“Well, you don’t have to, but I wouldn’t want a repeat of last year’s overreaction from your aunt if I were you. Unless you want to have your fridge stacked with pity food.”
Griffin was referring to last summer’s opening ceremonies, which Nathan had chosen not to attend. Instead, he had gone to a poetry reading at the local library, which he frequented, but he did not tell his aunt or uncle. They had taken his absence as a sign of teenage rebellion. They assumed he was feeling a little down after the departure of his father and shared this information with families who took to pitying him with gifts of comfort food and visits, neither of which he wanted. He abandoned his poetry interests soon after the incident.
“Ugh, I guess you’re right. I’ll go with your family. Cass and Marty will make a big deal about it and I’m too tired to deal with that nonsense,” Nathan retorted, in a rather harsh fashion. He took a big gulp of his coffee.
He didn’t want to tell Griffin about his break-up just yet, as the so called “bro code” required. The whirlwind of events that had led him to this moment in time didn’t give him much of a chance to process what had happened. He wasn’t the type to get overly sentimental and would prefer to save the obligatory cheer up session Griffin would undoubtedly provide for another time. The two finished their breakfast and Griffin took Nathan home.
Chapter 3
No one was home when he arrived. There was a note on the kitchen table from Aunt Cassidy. She and Uncle Martin had gone to Elizabeth and Piper’s softball game. The girls were seven years old and had been living with the Thompsons since they were ten months old. The subject of younger female siblings had been a topic of an early conversation between Nathan and Sarah. Nathan had not bonded much with the twins during his time living in their home.
The note didn’t say whether or not they’d be at opening ceremonies. Nathan hoped they weren’t going. Many of the adults knew Nathan from the local library or functions around town that he and sometimes Griffin liked to attend. This made small talk easy, but he felt weird doing it in front of his aunt. This behavior was seen as peculiar by his relatives so he liked it when they appeared oblivious to his adventures.
Before he could relax in front of the television, Nathan had to take a shower for a few reasons. He didn’t want his sheets to smell bad. His uncle always told him that a shower was the best hangover cure. Being stoned, Nathan thought otherwise, but the warm water certainly felt good.
Afterward, he checked his phone to see if he had received any texts from Sarah. There was nothing except an invitation to play a game, which he did not accept. He rarely accepted invitations to play games on social networks. People usually cheated, and it annoyed him.
Nathan had the whole third floor of the Thompson household to himself. It looked more like an apartment than many rooms occupied by people of his age, but this was largely his own doing. Nathan had taken a class in interior design at the local community center. He had been the only male in the class, but he didn’t mind because he now had a room that resembled one that might belong to a human with a much higher maturity level.
Nathan climbed into bed to watch some of the shows that he’d recorded. House Hunters and the other programs on HGTV were some of his favorites since he had taken his interior design class. When he was older and had his own house, he would not have to pay someone else to decorate it. He was had aspirations to eventually work toward not needing a realtor either.
After he had watched two episodes of the reality TV show, Nathan took a nap. Sleeping on the floor was not conducive to his REM cycle and he wanted to feel somewhat alert before he was expected to make small talk with the people of his yacht club. Most of these people regarded Nathan as more intelligent than his peers and he did not want to make them feel otherwise. They might be handy someday when he was in need of a job.
Of all the extracurricular activities Nathan was interested in, work was not one of them. He didn’t need the money and at his age could not find employment that was of more interest to him than his current activities. Griffin did not share a similar attitude.
Nathan had tried working with Griffin at the clothing boutique where he worked, but he did not share the same passion for fine clothing as Griffin. On top of that, Money was no object to Nathan because of his father’s guilt for not being around. Jerome sent lavish checks to his son as a substitute for love. Nathan occasionally took odd jobs to pass the time. He preferred not to babysit as the kids usually yelled too loud or made messes which he felt obligated to clean up.
Instead, he sometimes served as a driver for the children of a well-off couple who traveled extensively to exotic regions he had often never even heard of. The family paid him far more than what he felt the job required and it provided him with a deviation from his normal routine.
Sleep should have come easy for a weary Nathan, but it did not. He found himself checking his phone for contact from Sarah, even though the device would let him know if anyone was trying to get in touch with him. He did not want to contact Sarah first as he bore guilt for not fighting harder to keep their relationship intact.
The root of the problem was that Sarah and he were fundamentally different people. Nathan had little trouble getting along with her friends, and Griffin was more than pleased with that state of affairs due to the potential possibility that one of Sarah’s friends might be interested in him. Conversation was never an issue. Nathan found it easy to talk to just about anyone, except for his father of course.
But despite how agreeable Nathan was, Sarah had often said no to things he wanted to do. He once purchased a discounted kayak tour for the two of them, but she turned it down like everything else, and Griffin went instead.
Another time, he wanted to go to the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. It was just the kind of romantic artsy date that Sarah was always going on about. A little too coincidentally, she was busy with plans just as he’d bought the tickets, so Griffin went instead.
While Nathan understood that his ideas for grand adventure might not be necessarily appealing to everyone, he grew displeasured when he purchased a five-course meal at a French restaurant with the hopes that their aspirations for romance and culture could finally reach some middle ground. She declined and made an unfunny and dated joke about a dislike of snails. Nathan had to exercise restraint when it came to questioning this conduct unbecoming of his faux socialite girlfriend. Griffin went instead.
The lack of compatibility wasn’t a huge concern to Nathan. He had read an article shortly after their courtship began that said the average person went on seventy dates before finding the elusive “one” who they were supposed to be with until death. Nathan grew disenchanted with the credibility of the whole process, having been surrounded in untraditional or broken marriages his entire life. The occasional Disney princess movie did little to make him feel otherwise.
What he did know was that Sarah was his first girlfriend, not his soul mate, as she often liked to suggest. She was by no means the last girl he’d ever call his girlfriend. Nathan was sure to remember that high school romance should be fun before it was anything else. He told himself to exercise caution before entering a relationship like that again.
This brought conflicting emotions which prevented him from taking the nap he so desperately needed. His relationship with Sarah was never going to last very long. Someone who couldn’t appreciate a fine French meal, no matter the age, was not fitting for a man of his disposition. But Sarah had been fun at times and he could not shake the idea that he was going to miss her.
He thought there was a chance he might have made a mistake. She wasn’t perfect, but he hadn’t encountered many girls who could appreciate him for all his eccentricities and interests that were not typically shared by other teenagers. Before he met Sarah, kissing was just something he saw on TV or read about casually in books. Nathan had seen people hooking up at parties. But the exchange of alcoholic slobber while mounting each other on beer soaked couches wasn’t the romance he wa
s drawn to. It was a release of some sort of built up angst that Nathan just simply didn’t feel.
“You didn’t fight for a reason,” Nathan told himself as he tried to fall asleep. “It wasn’t right.” He couldn’t shake the sensation that this wasn’t just comfort speech to stop his mind from hammering him.
What Nathan didn’t realize was that these feelings came naturally at the end of a relationship. He was without much experience on the topic as a result of not having much guidance in his life at all. There wasn’t anyone to talk to about it and he doubted Sarah would want to engage him in an analytical discussion as to what went wrong with them. Even if she agreed that the events of the previous night had been some terrible mistake, now was not the time to fix what shouldn’t be fixed. Nathan continued to ponder the ramifications of his indifference and indecisiveness until he finally fell asleep.
Chapter 4
Nathan awoke to an unpleasant sound.
“Now it’s my turn. Wake up, asshole,” Griffin yelled. There had been no alarm set, a byproduct of marijuana and self-pity.
“You better not still be stoned,” his friend added. It had been almost four hours since their last toke.
“I’m no lightweight, man,” Nathan replied. He felt groggy and annoyed that his slumber had been disturbed. This was a half-truth. Nathan had not been much of a pot smoker while he was dating Sarah out of fear of her father. The amount of time away from weed had affected his tolerance. Whether or not he had in fact become a lightweight was difficult to quantify.
“Good. Brush your hair and let’s go or else we won’t get a good seat,” Griffin said.
Nathan’s hair was a tangled mess since he had fallen asleep with it wet. This generally wasn’t an issue, since it made his pillow smell good, but time was now of the essence. “All right, be done in a minute,” he replied, and got out of bed. Griffin did not look terribly impatient.
Both of Griffin’s mothers were waiting in their convertible as the two friends made their way outside. Victoria’s car was a yellow Camaro, which complimented her golden blonde hair. The car had been a gift from Megan after Victoria received her big promotion. The Rousseaus liked to buy American, especially after a family viewing of the Clint Eastwood film, Gran Torino. Her company also gave Victoria a mini-van, but that was seldom used and simply gathered dust in their garage.
Nathan’s worries that he had made the Rousseau family wait were alleviated as he got to the car. Both women had big smiles on their faces. The air was particularly fresh for Memorial Day weekend and neither one of them had anything else to do. Griffin was their only child. The artificial insemination process had not been pleasant and neither one wished to go through it again.
“Sorry I’m late, Mrs. and Mrs. Rousseau,” Nathan said, as he and Griffin advanced toward the car. This greeting was not universally standard for lesbian couples, but Nathan had used it ever since their first play date in kindergarten. The world had not been as receptive to same sex couples with children back then, and the Rousseaus found the formality charming.
“Hi, Nathan. Will the rest of your clan be there?” Megan asked, who relished the role of shotgun passenger so she could make conversation with everyone else in the car. Victoria had received several speeding tickets, and did not make for the best driving companion. The radio had at least been turned off. The Rousseau family was quite fond of a station that played classic eighties alternative.
“I hope not, but I think so. They’re at the girls’ softball game,” Nathan replied. He felt comfortable sharing this information with them, the closest family he currently had in the states while his father was gallivanting abroad. The Thompsons had only moved to the suburbs of New York City five years before in order to raise the twins in a more pleasant environment. Nathan had not socialized with them all that much until he moved in to their home.
“What’s the matter? You don’t want more casseroles to celebrate the start of summer?” Victoria joked. Nathan always thought Griffin got his sense of humor from Victoria.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Nathan said. “Is the sympathy I’ve received due to my father’s abandonment of me, which has left me an emotional orphan, somehow funny to you?”
There was a solemn silence in the car for about five seconds, which felt like an eternity.
“Now, that was funny,” Nathan added, with a large smirk on his face.
“You’re an asshole,” Victoria replied, echoing her son. She floored the pedal which sent both Griffin and Nathan flying back so their heads slammed against the back of the car. Thank God for seatbelts.
The club was crowded as one would expect on opening day. Some people were very dressed up, but Nathan and the Rousseau family wore casual attire.
Seers Point Yacht Club was a bit of a paradox in the world of private clubs. The club had a fancy restaurant, which remained open all year, but the pool’s vibes were colloquial. This latter point prevented the place from becoming a breeding ground for the pretentious, though that was usually not the case in the winter. The club was despised by Nathan’s late mother Hilary, which was likely the reason Nathan’s father retained his membership though he rarely stepped inside its exclusive borders. The club had served as a convenient barrier between Jerome and Nathan long before the Atlantic Ocean took over. Nathan used it more in a week than Jerome did in five years.
Though he wasn’t too fond of Seers Point, Jerome had used his influence as a businessman to sponsor both the Thompsons and the Rousseaus to the club. The nomination of the Rousseau family had been met with fierce opposition from then club president Raphael Lellenberg, but Jerome had paid him a visit to suggest that discrimination against such a prominent couple in the New York area was unwise regardless of their sexual orientation. The Thompsons followed with far less of a struggle.
The parents and the teenagers separated so they could mingle with friends and acquaintances. Griffin had been yelled at by his mothers for overusing the phrase, “let’s do lunch” to people who engaged him in conversation. “Let’s do lunch” was not so much of an invitation to share a meal as it was a common way to end a conversation or stop-and-chat that one did not wish to have had in the first place. While the phrase was acceptable and perfectly normal for adults to use, Griffin appeared sad to hear that people had less than enthusiastic reactions to his use of the phrase.
Nathan saw his relatives in the distance and ushered Griffin toward the docks, where his aunt was less likely to ask questions about the previous night. Had he not endured a break-up, he would not have cared about talking to her. She was fine with Nathan going out, but she had been a major opponent of marijuana use ever since college. While in college, Cassidy Thompson ate a few too many pot brownies and had a panic attack inside a movie theatre during a showing of The Thing. Pot from then on was the devil, and though Nathan had come down, he still wished to avoid her if it was at all possible.
Griffin was not amused, for he seemed to be looking forward to the beginning of the social season at Seers Point. This was the first of many special days where people, particularly woman, took extra care in their appearances. A gesture not lost on young Griffin.
“This is not cool, dude,” he said as they approached the empty docks. “I wanted to see the MILFs,” he said, referring to the attractive female parents who frequented the club. Griffin could use the word freely around Nathan, but he couldn’t let his mothers overhear it, or even the people he would say, “Let’s do lunch” to. The people he said, “Let’s do lunch” to, were often the MILFs themselves.
“That’s weird, coming from a guy with two hot moms,” Nathan commented. “How would you like it if Chris Towers said that about your mommies?”
Griffin scowled. Chris Towers was a degenerate from their grade who was also on the swim team and a member of Seers Point.
“I would punch him because there’s plenty of MILF stuff on the Internet about my mother already. Unless he came up with something particularly creative,” Griffin said. Pictures of Megan Rou
sseau from her modeling days were popular for people to look at while at work, where filters would catch photographs described as pornography. Griffin knew about this all too well.
Seeking to change the subject, Griffin said, “I’m surprised you weren’t forced to bail on this to see Sarah off at the airport. Did she ask you to go?”
Nathan was not very surprised by this question, but he was not in the mood to come clean about the break-up and instead looked for a way to switch the subject as quickly as possible. He did not wish to lie to his best friend, but he didn’t want to answer the question truthfully either. Griffin would likely press the issue if given the opportunity.
“No,” Nathan said. “I think she was tired after last night. We said out goodbyes then. Thank God, I did not want a long drawn out goodbye.”
“I see,” Griffin replied, who was more indifferent to the answer than Nathan had expected.
Just then, a bell began to ring. This was used to summon the members of the Seers Point Yacht Club to their seats. Nathan hadn’t liked this bell from the time he was little because the ceremony was long and usually boring. But at this point in time, it was a very welcome sound to hear.
Chapter 5
Nathan took a seat with the Rousseau family. Even though he had initiated contact with the Thompsons, he did not take that as a cue to move over to where they were seated. People might think of this as weird, but it did not bother him in the slightest. Nathan was used to people thinking he was odd.
As he sat down, his gaze was drawn to a woman and to the look on her face and the energy he felt radiating toward his general vicinity. The fact that her curly brown hair was waving in the wind so that it covered a bit of her flawless face made her all the more curious to him. It might have helped create her unexplainable allure.
Courting Mrs. McCarthy Page 2