I opened the door just as Mason was about to knock. His usually tidy hair was a mess, like he’d been running his hands through it, and his polo shirt was wrinkled from travel, but he looked… good. Happy. Not in the moment, obviously, since his expression suggested he was ready to commit all kinds of violence, but deep-down happy and lit-up from the inside, probably thanks to Fenn.
I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror, all red-rimmed eyes and zero hair product. Further proof that relationships were like wide-legged pants or anything mustard yellow: fine for some, but a positively hideous look on me. I should have known better.
I did know better.
Yet here I was.
“Hey.” I gave him a little smile as I stood back from the door. “How was O’Leary?”
“Oh. It was nice, actually. Seeing Fenn hold the baby was…” He scowled. “Stop. Don’t distract me right now, Toby. What the heck is going on? Imagine me seeing my best friend’s tattoo on the news three days ago and then calling and texting him a billion times, but he never replied. I was nearly ready to detour to the fucking city before we came home, asshole.”
I winced. I’d been thinking that I didn’t want my sudden appearance in Florida to ruin Mason’s time Upstate. I hadn’t really considered that Mason would find out anyway and be worried. I guessed I’d been looking at a lot of things wrong.
“I’m sorry. My phone died. Was murdered, really.” Just saying that made me think of Beale’s teasing, and I nearly cried again as I sank down on the bed.
I took a deep breath and explained the whole story about Dive, and Jayd, and the paparazzi. I explained how I’d come here to ask Mason’s help, and how Littlejohn had helped me get into the guesthouse. All the important facts except the giant, Hagatha-shaped one.
“The guesthouse,” Mason said, breaking his silence. “Where Beale was staying.” He stood against the wall by the closet, arms folded over his chest.
“Yeah.” I found myself strangely reluctant to provide details. Beale could if he wanted to, but as far as I was concerned, what had happened between us was ours and no one else’s. “Beale took mercy on me and agreed to let me stay. He, um, knows that I’m your friend Toby. I didn’t tell him why I came here, though. Once I realized the Goodmans knew Jayd, I decided I couldn’t…” I trailed off and took a deep breath. “Anyway. His brothers randomly decided I must be his first love from summer camp years ago, so we went with that because I didn’t want anyone else to know I was Toby. I figured if they knew, they’d call you to come home and that would ruin your fun.” Marjorie curled up beside me, and I stroked her fur absently.
Mason’s eyes narrowed to slits. “Ruin my fun, Toby? Or yours?”
“Huh?”
“Were you or were you not fucking Beale Goodman in the kitchen twenty minutes ago?”
“I…” I opened my mouth and shut it again. “I mean, in the interest of accuracy, I wasn’t doing the fucking.”
“Tobias!”
“Yes, yes, fine. Obviously I was, but that’s neither here nor there.” I’d decided not to ruin Mason’s trip before Beale and I had ever done… anything.
“Neither here nor there? Do you know what you’ve done? Do you know what kind of person Beale is?”
“Yes, of course I know. I told you, I’ve spent the whole week with him. He’s—” Amazing. Brilliant. Talented. Mischievous. Gorgeous. Compassionate.
“Thoughtful and kind, Toby. Sweet and good and, like… wholesome.” Mason’s voice had this reverent tone, like he was discussing some kind of religious vision instead of an actual human.
I wrinkled my nose. Nothing he said was wrong per se, but if he thought that was all Beale was, he was blind.
“You make him sound like a chocolate chip cookie, Mason. God. He’s also really, really smart and capable.” And then because I refused to get all schmoopy over a guy who’d basically dumped me—I mean, not without cause, but still—I examined my nails closely as I added, “And he’s not as innocent as you might think. Just sayin’.”
“Ugh,” Mason groaned. “I do not wanna know that. Tobias, I understand that you change sex partners as often as most people change underwear, but you need to understand that for most of us, it means something. For Beale it means everything. He’s not one of your conquests back in the city, and it was pure selfishness for you to take advant—”
“Mase, stop. Beale and I… it wasn’t whatever you’re thinking. I told you, he knows who I am. He knows… me.” Honestly, better than Mason did in a way, since despite our years of friendship and how much I trusted Mason with other things, I’d only ever told him I was a writer, not what I wrote. Mason could be a wee bit judgmental over anything that didn’t fit in a loafer-sized box in his mind. “I really don’t need a lecture right now. I need your help.”
“My help? What do you want me to do?”
“I don’t know, man! If I knew, I’d have done it. You’re the one with a cool head in a crisis, right? You’re the one, of the two of us, who always knows the empirically right thing to do. You’re the yin to my yang. The Squidward to my SpongeBob. The Mary Kate to my Ashley. The Aziraphale to my Crowley.” I dragged the toe of my shoe along the floor. “I need you to tell me how to fix things back in New York so the paparazzi will leave me alone and I can go back to my life, but without outing someone who didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Toby, I wish I knew.” Mason blew out a breath. “That’s way out of my realm of expertise. And I’m honestly still a little bit overwhelmed at coming back from a trip to find the entire town out on my back lawn—” He pressed his fingertips to his eye sockets. “—and, not to keep harping on this, my best friend fucking Fenn’s best friend.”
“Once again, I wasn’t actually—”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake! I can’t help you sort your shit this time, okay? It’s beyond me. But you can’t keep hiding here. You do need to go back and deal with it, ’cause it doesn’t seem to be going away on its own. Maybe ask Aunt Hagatha.”
Oh, the irony.
I made myself nod calmly, like my heart wasn’t aching. “Yeah, okay.” I forced a smile. “See? I knew you’d know what I should do, precious.” Turned out the incident at Dive had been the least of my fuckups this week. The veritable tip of the fuckup iceberg. I’d fucked things up with Beale, and now it seemed I’d fucked up my one and only friendship, too.
“Look, Mase.” I stood up and laid a hand on Mason’s bicep. His face was so familiar to me, even after not seeing him in months, and his picture would always be found in my personal dictionary beside the word friend, so I didn’t want to say goodbye with him still angry at me or, worse, at Beale or Rafe or any of the party planners. “A whole lot of people came together and worked really hard to make this housewarming party happen for you and Fenn because they love you guys. I understand that it’s overwhelming, and that the timing is absolutely deplorable. I also understand you’re frustrated because you think I’ve seduced Beale for sport or something, but I’ll repeat for the record: it wasn’t that.” Not at all. “Though, for what it’s worth, I do know that he deserves way better than the likes of me, and Beale knows it, too.”