Age of Consent

by Amanda Brainerd

  After a while Clay’s sobs subsided and his chest stopped heaving. He opened his eyes and sat up, shaking his head. “Everything’s so totally messed up.”

  “I’d better go.”

  He kept shaking his head. “Justine, please. I’m sorry. Forgive me.”

  She turned and left, and this time Clay didn’t run after her.

  * * *

  —

  Justine walked to the corner. She couldn’t bear to go home and lie in bed alone. Not yet.

  It was a balmy night and she walked a few blocks east. On the sidewalk a discarded sofa was occupied by two punk girls smoking clove cigarettes.

  She glanced at her watch. One a.m. Justine wished Eve were with her. But her friend had been tucked in her soft bed for hours. How could so many different worlds exist in the same city?

  Shoving her hands in her jeans pockets, she felt a crumpled piece of paper and pulled it out.

  Stanley. 541 E. 13th Street.

  Stanley! He might be willing to talk.

  Stuffing the note back in her pocket, Justine headed up Avenue A, staying across the street from the gnarled jungle of Tompkins Square. The Pyramid was down the block, but that night with Clay seemed like ages ago. Now Philip was a father in a pink Oxford covered in his son’s blood.

  On the corner of Thirteenth a guy in striped hot pants adjusted leg warmers around hairy calves. Funny, Tierney had the same leg warmers, she thought as she walked by. Even now, Justine envied them.

  Justine passed tenements with overstuffed garbage cans, the scuttle of rats behind them.

  At last she found the building. Windowless holes gaped from the façade, behind fire escapes laden with plants in milk cartons. Vines and wires intertwined across the front. A large, dripping A in a rough circle was painted on the brick, and a man with a bandanna on his head leaned in the doorway like a doorman at a club. As she approached, two Dobermans lurched at her, barking furiously.

  “Quiet!” the man snarled at them. The dogs strained on their chains.

  “Welcome to the Hotel California.” He grinned, showing several missing teeth.

  “I’m looking for Stanley Glasgow.”

  “You a friend?”

  Justine nodded, wondering if there was a password.

  “Second floor, room three.” He stood aside, holding back the Dobermans.

  “Candles are twenty-five,” he added, gesturing to a pile of half-burned stubs on the floor.

  “Huh?”

  “Pretty dark up there.”

  She looked at the unlit front hall and realized the building did not have electricity.

  “I don’t have twenty-five dollars.”

  “Twenty-five cents, baby face.”

  Justine handed him a quarter, took a lit candle, and started to climb. The wick flickered over graffitied murals. Human figures, some with animal heads, and crazy writing. She felt like an archaeologist discovering a lost temple of an ancient civilization. Dodging a spot where an entire tread was missing, she continued to climb.

  On the landing, a girl was sitting on the floor holding a doll, a candle burning beside her. As Justine’s eyes adjusted, she realized it was the bald head of an infant, a pale flap of breast swelling in its mouth.

  “Do you know which is number three?”

  “One with the eye,” the girl said, gesturing with her head.

  The door was ajar. Justine pushed it open, revealing a small shadowy room. Ragged curtains fluttered in the open window like summer dresses. The candle illuminated a figure on a mattress.

  “Stanley?”

  “Hmm?”

  “It’s Justine.” She approached the bed.

  He sat up, rubbing his eyes. “Sorry, what time is it?” Right, he probably had to work early.

  “Past one. Sorry, I really need to talk to you.” His T-shirt was stained and the room smelled rank. “Have you been living here all summer?”

  “Yes. It’s been an experience.” Stanley peered at her. “What’s the matter?”

  Perching on the mattress, Justine lit a cigarette. Smoking, she told Stanley what had happened.

  “I highly doubt Clay’s in love with Bruce,” Stanley said. “I just think sometimes these hetero guy friendships are weirdly codependent.”

  Why couldn’t Clay have depended on her instead?

  Justine thought about going back to Griswold without Clay, without Eve, and having to see Bruce. At least Stanley would be there. Maybe some of his wisdom would finally rub off on her.

  THIRTEEN

  A few minutes before the gallery opening, Eve ducked into the bathroom. She glimpsed red suede pumps under one door. Trying to pee quietly, she heard sniffling. Was Margot Moore actually crying? Could she be nervous about the event? Impossible. Eve flushed, rinsed her hands, and hurried out.

  A brawny caterer bustled by with a crate of champagne glasses, whistling “Oklahoma.” The paintings were hung perfectly, the scent of linseed oil filling the air. It was the smell of creation.

  “Eve! Sorry we couldn’t get here earlier!” Deirdre’s voice rang across the tiled floor.

  A waiter offered goblets of champagne on a tray.

  Deirdre took one. Waving her arm, she strode toward a painting. “Teach me! What about this?” Her mother pointed at a picture of a naked young boy with outspread wings.

  “Cupid with his finger up his ass,” Eve muttered.

  “Looks a bit like that Caravaggio,” her mother mused, frowning at it.

  Was she implying that Massimo was derivative? Well, so was Barbara, then. The whole New Masters movement was, but to Eve’s mind, brilliantly so, reshaping the old by casting it in a modern light.

  “What’s the one there with the cloth over it?” Frederick pointed.

  “The Susanna, at last! Nobody has seen it. Margot’s going to unveil it when everyone’s here,” Eve explained.

  Just then Eve caught sight of Clay taking a glass from a waiter. He downed it and grabbed another.

  “Excuse me,” she said, and squirmed away, making a beeline across the gallery. “Holy shit!” she said when she got to him. “Isn’t this so cool?”

  “Hunh?” He smelled like alcohol.

  “Are you drunk?”

  “Getting there.”

  The gallery was rapidly filling with guests.

  Eve took a glass from a passing waiter. “Aren’t you supposed to be back at Griswold?”

  “Not going.”

  Eve gave him a look of disbelief. Maybe he could afford to be a day or so late considering his family connection.

  “What about Justine?” she asked.

  “We broke up.” He drew his finger across his neck.

  Why hadn’t Justine told her?

  “It was mutual,” Clay added. “Just wasn’t meant to be.”

  Oh bullshit, Eve thought. There was no way it was mutual. Eve wondered if she could call Justine from the back office. Had that been what Clay meant when he said he wasn’t going back to Griswold? What on earth was he doing about school instead?

  Taking a few sips of her champagne, Eve made a decision. “Do you ever think about what it would be like to be gay?”

  Clay’s glass tipped forward. She grabbed it just in time, handing it to an obliging waiter.

  “Did Justine say something about that?”

  “Nope.”

  Clay took another glass from a passing tray. “Sure, I have. With Philip how could I not?”

  “And?”

  “I feel sorry for him.”

  “Yes, but that is him, this is you. We have to define our lives separately from our parents. We can’t let them crush us.”

  “Oh Jesus! They crush us anyway. Just because I’m just a shitty boyfriend doesn’t make me gay. I’ve finally accepted that I’m doomed to solitude.”
>
  “The human condition,” India said, joining them. She was in a fitted gray cocktail dress and pumps.

  Clay emptied his glass, sloshing champagne onto his front.

  Eve and India exchanged looks. India rummaged in her purse and handed Clay a handkerchief. Eve looked around to see if her parents were in the crowd. She glimpsed them, admiring the Magdalene.

  India pulled something else out of her bag. Eve looked down. It was an airplane ticket. India Clarkson, New York to Rome.

  Suddenly they heard a stir near the front and Massimo strode in, alone.

  The crowd parted. A few flashbulbs went off. Massimo bowed and the crowd burst into applause. She and India pushed their way a bit closer.

  “Where’s his wife?” Eve whispered. India put a finger to her lips.

  Margot marched into the room in a red sleeveless dress, her teeth bared in a shiny grin. Eve could not see any evidence that her boss had been crying in the bathroom. Standing before the covered canvas on the wall, Margot put an arm around Massimo. She turned to the cameras and raised a champagne glass, revealing her signature tuft of underarm hair.

  “Ladies and gentlemen!” Margot boomed. “I’m proud to present the new work of Massimo Sforza. This is one of the most important and highly anticipated shows of the year, and by far Massimo’s most personal and profound. I have labored over it all summer long; no, in many ways, for several years. I know you’ll agree my efforts have paid off.”

  Applause. Eve caught Raymond’s eye. Margot would never think to thank her gallery staff, the ungrateful vampire.

  “This show is a fitting opening to the 1984 season,” Margot continued. “Which promises to be one of the most exciting ever!” She waited for the applause to die down. “Massimo Sforza is himself one of the most influential painters of our time.” She waved an arm around. “I am honored to show this triumphant new work, elevating the New Masters movement to a higher echelon.” There was loud, enthusiastic clapping. Eve saw her mother nearby, looking elated. “These biblical stories contain lessons for each and every one of us.” Margot scanned the crowd. “Lessons that transcend time. Massimo has gone one step further and has taken an autobiographical attitude toward these universal themes.” Everyone was silent. “Art asks the difficult questions about the human journey. By plumbing the depths of his own experience, Massimo has taken a daring risk, and you”—she paused—“will be the first to see it.” Applause rippled through the crowd. “Massimo, would you do the honors?”

  Massimo loomed over everyone. He looked around, smiling, and raised a champagne glass. “To rebirth!” the artist cried, and swept the cloth from the Susanna.

  Gasps erupted from the crowd. It was India, her belly hugely distended in pregnancy. Eve glanced toward her friend, but India was still holding the ticket to Rome, her face radiant with happiness.

  * * *

  • • • • • • •

  Stanley sat across from Justine as the train sped toward New Haven. She gazed out the window over the Long Island Sound, where a few small powerboats were headed out to sea, plumes of water spreading behind them like frothy peacock tails.

  Eve and India were probably out there with Clay doing something fun. Then Justine remembered they would all be attending Massimo’s opening. The momentous event, and here she was, returning to Griswold while her friends drank champagne without her.

  Justine lit a cigarette, and exhaled. Why had she imagined she’d be transformed by a summer in the city, somehow reborn? It was over, and she felt diminished. She thought bitterly about Clay sobbing on his futon, his tear-streaked face. Even his life was moving forward, while she and Stanley were going back.

  “Tickets, please.”

  Justine handed hers over. As the conductor punched them, she felt tears coming.

  Stanley leaned forward. “Is Eve really so much better off?”

  Justine couldn’t help but smile at his telepathy. And compared to Stanley’s life, her existence was full of good fortune. She wiped her eyes with the back of her sleeve and stubbed out her cigarette.

  Cressida was waiting for them at the station. Justine fell into her mother’s soft hug.

  “You must be Stanley.”

  Stanley shook Cressida’s hand as Justine climbed into the back.

  “Your father’s home early and I’m making your favorite roast chicken!”

  Justine gave her mother the thumbs-up in the rearview mirror. Cressida smiled and turned her high beams on Stanley.

  “Can you join us? I’ll get you both to school by nine.”

  Stanley looked hopefully at Justine, who nodded.

  “Yes, ma’am. Thank you.”

  “Call me Cressida.”

  Justine wondered how long it had been since her friend had had a home-cooked meal. Cressida made a delicious gravy too.

  Her mother turned on the radio, but, as usual, all she got was static. She switched it off. “How was your summer, Stanley? Were you working?”

  Justine rolled down the window. The air-conditioning was still broken. Same old scene. As the breeze swept her hair off her face, Justine remembered that terrifying drive to the Hamptons with Barbara—the cocaine, India on the back seat, Clay’s unhappiness. It felt like a lifetime ago, and someone else’s life. The whole summer had felt like playing dress-up in someone else’s clothes. Now she was back in her ripped jeans.

  Wasn’t Eve so much better off? Weren’t they all? They had choices. And money. But she knew she couldn’t dissect their lives, keeping the good parts and discarding the bad. Justine watched her mother’s plump hands on the worn steering wheel, listened to the familiar lilt of her voice as she chatted with Stanley. Settling back into the worn car seat, Justine tried to imagine swapping Cressida for Barbara, for Deirdre. What was that saying about the devil you know? Justine hugged her arms around her body and faced into the wind.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I am grateful to many: Cynthia Kling, brilliant teacher, confidante, lighthouse in a storm, and dear friend. Fran Lebowitz, who coaxed this novel out of the closet. Elisabeth Schmitz, who saved me from the slough of despond. Lorin Stein: to learn from you is like taking a piano lesson with Chopin. Patricia Marx, a most loyal, creative, and hilarious brainstormer.

  Thank you to my early readers and friends Jane Mendelsohn, Aline Brosh McKenna, Alexis Gelber, Katie Roiphe, Stephanie Cabot, Genevieve Toles, Christina Clifford, Norman von Holtzendorff, Alissa McCreary, Sophia McCreary, Warren St. John, and Hanna von Goeler.

  For inspiration and forbearance, my lifelong partner in crime, Jessica Rosenblum.

  Thank you to my energetic and brilliant agent, Alice Whitwham, and to everyone at the Cheney Agency. To my patient and incisive editor, Allison Lorentzen, not only for her intelligence but also for her optimism and good cheer—qualities that are in woefully short supply these days. And to the team at Viking: Brianna Harden for her gorgeous cover design, Jason Ramirez for elegant art direction, Brian Tart, Andrea Schulz, Kate Stark, Lindsay Prevette, Brianna Linden, Lydia Hirt, and Mary Stone. And thank you to Nancy Palmquist for her thorough and considerate copyediting.

  Thank you to my family, and particularly my husband, Chip Brainerd, for cooking, cleaning, and parenting without complaint so that I could write.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Amanda Brainerd lives on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, blocks from where she grew up, and attended The Nightingale-Bamford School before going on to graduate from Harvard College and Columbia Architecture.

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