Page 8 of The Couch Where It Happens

“That.” He wore socks, the sign of a guy who probably never had a gin and tonic at four in the afternoon, definitely not the type for blowout parties in the Hamptons. He seemed more like he belonged on my side of the equation, maybe working at a marina for the summer or using those big hands to wrestle lawn equipment.

“I’m subletting in Manhattan with a guy who went to Exeter with our host.” He said the boarding school name with the slight amusement of a person who has met at least three graduates of that institution. “Nice enough during the week. My internship ended last Friday, but I don’t have to be back on campus until Monday.” He shoved his hands into the pockets of his shorts and shrugged.

“You gave up having a peaceful apartment in the city all to yourself?” On Mondays, when I got the whole property back, I reveled in the solitude. It would end soon enough when I returned to grad student housing.

“I’m from Seattle. I miss the water.”

I felt the slight rock of gentle waves licking the sides of the dinghy. We both knew it was nicer down here on my seat than standing there or going back to the house party, where blazing lights backlit about fifteen male bodies in and around the pool.

He turned to look behind him too. “They said they’re waiting for call girls. Apparently, Sag Harbor is pretty far for them, thank God.” Then he slumped. “I didn’t think it would be this awful.”

Someone cued up a galloping riff on the house stereo, and I recognized Iron Maiden’s “The Trooper.” My sigh must have caught his attention.

“Not a metal fan?” He looked at me.

“The opposite. It annoys me because I know they don’t understand the source material.”

His eyebrows rose. “For ‘The Trooper’?”

If I could feel the pulsing lyrics pouring down the hill, so could he.

“It’s a legitimate anthem against senseless war, with well-known literary antecedents.” I realized I had used my instructor voice, which differed from my house manager voice more in content than in tone.

He raised his right arm and propped his chin on the back of his hand, letting his elbow point down at me in a vaguely Rodin-inspiredThinkerway. “Literary antecedents, you claim?”

Looking up at him, I thought he might be flexing, but his button-down shirt hid his muscles. My pulse beat underneath my skin, and I wanted to cause trouble. “I said what I said.”

A long riff, heavy and fast with guitar, ended. Another verse began.

“It’s about getting shot down,” he began. “But it’s not Johnny Cash.” A smile played around the corners of his mouth, and he dropped his arm. “Muskets, sabers, Russian guns, I think they wave a Union Jack on stage, so it’s British soldiers dyingin the dirt…” The faint glint of moonlight reflecting from his eyes disappeared as if he’d closed them to better trawl deep memories. “Into the Russian guns, into the valley of death rode the six hundred…maybe the Light Brigade? Is that, uh, Tennyson?”

Watching him, that melodious muttering to himself and the way he rocked between the balls of his feet and his heels as he worked through the language, he had me. Sure, it was ninth-grade poetry, hardly a dissertation, but we English lit grad students take what we can get. I was mentally throwing my panties at him, and I’d never even seen him in full light. To be fair, I was still sitting below him, and looking up at his expression meant my gaze had to travel the length of his body, so my mind was addled.

“Are you going back to the house?” I wanted him to say no.

“Fuck no, it’s a cock party up there.”

And he had the same dirty mouth I did. This was happening. “Not into cock?”

I like that word. Occasionally I say it to myself, over and over, because I really like the firm Old English feeling of the two-letter digraph at the end. A large part of the world has a similar word for the male of the domestic fowl, whether it’s Old Norse kokkr or Malay kukuk, and I enjoy the associations.

Who am I kidding? I enjoy cock.

“Prefer the water.” He shrugged and turned to the bay, but he looked lonely and bored, annoyed with the dudes up the hill and, I thought, with himself. Mostly with himself.

“Hop in,” I said to a stranger I’d known for thirty minutes. “Guys who can recognize Tennyson’s influence on British metal get a free ride.”

We both letthathang unanswered, but I couldn’t repress my smirk.

He returned it. Then he stepped aboard and cast us off. Despite his size, he had enough balance that the dinghy barely rocked, although it did dip once his weight settled closer to the bow.

“It’s a perfect night, but just in case.” I gestured at the extra vest peeking out from under his perch. “Put it on.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He didn’t insist he knew better than I did, or that he was a great swimmer and didn’t need a life vest, so I fired up the outboard.

I don’t know how long it had been since I went this hard after a man. I’m careful here in the Hamptons because of my position, and at school, hookups with other grad students happen without much effort. But this guy had strayed into my life with a hint of sadness and a big dose of shoulders, and he charmed me, making it logical for me to try charming him with a tour of the bay.

With the outboard grumping behind me, we couldn’t talk. I guided us north, parallel to the ribbon of beach. The not-yet-leveraged-up cottages of Actors Colony slipped past on our port side. Moonlight silvered our wake and bleached the color from docks and sand, stark in contrast with the dark trees layered behind the sea walls. Even most houses were dark in the middle of the week. I liked the solitude and the feeling of being a castaway, and I liked sharing it with the guy in the bow.

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