Excerpt of Over 50's Singles Night by Ellyn Bache

"So now BJ Fradkin has the brilliant idea to start an over- fifty singles night? Of all people!"

Oh yes, BJ knew what they'd say. This would be Sarah Kline, nosy and nasal.

"Why not? David died six, seven years ago. Maybe she wants companionship." This would be — who? Amy Friedman, head of the bereavement committee?

"Maybe she needs money," Amy would whisper.

"Pfft. David left her plenty, and what BJ makes from that advertiser rag she runs, she has more money than she knows what to do with." Sarah would tug at a skirt far too short for a woman of sixty — a fact she might have known if she'd shut up long enough to listen.

"And that house! If BJ minded rattling around so much, she'd have found a companion years ago. Or sold it."

Amy would consider this. "She's not looking for sex, either," Sarah would continue. "She once said her interest in sex was over, kaput, done with, thirty years ago after Janelle was born."

This was an out-and-out lie.

Would Sarah actually say such a thing?

Get a grip, what difference did it make? At the Temple of Israel there was always plenty of gossip. You ignored it and did what you had to. At the moment, an over-fifty singles night was the best idea BJ had.

She mentioned it first to Rabbi Seidman, who said, "An over-fifty singles night? Sure. Why not? Just clear it with the board."

BJ wrote a little proposal. She'd served three terms on the board, back when she'd been building her business. She knew what to emphasize. The more activities the temple offered, the better the chance of signing up new members, who helped fill the treasury. There was never enough money. Tactfully, BJ noted that over-fifties were generally richer and more likely to make donations than, say, new families with pre-schoolers and an expensive sitter.

Kay, the temple's longtime secretary, had an untreated cataract no one ever mentioned, even when her notices went out rife with errors. But when Kay nearly sent out an e- mail announcing an Over-Fifty Singles Club, BJ couldn't remain silent. "Singles night, not singles club. Call it a club and people will think they're making another commitment, the last thing anyone wants."

BJ didn't want another commitment, herself. What she wanted was a new husband for her sister Iris, who had been widowed nearly a year and a half ago. To BJ it seemed like forever. Iris had spent the past two months sleeping in BJ's guest room and showing no inclination to leave. Iris walked BJ's dog, Randolph. Iris exhausted whole bottles of Windex wiping streaks and paw prints from sliding-glass doors that had been dirty for years. Iris shopped for groceries and wouldn't let BJ pay. After work BJ's den smelled like Lemon Pledge and her kitchen smelled like the stuffed cabbage their mother used to make. It was pleasant enough, but BJ was worried. Iris was only fifty-five, seven years younger than BJ, and BJ had always looked out for her. Much as she loved Iris, she knew her sister did not need another woman, even a sibling, to cook and clean for. Iris needed a man.

"I know what you're doing," Iris said on the afternoon before the first Singles Night Out. She had wrapped ice in a towel and was applying it to her left temple, claiming a headache. "You're trying to cheer me up, get me out of the house."

"I'm trying to provide a nice social environment for people who enjoy a weekday evening out that isn't a business meeting," BJ replied. "But in the event that my motive was to cheer you up, why would that be so terrible?"

"Because I'm not depressed." With dramatic nonchalance, Iris sank into the oversize cushions of the couch, practicing the artful, slow-motion collapse she had perfected in second grade. "I'm not lonely. I don't need companionship. I just have a headache." She hunkered deeper into the cushions. "But if you need me so desperately to make your project a success, I'll make every effort to recover."

BJ studied her sister. In her purple Ralph Lauren sweatpants and matching sweatshirt, Iris looked stylish and not the least bit sick. Slender except for her big bust, long limbed for a woman who stood only five-three, Iris could have risen from the couch and gone to the dinner without changing clothes or touching up her makeup, and still have been the most put-together person at the table. Even her hair, held back from the top and sides with combs and left to its natural curl in the back, looked presentable except for the dye job that always left it far too patent-leather-black.

At fifty-five, Iris also had a firm, taut jawline with no trace of a double chin. She had no bags under her eyes and no sagging above them. If BJ had once been critical of Iris for responding with cosmetic surgery to each of her husband Sheldon's dalliances, now she thought her sister had had the right idea. The new man, whoever he turned out to be, would appreciate Iris's youthful face. Except, possibly, for her nose. Iris's nose, reshaped more than once, sloped to a short, perky point that in other circumstances might have been lovely. But in combination with the black hair and luminous, almond-shaped black eyes and smooth olive skin, it gave Iris more than a passing facial resemblance to Michael Jackson. The likeness was eerie. BJ was always amazed how many people thought Iris reminded them of someone but never made the connection. "Why are you staring at me?" Iris opened her eyes and struggled to sit up among the bulky cushions that engulfed her. "You think I look older, don't you?"

"No, of course not. I wasn't staring. I was thinking."

"I do look older. After the death of a spouse, people age." She ran a manicured hand across her cheek.

"You're thinking I should probably have a little more work done."

"Don't be ridiculous. What work could possibly be left? You look fine."

"You think I ought to go for another consultation."

"I don't think any such thing. When did you get to be such an expert on what I'm thinking? Besides, I thought you gave it up." Shortly before Sheldon's untimely demise, Iris had read that deep general anesthesia could leave patients cognitively impaired. Frightened more by the prospect of early dementia than by wrinkles, she declared a moratorium on any procedure too painful to be numbed by a shot of lidocaine. As far as BJ knew, her sister had limited herself thereafter to Botox and dermabrasion and the occasional blue peel.

"Well, think whatever you want to, but I'm finished with surgery even if I turn into a hag," Iris said.

"Honey, your face is gorgeous. Your bosom is high. Your stomach is flat. How many other women over fifty can say that?"

"Thank you, but the key term here is 'over fifty'," Iris said. "I know when I'm being referred to as old."

"Iris, listen to me. I've been looking at you since the day you were born, and even now, fifty-five years later, the sight doesn't make me gag or throw up."

"Very comforting. Very reassuring." Iris tried in earnest to release herself from the clutch of the pillows. She looked like someone treading water.

"Anyway, you can fix yourself all you want to, but someday the backs of your hands will break out in age spots or you'll get arthritis that makes you walk with a limp."

Horrified, Iris catapulted herself off the couch into a standing position. She examined a flawless hand and flexed an arthritis-free knee. "I wish you wouldn't say those things," she said.

"Come on, Iris. Come to the dinner with me. How could it hurt you?"

"It could make me fat," Iris asserted, and headed in the direction of her room.

This turned out to be just as well. The Over-Fifty Singles Night was still a work in progress. Although BJ had chosen Pepper's Restaurant and Sports Bar because it was a favorite with local men, five females showed up, all of them closer to seventy than fifty, and only one male, Fred Shulman, who was gay.

"So why are you here, Fred?" BJ asked over a glass of merlot. "You still miss Tommy?"

"Well, sure. I'll always miss Tommy. You don't miss David?"

"After six years, not so much."

"Mainly, I came because I get tired of eating alone," Fred said.

"Not me," piped the reedy voice of Molly Gerber, age eighty-seven, a resident at Manorhouse Retirement Home. "You're never alone in the dining room over there. But the food! Don't ask."

One of the two other women she'd brought nodded in vigorous agreement. "No salt. No nothing." She waved dismissively. "Pap."

They had just given the waiter their orders when another man approached the table. He was BJ's age, early sixties. Pleasant face, deep tan, really terrible toupee.

"Oh, good. You came," Fred said. "Everybody, this is Arnold Lieberman."

"You belong to the temple?" Molly Gerber asked.

"No. Unaffiliated." Arnold sat down next to Fred.

"Gay?" BJ had never been one to mince words.

"Straight," Arnold growled.

She thought, lose the rug and he's not bad for an old geezer.

Arnold was probably thinking, what a bitch. It was not an auspicious beginning.

Iris's husband, Sheldon Meyerhoff, hadn't died immediately. BJ believed it would have been better if he had. After collapsing onto the plushly carpeted floor of the restaurant where he was lunching with thirty-something Dee Dee Adams, Sheldon had responded to CPR administered by the bartender, and spent a week in cardiac care before succumbing to a second massive heart attack. During that week, he had apologized to Iris repeatedly, in a pathetic thin voice that had no doubt won her heart. At the funeral, Iris's daughter, Diane, and Diane's husband, Wes, walked on either side of Iris to hold her up. In BJ's view, Iris displayed a grief Sheldon didn't deserve.

Despite the standard admonition to do nothing the first year, Iris had put her house up for sale almost at once. Both Diane and BJ tried to talk her out of it. "What's the hurry? Why not wait? You don't need the cash." Sheldon, who at various times had been a salesman of everything from automobiles to vinyl siding, had never been well-off, but he had provided handsomely for his widow. During a brief stint with a life-insurance company, he had been his own best customer. Iris would not have to work another day in her life.

"It's not just about the money," Iris said. "I can barely live in this house another minute, never mind another year."

"Okay, but I want to be clear on this," BJ said. "Are you moving because of what the neighbors might be thinking? Or because you don't want to spend any more time than you have to where that stinking, womanizing piece of slime sometimes slept?"

Iris averted her eyes and said nothing, unable even now to acknowledge the fitness of BJ's candid descriptions.