Page 6 of Collin: Episodes 4-6
“Because if I bought his daylight hours, I would have to worry about what someone else was doing to his nights.”
“Young men aren’t toys to collect.”
“No, they’re gemstones to be harvested, cut, and polished and allowed to shine as brightly as possible.”
“You don’t have to have sex with them to do that.”
“If I wanted to merely have sex with Collin, I could do that in the back of any bar with a drink and an intelligent conversation. I could send him an anonymous message on an app offering him enough money that he wouldn’t have to worry about you and his sister until he graduated. I could pretend to be someone other than myself and meet up with him for Netflix and chill on Friday nights in an apartment I pretend to rent. I could fill his ears with the half-remembered and rarely fulfilled promises of our modern hookup culture and then abandon him when another boy caught my eye. And I would still be one of the best he’d ever had.”
Dr. Ryker’s face was ice pale. If she didn’t start breathing soon, she’d pass out. “You really think you’re so much better than us.”
“No, I think I’m more honest.”
She’s going to do something terrible. Collin glanced around the room. Perhaps he should have chosen somewhere else. But no, they were seated in the room between the main bar and the main breakfast area. There was only one other party at the end of the room. And no one was raising their voices yet.
Against the odds, Dr. Ryker raised her chin again, the edges of her lips twitching with dark emotions. “Explain.”
“The illusion of the middle class and those who believe they are the middle class is that following one’s passions and talents is what it takes to make it in this world. But I don’t think you believe that, do you, Anastasia? That hard work and effort provide protection? In reality, in a patriarchal society, it is power that provides protection. You want a quiet, secure, small life for Collin. One familiar enough to be safe. One where your amount of influence might make a difference.”
“I want him secure and happy. You are not that.”
“You need him tied closer to you than to someone else who might have enough power to keep him away from you when you need him most. You’re almost alone in the world without him.”
She was breathing with intention now, eyes bright. “Every good mother wants a relationship with her children.”
“Not every mother is afraid that her son will pay the same price she paid for the future.”
A tear spilled over and rolled down her cheek. “You have no right. No right.”
“Collin has choices, Dr. Ryker. He has you. He has most of an education. He has skills even if they are low paying. He’s not helpless. If he’s with me, it is because he sees an opportunity. It’s because he wants what I want. Physical services have never been a requirement. Collin wants to change the world, not merely survive it. I offered him a place on my team.”
More tears splashed down her face. “Everything I did was to make sure my children never paid that price to make their way.”
Mr. Reevesworth glanced toward Collin and then to Ellisandre, then turned back. “Dr. Ryker, how would you mark the difference between paying for status and resources with one’s body and a committed, intimate relationship of mutual respect between two adults, in which one has significantly more power and money?”
“Time. Attention. Input. The relationship that the more powerful partner has with the family of the less resourced partner. The demands the more powerful partner places on those in his own class concerning how the less powerful partner is treated.”
“Then”—Mr. Reevesworth leaned forward—“consider this. Collin has already set time aside for Samhain. He will be home with you for the sabbat. Your anniversary and the birthdays of everyone in his family are not only in my calendar but my husband’s calendar as well. I hope to meet Alice soon. I already know her graduation date. My private residence is sanctuary to me and my husband, but you and Alice are always welcome in our guest apartment. I won’t be your spy on Collin, but I am willing to engage in all the exchanges that one could expect of a child’s healthy partner including reaching out to you if he has problems or incidents in the future.”
“And your husband allows all this? Does he also have young toys?”
“His current extramarital partner is older than he is. And they have been together almost as long as he has been with me. Émeric is as committed to the well-being of my mentees as I am. I rely on him as my life partner in all that I do. Collin can go to him for anything. He was the one who stayed with Collin in the hospital when I had to take a meeting.”
“And if Collin took a partner, an equal partner, of his own age, what would you do?”
“Run a background check on them, interview their last five employers, send my private investigator to conduct surveillance, and have a profiler scrape their social media, school work, and any other available data.”
Dr. Ryker cracked a laugh. “That is a psychotic level of a need for control.”
“I do no less for potential business partners. Collin will be the vessel of significant emotional, social, and financial investment. Why would I treat a man’s life and potential future impact with any less care than I take with my businesses?”
“Because that’s not how we treat relationships.”
“If a greater number of individuals treated their dating with the same care that some used for choosing schools or buying a computer, our society at large would have a higher level of success in relationships.”
“Not all of us have the resources to do what you would do.”
“No, but your son interviewed no less than three of us before he even agreed to work part-time in my sister’s office as a field investigator. And he knew what I was offering him personally though he did not choose it immediately.”
