Free That Old Cape Magic by Richard Russo Page B

that his feelings for the boy’s mother were precisely that. When Mrs. Browning wore a two-piece bathing suit, he had to lie on his stomach in the hot sand to conceal his erection. He didn’t let on to Peter, of course, not even daring to say something innocent like “Your mom’s really pretty,” but somehow he seemed to know anyway. Was it possible Peter harbored similar feelings for his own mother? Did that happen? Mr. Browning also noticed Griffin’s admiration, but instead of being annoyed or even angry, as Griffin imagined he might be, all he did was smile, as if he understood his wife’s charms all too well and couldn’t blame the boy for being taken with them. In fact, his kindness so shamed Griffin that for a day or two he tried his best to banish any dirty thoughts (as he’d characterized them) about Mrs. Browning, but it was no use. One afternoon, lying on her stomach in the warm sand, she untied her bathing suit top to take full advantage of the sun and then fell asleep. The waves were perfect that day, but Griffin told Peter he was tired of bodysurfing, whereas in truth he was intoxicated by the possibility that when Peter’s mother woke up she might momentarily forget the untying and rise up, bare-breasted. She didn’t, of course, but again Griffin felt that his friend knew what he was up to.
Had he ever again felt quite so sick at heart as at the end of their Cape vacation that summer? Not in adult life, surely. During the first of their two weeks he’d fallen in love, however improbably, with the whole Browning family, and every day, even the rainy ones, was radiant. During the second week, though, everything pivoted, as each passing day moved relentlessly toward the conclusion of their stay. The thought of leaving the Cape and never seeing Peter or any of the Brownings again engendered in Griffin a dark, complex emotion every bit as powerful as love. Part of it he recognized as despair, a panicked anxiety that left him breathless and weak, certain that things would never again return to normal or, worse, that normal was no longer enough, that his previous life amounted to starvation. But there was something else that scared him even more than despair: the desire to … what? To harm himself. To hurt even worse than he was already hurting. To ensure that whatever had been broken was beyond repair. Though there was a word for it —perversity— he didn’t know it yet, wouldn’t for many years. He knew only the feeling, but that was full and sufficient.
The evening before the Griffins were to leave, the Brownings invited him over for hamburgers and ice cream. Mr. Browning had some sparklers they were saving for their own last night, but since their new friend and his parents were departing, they’d decided to break them out early. Wanting desperately to accept their invitation, he instead told Peter that he and his parents were going out for a fancy dinner at the Blue Martini. It was very expensive, he said, but his parents had promised him he could order whatever he wanted, no matter what it cost, so he’d have to say no to the hamburgers. The look of disappointment on his friend’s face provided a kind of bitter satisfaction.
It was true his parents had planned a fancy dinner out, but for just the two of them, and their surprise and annoyance when he told them what he’d done was pleasurable as well. “Why?” his mother said. “It’s your last night with Steven. For the last two weeks it’s been nothing but Steven this and Steven that.”
“Peter,” he’d corrected her—shouting at her, really, and not caring if this meant trouble. “His name is Peter.”
She studied him for a long beat. “Why are you acting like this?” she said, but her tone suggested that she knew perfectly well, as if she’d been wondering when this side of his personality would reveal itself. “You’re only hurting yourself,” she told him. “You know that, don’t you?”
But of course that part was a bluff. He wasn’t hurting only himself. He