; other of their dates, these lesbian aunts, adjust their tight, waistteething undergarments with none watching save the assembled…a gape of mouths, set to drink, to eat and talk, with further drink to wash words down, without meaning save a warming gurgle, a bitchy burp; a fit of sneezes, croupy coughs, Gesundheit’s mouthed and thanked. A mensch obviously with the hiccoughs, his wife arrives at his side to scare him with a glass of seltzer; for her, an extra glass of ice to soothe her swelling, weepworn eyes, everything’s so wonderful, it’s just my luck, I dressed for a disaster. Other drinks more like melt are worryingly brought into balance, carried through the shot from the bar tended to upper left like the last standing wall of a godless Temple; interrupting conversations, occasional groupings of untuxed bowtie. Menschs in singlebreasts, doublebreasts, in threepieces, vested, invested to the fullest extent, as nothing’s ever optional: the invitation in one pocket, their placard placesetting in another. Who do you have to handle the divorce? You might keep me in mind.
A mensch arriving directly from work, a doctor oncall, or that lawyer returned from emergency court, an ambulance fetch turned vehicular homicide, a businesscard dropped on a woman’s toe resulting in severe hematoma; excusing himself to the bathroom to change into his dressier suit: one arm in his shirt, one out, one leg in his pants, one out, he’s halved and hurried to let his wife know he’s here, she hadn’t noticed. Another mensch standing in the last stall, then sitting almost naked: as he ate and drank he’d spilled and food fell from him and his fork and he stained his clothing, article by item; each time he’s so klutzed with drecky luck removing himself to the bathroom and there removing under the sink and then in the stall whatever clothing stained, first his bowtie then his cummerbund, upon which he’d spilled wine, then his shirt, which he’d taken off when he’d spilled on it gravy, then off with his pants when he’d dropped his knife on them to cut between the legs, and so there he sits much to the humiliation of his wife now hurrying herself on home for another pair, a spare, without even a full meal in him or a drunk in the cooling bathroom, barechested, wearing only his underwear, womanly soft and fat.
