Gabrielle opened the pizza box, pointing it toward me. “We figured you’d be starving after the dinner.” I took a slice and she waved an empty glass in the air. “You want?”
“Yes, please.” I hadn’t had a drink since just that one in Cleveland—but I had done good work today. I would let myself enjoy the night.
“Have you been to New Orleans before?” asked Tommy.
“My first time. But I think I’m already in love.”
“It does that to you,” said Gabrielle.
“I’m meeting my boyfriend and some gays at a bar after this, if you want to come along,” Tommy said. “See the Crescent City’s seedy underbelly.”
“So,” Claire said, “how did it go?”
“Honestly, it was a really good day.”
“What do you need to know?” Gabrielle asked. “We want to be helpful.”
“Looking out for our other others,” Desiree said.
“Desiree,” Tommy said, “no,” but everyone laughed.
“What’s the ‘other others’?” I asked.
“It was this whole thing a few years ago,” Gabrielle said. “Desiree, you tell it best.”
“Wait, I need a full glass for this,” Desiree said, letting Gabrielle top her off, and then explained: A few years ago, in an effort to retain queers and faculty of color, the provost’s office put some discretionary funds into social events to help foster community, though, Gabrielle interjected, they would have preferred the moneyitself. At the inaugural event, the provost, a white guy well into his sixties, made some opening remarks. “Because an old white man is exactly who you want welcoming you to the diversity luncheon, right?” Everyone laughed. “And he starts with something like,We want you to know that the university supports its diverse faculty. Women, minorities”—and Tommy cut in, “Minorities, like it’s the 1950s”—and Desiree continued, “He goes,and the LGBs, tripping over the letters like he’s learning the alphabet. And then says, with like this air of triumph,and others. Minorities, LGBs, and others.” We all laughed again and Tommy raised his glass—“To other others!”
Another bottle was opened and passed around and I asked how long they’d all be in New Orleans. Desiree said she’d spent almost her entire life there. She left for grad school but got through her coursework and exams in just three years, and then came right back to write her diss.
“That’s the way to do it,” I said. “Where were you technically enrolled?”
“Berkeley,” she said. “Oh as a matter of fact—someone from a few cohorts ahead of me is at Sawyer. Safie Hartwell? You must know her.”
“I do.” My voice caught, my throat suddenly dry—could she hear it? “Safie’s wonderful.”
“I haven’t read her book yet, but I just got it. I can’t wait.”
“Yes—” it had come out and I hadn’t even realized “—it’s amazing.”
“Please tell her I say hello. We didn’t know each other, not really. She was done with classes when I started. But this woman was very cool.”
“Mark, of course, was intimidatingly cool in grad school,” Gabrielle said.
“I’m sorry, who was?” I asked, surprised, but grateful for the change of topic.
“You know everyone was a little obsessed with you.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“False modesty does not suit you,” Tommy said. “It’s not a good look.”
Gabrielle turned to the others. “You know, NYU was great. But, god, people were so insecure they weren’t at Columbia. It was like this inferiority complex that just bred a competitive vibe. And then Mark shows up. Twenty-two. Straight from undergrad, right?”
“That’s right.”
“And, no offense Mark—I mean I went to San Antonio—but he rolls up from some Florida school, and in seminars, he’s running rings around all these people who’d gone to Yale and Brown. With MAs from Chicago. Like, seriously pedigreed. But he didn’t care about any of that elite nonsense, or the politics of the department. Like he was actually there to learn.”
“That is very novel,” Claire said. “And as a person of serious pedigree”—we laughed at this—“it checks that people would be obsessed with you, and also unwilling to show it.”
