Page 4 of Exquisite Things
“We’ll be singing throughout the evening. One happy birthday for each stop we make. Tonight, my cousin, you’re getting a tour of all our spots.”
“Well, perhaps not the tearooms and orchards,” Jack says. “Baby boy is far too innocent for those haunts.”
“I’m not a baby boy,” I snarl defiantly.
“Is that so?” Jack says with a wink. “Care to prove it?”
“Ignore him,” Brendan instructs. “He thinks everything is about sex.”
“Except sex!” Jack squeals. “Which is about power.”
“Thank you, Oscar Wilde.” Brendan blows a kiss up to the ceiling, like Wilde himself is up there somewhere.
“If you’re attempting to send some love to dear Oscar, he’s not up in heaven. He’s down in some gutter, looking at the stars.” Jack’s tone suddenly changes for a moment. He blows a kiss down to the ground, and with startling sincerity, he whispers, “Thanks, Wilde. You suffered for us. Rotted away in jail so that we could be here, drinking champagne, billing and cooing.” Jack stands up and takes Brendan’s hand. Twirls him around. “Dancing with each other.” He leans in to kiss Brendan. “And also...”
But Brendan stops him. “Sorry, dear roommate, bank’s closed.”
“And what time does the bank open?” Jack asks.
“For you, dear roommate, never.” Brendan pulls a pouty Jacknext to him. “You’re my best friend. Let’s not destroy it all for a night of sin.”
“But why must it be a night of sin?” I ask.
“Because that’s all Jack is capable of,” Brendan says lovingly, like he doesn’t really mind.
“Shameful but true,” Jack admits. “I bore easy. Not to worry, dear roommate. I’ll find myself some ripe fruit with less self-respect than you have later tonight.” Jack approaches the Victrola and the sound of Sophie Tucker crooning “Some of These Days” fills the room. Brendan and Jack dance together like clowns, laughing, spinning, twirling. I see what they can’t. That for all their jokes, there’s real love in their gazes. Perhaps Brendan likes Jack’s power. Jack is a son of influence and carries himself as such. His grandfather was a German immigrant and a chemist who started a small drug company. His father took over the company, renamed it Whitman & Whitman, and turned it into a pharmaceutical giant. As for what Jack sees in Brendan, that’s obvious. Brendan is the only person willing to say no to him.
“These cookies are absolutely tremendous,” one of the boys says with a full mouth. “Just tremendous.”
“The secret’s in the nuts,” I say slyly.
“It always is,” Jack snaps as he whirls Brendan’s huge body around and cups his crotch. “The secret’salwaysin the nuts.” Jack transforms Mother’s innocuous statement about oatmeal cookies into something raucous and bawdy. They speak in code, Brendan’s friends, and I love that about them. It’s like learning a new language. Or a new instrument. They’rein the life, as they say, which means they know the hidden things, the things my mother doesn’t see happening in her city, to her beloved son.
The birthday boy, Cyril, approaches me. “Brendan says you’ll be coming to Harvard.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I say sheepishly. “I hope so. But I need a scholarship. I’m not like Jack over there. My father isn’t a millionaire.”
“Nor mine,” Cyril says.
“How old are you today?” I ask.
“Twenty,” he says. “You?”
“Seventeen. Eighteen this summer.” I bite my lip anxiously, wishing I were older, ready for the rest of my life to begin. “So what can a twenty-year-old teach a seventeen-year-old?” I ask. “Is there some secret wisdom you’ve finally uncovered?”
“Yes, actually.” His eyes brighten. Cyril isn’t like Brendan or Jack. Those two feel like they’ve crossed the threshold into manhood. Cyril still looks and acts like a boy. Like he’s still a sketch in a coloring book, waiting for someone to fill him in. “I’ve been thinking a lot about how twenty feels like the perfect age to stop thinking about nothing but the future. All my life, I’ve worked to get to Harvard. Now that I’m here, I’m constantly told to keep my head down and study so I don’t get put on academic probation again.”
“Why were you on probation?” I ask.
He shrugs. “Poor grades.” Then he adds, “Sometimes, when the pressure feels too... overwhelming...”
I feel him struggling and say, “You don’t need to talk about it if you don’t—”
“It helps to talk,” he says quickly. “Well, to a good listener like you.”
I feel myself glow from the compliment. From the sense of belonging I feel in this room.
“I just get overwhelmed sometimes, that’s all,” he says. “And when I do, I break out into hives. It makes me look like a rotten cabbage, as Jack likes to say, and I get so scared that I’ll break intohives again that I spin myself into a state of worry about it, even though worrying seems to be what causes it in the first place.”
