was something deeply vulnerable and unguarded about him,
like a little boy sleeping. Her heart tugged, a sudden rush of tenderness unlike anything she’d ever felt.
She pressed her hands against his shoulders, nudging him
off. He was a quick summer hookup, nothing more. “What if
your dog is watching?” She pointed to his jacket pocket where the small box of ashes was jutting out.
He rolled over with a sigh and lay on his back beside her.
“That’s okay. He’s seen a lot more action than this.” He flipped his jacket over, covered the container. “There. Privacy.”
She laughed. “Much better.” The dizziness she’d felt as he
kissed her lingered.
They were quiet for a moment.
“Do you think he’s, like, around you somewhere?”
“Indy? Well…he’s not coming when I call his name, so…”
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She smacked his arm. “You know what I mean. Do you
think there’s just nothing left of the barking and running
around and happiness to see you?”
She searched his face. A strange sense of urgency was grind-
ing inside her. Lately she was too aware of the tenuousness of everything. She couldn’t stand the idea that nothing lasted.
She thought of her friends, of that night, lost in that dark
neighborhood. The obliteration of light. She pushed it away.
“I don’t know,” Andy said. “I hope not. I hope I’ll see
him again someday. In heaven or wherever. He was a great
brother.”
She sighed. A stillness settled over them as they gazed into
the black expanse above, the crowd of tiny stars, the mot-
tled moon suspended in the sky as if someone had batted it
there. A particular kind of ache settled in her chest, something about the beauty and sadness of existence being so inextrica-bly bound. “I’m not a God person,” she said. “I think we die
and that’s it. There’s nothing.”
“That’s grim.”
She turned to him. “Is it?” It was. But. “Maybe it just makes this life more important.”
Their eyes caught. She felt something like love. Though
she knew it couldn’t be. She turned back to the sky.
“I have this theory,” she said, “that your degree of faith is based on your prebirth relationship with your mother.”
“Okay, I’m listening.”
“That’s our first experience of another being, right? In the
womb. A presence that can be felt but not seen—one that is
hopefully, but not necessarily, protective and benevolent. And that’s when our brain starts developing, so…”
“Right…”
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“Anyway, that’s about all I’ve got.”
“Wait. That’s your whole theory?” He laughed.
She laughed too. “Just that maybe you either learn to trust
in something bigger than you early on…or you don’t.”
He frowned, considering.
“Look, I’m not saying it holds up, but it certainly would
explain my lack of faith.”
“I mean, but even by your example, doesn’t the womb just
prove the limits of our perspective? I’m sure when we were
in it—which is really weird by the way—I’m sure we thought
that that was all there was. We had no idea there was this whole universe out here.” He gestured toward the pool, the
house behind them, the trees shivering lightly in the breeze.
“My friend Hannah thinks that when you die, your soul
merges with those of everyone you’ve ever loved. Like you
know how sometimes when you hug someone you’re in love
with you feel like you can’t get close enough, you want to
crawl up inside them? She thinks death is like one giant soul hug. Like our bodies are the prison and death is the freedom.”
She paused, thinking about Henry. “Anyway… I’m not actu-
ally sure she still believes that.” She needed to stop thinking about sad things.
“I hope it’s something good,” he said. “I’m sort of afraid of death. Or at least of dying in a gruesome way. You?”
“Not at all. Don’t intend to ever do it.”
“Good plan,” he said. He leaned over and kissed her, and
then his weight was on top of her and his weight was the cer-
tainty, the salve against all the instability in her life and the strange feeling she’d been having of being too light and loosely tied, made of dandelion feathers. He squeezed her and she
wanted to say “Don’t let go,” wanted to glue herself to him
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so she wouldn’t float away on a breeze. She suddenly under-
stood what Hannah meant about souls hugging.
“I could lie out here forever,” he said.
“Wait, how long have we been here?” She thought of her
friends back at the restaurant, imagined them as she hoped
they’d be, halfway through dinner in their lobster bibs, laughing and talking as they cracked claws, dipping their mini forks in butter, all of their differences set aside.
He looked at his watch. “About forty-five minutes.”
“We should probably get back.”
“Yeah, for sure.”
Neither of them moved.
“Okay. Off we go.”
“Back on the road.”
“It was fun while it lasted.”
“Yep, we should do this again sometime.”
Finally, Maya sat up, looked around at the manicured lawn,
the white lights strung like musical notes across the patio, the glowing ripples of the pool reflected on the house. “It’s pretty here. I can see why Indy liked it.”
“Mmm-hmm,” he said, though he was looking at her and
not the surroundings.
“We should get married here.”
“Indy would’ve loved that. He was a romantic at heart.”
“You think the homeowners would mind?”
“Yes.”
“Then we won’t invite them,” she said.
He smiled, and she was surprised to find that she could
picture it all. She had never actually thought about marriage.
She’d only been teasing. And yet. When she’d said it out
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loud it made sense. There was just something about him…
she didn’t know what.
She’d had too much to drink, that’s what, she decided.
Still, it was sort of fun to think about.
“A fall wedding, I think. Small. Twenty people or so. I
don’t want anything fancy. But I want a pretty dress. I want
to be the prettiest girl you ever saw.”
“You already are.”
“So you’ll marry me, then?”
“Of course,” he said, and he said it just like she had, like
they were merely playing a game—but there was an earnest-
ness beneath the conversation, as if they realized that rescue had come for them both. Blue would hate her for a thought
like that, think it was weak and dependent, but Maya was
starting to think that all people were in need of love’s rescue and women were sometimes just
more honest about it.
Not that this guy meant anything though. She understood
how chemicals worked in the body.
She jumped up, went to the pool, bent down and ran her
fingers through the still water. He followed her.
“I guess you can’t exactly spread the ashes here. That would
be kinda gross for the owners. But any last words for your
pooch?”
He smiled, considered. Their eyes locked for a moment
before they both looked away. “Nah,” he said. “He already
knows.”
“Okay, then, I’ll say something.” She stood, raised an imag-
inary wine glass. “To Indy,” she said, “who always liked to
make a splash.”
She turned and pushed Andy into the water. He pulled her
in behind him, the two of them crashing into blue, coming
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up laughing. The water was warm and rousing. He grabbed
her, kissed her, her stomach whooshing, her heart floating in her chest like a beach ball. Making her forget everything but the moment.
Suddenly the night flared white, spotlights glaring at them
from every direction. They heard a window open in the house.
Their eyes widened as they looked at each other. Then,
giggling quietly, they scrambled to the pool ladder.
The back door flew open. A man was yelling, charging
toward them.
“You goddamn kids!” he shouted, which, at the moment,
they felt like they were, and then they were running across
the patio and scaling the gate, leaving a guilty trail of dripping water behind them.
They reached Andy’s bike and he handed her his jacket be-
fore they both hopped on.
“Go!” Maya yelled happily as she tucked her wet arms into
the sleeves. She clutched his damp back, shivering with cold
and adrenaline, life swelling like a laugh in her throat, ev-
erything pure, simple, fun. Perfectly what she needed. And
two more days lined up like this, a boy and her best friends
and summer on the wind. It was going to happen. Then Blue
would lend her money for the house and everything would
work out okay just like it always did.
“You all right?” Andy shouted over the roar of the motor
as they pulled back onto Montauk Highway.
She was.
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BLUE
Blue paid the check as Renee fired off texts to Maya that went unanswered. “So much for Maya buying dinner,” she said to
Hannah. “Mystery of her disappearance solved.”
She told herself Maya was fine. Hannah had seen her talking
to some guy earlier, and now, knowing Maya, she was prob-
ably off in a secluded area making out with him. Which was all the more annoying considering she’d been cornered into lying to Renee about Jack because Maya had left them alone
together. Oh, it didn’t matter that it had been her choice to lie. She was fully aware that it wasn’t fair to be mad at Maya about that. But she had enough legitimate reasons that she
didn’t mind adding some illegitimate ones to the list. She
should’ve never let Maya drag her on this stupid vacation. And okay, fine, she hadn’t technically been “dragged.” It was another spurious claim, but still, stil . Maya left her with Renee!
Who she didn’t want to share a country with, much less an
evening. And now Blue was stuck dealing with the fallout.
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“I’ll check the parking lot,” she said, throwing a cash tip
on the table.
A sudden sick feeling turned her stomach.
A glimpse of memory, darting like a shadow across her
periphery.
The recall of danger.
“I’ll see if she’s on the dock,” Renee said, nervously fin-
gering the cross around her neck. “Maybe she went into one
of those little stores.”
“I’ll double-check in here,” Hannah said.
A look of dread passed between them.
“She always does crap like this,” Blue said. “I refuse to
worry.”
But she couldn’t help it. That night lived in her. Rose up
like a rogue wave and crashed down in irrational, all-con-
suming terror. She could see it in Renee’s and Hannah’s eyes, too, that quick leap to panic. One night, a few minutes, was
all it took to rewire a brain.
And even back then Maya had been too loose with the
world, too obtuse to its realities.
Even back then.
She didn’t want to think about it. About that creep in her
spine when eighteen-year-old Hannah had said, “I think we’re
lost.” About the way her body had seemed to sense what was
coming.
But no, this was not the same as that. Maya was fine. Ev-
erything was fine.
And yet hadn’t she thought the same thing back then, when
they pulled in to the convenience store that night to get di-
rections? She thought they would be rerouted back to safety.
And instead. Instead.
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God, why didn’t Maya ever learn?
Drunk and high as Blue had been after Check’s party, she
knew enough to force herself sober the minute they’d gotten
lost. And when they’d spotted that convenience store and got
out to ask for directions? Blue had been acutely aware that the neighborhood was unsafe, that they should not draw attention
to themselves. But not Maya. Oh no! She’d been as loud as a
jet engine as she clambered out.
“Who’s buying me a Slurpee?” she’d shouted.
“Shh,” Blue said as they stepped around a homeless man
on their way into the store. She still remembered the way he
swatted at imaginary flies, his wide, electrocuted eyes look-
ing out upon some unknowable horror.
“Who’s buying me a Slurpee?” Maya repeated in a whisper
and then burst out laughing.
Maya got her Slurpee and directions from the cashier and
the girls pushed back out into the night. Blue paused to give the homeless man her change, and that’s when she noticed that another car had joined theirs in the parking lot, a scratchy-looking guy leaning against it, sucking on a cigarette. His two friends sauntered past them into the store. Even before the man spoke, Blue felt something, an antenna standing at attention
inside her, tuning in to some unnamable danger.
“Hey, baby,” he rasped at Maya, his voice perverse, violat-
ing, as if he was rubbing up on her with it.
Blue shot him a look of disgust and he laughed. His smile
was a jack-o’-lantern’s, his rotted, broken teeth suggesting
the meth pipe. He stuck out his arm and grabbed Maya’s ass
as she went by.
Blue wanted to say something, punch his ugly face, but
alarm bells sounded in her head. She was too aware of where
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they were—lost. How dark
the night was—crow black and
underlit. How vulnerable four girls alone would be inside it.
“Ignore it,” she said, pushing Maya toward the car.
“Fuck that,” Maya said. “He doesn’t get to put his nasty
hands on me.” She shook free of Blue, turned to the guy. “Listen, needle dick—”
“Ooh yeah!” the man said, cackling. “I like ’em with a lit-
tle fight.” He grabbed his crotch. “Whatchyou got for me,
little girl?”
“Maya!” Blue said. “Come on.”
Maya squared up on him. “Keep talking and I’ll knock out
your last tooth.”
The man licked his lips. And again that laugh—it sent a shiver up Blue’s spine, the way it had a slime to it, slick with hate. She turned and moved faster toward the car, pushing Maya in front of her. She shoved her into the back seat and scrambled into
the front. Turned to Hannah. “Let’s get the hell out of he—”
“Blue! Watch out!”
Blue turned as a blur of greasy hair and rotten teeth lurched toward her. She yanked the door closed just as his grimy hands slammed down on the glass in front of her face.
He went for the door handle.
Hannah dove for the locks.
“Go!” Blue cried.
Hannah fumbled to get the key in the ignition. “I’m trying!”
“Fuck, Hannah, go!” Maya said.
He pounded on the window so hard the car shook.
Renee leaped forward, blasting the horn to alert the store
clerk. Blue saw it draw the attention of the man’s friends instead. They turned and pointed, abandoning their stuff as they ran for the door.
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“Oh my god,” she said.
Hannah was fishing around on the floor.
“What are you doing?” Blue said.
“I dropped the keys!”
The man made a lewd gesture with his tongue, rattled the
door handle as Hannah scrambled for them in the darkness.
“Shit.”
He pressed his face against the window, baring that nasty
shattered-glass smile.
“Hurry!” Blue shouted.
“Shut up!” Hannah cried.
His friends reached the car just as Hannah found the keys,
got them in the ignition. One creep pounded the hood. She
slammed the car in reverse. Screeched out of the parking lot.
“Jesus,” Hannah said. “Is everyone okay?”
“We’re fine,” Maya said. “Everyone’s fine. Those slimeballs
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