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“Pretty much as we please, being adults and all,” Jackson said.
I glanced at Jackson and said, “I’m always confused when people ask that question, as if knowing what I do to pay the mortgage tells you anything about me.”
Now it was Kitt’s turn to be annoyed. “If you think by being coy about your job you’re being discreet, you’re wrong.”
“We’re not being discreet,” Jackson said in a peeved tone. “We’re politely telling you what we do isn’t any of your business.”
Barely glancing at him, Kitt continued as if Jackson hadn’t spoken. “This house, thatwatchJackson is wearing—a vintage Vacheron Constantin, the art deco model with special logs, I believe—tells me everything you’re attempting to obscure.”
When we glanced at her in surprise, Jackson staring at his watch, she said, “I’m a jewelry appraiser at an auction house. See? Not a hard question to answer. Well, I reallymustbe going,” she said as if we’d been keeping her. She rose to her feet and swiftly left.
Sunday, May 11, 2014, Janus—Jackson and I were out front, attempting to plant in the rocky, inhospitable soil under the living room window, when Jackson glanced up and muttered with dismay, “Here comes the angry Amazon.”
“What?” Then I saw Kitt striding towards us, dressed all in black, her shadowed face like a storm cloud.
“You know,” she said before we could acknowledge her, “I didn’t think anyone would ever buy this…folly.”
Rubbing sweat from our eyes, we looked up at her.
“It’s such an eyesore,” she continued tactlessly. “For years, we tried to have it torn down, but it was during all that historic preservation hysteria, so no go.”
“I’m glad,” I said.
Shielding his eyes against the sun, Jackson remarked, “You know where we come from, folks considered us an eyesore. They would have tornusdown if they could have.”
Kitt, seemingly stung by Jackson’s words, looked at us appraisingly. “Indeed,” she said before starting back across the lawn. She stopped abruptly and wheeled around.
“Seriously, though, whythishouse?” she asked.
“It’s the perfect house for us,” Jackson said. “You see Oren identifies as an impoverished English Lord keeping up appearances.”
While I tried to choke back laughter, Kitt wrinkled her brow. Whether in confusion or disapproval at Jackson’s clear mocking of identity politics, I couldn’t tell. Looking at him, she asked, “And you? You’re Alec Scudder to his Maurice?”
I bristled at her implying that Jackson was somehow less than I.
“Oh, yes. I’m definitely Scudder to his Maurice.”
I looked at him in surprise. I’d found a tattered paperback of the E.M. Forster novel in the campus used bookstore sophomore year, after I’d discovered and read Patricia Nell Warren’sThe Front RunnerandThe Fancy Dancer. Since then, I’d read the novel repeatedly, obsessively. Our second Christmas together,Jackson had given me a pristine leather-bound edition, which had started my collection of books, but as far as I knew, he’d only seen the movie once.
“Climbing in his window nightly to reclaim him?” Kitt continued archly.
“No. No need for windows or doors,” Jackson said, “when you dwell in each other’s heart.”
Realizing Jackson was her match, Kitt turned and stormed away. Taking her place, a ragged black cat with an angry-looking scar on his forehead hissed at us. “Frankenstein, come,” Kitt barked without turning around. The cat cast us a baleful glance then stalked away behind Kitt on its silent cat feet.
Rising, I said, “I need a drink. How about you?”
“Just water,” Jackson answered, looking lost as if he’d been cast adrift in Kitt and Frankenstein’s wake.
“She didn’t come back, did she?” I asked, returning, glancing around cautiously.
“No,” Jackson said as he hacked furiously at an obstinate root. I handed him a tumbler of water.
“She’s something,” I said. “And that cat.”
Jackson nodded, leaning back on his heels and drinking greedily from the sweating glass.
“It’s so hot. I don’t understand how she can walk around wearing all that black.”
