A Night at the Jane: Felonies Redacted
The Jane Ballroom in the Jane Hotel on Jane Street, commonly referred to as The Jane never fails to provide the boring with stories and the interesting with cocaine, though I’d recommend partaking in neither. The lines inside the Jane are nearly as long as the line outside, which wraps neatly around the corner of the block, leaving latecomers to down the vodka water bottles with only the west side highway in view. On good nights, the line culminates in a simple card check by a chic man in a chicer coat, though on rare occasions, the ballroom will be home to a special event, and entry is solely dependent on a searching glance from whomsoever is running the door that night.
Once inside, and with the obligatory blurry, dark, atmospheric seven-second video posted on an Instagram story no one will care about, I elbow my way to the bar and order two vodka sodas. Waiting for me on the cushions in the back of the bar is my worldly friend, who’s taken up talking to a stranger that she thinks might buy us our second round.
“He,” she tells me, “works in fashion and made the very pants he’s wearing.”
I have no need to feign interest as they are, unquestionably, dope pants. And the both of us are content to talk to him without the promise of a second round at his expense.
But The Jane never disappoints, and before long, the well-dressed man has called over a horde of his friends who are more than happy to supply us with liquor and talk about their lives for as long as we’re willing to listen. Instagrams and phone numbers are exchanged and forgotten and my friend and I proudly lead the hoard from the bar to the ballroom.
The ballroom of the Jane is fucking exceptional. Filled with couches and coffee tables, there are endless surfaces to dance on. And when you're tired of men trying and failing to dance with you, you can stumble up the double staircase to the mezzanine where there is, in fact, a second bar and tipsier men with higher credit scores. At this height, you can truly appreciate the accessories that hang above the dancers and the cloud of vape pen vestige. An offensively large disco ball spins like a forbidden piñata amongst graceful chandeliers that were surely installed when the room had served grander purposes than housing drunk 20-somethings and teenagers who got their hands on a passable fake id. The mezzanine is also where you’ll find yourself far enough away from the music to have actual conversations, or at least as close as you can get in such a performative space. It was there that I met an actor that had just booked a national toothpaste commercial, a realtor who spent the entire night asking people for a hookup, and a man who owned a monkey.
On this particular night, my worldly friend quickly finds herself in the company of someone who’s started his own advertising firm and his friend from France. Simultaneously, I’ve met an ambassador’s son, and his friend, who just happens to be another ambassador’s son on the dance floor, standing atop a well-ringed coffee table. Call it kismet, but my worldly friend and I soon realized that we had aligned ourselves with two pairings from the same group. The sons of ambassadors, the advertising CEO, and the Frenchman had arrived at The Jane just after we had, along with a few other friends. The group included a man whose family name is internationally recognized and thus shan’t be mentioned, a quiet banker, and an assortment of Frenchmen who listed their respective provinces in the same way one might describe a cheeseboard you can’t afford.
The night at The Jane was waning, and it was easier and easier to maneuver in the crowd. But much to my dismay, a small trip to the bathroom separates me from my worldly friend. I spend a moment searching for her in the thinning crowd when suddenly one of the ambassadors’ sons finds me and alerts me that my dear worldly friend has gone off with half of their group for an afterparty at their apartment. Apparently, he had been sent to find me and ensure I made my way into the second Uber so I could meet her there.
Without another option or the slightest bit of protest, I agree and follow him to the car. He does not get in, excusing himself to the tune of an early morning meeting, and I’m instead sat with one of the Frenchmen on our way to an address in SoHo. The conversation is dry and enjoyable, as most French vintages are, and I’m reminded of just how much I miss Europe and its comforting nonchalance. I’m wishing the ride had been longer as I step out of the car and onto the curb.
My phone pings from my purse and I pull it out to see that the reception in the Jane is not as exceptional as the venue. A flood of texts fills my screen as I walk with the Frenchman to the door of the apartment building, a number of them from my worldly friend herself:
Where are you
This has been a wild fucking night
Can you call me
At the bar, I am so high
Wait
You’re coming right
Bro where are you
Plz stalk me I am in Uber w. Bunch of hot French guys
Kicking myself and making a mental note to sue Verizon, I climb the stairs to the seedy walk up. A part of me wonders why men of such status live in such a shitty building before I think back to the many successful men I’d known over the years and the absolute lack of care for living arrangements. Of course, it wasn’t across the board, there were a few who managed to make pleasant homes for themselves, but on the whole, I’ve found most men would rather buy a diamond watch and sleep in a cardboard box.
The inside of their apartment confirms my assumptions, although the interior design is hardly my priority at the moment as I am instead frantically searching for my worldly friend who at this very moment could be trapped by the Frenchmen, forced to talk about— God, who even cares what. Taxes? Guillotines? The pesantry? To my relief, she is simply lounging on the couch in deep conversation with one of the ambassador’s sons and looks absolutely content.
It does seem that the group suffers from the fact that they are all too interested in being interesting and have no desire to listen to anything but their own voices, but it’s late and this is weird and we’re drunk, so it doesn’t really matter anyway. Knowing that my worldly friend is not, in fact, being held captive by the French, I make my way to the kitchen, pour myself a stiff drink from a well-loved bottle of vodka, and settle into an armchair with one short leg.
I won’t say the rest of the night is fun. It’s perfectly pleasant, though I spend most of it silent. On nights out, I’ve realized sometimes the night is mine. And sometimes it’s not. They’re talking about Proust, whom I should know more about but don’t, and comparing family homes overseas. They agree about art history. I’ve never been very good at talks like that, so I try to listen and before long they’ve forgotten I was there at all. But tonight is not my night. There is music here, no dance floor, and my job is not to be interesting, but rather to watch where the interesting men put their hands and call an Uber when the sun starts to rise.
