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I’m setting a good example for Alyssa.
    In spite of my panic, I grin back, although I can feel it tremble around the edges. Alyssa’s my buddy; I’ve sat for her more times than I can count since Ted won custody of her four years ago, no mean feat for a gay man, even today. In the last year, she’s begun to notice boys, which I gather is about the same time her father did. But you know how it is, always easier to talk to someone outside the family about these things….
    I notice her hands are clamped around a plate of cookies. Oh, yeah—things are definitely looking up.
    â€œWe got concerned when we didn’t hear you leave the apartment,” her father now says, looming behind his daughter. I get a glimpse of a faded navy T stretched across a solid torso, and bare, hairy legs protruding from the bottoms of worn drawstring shorts—the freelance writer’s summer chained-to-the-computer ensemble. Underneath silver-splintered, dark brown hair as curly as mine, worry lurks in hazel eyes as he takes in my less-than-reputable appearance. “I hope you didn’t spend longer than ten minutes to get that look, honey, because, trust me, it isn’t you.”
    My attention really, really wants to drift back to the cookies, but I suddenly remember the peril I’m in. “Oh, God. My mother’s on her way. In a taxi. ”
    Ted looks at me, glances over my shoulder into my apartment. I swear he blanches. He, too, has met my mother. “Got it. We’ll be right there.”
    â€œOh, no, you don’t have to—”
    Ted throws me a glance that brooks no argument, then says, “Al, go back inside and get the box of trash bags. And grab Randall while you’re at it.”
    Knowing the cavalry is coming shakes me from my stupor enough to send me back into my apartment, where I once again freak out. Where did all this crap come from? Do I really subscribe to this many magazines? Why do I have so many dishes? And where am I going to stash it all?
    I grab the wedding dress, then stand there doing this bizarre, twitching dance with the thing—there’s no waythis puppy is gonna fit in any of my closets and the only door behind which I could conceivably hide it leads to the bathroom. Where I need to be right now—
    Randall, Ted’s lover, slips his bold, buff, black, bald self in through the open door, lets out a deep bark of laughter. He’s in High-Wasp casual mode—Dockers, blue Oxford, striped tie, penny loafers. And a diamond earring. “Lord, woman—you have a consolation orgy in here or what?”
    Out of the corner of my eye, I see Ted and Alyssa return. To my immense relief, she still has the cookies, which she sets on the counter. A synapse or two misfires.
    â€œI don’t know,” I say. “I mean, no. I mean, I don’t know how it got this way. Are those for me?” I finish with a bright smile for Alyssa.
    â€œUh-huh,” the kid says. “Dad taught me how to make them this morning.” She peels back the Saran and carries the plate over to me. Randall pries the crushed dress from my hands before I salivate all over it. I take a cookie, watching him stride out the door. It is a bittersweet moment.
    â€œThe place got this way, honey,” Ted says, deftly picking up the thread of the conversation, “because you’re a pack rat living in a shoebox. Okay, Al,” he says to his daughter, attacking the corner where the desk used to be, “the object is not to clean, but to make it look clean.”
    â€œYou mean, like when Mom comes over?”
    â€œYou got it.”
    I stand there munching as the child calmly opens a closet, begins shoving things inside like a pro, while her father straightens and stacks and fluffs. “You know,” he says, “a cousin of mine just got a three bedroom in Hoboken for probably half what you’re paying for this dump.”
    That’s enough to make