Page 38 of Swan Song

We show up wearing flamingo, blush, salmon, magenta, fuchsia, and rose gold. We wear pearl, blanched almond, alabaster, polar ice cap, and cloud. Fast Eddie is in a pink-and-white seersucker suit—is this too much? Apparently not, because the dentist Andy McMann wears a neon-pink top hat and his wife, Rachel, is in swan feathers. Even Romeo from the Steamship has cleaned up his act: He’s wearing a Bazooka-gum-pink bow tie and has traded in his usual cargo shorts for a pair of pink madras pants.

We park along the Richardsons’ white-shell driveway and note that all the hydrangea bushes are pink.

“Yes,” we overhear Benton Coe say. “Leslee wanted the hydrangeas pink, so I put lime around the bases.”

Whatever Leslee wants, Leslee gets, Blond Sharon thinks.

Sharon picks up her pace, even though she’s in heels, to meet up with Romeo. “You look dashing tonight,” she says.

Romeo notices Sharon teeter as she crunches through the shells in her stilettos. Impractical, he thinks, though they make her legs look a mile long. “Can I offer you my arm?”

“Thank you.” Sharon is grateful to Romeo, not only for his steadying presence but also because now she won’t be entering the party alone. She imagines Walker hearing that she and Romeo from the Steamship were looking cozy together at the Richardsons’ party. Ha! It would serve him right.

On Nantucket, the prevailing aesthetic for everything—even parties—is understatement. The old society matrons pretend to go to no effort when they entertain (and some of them aren’t even pretending). One infamous hostess sends out invitations on index cards that read, simply, Drinks, 6:00 p.m. Another hostess serves only two snacks: ham and butter sandwiches on postage stamps of Wonder bread and spears of pickled asparagus.

We’re elated to find that the Richardsons’ party gives maximum effort. The entrance is a soaring arch of Juliet roses. (Members of the Nantucket Garden Club inform us that Juliets are among the most expensive flowers in the world and to have such a profusion of them is unheard of. We pose for pictures under the arch—this is something our friends on Facebook have to see!) On the far side of the arch, servers hold trays of drinks: flutes of Laurent-Perrier rosé champagne, a cocktail called the pink lady—made with Triple Eight vodka, of course—and pink lemonade for the teetotalers.

We saunter onto the front lawn, where a pink-and-white-striped tent shades a full bar, a huge grazing board, and the guitar player, Sean Lee, who at the moment is playing “Pretty in Pink” by the Psychedelic Furs.

The Richardsons are leaning into the theme, we see.

The entire harbor is spread out before us like a banquet. The water is spangled with golden coins of sunlight; we see the church steeples of town in the distance; and the Richardsons’ yacht, Hedonism, cuts an impressive silhouette against the horizon. In the center of the lawn, halfway between the tent and the beach, Leslee Richardson receives her guests. She’s wearing a vintage Hervé Léger bandage dress in pink ombré stripes and pink metallic platform sandals; her makeup includes pink eye crystals.

Hello, thank you for coming, so lovely to see you. Most of us have to introduce ourselves because we’ve never actually met the Richardsons.

Blond Sharon and Romeo are standing with Fast Eddie and his wife, Grace. Sharon’s heels are chewing into the Richardsons’ lawn and she regrets not wearing flats. Sharon knows every single person at this party except for the people throwing it. A moment ago, she shook Leslee’s hand and said, “I’m Sharon, thank you for having me.”

“Nice to meet you,” Leslee said. (Immediately, Sharon caught a waft of Leslee’s vanilla perfume. Delilah was right; Leslee smelled as delicious as a French bakery.) “I’ve been told to stay on your good side.”

Sharon laughed in the moment, although now she wonders if she has an intimidating reputation. (Would this be a good thing or a bad thing?) Well, Sharon won’t worry about it tonight. Leslee probably meant that Sharon knows everything about everyone and isn’t afraid to share.

Sharon soon discovers that Romeo has never met the Richardsons, and Eddie and Grace know them only slightly. Sharon’s antennae rise. The Richardsons don’t know, but they do know, she thinks as she scans the crowd. This is more than just a party to meet the neighbors. Everyone here is a Nantucket someone. How did the Richardsons figure out whom to invite? She watches Delilah Drake enter the party in a white halter and pink pants with pom-poms on the hems, and Sharon relaxes. If Delilah has given the Richardsons the benefit of the doubt, then Sharon will too.

Sean Lee segues into “Who Knew” by Pink. Okay, we get it, Sharon thinks with a bit of an eye roll. But she’s delighted when the food starts to appear. There will be no white bread or stale cashews here—Zoe Alistair is catering! Her servers pass immaculately constructed bites, from tiny chicken and waffles that Sharon dips in maple syrup to vodka-spiked cherry tomatoes rolled in basil salt.

Romeo sees that Sharon’s champagne flute is empty and procures her a full one, then they wander over to the raw bar. “Where’s your husband tonight?”

“Haven’t you heard?” Sharon says. “He left me for his physical therapist. We’re getting divorced.”

“What an idiot,” Romeo says. He has never understood men who leave their wives for younger women. Romeo believes women get funnier, wiser, and, yes, sexier as they get older. He would never ask Sharon how old she is but he’s guessing they’re within a couple of years of each other. He likes her smile and her energy. She engages in life. Romeo bets she’s dynamite in bed.

Sharon helps herself to an oyster with mignonette while Romeo chooses a cherrystone. When they both reach for a plump pink shrimp, their fingers brush.

“Allow me,” Romeo says. He dips the shrimp in cocktail sauce and feeds it to Sharon while holding a napkin under her chin.

Is everyone at the party watching? Sharon wonders. Oh, she hopes so.

The Chief is wary of big parties like this—so many things could go sideways. For starters, every single car lined up along that driveway will presumably be driven home tonight, and from the looks of things, designated drivers will be scarce. Where there is drinking, there are accidents; someone could fall off the octagonal balcony or drown in the harbor. Then there are dangers of the emotional sort—arguments, fistfights, hurt feelings, affairs. The Chief has seen it all.

But it’s a stunning evening, the most glorious of the year so far, and they’re in a spot that’s extraordinary even by Nantucket standards. In the car on the way here, Andrea praised the Chief for all the progress he’s made with his health. That morning, he jogged three miles and did ten full minutes of meditation. “You deserve a night out,” she said.

He does, he thinks. It’s his last summer on the job; they’ve narrowed the search for a new chief down to two people—a young guy from Brockton and a woman from Oak Bluffs—and the Chief feels the heavy mantle of responsibility he’s worn for the past thirty-five years lighten a bit. Enough for him to have a real drink, anyway. He chooses the pink lady.

Coco stays upstairs at Triple Eight, checking in with the catering staff and prepping all the surprises in the party room until the guests start to arrive, then she hurries outside. Kacy glides in under the flower arch with her brother, Eric, and his girlfriend, Avalon. (Coco had called Avalon earlier that day because Leslee wanted her to do an at-home massage—throwing the party stressed her out. Avalon said, “I don’t think Leslee and I are a good match, but here are a couple of other names.”)

Kacy comes over, glass of rosé champagne in hand, and gives Coco a hug. “This is un-freaking-believable.”

Well, yes, Coco thinks. Nothing in Rosebush, Arkansas, or the barefoot paradise of St. John has prepared her for this kind of glamour. There’s a lot more to come, though she’s been sworn to secrecy.

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