Crescent City Connection

including the Marsalises. And plenty of black people were at the party. She wondered if one of them was Ellis Marsalis, maybe even Wynton.
    She thought the people who lived in the house were probably musicians as well, or artists—something interesting, anyway. They had a big old grand piano in the living room, and the walls were covered with paintings—not those stiff pictures of people in old-fashioned clothes that were usually deep browns, real depressing; these were all bright colors, and big as the walls themselves, pictures of leaves or something, except not really leaves, just a design.
    The house was in a nice neighborhood, out near Audubon Park, so the people must be rich, but there was something real different about these white folks. The house was different, for one thing—it was real, real big, but cozy, with those same rugs on the floor, the ones that looked all worn out, but these had bigger designs in them, not all those little flower-dy things. And there was some silver here and there, and a little bit of crystal, but most things looked like crockery—ceramic, she thought it was called—or were made out of bright-colored glass, all fancy designs. The furniture was kind of worn, too, like the rugs, and the pillows and things were great, huge, old-fashioned flower prints, like in old movies, or those Hawaiian shirts white men like to wear.
    Dorise had just never seen a house like it. She wanted to go get Shavonne and move right in.
    And the people at this party! Some of them were just regular white folks, little-bitty skirts and great big jewelry on the women; suits and ties for the men; but a lot of them looked like movie stars, or anyway like they just blew in from California. They had on denim vests and they were bare-legged, with good tans, and little catlike glasses, and strange shawl kinds of things, and jewelry that looked as if it had been made by Indians or Africans—turquoise and amber, stuff like that. There were two men with completely shaved heads, one white, one black, and the black one was gorgeous. He could have been Michael Jordan, for all Dorise knew.
    Maybe he’s my secret admirer
, she thought.
Maybe he’s seen me somewhere, and he’s the one who leaves the little things for Shavonne.
    She smiled at someone across the room and mouthed, “Hello, darlin’,” more or less just so she could smile to herself and not look like a lunatic. “Secret Admirer” was just a game she played with herself. She was pretty sure she knew who left the Christmas stocking, and the JazzFest T-shirt, and the little House of Blues souvenir that time. Once she had seen her. She knew it was a white woman, a big one, and she knew the candy wasn’t poisoned or anything, because she was pretty sure what it was all about. She just didn’t meet it head-on, kept it on kind of a back burner so she wouldn’t have to think about it, instead playing this game with herself.
    My secret admirer loves me so much he knows the way to my heart is through my child.
    My secret admirer is handsome and rich and plays football for the Saints—but he can’t declare himself because first he must make me love him for himself.
    My secret admirer will buy me the best house in Eastover, and Suzanne Nickerson will come to my parties.
    Suzanne Nickerson was here, at this party. She was the gorgeous anchorwoman Dorise had met before and who was more or less her idol. “How you, darlin’?” Dorise said and Nickerson said, “Hello there—nice to see you again,” just as if she meant it, as if she remembered Dorise, and she was so nice Dorise thought she really did, no matter what her sister said about her being just the help.
    There was dignity in being the help. It was honest work, and the Bible praised honest work.
    Just to make the party complete, a fine-looking man even talked to her. She was passing a tray of crawfish beignets, and he said, “You have the prettiest smile. I was noticing the way you say hello to everybody.”
    “I like meeting people,” she said. “It’s my favorite part of the job.”
    He waved a denim-clad arm in a wide, careless arc, nearly upsetting her tray of goodies. “These people? My God. You enjoy meeting these people?”
    She saw he wasn’t nice. He was just a bitter white man trying to make himself feel better by talking to a black person, thinking he was giving her some kind of crumb of charity because he probably felt inferior to these people. He was probably an unpublished