Inside the Mind of Gideon Rayburn (16 page)

Cullen and Nicholas nod gravely.

Totally unaware that I know they are so incredibly gay.

Cullen leans across the table. "We're telling you this so you realize that this whole thing...it's all a game. I
mean, the whole thing is so crazy, how can we not make a game out of it? Girls get caught up in the moment in their way
—romance, love, whatever—and you get caught up in the moment in your way. With sex."

"How? How do we get caught up in sex?"

Cullen raises an eyebrow. "Because you're fucking? Girls get caught up in the love part, and we just get caught

up in the thing itself. And the game part, the bet, and then, getting back to what you were calling lying and what I would
just call being a guy, well, it's just part of how guys and girls just do this whole
thing."

"Oh, right. Okay." Poor Gid thought he was about to get some useful advice. Maybe next time. At least I find
Cullen and his occasional philosophical sidetracks fascinating.

"Anyway," Cullen says, "I may have said some things to Fiona I won't mean forever..."

What an incredible turn of phrase to get around the word
lie\

He continues, "But Fiona's going to be
fine.
Erica's going to be
fine.
Honestly, and I really mean this, we are
preparing them for life. I mean, in a way, a girl meets a guy like you, and she could actually go through the rest of her
life thinking guys are sweet and caring and nice. And what kind of good is that going to do them?"

You know, in a really disgusting, morally bankrupt way, Cullen's got a point.

And maybe it's just the weird stupid clarity of two Guinnesses and a shot of whiskey gorgeously killing his
Vicodin hangover, but it's all making incredible sense to Gideon.

On the walk back to the car, more doctrine on the subject of girls is drilled into Gideon's head. It's not about a
girl; it's about girls. You don't worry about one specific girl, because there are always more. Molly can just be part of
a master plan, which involves putting off Pilar, and then having sex with her. And maybe he could even have sex with
both of them. "Remember how you refused to fool around with Mija, and immediately, Madison was on your jock?"
Cullen points out. "When you start having girls hit on you and you turn them down, or better, when other girls see that
you have sex with other girls and then blow them off, you totally increase your chances of being able to get anyone
you want. Dig?"

Gideon decides Cullen is snowing him a little. For sure. Cullen makes it sound as if Mija had been really into
him. And Madison, well, wanting to have sex with Gid so she could show a video of it to her boyfriend, that's a far cry
from being on his jock. He's going to have to talk to someone about this.

"I would like to say something about Pilar, if you're ready to hear it," Cullen says.

"Yes," Gid says. "Of course." This is his dream. He wishes she were all they talked about. Anything to make it
feel, even if it's only in his mind, that she is part of his life.

"I can see why you're so into her. She's really smart, but she totally has the body of a stupid person," Nicholas
says.

Cullen nods. "It's a lethal combination."

The campus they pull into is the campus of Gid's daydreams, cozily dark, yellow lights twinkling in the dorms,
fresh-faced students bundled in fall layers just starting to trickle from their studies to dinner. Among them, coming up
the campus road three abreast, just as they did on Gid's very first day of school, are Molly McGarry, Edie Bell, and
Marcy Proctor.

Gid spots them first. Molly's wearing a blue pea coat and a black wool hat, with her hair tucked up underneath
it. Her head is bowed with an air of scholarly duty. I'm jealous of her, Gid thinks, surprised. She looks so
self-contained, so unconcerned with anything but her own thoughts. He closes his eyes and intones a short, fervent
prayer that Cullen and Nicholas won't see her.

But Cullen's eyes light up. "Ho, ho! What have we here!"

Nicholas looks out the window and nods. "You should probably talk to her," he says.

Gid wants to say something about how now doesn't seem like the right time, but it seems even less like the
right time to say that. Nicholas slows down.

Edie, her giant saucer eyes framed by lank hair, stares at the ground. Bright, cheerful, direct, Marcy says
"Hello" and "How are you?" perhaps a little too friendly, probably blushing at Cullen's interest, however indirect. Molly
looks suspicious. Not only that, she walks right up to the car, leans down, and sniffs. She sniffs again. Gideon looks
down her shirt. She's wearing a white bra. Padded? He can't tell.

"Hi, Molly," says Gideon. What should he say next? How was your weekend? How are you? What's going on?
He's weighing his options when Molly speaks up.

"Your car smells like pot," Molly says. For a split second, Gideon feels proud of himself. Attractively outlawish. Though there's nothing in her tone to suggest she's impressed. Girls have to be impressed with you, Gid knows, in
order to have sex with you, but you can't try to impress them. Cullen and Nicholas are sort of laughing. Not too hard. Not denying anything, not admitting. Gid imagines he should laugh too. He's about to start when, a hundred yards or so up the road, he sees a figure coming toward them. The figure is tall, with a serious, adult gait.

Marcy notices the figure at the same time. "Oh, God!" she says. She smoothes her blonde hair with a flat
hand, and, grabbing the strap of Edie's ubiquitous book bag, takes off with her.

"Oh, great," Nicholas says. He squints up the road. They all do. There's definitely someone coming, a large
person.

"Holy shit," Cullen says. "Captain Cockweed."

The figure is still pretty far away, but when he raises his hand as if he wants to talk to them, no one misses it.
Now they can't just take off. It would look weird. It would look like they had pot.

"Your car stinks," Molly says matter-of-factly. "I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if he could smell it from up there.
Not that he would ever put two and two together and suspect a nice group of boys like you." Her smile blazes with
sarcasm. But when she turns to look at Gid, her face softens into concern. Maybe she's affected by the terror in his eyes. Maybe it's just a burst of altruism, or one of those weird sensations that seemingly comes from nowhere that
makes you want the next minute of your life to be really, really exciting.

"Give it to me," Molly says. "Hurry up."

Gid unzips the compartment. Now the smell is stronger, so dense it almost seems to have weight and texture.
How
could they not have noticed it before? "Hurry up," Molly says, "before he can see who I am." But before he can
hand
it to her, Molly reaches into the car and grabs it from him with considerable force. The momentum makes her
stumble back a few feet, but then she pivots and takes off running through the dark patch of the quad.

Gid's heart beats in his chest and his throat. His stomach tingles. Gid can vaguely make out Molly racing
toward the deeper shadows alongside the classroom buildings at the top of the hill. Mr. Cavanaugh must be able to
see something too. As he walks toward the car, swiftly now, he keeps glancing up that way, as if he isn't sure what to
track. He approaches the window and motions for them to put it down.

"Can't
we refuse?" Gid whispers. "What about our rights?"

Nicholas rolls his eyes and starts tucking his shirt into his pants. "You douche bag," he says. "We're in prep
school. We don't have any rights."

pork butt

Dr. Frye, the headmaster, is at a chamber music concert in Brookline. So Cockweed left them in the care of his wife,
Mrs. Frye. For two hours, Gideon, Cullen, and Nicholas have been sitting at the foot of a large wooden antique dining table covered with dried flower cuttings, watching her putter about and braise a roast. Her kitchen is
wood-paneled, and copper pots and baskets of garlic and tomatoes hang from hooks on the low ceiling. "Pci^k butt is
such an excellent cut," she says. She's very breezy considering how much trouble they're in. But maybe she's just
British and batty and consumed with her pork butt. "Inexpensive, yet succulent," she continues as she shuts the oven
with a satisfied smile.

She's watching over them like a mother hen. There's nothing prison guard-y in her manner, but it's kind of clear
that she's not going anywhere. So neither are they.

She opens a sizable bottle of white wine and pours some over a tall glass of ice.

"Jesus," Gid whispers to Cullen. "It's not fucking Sprite."

"Hey," Cullen whispers back, "I got a question for you."

Gid nods gravely.

Cullen narrows his eyes and makes his face very serious. "If there's a God," he says, "then why does my anus
itch?"

They laugh the laughter of the condemned.

Mrs. Frye dumps her first glass of white wine into her mouth and immediately refills it. She adjusts her bun with
a hairpin, dries a blue glass vase, and sets it down on the table. "Feel free to try your hand at arranging some of
those ranunculus, roses, and lavender," she says. She cocks her head at Gideon, and her loose bun tips over to the
side of her head. "You're new, aren't you?" she asks.

The telephone rings. It's the only vaguely modern thing in the house, and its space-age alert sound is sort of a

surprise.

"Excuse me!" Mrs. Frye cries out and whips the phone off the wall with a flourish. "Oh hello, dear," she says.
"Yes. Yes, they're here, awaiting your judgment. Nicholas Westerbeck, Cullen McKay, and...I'm sorry, young man, I
don't know your name. Funny, i know how you like your tea, but I don't know your name." She laughs, again chugging
her wine down to the ice cubes.

Gid
—it is about time—realizes at this moment that she is insane. "Gideon Rayburn," he says.

"Gideon Rayburn," she repeats. She winks at him. "You got the story from Gene, then?" Gene is Captain
Cockweed's real name. Not surprising. She cradles the receiver under her chin and fiddles with her hair with both hands, producing several pins. She puts one of them back in, tucks the rest into her mouth, and speaks over them.
"Certainly. Certainly. So you're going to fix the tire and then be over. I will call him, yes, by all means get off the
phone if you're running out.. .Whoop!" She hangs up and sets her hands on her hips. "Lost him."

She dials. "Hello," she says. "This is Mrs. Frye. Just fine. A little excitement, indeed. Anyway, the doctor
wanted me to tell you he'll be there in about forty-five minutes? All right. Good-bye." Mrs. Frye's brown eyes hover
above them, the whites round and glassy like boiled eggs. Gid's insides pulsate.

"Well, boys," she says, "the headmaster and commander will be back in an hour." She checks an old wall clock
that makes hideously hollow and ominous ticking noises. "I'm going to go watch my program, and you...are going to
sit here." She drapes her apron over the cabinet door and, grabbing her tumbler and the bottle, walks out. They hear
the stairs creak and a door shut.

"I can't believe there's a television in this house," Cullen says. "I feel like we're in Colonial Williamsburg."

Nicholas is on his feet. He picks up the phone and hits REDIAL He taps his foot. "Come on, come on," he
mutters. Then his eyes light up. "A machine." Cullen rushes over to hear and Gideon, having no idea at all what's
going on, does the same. Nicholas holds out the phone so they can all hear the message. "Hello, this is the
constable. Leave a message or, if this is an emergency..."

"I knew it," he says, hanging up. "The constable."

"Who is the constable?" Gid asks. It doesn't sound like anyone good.

"The constable," Cullen says, "is a town policeman. A real old-school kind of guy. Anyway, when drug stuff
goes down here, they call him. He shows up, with this dog that he's got. And they walk around the dorms. And they
find it. You better believe they find it."

"What kind of dog is it?" Gid asks.

"What kind of dog? Who cares what kind of dog it is?"

"I think it's a yellow Lab," Nicholas says.

A yellow Lab? A special, drug-smelling golden Lab? God, I love New England!

Cullen blows air out of his lips, a sort of defeated half-snort. Nicholas paces a little, hoists his foot onto a
window ledge, stretches a hamstring, then paces some more. He opens the refrigerator again. He takes out a grape
and eats it.

"So," Nicholas continues, "here's what's going to happen.'
⁷
He's now removed the entire bowl of grapes from
the refrigerator and is sitting cross-legged on the headmaster's kitchen floor, eating them one by one. "The
constable will get here. Molly McGarry, who has no idea that anything is going on, and has more than likely hidden the pot in her dresser or under her bed or some other incredibly obvious place, gets caught with it, and et cetera, et
cetera, et cetera. I mean, you know, if it comes to that, we won't let her hang, but she'll get in trouble too."

"No, that can't happen," Gid says. "One of us has to go find her. I can't let Molly go back to Buffalo."

"If Molly gets kicked out and you don't," Cullen says, "we can fix the bet."

Oh my God! Evil!

Gid is standing up, putting on his coat.

At this moment, Mrs. Frye pops in, shuffling in sheepskin slippers. "Just checking in on my friend," she says.
She bustles around the oven with a baster, poking the pork butt. "That's fine," she says, and pads back upstairs.

Gid zips his coat and, rather nerdily, checks his shoelaces.

"You can't go anywhere," Nicholas hisses. "She'll be back."

"We're all going back home, courtesy of the constable," Cullen says. He lies down on the floor and rests his
feet on the oven door handle. "This is surprisingly comfortable," he says.

But Gideon's not ready to give up. The outlaw spirit starts to burn in his chest. "Maybe you won't mind going
home," he says to Cullen. "You'll have your own car that you'll be driving to a posh day school full of new, naive girls.
But if you knew what I was going home to, well, you would know that I would do anything to keep that from happening."

Cullen and Nicholas are certainly surprised by Gideon's bravery in the face of danger, prep school style. I, for
one, always knew he had it in him.