“I love you too. You want to go back to Putty’s apartment after a while?”

“I have the key.” His leg brushed against mine. A marching band began to play. The first Wreck hove into view, a vehicle with a bed mounted on top. On the bed were two young men dressed as women. They were wearing pantaloons and huge balloon breasts and they were locked in an embrace. Now even the trees seemed sexual, locked in the ground by their roots. The sycamore leaves made golden beds upon the grass. Light coming down between the buildings seemed a sexual thrust. I looked up into Malcolm’s face. There were specks of gold in his green eyes. Gold on the freckles of his arms.

“Let’s go now,” he said. “We don’t need to see this damn parade.”

There was a party at the house that night and Malcolm drank gin martinis and danced a crazy dance he learned from his mother’s gardener. “I call it the hootchy-cootchy,” he would yell, and laugh uproariously and do it again. His legs and feet moved like liquid. I could barely keep up with him. “Yes, it’s me and I’m in love again,” he kept singing. “Yes, it’s me and I’m in love again.”

At intermission I went out into the backyard. One of Charles William’s projects had been turning the backyard of the KA house into a garden. There were rows of holly bushes and flower beds and a goldfish pond. Charles William and Davie were standing by the pond. As I watched, Charles William took Davie in his arms and kissed him on the mouth. He knows I’m watching, I thought. He knows I see him doing that. I was in a strange conflicted sensual mood anyway. The things that Malcolm and I had been doing all afternoon were all over me. I didn’t feel guilty about doing them, just surprised and interested and amazed. I turned away from the pond. I thought of the weight of Malcolm’s body on mine, the smell and taste of him, how I had thought I could kiss through his shoulder to the bone and taste the birth of blood. I had melted into his body and he into mine and that was what was meant by love. And that was what Charles William was doing now to Davie.

“Rhoda, where are you?” It was Malcolm, coming across the patio looking for me. “Come dance with me,” I said. “I want to dance some more.”

“What’s going on?” He looked toward the pond. “Oh, that. Well, he won the Wreck Parade for us, didn’t he?”

“Why is he kissing Davie?” I took his arm. “Why is he kissing him?”

“Don’t you know, Rhoda? You really don’t know?”