White Wedding

by Peter Gifford

We were playing at the Orpheum that night. It was a new place. We’d been to Chicago and done the usual joints scores of times of course—the Palace, the Presidio—fancy names—Eva’s, Dave’s, the Dreamland Cafe—not so fancy ... but the Orpheum, and that night, was something special. I don’t know how Johnny got the gig, but it was the best one he’d lined up all year. A high society shindig, not another four hour late night set in a back alley dive.

Things were really cooking in the windy city in those days. We’d started back in Storyville in New Orleans like most jazz combos, but the work was getting thin and everyone was heading north, whether you played or not. A young black man could walk down the street with his head held high, could start thinking of his future, not just getting by from day to day. The bars were smoking and you could hit any club any night of the week and hear guys like Armstrong, Jelly Roll and Keppard doing their thing.

We were small time, but we had big plans, and this gig was a step up. We showed up early with our worn suits pressed and our hair slicked back real nice, and set up on stage. I remember feeling real small in that place. It was all set out with tables, flowers and gleaming silverware, and the room was big, but the biggest thing was the chandelier, which hung real low from a long chain that led up to a domed glass ceiling. You could look up and see the stars through it. I felt like big things were going to happen that night, that we were going to play the best gig of our lives.

We started with a few soft tunes when the people came in about seven. They were all dressed up in tuxes and real colourful gowns—all white folks of course—and I think I caught someone say something about the bride and groom, so it was only then we found out it was a wedding. No one had even told us. When the couple finally came in everyone stopped and applauded, and we played something up beat.

She was really something—the bride I mean. She walked like she was walking on air, and smiled enough to light that big room up—even brighter than the chandelier. The guys started ragging on me because my horn solos were getting shorter, so I could spend more time standing to the side of the stage, just watching her. The groom—well, I don’t even remember him, but he was one lucky guy. The room filled up with rich folks talking, and there was always a big group of people—mostly men—gathered around her, hanging on her every word.

Well, they had themselves their big meal and the speeches and such, and the night started getting older. Someone must have been secretly passing some hooch around ’cause the bow ties got loosened and a few folks finally came out on the dance floor. We had our own stash of course, and we were nice and comfortable by now, so we really started to blow. I was catching the eyes of the black waiters, and when they smiled and nodded their heads I knew we were really cooking and I felt happy.

Then she came out on the floor. Man, she could move. That white dress swirled all around her like river whirlpools when the steamers go out. She gave herself up to it, and I played my horn like I never have before. It got to feel like I was playing her, she moved so close to the lines I was coming up with, like she was running up and down the notes as I pressed the valves and I was thinking I don’t know if I was playing her or she me. And she knew it too, she threw her head back and she looked at me as she spun around, and I played faster as she smiled, and the band locked into something that was so good I felt I was floating up above my body, up near that chandelier, up near the glass ceiling, looking down at her dancing and me playing.

Then it ended, and I floated back down to my body and she twirled to a stop. She had sweat glistening on her pretty face and I saw her speak to a few people and move off the dance floor and through a side door, and with one palm on the door to push it open she stopped, and looked round and straight at me.

I signalled to the band and we took a break. I was off that stage in no time at all, and through a side door that I knew linked up with the corridor she was in. She was standing there, waiting for me. We took a good long look at each other, then she moved to another door with a sign on it saying ‘To Roof’ and went through. I could smell her when I followed her through it.

Way up on the roof the air was clean and the night was cool, and distant sounds came up through the glass dome, five stories below us. We were up on the top of the block and the ballroom was in the front part of the hotel, so we could look down and see the people moving around way down there in the room, like little black stars in a white sky. And up above us were white stars in a black sky. A breeze moved her long white dress around and she leaned on the ledge next to me not saying anything. We’d already said all that we needed to say anyways, back in the ballroom. She looked at me, and I slipped my arm around the back of her dress and down the small of her back, pushed her into me and our mouths met.

Something changed then, I felt her stiffen, and try to pull away. Maybe she’d decided she’d had her fun and gone too far. Maybe she thought she’d heard someone coming up the stairs. Maybe she just realised that kissing a black man was just like kissing any man. She started squirming, and pushing at me, but the more she pushed the more I pushed back, and pressed my lips to hers, and moved my hands over her slim little body. It was just her and me up there and no one was coming, and I meant to finish what she’d started, back there on the dance floor. I lifted her up so she couldn’t get no purchase on the ground and sat her on the ledge, and with my mouth still on hers I pushed her legs apart and put my hand between them. She was struggling real hard now, both hands against my chest, trying to get me off of her, trying to make me stop.

I don’t know why I let go but I did. And she wasn’t there no more.

Then I heard two sounds, the first loud, the second soft, each like a bag of cement hitting the flatbed of a truck. I didn’t look over the ledge. I felt real calm, so I turned around, wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and went on down the stairs. When I got backstage the band asked me where I’d been and I said I’d gone to take a leak. They ribbed me about how long I’d been about it, and we got back on stage. I put my horn to my lips and began to blow. People were starting to whisper to each other, and a few were looking around the room. No one seemed to feel like dancing, even though I was playing real well, a slow cool tune that make me think of lovers and small bars, and late nights. I had my eyes closed and was drifting into the music when I heard the first scream.

Someone had looked up at the ceiling.