Rumaan Alam - Rich and Pretty

She had steadfastly declined, those months, the opportunity to be showered with gifts, as is the custom. Lulu was horrified.

“This is just what people do,” she’d said.

“I just made everyone come and watch me get married. I’m not going to make them celebrate me again so soon.”

And here’s the thing: Pregnancy gives you authority. No one wants to anger you, and if they do, you can display that anger without fear of seeming irrational. Pregnancy makes every emotion into a force of nature, something to be respected, honored, even. There was no shower: no white cotton onesies, strung on a line, no party games, no baby bottles filled with prosecco.

So, détente: an afternoon meet and greet, at her own apartment, not her parents’ house, so Hank can nap in his own bed, or anyway, the little upholstered box in which he sleeps. Just a few snacks, most ordered in from the same service that brings the groceries: a plate of baby carrots and celery sticks with a bowl of garlicky hummus at its center, an arrangement of suspiciously perfect-looking strawberries and orange arcs of cantaloupe. She’s put on a pot of coffee.

Meredith is first to arrive. A baby blue gift bag in hand, visage of a stuffed, soft monkey just visible between the twine handles. Meredith kisses her on one cheek, then the other, barely brushing up against her body like she’s afraid of hurting her. I just pushed seven pounds of arms and legs out of my vagina, Sarah feels like telling her. I can take anything.

“You look beautiful,” Meredith says.

“So glad you came,” Sarah says.

“I can’t wait to meet the little man!” She grins. “Should I take my shoes off?”

Sarah shakes her head, guides Meredith into the apartment. The baby is snoozing happily, noisily, in the seat. His snore is surprisingly loud.

Meredith considers the baby. He’s so small, but so much bigger than he’d been only weeks ago. She pantomimes her excitement, lest she wake him, clasped hands, open mouth, a gasp. Mouths: He’s gorgeous! The exclamation mark is implicit. She perches on the edge of the sofa, looks up at Sarah. “Tell me everything,” she says.

“Everything is good.” Sarah sits. The air-conditioning whirs to life. “I mean, you know.”

“I don’t, but I can imagine.” Still whispering. “Just look at that face!” Meredith seems almost overcome.

“Thank you.” It has occurred to Sarah since giving birth that it might be easier to accept compliments relating to her offspring had she adopted. Thanking someone who praises his beauty seems to be tacitly endorsing that she and Dan are themselves beautiful and somehow responsible for this. She just says thank you but doesn’t entirely mean it. Henry, young as he is, is an entity independent of her. “How are you?”

“Oh, you know.” Meredith waves this question away.

Sarah does know: She knows that her matchmaking has been successful, and since the wedding Meredith and Jamie have been seeing each other constantly. She’ll marry him, Sarah’s sure of it. Meredith will ask Sarah to be her matron of honor. The couple will probably be very happy.

“You look good,” Sarah says. She’s not sure what else to say. She’s not interested in talking about the baby: Almost every conversation ends up being about the baby, and they’re not interesting. She’s been hungry, starving, actually, for a real conversation, one about a book, about someone’s experience at work, a bitter complaint about a relationship, plans for a vacation — anything. But now, confronted with Meredith and the opportunity to have such a conversation, she can’t think what to say. She needs Lauren. Profane, honest Lauren. They will have a real conversation.

The buzzer rings once more, and she realizes that of course she won’t have to make conversation today, after all — when playing hostess, you never get to speak to anyone in any satisfying detail. They’re not there to talk to her anyway; they’re there to coo, to give presents, to pay respects.

It’s Fiona, who’s taken the elevator up with Lulu and Lulu’s friend Sharon, Auntie Sharon, a silver-haired, soft-spoken woman, a photographer of great renown, one of Lulu’s closer friends. Sharon is carrying a big tote bag — Lulu has no doubt prevailed upon her for some photographs of the new mother, or, more likely, one of herself and grandson. Sarah’s eye falls first though, on Fiona, the swollen tautness of her belly. As etiquette decrees, a warm hug for Sharon, whom she’s not seen since the wedding, then a quick hello to her mother, then an embrace, the first she means, with Fiona, so tall and expansive, pulling her nearer to her body, its leaking nipples.

“You didn’t tell me,” she says. “Congratulations.”

Fiona brushes this aside. “It’s your party,” she says. “But yes, now you see.”

“Playdates! We’ll have playdates.” Sarah finds this genuinely exciting. She closes the door.

The right gift eluded Lauren.Her initial thought had been a blanket. Then she had a drink, one night, with Jill, poor Jill, eager for some female companionship. Jill had e-mailed, Jill had called, Jill had kept the nanny on late one Wednesday evening and Jill had met her at an annoying Cuban-cum-French place that had always driven Lauren crazy but Jill chose, and Jill paid, so she went. She drank rosé, listened to stories about Jill’s nanny, who seemed to be the only connection to reality in Jill’s life. Jill’s nanny was a painter, and her boyfriend was a photographer whom Jill described, more than once, as sexy, which was an intriguing admission. Lauren used the opportunity to do some focus grouping.

“Whatever you do, don’t get her a blanket,” the first thing Jill said, upon being asked the best baby gift, without knowing that’s just what Lauren had planned on.

She didn’t protest, didn’t counter that it was Missoni. Jill knew, Jill must be heeded. So, no blanket. Lauren spent a few days in the stacks at various bookstores, putting together a list of the least-boring children’s board books, the ones with the best pictures, the ones with the least-sexist stories, but then she remembered that she worked in books, and such a gift would seem like something plucked from the free table at work. The big-ticket items were a possibility — a stroller, a crib, a high chair — but there was nothing special in those, the presents a wealthy aunt would send.

“A Tiffany rattle?” she tried.

“Very WASP,” Jill said. “Perfectly good taste, perfectly useless.”

Uselessness was the point, but it did have the feeling of anonymity; a silver rattle is what your husband’s employer’s human resources department would send by way of congratulations.

Lauren assumes the doorman at Sarah’s building knows her, but he doesn’t. He looks at her, looks at the box in her hands, understands, and says, “Burton?” The doorman rings the apartment without asking her name, waves her along.

The package is unwieldy, but not heavy. She’s settled on some ridiculous clothes, the sort no reasonable mother would buy for her own child: a tiny, cashmere cardigan; a gingham button-down shirt with faux mother-of-pearl buttons; a pair of velvety corduroy pants, bright green; a very small fedora; an honest-to-God sailor suit, with navy blue shorts, crisp white smock, and neckerchief printed with tiny anchors and cartoon whales, all meant to be worn when he’s a much bigger boy — she’s even accounted for season and his relative age, buying the sailor’s suit in size 12 months, so Henry can wear it at some point next summer. She’s also bought a photo album, or a blank book anyway, bound in green leather, and plans a lecture about how no one gets actual printed photographs anymore, but there’s something about flipping through the pages of an album that scrolling around on a telephone cannot replicate.