I clipped the baby monitor to the thin plastic belt around my waist and made my way slowly back down the stairs. Many of the guests had left by now. Lonnie had finally stopped pushing drinks and was lounging on the leather sofa, slumped into it. She was trying to take a drink from a champagne coupe without sitting up, moving the glass very slowly toward her mouth, giggling a little, her hand shaking with the effort of not spilling. She was sitting alone, so I walked over and lowered myself down gently next to her.

“I put William to bed,” I said. “He’s asleep.”

She didn’t move the glass away from her mouth even after she’d stopped slurping at the bubbling liquid. She nodded, a vacant smile beneath the coupe. When the glass finally detached from her mouth she passed it over to me, and I grabbed it with both hands, narrowly avoiding the drink sloshing onto my dress.

“Try it,” she said. “Have you tried it? You have to catch up now.”

I put my mouth over the faint smudge of coconut oil from her lips and sipped, then gulped the rest of the drink down. Lonnie watched me, still smiling.

“It’s good,” I told her. “It’s very good.”

My lips glided against each other. She rested her head on my shoulder.

“There’s something about you I really love, Elle,” she said. “I don’t know what it is about you, but I really love you.”

I had a desperate urge to believe her, while at the same time a thought came unbidden and unexpected in its strength: I might hate you. Carlow approached before I could respond. He handed Lonnie a crown of flowers taped together with green florist tape. She gasped. “What is this?”

“A birthday crown,” he said. “Put it on. But be careful, I used one of your wire hangers as a base and the hook is still sticking out under the flowers.”

“You made this?” Lonnie exclaimed.

“I used your flowers,” he said. “I took some from a vase.”

“These are my flowers!” Lonnie said as she put the crown on. Carlow leaned over and adjusted the wire, molding it to the shape of her head.

The creamy blush of the petals offset her complexion in a way that made her look soft and dreamy in the candlelight.

“I want to see,” she said, taking the crown off and passing it over to me. “Put it on so I can see what I look like.”

I placed the crown on my head and turned to face her, a potent floral scent swimming around me. The wire fit snugly against my skull. We stared at each other.

“You used the moonflowers from the terrace too!” Lonnie said. “This is a dangerous crown! Wire hook and poisonous flowers!”