Pine Cottage, 6:18 p.m.
Quincy and Janelle stood in the cabin’s kitchen area, separated from the great room by a waist-high counter. It was Janelle’s suggestion that each of them prepare some aspect of dinner. A surprise, seeing how the most elaborate thing Quincy had ever seen her cook was ramen noodles.
“Maybe we should just roast hot dogs,” Quincy had said when they were planning the weekend. “We’re camping, after all.”
“Hot dogs?” Janelle replied, affronted. “Not on my birthday.”
So there they were, colliding with Amy and Betz, who had been tasked with the main course of roast chicken and several side dishes. Quincy was on cake duty, and she had lugged along an entire bag of baking tools to use for the occasion. A cake pan. All the necessary ingredients. An icing bag with detachable tips. Yes, Janelle’s mother and stepfather had paid for the cabin rental, but Quincy was determined to earn her keep in cake.
Janelle had an easy job—bartender. While Betz and Amy fussed with the chicken and Quincy decorated the cake, she set out several bottles of liquor. The large, cheap kind that came in plastic jugs and were meant to be poured into red Solo cups, of which Janelle had brought plenty.
“How long are you going to let Joe stay?” Quincy whispered to her.
“As long as he likes,” Janelle whispered back.
“Like, all night? Seriously?”
“Sure,” Janelle said. “It’s getting late and there’s plenty of room. It could be fun.”
Quincy disagreed. So did everyone else, in their own muted way. Even Joe, with his odd cadences and filthy glasses that clouded his eyes, seemed unenthused by the idea.
“Has it occurred to you that Joe might want to go home?” Quincy said. “Isn’t that right, Joe?”
Their unexpected guest sat on the threadbare couch in the great room, watching Craig and Rodney kneel in front of the cavernous fireplace and bicker over the best way to start a fire. Realizing he was being addressed, he looked Quincy’s way, startled.
“I don’t want to be a bother,” he said.
“It’s no bother,” Janelle assured him. “Unless you have somewhere you need to be.”
“I don’t.”
“And you’re hungry, right?”
Joe shrugged. “I guess.”
“We’ve got plenty of food and drink. Plus we have a couch, not to mention an extra bed.”
“We also have a car,” Quincy said. “Full of cell phones. Craig could call a tow truck or drive him anywhere he needs to go. You know, like back to his own car. Or his house.”
“Which will take hours. Besides, maybe Joe wants to join the party.” Janelle looked his way, hoping he’d second that thought. “Now that we’re all friends.”
“Technically, he’s still a stranger,” Quincy said.
Janelle flashed the exasperated look she always got when she thought Quincy was being a goody-goody. Quincy saw that same expression before both her only sip of beer and her single hit of a joint. In both instances, Janelle had used sheer force of will to coax her into doing something she didn’t want to do.
Now, though, Janelle’s frustration was amplified by the situation. Everything about the weekend—the cabin, her birthday, the absence of oversight of any kind—made her slightly manic. She was like a kid on Christmas Day, hyper from presents and sugar cookies.
“We’re here to have fun, right?” she said. There was something accusing about the way she said it, as if she suspected she was the only one there intent on a good time. “So let’s. Have. Fun.”
That seemed to settle it. Joe would be staying as long as he liked. The birthday girl again got her wish.
“What’s your poison?” Janelle asked Joe once the makeshift bar was complete.
He blinked at the bottles, alternately confused and dazzled by the choices. “I-I don’t really drink.”
“Seriously?” Janelle said. “Like, not at all?”
“Yes.” He frowned. “I mean no.”
“Well, which is it?”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to drink,” Quincy said, again the voice of reason, the angel perpetually perched on Janelle’s shoulder. “Maybe, like me, Joe prefers to maintain control over his mental faculties.”
“You don’t drink because you’re a wuss,” Janelle told her. “Joe’s not. Isn’t that right?”
“It’s just—I’ve never tried it,” Joe said.
“Not even with your friends?”
Joe stammered, trying to push out a response. But it was too late. Janelle pounced.
“What? No friends, either?”
“I have friends,” Joe said, a prickle in his voice.
“A girlfriend?” Janelle asked, teasing.
“Maybe. I-I don’t know what she is.”
Behind Quincy, Betz whispered, “Imaginary is my guess.”
Janelle glared at her before turning back to Joe, saying, “Then you’ll have quite a story to tell the next time you see her.”
She began to pour, splashing liquor from several bottles into a cup and filling it the rest of the way with orange juice. She took the cup to Joe, forcing his fingers around the red plastic.
“Drink up.”
Joe tipped his face toward the cup instead of the other way around, his nose dipping bird-like beneath the rim. A cough rose from inside the cup. His first sip. When he came up for air, his eyes were wide and goofy.
“It’s okay,” he said.
“Okay? You totally love it,” Janelle replied.
Joe smacked his lips together. “It’s too sweet.”
“I can fix that.” Janelle grabbed the cup from his hands as quickly as she had put it into them. Then she was back at the bar, snatching a lemon and searching her work area.
“Does anyone have a knife?”
She spotted one on the counter, a carving knife intended for the chicken Amy and Betz were preparing. Grabbing it, Janelle pushed it into the lemon, slicing through peel, pulp and, ultimately, her finger.
“Dammit!”
At first, Quincy thought she was being dramatic for Joe’s sake. Giving him what the rest of them had dubbed “The Janelle Show” behind her back. But then she saw the blood pumping from Janelle’s finger, spilling over the paper napkin pressed against it, littering the counter in drops the size of rose petals.
“Ow,” Janelle whimpered, tears forming. “Ouch, owie, ow.”
Quincy swooped in behind her, cooing, performing her roommate-appointed duty to soothe. “It’ll be okay. Lift your hand. Put pressure on it.”
She flailed around the kitchen, searching for a first-aid kit while Janelle hopped from foot to foot, wincing at the sight of all that blood. “Hurry,” she urged.
Quincy found a tin of Band-Aids beneath the sink. The old-fashioned kind with a hinged, flip-top lid. So old she couldn’t remember the last time she had a similar pack in her own house. She grabbed the biggest Band-Aid she could find and wrapped it around Janelle’s finger, begging her to hold still.
“All done,” Quincy said, backing away, hands raised. “You’re good as new.”
The drama lured Joe off the couch. He hovered nearby, watching Janelle examine her bandaged finger. He lowered his gaze to the knife on the counter and its blood-splotched blade.
“That looks sharp,” he said, picking up the knife and touching the pad of his index finger against its tip. “You need to be more careful.”
He stared at Janelle and Quincy, as if seeking assurances that they would be. Beads of liquid clung to his bottom lip—remnants of his first cocktail. He wiped them away with the back of his hand and, knife still in his grip, licked his lips.