This time it would just be him, his mom, and me. I'd been there before: sometimes with boyfriends, sometimes with large groups.
Then, four years ago, Mat invited me to his family's place in Cape Cod from my home in Brooklyn for a long weekend in July. But mixing friends with sex seemed like the road to ruin to me, in which a solid friendship is sacrificed for a night of questionable and potentially awkward passion. Pop culture loves the narrative that your best guy friend is secretly your meant-to-be partner, waiting in the wings while you date a series of idiots.
'Are you sure there's nothing there?' There wasn't. 'He's hot and you hang out all the time,' they'd say. This seemed to confuse my classmates and girlfriends, who'd ask if my buddy Adam was my boyfriend, or if I was taking my friend Hans to prom. I'm not the sporty 'just one of the guys' type and have always had plenty of female confidantes, but I easily connect with guys, gay and straight alike. Mat was the latest in a long line of close, platonic male friends.
