And he was, technically, the first guy I’d slept with, although I let Ricky Hofstedter 
press his fingers up there sophomore year, and then there was that time that I got 
drunk at Hollis Ownby’s party and wound up making out with Harvey Somebody (he was a 
Somebody. I just can’t remember his last name) until I woke up with a hangover and a 
major pain down there and I hoped it hadn’t gone too far beyond basic, you know, petting.
  But Jimmy had all these needs, and some days, particularly in June and early July, I 
just wanted to chill and hang out with some friends without worrying about whether I was 
paying attention to Jimmy and all his issues.
  I didn’t think of Owen much except sometimes I remembered how much fun he was when I 
was younger and exploring the beaches, or how I'd take him out in one of my dad’s small 
boats, and he’d tell me all about his plans. How he was going to slowly start investing 
in stocks. I’d ask him how?
  And he’d look at me funny, and laugh. Then, he’d tell me how his mother's father had 
been well-off and then when Owen turned twenty-one, he’d come into a trust fund. I knew 
he was lying, but I sort of liked his lies. They made the days go by. Sometimes the 
summer seemed short when I was around him, and by the time I got back to school in the 
fall, I felt renewed. I owed a lot of that to Owen.
  But this summer, I’ve been distant from everybody. Part of it is Jimmy.
  And yes, it’s sexual, I guess. But since I’m paying you by the hour, I’d guess that 
you’re okay with me telling you, right? Well, Jimmy seems to not be all that aggressive 
in bed. I know that must sound weird since I’m not terribly experienced in that arena, 
either, but I’ve watched movies, I’ve read books, and I talk with my girlfriends about 
this stuff. This isn’t like twenty years ago when no one ever talked about sex. My 
friends all say their boyfriends seem to put the moves on them constantly. With Jimmy, I 
have to literally reach down and grab him. And then, he just sort of you know touches me 
here and there and then he — well you know — and then it’s over and sort of unpleasant 
even though it’s not ghastly or anything. It’s just not what I expected.
  And then there was that fiasco with my birthday party. Christ, it was embarrassing. 
Mind if I light up? I’m hungry for nicotine at the moment.
  Ravening.
  Ah, that’s better. I know everyone has to give up smoking at some point in their lives, 
but how nice to not have to give it up just yet.
  So, the seventeenth was my big party, and I didn’t even want Owen there — he didn’t fit 
in with Jimmy’s friends, and many of my friends found him a little cold. Plus, there was 
the whole problem of his mother, who’s a force to be reckoned with. She’s always looking 
at me like I’m the Whore of Babylon.
  She was helping us set up the party, and she kept giving me that look. You know that 
look. That mother look.
  But Owen showed, and frankly, I was happy to see him. It was sort of a relief since I’d 
barely seen him all summer. Well, I saw him when he went swimming. In our pool of course. 
In our pool. I called him Leech (funny that he and Jimmy both have been called that, 
huh?) when he wasn’t around because he really is such a leech. I mean it in a funny nice 
way, not some awful way. I once slipped off a rock into one of the little ponds on the 
property, and my legs were covered with leeches. They don’t hurt. You’d be surprised 
at that, wouldn’t you? You’d think that something that sucks your blood would hurt, but 
they don’t. It’s just the fact that they’re there that makes them bothersome.
  So it was my little joke: calling Owen Leech. I care a lot for Owen, actually. We grew 
up together practically. My island boy. My father laughs whenever I call Owen Leech 
behind his back, but my mother, well, she doesn't understand that kind of humor. That 
ironic kind of humor. I mean it as an affectionate term. Sort of like the way Jimmy calls 
him Mooncalf. It’s a name.
  I guess it distances me from him or something. But it does get annoying when someone is 
always borrowing things or using your things or assuming things just because his father 
works in the garden. I like them. They’re like family. I feel a lot for Owen, but really, 
he should’ve gotten over that Leech thing years ago.
  I can hear my mother’s voice in my head: that’s cruel, Jenna. I know. I know.
  I get accused of cruelty all the time. Not physical cruelty. My mother means it’s cruel 
to fault poor people with using our things.
  My mother has this thing for him. Well, for all young men. She won't acknowledge it, 
and she thinks Daddy’s the bad one, but I know she likes the boys who hang around me. And 
no, I’m not jealous of her. Why should I be?
  She’s old. Her time has come and gone. My time is only just beginning.
  Anyway, eighteen year old boys do not want forty year old women. It's embarrassing, 
really.
  Even at the party, Mom is sauntering around in that green getup she has that looks too 
glitzy for the island. We all go casual here, so she looked like too much like Ginger on 
Gilligan’s Island — too done up. Too too, as Missy Capshaw says. She’s too too.
  Missy came down from the Vineyard, and Shottsy had his cousin Alec with him, and pretty 
much the whole gang was there, except for the Faulkners who all went to Maine for the 
summer. I guess about sixteen of my friends came, and then six or seven of Jimmy’s, and 
then Owen with his shirt that was so new it still had the wrinkles from the cardboard 
box, and Shottsy made a big point of letting everyone know that part of the plastic 
collar liner was still under the collar. Owen brought me this nice little gift, I mean 
that in an ironical way, and that’s really the issue here.
  But I was having some margaritas and just getting sort of high, and Marnie Llewellyn 
was regaling me with that story again, the one about her brother’s professor and how him 
and two female students had gone off to Fenwick together and then got caught in the worst 
way, the very worst way possible.
  And I saw what Owen was doing.
  I saw that he had already cast a spell. Some kind of spell. Just like a witch.
  Over Jimmy.
  I saw Jimmy put his hand in Owen’s hair, and I saw how they laughed, and I know it must 
seem irrational and paranoid, but the first thing I thought was:
  That bastard is trying to steal my boyfriend.
  You can imagine how I felt. I mean, I thought it was ludicrous. It wasn't like Skippy 
Marshall and that Donovan character from Harrow — they were both homosexual, and we all 
had known it since they got into the drama club and developed the perfect butts in the 
workout room doing squats.
  This was different.
  I thought it was absolutely ludicrous. But I grew livid as I watched them. Absolutely 
livid. Really, from the corner of my eye. I was working on my third or fourth margarita, 
and Missy kept talking and Alec kept eyeing my breasts like he always did, and I had my 
little circle, but they knew something was up, too. They knew that Jimmy was not fawning 
on me, and I didn’t really enjoy that. Frankly.
  I suppose if I had not been drinking, I wouldn’t have caused a scene.
  But I kept my eye on the two of them, and I saw the touches.
  Yes, that’s right. Queerish little touches. Not the kind that boys do.
  Not normally. Owen touched Jimmy’s elbow, and Jimmy looked at Owen's hand. And they 
laughed, and whenever one of them could, he took his fist and gently patted the other on 
the chest. Like old chums, yes, maybe. Certainly that’s what I’d like to believe, but in