The Conditions of Will

by Jessa Hastings

“Dad was so straight-laced,” I add. “What could be in there? He has a secret kid?” I scoff. Tennyson’s jaw juts forward subconsciously, but Oliver sniffs a laugh. “Yeah, right.”

Uh oh…

It’s been seven days today since I first met Sam Penny and I can confirm with absolute certainty that I am completely in love with him. Ridiculous, I know. It’s fucking insane, actually.

And if I wanted to pull it apart, I could say I’m in distress; it’s a trauma response and I’m latching on to him because of that. There are a lot of emotions swirling around me at the minute—that’s true. Sam Penny is a safe harbor—also true. But what else is true is this: Sam Penny is undoubtedly the greatest man I’ve ever met.

His kisses are commas.

Like my whole life has been a corset done up too tightly, and slowly he’s unlacing me.

We don’t need them. But we would like them.

I’m a little intrigued by the secret girlfriend though, only because I wonder if I’d have picked up on it if I knew him better.

Girlfriend or maybe daughter?? Is it a boyfriend?? Alexis can be a men’s name in French?

Rooftops were invented so I could shout off of them about Sam Penny, and here I am barely able to look at him in the eye.

She glares at me, and I know it’s mean to do it to her, but it’s also kind of fun.

Tenny’s knee-deep in the story of how he met Savannah, and it’s cuter than I expected from my brother, but if I’m honest, Tennyson is starting to surprise me in general.

And for the briefest second, it makes me feel like I mustn’t really be in love with him, because how could I be? How could I be in love with someone and not even know that they don’t believe in marriage? I decide to flick that thought away, though, because it would be foolish to think you need to stop learning about the things you love.

Trying to make someone commit to you who’s afraid of commitment is like trying to tie down a tarpaulin once a hurricane’s already started. I’m not doing that.

“You don’t know whether you were addicted to her or the drugs.”

This is undoubtedly and somewhat unfortunately the most beautiful, romantic hotel I’ve ever been to in my life, and I’m here with the boy of my dreams, and we’re saddled with my buzzkill brothers.

It’s a fair assumption, though likely incorrect, because pain begets pain, shame begets shaming, and not being tolerated begets intolerance.

“Georgia—you and me together—” He gives me a look. “This is—it’s not normal. I’m not going to find this again.”

I stare over at him, and I don’t really know what to say, how to speak to this new, thoughtful part of my brother that’s emerged and I’m rapidly growing increasingly fond of.

“I’ve met you, and I’m different now.”

“I think I’ve waited my whole life for this day.”

We kiss in public, we hold hands, he holds doors open for me, he carries my bags, slings his arm around me—we, in conclusion, do the most generic, regular shit that couples do together, and it is, in a nonhyperbolic way, probably the greatest day of my life.

I glance at him. “What does a whore’s house look like?” “I don’t know.” he shrugs. “A second-floor condo on the corner of Ocean and Alta?” Sam pauses. “That’s where you live.” Oliver gives him a wink.

It is, in fact, a man standing in front of us.

👀👀👀

They’re like Horse Girls, but men. They don’t fucking shut up about their planes and their flight times and their craziest landings.

“A small town outside of Bordeaux.”

👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀

Saint-Émilion!

👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀

Then there’s Alfred Tennyson, Marianne Moore, Mary Oliver, and George Gordon Byron. My eyes fall on a framed degree. Poetry. Cornell.

👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀

But as I barely make it down the stairs and into the front yard of my father’s lover, where I sort of willfully fall into a little bush of common purslanes that I then throw up in, it’s Sam who gets to me the fastest.

I KNEW IT!!!!!!!!!

“We were right,” I tell Tennyson. “Alexis Beauchêne and Dad were having an affair.” I look back at Oliver as I point to our father’s lover on the porch. “And that man is Alexis Beauchêne.”

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

What kind of person lets his children be treated how Oliver was treated—how I was treated—when he too was gay and he too was an adulterer? I’m not even a fucking adulterer, really.

The years of lies that have pressed down on our whole family, squashing and contorting our lives and selves. Who might we all have been if truth was allowed to live under our roof?

It feels how it used to now. This tension between us that meant we’d never be close. Two people related by blood who’d never willingly spend time together, let alone be in this close a proximity to each other unless they were forced to.

💔

Because it’s true. I am all the things Maryanne said I was. It was a prophecy, not a declaration of truth. We just didn’t know it back then.

💔

And listen, we’re all sinful, but I think it’s a lie that all sins are equal. Not all of them are. Not all of them could be.

And I think to myself, wouldn’t it be so lovely if we viewed ourselves through the same lens as the people who love us?

“Okay.” Sam nods, patience well waned now. “Let me worry about that spell of your sister’s—that I’m very willfully under, by the way.”

“We are a family of fuck-ups, Georgia—no doubt about it. You’re not one of those fuck-ups though. You’re the only one who isn’t.”

He smiles, and the edges of it feel tender. “William wanted to be an art major, not an econ major.”

🥺

“I believe he was quoted to have said to William, ‘that’s’”—and then he proceeds to spells out the F word that isn’t fuck—“‘learning.’”

😭😭😭

“Hold on.” I pause, thinking. “So when did it end between you?” “Seventeen days ago.”

💔💔💔

“But William always talked about buying it maybe, one day,” he offers. “When we would imagine a different version of how life could be.”

💔

“He was very proud but afraid of you.” I pull a face. “Why afraid?” Alexis gives me an amused, almost paternal look. “You spot lies for a living, and he was living a big one. At least much of the time.”

“But for whatever it is worth to you, and I hope it’s worth something—I know he wanted more for you. He just didn’t know how to give it or be it.”

“I have thought so much about why he was the way he was with you, trying to make sense of it—I think he was jealous of you.”

“Cruelty is a bit of a harsh word.” “But an appropriate one,” I tell her, unflinching.

“I’m in love with her, Oliver—I’ve been into her since the second I first saw her when she felt me up because she thought I was your boyfriend, and I’ve been in love with her since the morning after when we went to the beach and she wouldn’t take my jumper.”

“You reckon there’s going to be any other surprises in there?” “What?” I scoff. “Like, a surprise second lover who he’s bequeathed a ski chalet? I mean, I hope not, but what a curveball.”

“Georgia, I don’t think he was leaving you the empty plot.” He gives me a cautious look. “I think he was leaving you Alexis.”

😭😭😭

“And maybe—I don’t know, maybe I’m reaching or hoping or loving you has turned me to fucking mush or something, but I think maybe he knew Alexis could be something to you that your dad could never figure out how to be for you himself.”

😭😭😭

“This has been the weirdest fucking couple weeks,” Tennyson says, glancing between Sam and me, and I laugh. “And it should have just been shit,” he keeps going, “but I had so much fun with you. I’m sorry for—”

🥹

What could have been if my father felt empowered to be his whole self, embrace who he’d spent his whole life hiding—what