“Please, enjoy yourselves,” Lucy said. She turned instantly to a dashing young man who had arrived alone.

My mother rolled her eyes, and we moved forward to pluck glasses of champagne off one of the trays. My father handed me one.

“Drink it slowly, my dear.”

“So it lasts all night,” my mother added with warning.

I barely let my lips touch the bubbly and then followed them into the mansion as they greeted people, my father constantly introducing me and wallowing in the praise I captured and the compliments both he and my mother were being given for having such a beautiful, poised young woman. We moved toward the ballroom, where the musicians were playing and the food was laid out on long tables. There were tables and chairs everywhere and dozens of servants.

I want to live like this, I thought. I deserve to live like this.

Everything in the ballroom was decorated, from the chandeliers to the chairs at tables, colorful crepe paper, balloons, and, streaming from one side of the ceiling to the other, a pair of white and red drapes. Just like my dress, I thought. It was all serendipity. As I panned the room, studying other women, noting how some clumped together to chatter while the men gathered in smaller circles, I turned and suddenly, ironically, faced Emma Lawrence, whose birthday was a day after mine, although no one would believe it. She was with Elsie Daniels. Both wore simple cotton dresses that looked two sizes too big on them. Probably hand-me-downs, I thought. Emma’s was light blue and Elsie’s a chocolate brown. Neither wore any jewelry, and both had the ugliest black shoes, footman shoes.

“How fancy we are,” Emma said. She was tall, nearly five foot ten, but far too plump. The features of her face were almost swallowed by her ballooned cheeks. I thought she still moved more like a boy and wondered if being so overweight smothered sexual development, especially in a girl. Elsie was only about five foot four but had stunning strawberry-blond hair. Her freckled cheeks and moss-green eyes made her cute but not really pretty in my judgment.

“Is that a compliment?” I asked.

“You look very pretty,” Elsie admitted, somewhat reluctantly.

“Thank you.”

“The best thing to eat is the roasted pork,” Emma said. “And they have wonderful cupcakes.”

“I’m not going to eat a thing,” I said. “I’m just going to drink champagne.”

I held up my glass. Both girls eyed it as if I held a valuable diamond in my fingers.

“My mother wouldn’t let me take one,” Emma said.

“My father said absolutely not before I could even ask,” Elsie added.

“They simply don’t think you’re old enough,” I said, smiling. “You’ve got to convince your parents that you’re an adult. You’ve both attended one of my womanly talks, haven’t you?”

“A year or so ago,” Emma said. “We’ve never been invited back.”