MASON AND SULLY WERE BOTH at the house when the MacDonalds arrived. They all stood in the foyer which, Mason noted, was not like the foyers in Addison’s neighborhood, but a great hall with parquet wood floors, portraits of dead family members looking down and the light of mid June shining through a long skylight.
“Aunt Ruth, Uncle John, glad to see you. Balliol,” his cousin Herse pronounced his name in an entirely uncongenial voice.
“Herse,” Balliol returned in the same voice.
Herse MacDonald and Balliol dressed the same, in cargo pants and tee shirts under sweater
vests. Neither one of them really believed in blue jeans, and both were wearing Birkenstocks. They looked alike, but Mason was thinking of the line from The Two Towers when Gandalf and Saruman stood together and one of the hobbits pronounced: “Like and yet unlike.”
“I’ll leave you all to talk alone before you leave,” Ruth told them. She leaned in elegantly to be kissed by her nephew, but didn’t look like she really wanted it. John was already gone. He was older than Mason had expected.
Surprisingly, Ruth turned to Sully and Mason, gave them quick playful winks and then, regal again, she was gone.
Now here was a girl who was just coming up the steps into the house behind Herse. Only she was all in black, drab clothes and wearing a baseball cap and sunshades so it wasn’t until Mason saw her chest that he realized she was a girl.
“I’ll only be here for a moment,” Herse was saying, “Just came to drop off Swain, so you needn’t pretend to be sad to see me going.”
“Don’t worry,” Lincoln told him. “I wasn’t. I’m all out of pretend today.”
“Lincoln,” his cousin looked around. “Lincoln like the Town Car.”
Balliol raised an eyebrow.
“I’d never thought of it that way, Herse, like the vehicle they put dead bodies in.”
“Dead like your fashion sense.”
“Dead like your brain cells. And when did you start paying attention to my fashion? Or have you finally come out, MacDonald?”
“If anyone’s queer—” Herse began.
“Then it’s me,” Sully put his hand up, reminding them all he was present.
Behind her glasses the girl laughed.
Balliol and Herse, who had completely forgotten about Mason and Sully, looked at Sully while Mason gave a small bow to the girl and said, “I am Mason Darrow. And this is Sullivan Reardon. Balliol’s friends—”
Herse smirked at Balliol and said, “How much do you pay them?”
“How much do you pay the escorts in Manitoba?”
“Montreal,” Herse corrected.
“You know, it’s really been so many schools you’ve been thrown out of it’s easy to lose track.”
“At least I’ve actually attended a real school.”
“What difference does it make if every one you come to asks you to leave?”
“It’s not my fault that a school that finds itself in possession of a different sort of student—”
“Possession is the problem isn’t it?” Balliol continued. “I think what Aunt Leah said last time was the problem was possession of cocaine. Or was it opium? I lose track.” Balliol turned to his friends, “I lose track. Like most rich kids Herse is a bit of a—”
Balliol touched his nose and snorted. “I think we do it to escape ourselves. I tend to like myself,” he continued. “But if I was Herse I’d get as far away from me as I could too.”
“Are you finished?” Herse said.
“No,” Balliol replied. “Not quite. There’s just this:”
Balliol leaned forward, pulled in Swain’s bags, pulled his cousin into the foyer, tipped Herse forward with his finger, and then shut the large door.
Turning around to his friends he said, “And now I’m finished.”
They all looked at him.
Swain, the girl, just started laughing then pulled off her shades and her cap. Her hair was a mess. It stuck up in black-brown angles, but her face was glorious and she fell into Balliol’s arms.
Mason and Sully didn’t know what to make of it, so they just looked at each other.
“It’s always like that between them,” Swain explained. “Herse hates Lincoln. But really, he hates everybody. He just hates Lincoln more because Lincoln has more money. And because everyone thinks his mother is more beautiful and more fortunate than our mother. Which, let’s face it, she is.”
“So you all are cousins on your mothers’ side?” Mason said, not because this wasn’t obvious, but because he wanted to understand the whole story. He’d heard a bit about Montreal and Manitoba and now it was clear that what they had on their hands was an intercontinental drama.
“Yes,” Swain said taking up a bag. Sully and Mason and Balliol took one too, and they headed up the stairs into the rest of the house.
“Mom and Aunt Ruth are sisters who come from some place in London.”
“No,” Balliol said. “They came from Manchester.”
“Oh, that’s right.
“Anyway, Aunt Ruth became a model, and Mom tried it out for a while too. She’s pretty. Don’t get me wrong. But she wasn’t Ruth Carey. Aunt Ruth took her everywhere, took her to America, and Mom hadn’t even gotten out of high school, you see? Neither had Aunt Ruth. So they were both just living the high life in New York and Paris and places like that. But really in New York. And then Mom met our dad, who was a Canadian, but living in New York. They got married. It was really big and Dad was pretty well off. We don’t have as much as we used to,” Swain continued as they went down the large second story hallways to her room. “But it’s nothing to complain about, you know? Anyway Ruth met Uncle John who was coming to America a lot because of Balliol Steel—”
When Mason opened his mouth, Balliol said, “That’s another story.”
“And they got married,” Swain continued as they entered a room easily half the size of Mason’s house and filled with large bay windows.
“Herse and Balliol were born around the same time, and then I came about a year later. We used to go between New York and Canada a lot when I was little, but then Mom and Dad got divorced, and in the end it was like I gravitated toward Mom and being American—she’d never go back to England. And Herse gravitated toward Dad, boarding school, and Canada.”
“And being an ass,” Balliol added, plopping down on the bed. “We mustn’t forget being an ass.”
Swain agreed. “No, I don’t think we could.”
When there was a third knock at the door that morning, Mason decided that the thing that really irritated him about his father more than anything else—and actually very little did—was his inability to answer doors.
He put down the lump of clay he’d been shaping into the head of something that existed somewhere between griffin and minotaur, and wiped of his hands on a dirty towel. He had a short space to go because he was in Sidney’s studio today.
“He must not be home,” Mason realized when he looked around the kitchen and living room.
When he opened the door the most beautiful girl he’d ever seen was standing right there. She wasn’t pretty or cute or even hot. She was beautiful. She had deep caramel skin and large brown eyes and copper tinted dark hair that was in a braid behind her neck. Little brass bracelets were on her arms and she was in a white top as she batted her eyes at him knowingly. He was frowning because he didn’t know who the hell she was.
“Mason,” she said a little chidingly.
He blinked again.
“Swain?”
“Yes,” she said, “May I come in?”
He let her in and closed the door.
“I realize I don’t look quite like I did the first time you saw me.”
“You looked like hell the first time I saw you,” Mason said plainly.
“Well, you don’t beat around the bush.”
“No, I try not too.”
“And neither will I,” she said. “You know that authentic Black American experience you hear about all the time?”
Mason shrugged. “Yes, I guess.”
“Well, My mother’s English, my father’s Canadian and I’ve always been rich, which is saying, I don’t know what that’s like.”
She looked around the house and said, “I’m guessing that in a lot of ways you don’t know what that’s like either. But... You’re probably less sheltered than me.”
“I think,” Mason said, gesturing for her to follow him to his room, “that a lot of Black people have no idea what that’s like.”
“You’re an artist,” Swain said in a tone of discovery. Then: “Don’t worry. I won’t touch anything.”
She said, delightedly, looking over the bookshelves, looking at the monsters. “You’re kind of crazy aren’t you?”
“Yes,” Mason told her. “A little.”
“You can’t go out in that,” Swain pointed to his muddy tee shirt. “Or with those hands. Doesn’t matter if you are an artist. Let me go through your closet, I’ll pick something out nice.”
“I don’t think I really have anything nice.”
“I bet you do,” Swain dismissed this, opening up the closet door and going through what was, for the most part, school clothes.
At last Swain pulled out an old silk shirt.
“That’s my dad’s. How did it—?”
“Don’t worry,” Swain said, “Your dad has better fashion that you do. We’ll have to do something about that. Thank God I’ve got the whole summer. Hurry up and get dressed.”
Mason just stared at her.
“What?” she said.
I guess we’re going out, then?”
“Yes,” Swain said. “Of course we are. I came all this way on the bus. Your buses here aren’t New York buses.”
She tilted her head.
“You haven’t shaved.”
Mason touched his cheek. He was just starting to grow facial hair quickly, and it always surprised him.
“I’ll do something about that.”
“Don’t,” Swain said quickly.
“You had that five o’clock the other day. It makes you cute.”
Mason’s face heated.
“I mean,” Swain said, taking the look of dismay on his face for something different. “I bet you look pretty nice without the five o’clock shadow, but... I like the five o’clock shadow.”
Mason stood there with the silk shirt in his hand, looking stupid.
He was hot all over.
“Are you trying to change me?” Mason said, putting the last of the shirts down.
“Do you mind it?” Swain asked him. “If you minded, I wouldn’t do it.”
“No,” said Mason.
“Good,” Swain said gathering the shirts by their hangers and stringing them all up on one finger. “Because a woman cannot help but change the man she finds. She places him in her cauldron of change.”
“Where the fuck did you get that from?”
Swain shrugged, given away. “I read in some women’s spirituality book.”
“Well, you should forget it.”
Swain nodded. “I think I will.” Then she said, “I think I’ll pay for these.”
Mason took the clothes from her and said, “I think I can pay for my own clothes.”
“I think,” Swain said, taking the shirts away gently: “Number one: I’m the one that said you needed new clothes and, number two: it’s almost your birthday and, number three: there will be plenty of times when I will make you pay. So,” she said again, “I think I’ll pay.”
Mason shrugged and followed Swain to the cash register.
“Chris!” he said, sounding strangled.
“I’m working here for the summer,” Chris Powers said. “Happy Birthday. It’s coming up in a few days, isn’t it?”
“On Thursday.”
“Yeah,” Chris smiled as he took the shirts off the hanger. “I thought so. See, I don’t forget. That’s—” but Chris didn’t read off the price, he just swung around the plate with the price and then Swain ran her credit card through it.
“This is Swain MacDonald,” Mason said.
“Swain,” Chris nodded and smiled.
“I like him,” Swain told Mason.
“Him,” Mason told her, “is Chris Powers.”
She reached her hand out and said, “Nice to meet you, Chris Powers.”
Chris handed them the bags of clothes and said, “Have a good one guys.” And then Swain and Mason were out of the store.
“I like him,” Swain repeated as they went out into the mall. “But you don’t.”
“Hum?”
“Well, there was something. I was paying attention.”
“You pay too much attention,” Mason said.
“There’s no such thing,” Swain told him.
“I like Chris, but I don’t like all of him. I’m not supposed to. It’s very confusing. He’s my godbrother.”
“Oh?”
“My father and his father are best friends.”
“Okay?” Swain said, still waiting for the complication as they passed the penny fountain under the large skylight.
“But he and Balliol pretty much despise each other.”
“Really?”
“Always. And… He’s Sully’s ex.”
“Ouch.” Then Swain said, “You know what? Gay guys in Ohio look nothing like gay guys in New York. You really can’t tell.”
“Well, it’s not certain what Chris is. But he was with Sully and the end wasn’t pleasant. How Chris and your cousin feel about each other really doesn’t matter to me. But what he did to Sully does. And that’s strange because I never really liked Sully until recently.”
“The strange thing is I’ve only met them once,” Swain said. “And I like them both.”
They stopped in front of the pretzel strand that smelled of heat and salt. The children’s merry-go-round was blaring out obnoxious music and across the court was an Abercrombie and Fitch with a poster of a hot, ambiguously pseudo-gay bare torsoed asshole giving the mall his smoldering gaze.
“I’m hungry,” Swain said.
“Yes,” Mason told her. “But I never showed you that authentic African American Experience. I mean, I don’t think shopping for shirts will get that.”
Swain raised an eyebrow.
“What will?”
“I think,” Mason answered, “Hecky’s Ribshack.”
“Wait a minute!” Addison said, taking his hands through his hair. “You mean to tell me this girl, this beautiful girl just walks up to your door and says, “Mason, I want to be your girlfriend?” Addison shook his head and said, “Unfucking believable. I gotta hand it to you, Mase, you are the man. I always knew you were, though.”
Addison always wore dress shirts, even in summer, never tucking them in, and Mason reached into his friend’s breast pocket and took a cigarette while he explained.
“Actually, she didn’t say all that. And the term she designated for us was, playmates.”
“Playmates?” Addison said.
“It sounds dirty out of your mouth.”
“It sounds dirty out of anyone’s mouth.” Addison lit Mason’s cigarette and took one for himself. “So, what does being a playmate entail?”
“By Swain’s definition a playmate is a flexible not quite girlfriend.”
“Like...”
“Not like Bonnie.”
“I wasn’t going too say that.”
“Well not like friends with benefits either.”
Addison nodded. “That was what I was going to say.”
“The playmate is like the girlfriends we had up until fifth grade. And who knows where it will go from there? Frankly, I think it’s better than a girlfriend. If Swain was my girlfriend I’d worry
about all sorts of things like true love and whatever. But at this stage she’s just my not-girlfriend. We can date. She can look nice on my shoulder and there’s no pressure.”
“And you can make out,” Addison said. “That is allowed, isn’t it?” crawling onto the bed and whispering confidentially to Mason.
Mason said in a measured tone with a hint of a smile. “It might be allowed.
“So…?”
“So what?” Addison returned.
“What exactly is Bonnie? We’re best friends, you gotta explain her. The first time I saw her she just hopped out of a van with you and Seth, and then she’s around all the time.”
“You don’t like her.”
“I don’t know her, Add. Truth to tell, I was never wild about Becky. Bonnie... Now, I have a weak place in my heart for crazy people.”
“Bonnie isn’t crazy.”
“I think you’ll see she is. But we can have that discussion later. Right now the topic of discussion is… Where does she come from?”
“One night I went out with Seth. Actually, Seth picked me up from work and we went over to his house. We... did things.”
“Things?”
“Drugs, Mason.”
Mason raised a sophisticated eyebrow and nodded.
“And liquor. Seth got tired. Bonnie and I went back into another part of the house and that’s how things started.”
Mason put his hand up and said, “My seventeenth birthday is this Thursday and my resolution for this year is to not let people skip over the good parts of stories. I don’t know cause I don’t question. When you say things started—”
“I mean we had sex in her basement, in the laundry room while Seth was asleep in the next room.”
“Oh.”
“It wasn’t like me at all. But you know that. I... Well, you know Becky was my first, and it didn’t just happen any old place.”
“No, it happened in my bed.”
There was a awkward silence from both of them, and then Addison said, “Well, this happened in a bean bag in Bonnie’s basement.”
Mason opened his mouth. Closed it. He said, delicately, “How did Seth know Bonnie?”
“He used to fuck her. If that’s what you’re getting at.”
“I was. I was just trying to be—”
“Fuck discreet. So, yeah, Bonnie and me had sex. I know that part of it was the drugs. That night. But part of it was I just didn’t want... I wanted something different than that heavy duty responsibility with Becky and I wanted to forget the whole thing. Becky. Bonnie seemed up for that. We were both really clear on this wasn’t romance. It was just going to be really good for the both of
us. I’m pretty sure it was that night, but... I can’t really remember.
“The next day we were perfectly sober when we had sex. I think we were both sort of certain that we should do it and be present for it, not have the drugs in the way or anyone else to blame for it. And you know what, Mason?” Addison crushed his cigarette out at the same time Mason crushed out his. They both took out new cigarettes together. “It was the most powerful sex I’d ever had. It wasn’t like anything with Becky. It ... it blew my mind.”
They lit their cigarette. Inhaled. Sat side by side whispering about sex. This was what friendship was about.
“And we just got on after that. It wasn’t awkward or anything. We just really liked being together and she told me how she was turned on by me. How she thought I was sexy like I thought she was. I never did that to Becky. I never felt... hot. And so things just started working. We just like what we have.”
“So she’s your girlfriend now?” Mason whispered, smoke leaking out of his nostrils.
Addison took another drag. “That’s what I call her. But... I don’t know what she is Mason. She just works. We work together. I’m not going to question it. I’m not going to jinx it.”
They kept smoking. Something was opening in Mason. Hearing Addison talk about sex with Bonnie blood had shot down in him. He’d gone erect but now it was just a firmness. He felt that whatever throbbed in his oldest friend throbbed in him. He understood it, wasn’t jealous, knew it would come to him too. This whole business was supposed to be wrong, but life wasn’t school or Sunday school. Life was much more complicated. It was rich. It was hotter. It was sexier.
“Are you all safe, though?” Mason said.
“Yes,” Addison said. And then: “Most of the time. But Bonnie doesn’t really like condoms, and she’s on the pill.” And then Addison added, Mason’s room was no place to lie, “Most of the time.
“You know what, though?” smoke came out of Addison’s mouth as he turned to Mason.
“I bet... No—I know for a fact that if we made a baby she’d keep it.”
As they lay side by side on the bed, in the room filled with cigarette smoke there was something sharp and potent about the image of Addison making a baby, about the knowledge that he could too. In fact, Addison had done it before. They had that electric power in them. So Mason put away the sensible part of himself that was going to add that the real reason he’d asked Addison about protection was because Bonnie had been with Seth and God only knew who else or what else might be passed on to his friend. But right here protected sex seemed so... protected. Not like wet, unguarded, dangerous no strings attached sex that Mason had, beneath all of his Anglican Catholicism, desperately hoped existed. And because he felt this way as he drew up his legs to the his chest and ashed into the glass tray by his right elbow he added:
“By the way?”
“Yeah?” Addison said, lazily, ashing into his own tray.
“Swain?”
“Yeah?”
“She’s Balliol’s cousin.”
Addison sat up, gagging on cigarette smoke.
Lazily, Mason just turned to his friend and smiled.
“I was actually thinking about not telling you because I thought ‘It’s not really his business,’” Swain said as she barged into Balliol’s bedroom.
“And then I thought, ‘Lincoln will find out sooner or later,’ and also I thought, ‘Well, it kind of is his business’. Besides, I do tell you everything.”
Balliol, whose door had been open and was now beginning to regret this, gave Swain a look that said, “Get on with it.”
“Oh, yes,” Swain said. “I’m seeing Mason. Not in a serious sense. But in a sense. We’re just friends. But I think we’re going to be good friends. He took me to Hecky’s Ribshack.”