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don’t smell like anything yet. I’m always tempted to take off my nightgown and wrap my naked body in the shirt. I just want to feel like some part of this man sleeping with my mother belongs to me.
    But I never dare. If Babs ever caught me touching Mack’s stuff, she would just laugh and say,
Oh, dear,
in a pseudo-pitying way. As if she had caught me trying to eat the oranges off the chinoiserie wallpaper in the powder room.
    After dinner, once Lily has cleared our plates and Stacey has gone to her room, Babs tells me almost everything they do on those nights.
    “Bettina,” she says, “what is going on between me and Mack is very educational. You need specifics, not that bland shit they’ll teach you at school.”
    I really don’t want to know all the details, but Babs launches right into them anyway.
    “When the time comes for you to have sex, I don’t want you sitting on your hands, fucking baffled. Oral sex, very important. First, the name. When a man sucks on your clitoris, you should call it
admiring the centerfold.
Much, much better than
eating you out
or
going down on you.
Giving a blowjob
is also stupid. Refer to putting a dick in your mouth as
raising the mast.
Or something like that. Blowing has nothing to do with it.”
    I wonder if I’m supposed to be taking notes.
    She continues. “Remember that every man’s different. You can’t just get lazy and have a pat formula. Mack, for instance. He likes to be licked rather than sucked. Except at the very end, when he is close to coming. Then he wants his penis to be worked over like a pacifier.”
    She reaches for a cigarette. I don’t like the idea of Mack’s penis in Babs’s mouth. I worry someday she’ll get mad and bite it off.
    “You must pick a man who knows how to properly admire your centerfold. This is the easiest way for a woman to come. But a man who has even the slightest skill in this area is rarer than you think.
    “Mack, thank God, knows exactly where the centerfold is and isn’t intimidated when he gets there. A lot of men make a quick pit stop at the centerfold because they think they have to but clearly would rather be elsewhere. Sucking on your breasts or grabbing your ass. Never waste time on a man who is afraid to put his mouth between your legs and fucking Wimbledon it like a true pro. Point, set, match. Mack admires my centerfold until I’ve had two or three orgasms. No self-respecting woman should settle for less. That’s just laziness on someone’s part.”
    Another night, Babs continues with more of her sex life. Tells me they often leave the aparthouse and go to Hopse- quesca, Mack’s country club in Grass Woods.
    “We have the place to ourselves,” Babs explains.
    “Mack parks his golf cart in the woods by the sand trap on the eighth hole. I wear tennis outfits. My legs look fabulous, and Mack can quickly flip up the skirt. He just wears his boring preppy uniform. Khaki pants, needlepoint belt. A button-down shirt. Penny loafers. No socks.
    “Then there are the damn pennies,” she continues, “those 1909-S VDB wheat-backs. His grandfather gave them to him on his fourteenth birthday. Before he left for Cardiss. He’s worn them in every pair of loafers since. Sentimentality in shoes. Stupid.”
    I don’t like to hear any criticism of Mack. Especially about something so trivial as his shoes.
    In the end, I don’t mind knowing what goes on at Hopsequesca. When you are eleven and your mother tells you things, you think these are things you should know.
    But already at my age, sex doesn’t shock me. I’ve read Babs’s copy of
The Joy of Sex
cover to cover with all of those gross drawings of naked adults. Underarm and pubic hair everywhere. I’m also not one of those dumb kids who think grownups are hurting each other when they moan or who get scared when they hear them yell out as they come. In fact, I know all about orgasms. I masturbate every night in the bathtub before bed. It makes it easier for me to get