Inside the Mind of Gideon Rayburn (11 page)

sleepover

Pilar eventually sank to the floor. Gid made sure she didn't break any bones.

Gid stands there for at least ten minutes, watching her drift in and out and asking himself all sorts of moral
questions about alcohol, girls, and sex. The yellow underwear flashes into his thoughts. When Pilar's eyes flutter
open and she murmurs, "Let's do it," he thinks he will die of joy. But she's wasted. She doesn't mean it. But she
doesn't not mean it. Her eyes are open. She's definitely awake. He holds up two fingers.

"How many fingers am I holding up?" he says.

"Peace," she says. Her eyes close, then open, then close.

He undoes a length of paper towel from the dispenser, folds it, and sets it under Pilar's head. "Just let me
sleep for fifteen minutes," she says. She's awake. So she does know what she's saying! He peeks out the door.
Nothing. He dashes back into his room.

The guys are asleep, though their personalities are still very much with them, even in repose. Cullen's on his
back, mouth wide open, his whole upper body tipped backward on the white bank of pillows he stole from a four-star
hotel in Tokyo. His head angles ever so slightly to the left, as if even asleep he knew this was the proper way to
display his neck and shoulder muscles to the column of light coming in from the streetlamp. Nicholas lies on his side,
his body in a perfect
C,
his hands clasped between his knees. Cullen's mouth grabs the air noisily. Nicholas doesn't
make a sound; air just flows through him.

Gid hears the soft but deliberate sound of feet on carpet. It's not Pilar. The steps are too...angry.

He looks out the peephole. That pink head, that purposeful walk. It's Captain Cockweed, alert, suspicious, his
powerful torso and hips propelling him toward their door.

Gid leaps onto his bed. He hears a tiny metallic sound, Cockweed's wedding ring against the doorknob. Then
the room floods with light. The door shuts. It is dark again. Gid waits.

Should he let Pilar sleep in the shower?

Yes, Gideon, that would probably be best for everyone.

Then he has a bizarre fantasy. That Cullen wakes up before he does and goes in to take a shower and that he
finds Pilar there, and that Pilar sits up, gives him a slow, sexy smile, and begins to slip off her clothes as Cullen
reaches to remove his shorts...

Gid plays out that whole fantasy as an excuse to risk going back into the bathroom.

Pilar's still asleep. A clear ribbon of drool hangs out of the pink corner of her mouth and is spreading in a moist
circle on the paper towel pillow. Gid slips one arm under her knees. She's wearing corduroys. They are soft. And
then one arm under her neck. He bends at the knees and lifts her up.

He has to open the bathroom door with his foot. He pushes it with a little too much force, and it swings back
too fast, lightly knocking Pilar on the side of the head.

She doesn't flinch. The hall is empty. It's only about six paces to his door, but Cockweed could emerge at any time. Gid leaps, his forward motion moving into the door so that he lands inside the bedroom.

He feels very
Matrix.

Cullen and Nicholas sleep as Gideon eases Pilar onto his bed and gently straightens out her limbs. She opens
her eyes. "Everyone thinks I am from Buenos Aires," she says, "but I am from Bahfa Blanca." She stretches and
rearranges her body so that she leaves only about a six-inch-wide strip, which Gideon, grateful he is skinny fat and
not fat fat, eases himself into. His arm is scrunched up underneath him. Would it be weird or bad if he kind of laid it
on top of her body?

He closes his eyes and imagines that Pilar Benitez-Jones is his wife, and that falling asleep next to her is the
most natural thing in the world.

He wakes up to Nicholas and Cullen standing over him.

"Hi," Gid whispers.

"Holy fucking shit," Cullen says. "This is awesome."

"It's not that awesome," Gid says.

That makes me laugh.

"You're not going to believe what happened," Gid says.

Cullen wags his head from side to side. "You found her wandering around drunk and brought her in here.
Happens all the time. Or it's not unheard of. Did you know Aztec warriors used to sleep next to naked virgins to
increase their resistance to pain?"

Pilar, still asleep, is fully clothed. And I would be very surprised if she were a virgin.

"Can you believe how beautiful she is? I mean, isn't it just heartbreaking?" Gid says. He dreamed about her all
night.

"Mother of God," says Nicholas. "Beautiful and about to get us fucking expelled." He goes to the peephole.
"Mrs. Cockweed is out there with the damn ironing board. Oh wait, she's packing it up, she's going. Cullen, get your
hockey bag out of the closet."

Cullen winks at Gid. "She is pretty hot," he says. "You're such a champ for not nailing her, what with the bet and
all."

"I want to call it off," Gid says. "I really think that Pilar likes me. She said..."

Cullen is coming toward him with a human-size red bag.

"No," says Gideon, horrified. "You're not going to put her in a bag."

"What are you going to do, carry her out in your pants?" Nicholas asks. He cocks his head at Gideon. "You
wake her up."

"Wait," Cullen says. "Gid wants to call off the Molly McGarry bet because he's in love with Pilar."

"No, no, no," Gid says, "I didn't say I was in love with her. I said she likes me, and
—"

"Both of those things are equally absurd," Nicholas snaps. "More absurd, in fact, than the fact that one of us
has to carry this one-hundred-twenty-pound girl out of our dorm in a bag."

Pilar opens her eyes. She sees Gideon, Nicholas, Cullen, then the bag. She knows what it's for.

"One hundred fifteen pounds," she says. She laughs. She closes her eyes again.

"You don't have to," Gid says. "We can probably..."

Pilar opens her eyes. She rolls onto her side and hoists herself on her elbow. She sits on the edge of the bed,
then puts her head between her knees.

Cullen opens his mouth. He's about to make a gross joke. I don't need to be inside his mind to know that.

"Shut up," Nicholas says. "It's too early for your stupid
fucking..."
He rolls his eyes, too world-weary to
complete the sentence.

Pilar, woozy, lowers herself onto the floor. She looks up at Gideon, her eyes huge and moving in her head with
intoxicated instability. She crawls into the bag. "Leave me in the woods behind my dorm." Her tone is dull. She is a
practiced misbehaver.

Gid savors every inch of Pilar's face as the bag is zipped up and it disappears.

Gid insists on carrying the bag. It's not too heavy. He can handle it. But walking through the doorway the bag swings out and some rather hard part of Pilar's body hits the molding. "Sorry," Gid says. A few steps down the hall,
the bag swings the other way. There is another thud. "Geez, sorry again," Gid whispers, kind of caressing the bag.

Cullen and Nicholas have been watching from the doorway, and Cullen comes barreling down the hall,
exasperated. "You can't fucking talk to the fucking bag," he says.

With little effort, Cullen takes the bag and hoists it onto his shoulder. "If you're totally fine in there," he hisses,
"don't say anything."

The bag is silent. Gid would feel bad that he wasn't the man for the job, but he makes himself feel better by
remembering it's because he cares too much. After all, he did carry her last night. Under the right circumstances,
she is not too heavy for him.

_{crates aren't inhumane}

Days pass, and Pilar doesn't talk to him. She always says hi, which in a way makes it worse, because it's not that
she doesn't see Gid. She totally sees him and chooses to restrict the terms of their interaction.

He hates that Nicholas is right. I kind of hate it too. This whole "in your league" idea is very unromantic.

Though, like most unromantic things, it could very well be the way life works.

Gid resolves to get used to the dull pitch of life, down from the whirring frenzy when Pilar was sort of around
more, and resolves to set his sights on Molly.

For three straight days, he studies the back of Molly McGarry's head all through Spanish class. Not
surprisingly, this provides no insights.

He's going to ask Cullen. This whole watch-and-learn thing, while less desperate than actually being schooled,
is also less effective.

Gid finds Cullen just as he's walking into the dining hall with Fiona, the calculating babysitter. Fiona Winchester,
black-haired, pink-cheeked, pert in front and behind, stands a whole foot shorter than Cullen. She looks up at him
with adoring eyes. Her eyes have a natural softness to them. It's easy to see why she might cultivate motherliness to
pursue boys. She's wearing shortish pants which are fashionable but to Gideon seem merely too short, a vintage
paisley shirt, and a pair of high-heeled boots that look purposefully odd with it all. Even her outfit is sort of
weirdo-cool mom-ish, though she's only fifteen.

"People don't understand that crates aren't inhumane," Gid overhears her say as he reaches them.

"Oh, Gideon," Cullen says, taking his arm. He puts his other hand on Fiona's back. "Will you excuse us?"

"Sorry," Gideon mutters as Fiona walks away.

"Please," Cullen says, "she was telling me how to train Irish setters. You did me a favor. What's up?"

They make sandwiches in the dining hall. Gid wraps his in a lot of napkins. Cullen doesn't bother. They settle
against a maple tree. Gideon has to force himself not to maniacally scan the quad for a glimpse of Pilar. "Okay," he
says to Cullen, "I've gone over this, and I just don't even know where to begin with Molly. I mean...you can't just make
a girl like you. Can you?"

This is an excellent question. A hard question. And even though Cullen's not usually up for the hard questions,
this one is made for him.

Cullen leans his head back against the tree trunk and closes his eyes. Gid eats his sandwich. He took the
opportunity of a lunch away from Nicholas to get salami with cheese, mayonnaise, and mustard. It's only cafeteria
quality, but it's incredible.

Cullen opens his eyes and sighs with some impatience. "I am trying to imagine what it might be like to get a girl
if it was, you know, not ridiculously easy." He closes his eyes again.

Cullen really only means to state the facts. Still, it's got to hurt.

"Okay," Cullen says, "I think 1 have something. Girls
—we all just think of them as, you know, nice tits, nice eyes,
this and that, but the thing they are into is their personalities."

I thought it was this bad. But I always sort of hoped it wasn't.

At least I can hear Gid thinking, "Wow, I know what Cullen means, but isn't that a bit extreme?" Though he's still
taking Cullen's advice. Well. I hate to admit it, but he probably should.

"We need to think about who Molly is, what she's into. When you know what chicks dig, it's a lot easier to get
them to like you. Give me your notebook." He starts writing. After a minute or two, he opens it so Gid can see. He
has written a few categories:
habitat interests, friends, food.
At the top, in large letters, he's written
M
²
.
He grins and
nods at Gid. "Pretty cool!" he says.

"Food?" Gid asks. "Who cares what kind of food she eats?"

Cullen just smiles. "Okay, what does Madison eat?"

Gid rolls his eyes.

"Go ahead," Cullen prompts. "You know."

"Uh, wine? Cottage cheese?" Gid throws up his hands. This is stupid. A new wave of students pours out of
Barrett, one of the classroom buildings, onto the quad. Gid can't resist looking. No Pilar.

"What kind of wine?"

Okay, hell play. "Red."

"What kind of cottage cheese?"

"Fat-free?" Gid has seen it. Little blue plastic containers that she brings to the dining hall in her backpack.

Sometimes she eats it plain, sometimes with Ry-Krisp she gets off the salad and soup bar.

"Okay, you're doing very well," Cullen says. "So. What does the wine tell you?"

'That she likes being drunk?" Gid's happy.

Cullen nods encouragingly. "And what else about the wine? What makes this wine different
—the wine Madison
drinks, the special wine, for special Madison..."

"She wants to be...French?" Gideon really wants to get the right answer.

"The wine's..." Cullen's eyes expand, as if he could somehow lead Gid to the word.

"Expensive!" Gid says, knowing he's gotten it.

"Okay, so let's put it all together," Cullen says, clapping his hands. Gideon sees that he's having a very good
time. "Cottage cheese and expensive wine."

"Madison is interested," Gid begins carefully, "in being drunk, glamorous, and thin."

"Exactly," Cullen says. "And so how do you get to sleep with Madison?"

"By making her feel all those three things," Gid says.

"I think two would probably do it," Cullen says.

"That was just food," Gid points out, consulting the list. "We didn't do...habitat, friends, or interests."

Cullen shrugs. "Habitat, she's from Park Avenue. Okay, friends. Okay, she pals around with her roommates,
reluctantly, they don't count. She's friends
with..."

"All the pretty girls," Gid says, getting it. "And her interests...! think she's most interested in magazines. We
could have stopped at food. Wow."

"I wonder if Hal thinks Madison is a pain in the ass or not." Cullen muses. "Whatever. Here we go, Molly
McGarry!" He claps his hands together. "Let's start with what we know. Habitat." Cullen taps his pen efficiently
against the notebook.

"She's from Buffalo," Gid offers, glad to have an answer.

"Good, good." Cullen nods. "Did she tell you this?"

"It was the first thing she said to me. When I met her, she introduced herself as Molly McGarry of the Buffalo
McGarrys."

"No way!" Cullen is very excited by this. "That means she's on to it, well, on to it and over it."
"On to what? Over what?"

"The whole prep school 'thing.'" Cullen makes quotes with his fingers. "The whole 'Oh, no way, my dad went to
the Strawberry Shortcake Cotillion with your mom's border collie' thing. The first thing she tells you, the very first

thing she wants you to know about her, is that she's from this shithole where most people here will never set foot,
much less live."

''What's the Strawberry Shortcake Cotillion?" Gid asks.

"Forget it. Write down 'Over prep school.'"

Gid writes it down.

"Write down 'Outsider.'"

Gid writes it down.

"Okay. Moving along. Friends."

"Okay,
well,
I've seen her with Marcy Proctor."

"Former roommate, assigned roommate." Cullen is dismissive. "Incidental."

Gid wonders, am I incidental to Cullen and Nicholas? He really doesn't feel that way. Cullen seems to be
genuinely enjoying himself.

"Mostly, though, she goes everywhere with that little girl, Edie."

"Right, right...," Cullen says. "Edie was assigned to live with Erica and Marcy
last
year, but she and Molly
chose to live together this year. So, write down 'Champion of the underdog.'" Cullen shakes his head. "That girl is in
my History class. She is weird. But kind of sexy in a little-girl-with-too-big-eyes kind of way. Like kind of so
innocent-seeming you want to defile her, but you know that you are also kind of a little afraid of her? I know you know
what I mean."

One of the things Gideon likes about Cullen is that he gives him credit when he doesn't deserve it. Nicholas
barely gives him credit when he does.

"Anyway," Cullen continues, "despite my occasional weird forays and creepy sexual thoughts, Edie is a
serious nerd. So you might want to put in parentheses, maybe with a question mark, 'Loves nerds.'"

Fiona Winchester, now done with her lunch, walks toward them with a comely mixture of shyness and sex
appeal. "Who loves nerds?"
she
asks, shielding her eyes from the sun. Not waiting for an answer, she walks
backward, away from them, all the while watching Cullen.

Cullen has never, not once, had to make a plan about a girl. Girls just appear to him, and all he has to do is

decide which one he wants.

Cullen stabs the notebook with his finger. "Okay, forget Fiona," he says. "Concentrate."

"Who in the world would want to see themselves as a nerd?" Gid asks.

"Who the fuck knows why anyone does anything?" he asks. "Why do we have a stupid bet to see whether you
can have sex with some girl? Because it's enjoyable. It gives us something to focus on. Because we will laugh when

that douche bag Liam has to give you the keys to Nicholas's car. What have we got now?"

"'Over prep school,'" Gid reads. '"Outsider. Champion of the underdog. Loves nerds?'"

"It's a pretty good start," Cullen says. "So here's the thing, when you talk to her, you have to make sure that the
stuff you say, like, confirms how she sees herself. I'm going to make it real simple for you. Say one thing, just one
thing, for each one of these things we've figured out about her."

"That's weird," Gideon says. "I don't know if I get it."

I get it.

"Sure you do." (Trust me, Cullen, he doesn't.) Cullen stands up and brushes his pants off. "You'll figure it out
when you talk to her." He looks across the quad and smiles. "How convenient."

Sure enough, here come Molly and Edie, their heads bowed over the books they're carrying. Edie's tucked
inside a giant scarf that makes her look even smaller. At one point a tail of it starts to trail down Edie's back, and
Molly catches the end of it and winds it carefully back around her neck. As they get closer, Gid sees Edie's tiny,
grateful smile and her eyes, saucer-round with what seems like perpetual bewilderment. Or maybe, Gideon thinks,
she's really bored and trying to stay awake.

"Champion of the underdog, loves nerds, et cetera." Cullen gives him a good-luck shoulder clap. "And most
important, you want to see what she's having for lunch. I think we've proven that's very helpful information."