Marina didn’t respond to the email. Sylvie used to send her links to Instagram flyers for events around campus: mixers for grad students in the humanities, a “queer and trans clothing swap” at the one gay bar, themed happy hours. This was just like that, exactly like that.

On Friday, she got back from work and realized that she would, despite herself, regret it if she didn’t go. It was better than nothing, and nothing else was going on, and she knew barely anyone else in this town. Wading into her barely unpacked bedroom, she found her one good dress and some lipstick in the bottom of a suitcase, gritted her teeth as she made herself pretty while leaning over the bathroom sink.

An hour later she got off the bus on the other side of town and followed the map on her phone to a short, dead-end street. The sun had just slipped out of sight. In the few lit windows in the suburban bungalows, couples watched TV and families ate dinner. Light and the smell of smoke came from the backyard of the house on the corner, hidden by a tall wooden fence. She took slow steps down the street, examining each house, before arriving at a big, tall Victorian mansion at the end of the street.

She double-checked the address and then stood there, dis-believing, until a pair of men came around the mansion from the side yard and walked past her, seeming not to notice. She went on standing there. When they were almost out of sight, one of them turned around and called out, “it’s around back, honey.”

She opened the gate and shuffled cautiously around the house. Sure enough, just behind the side yard there was a lower building with a separate driveway — an old, two-story carriage house under the shadow of a few big, twisted trees. Purple light and electronic music came out of the windows. The heavy double doors on one side were flung open and small groups of people stood in the gravel in front of them. Marina walked past them without saying a word and stood in the entryway.

Inside was one long room with a kitchen at one end. A couple dozen people — young, queerish, wearing flannels and jeans or big skirts and hoop earrings — milled around, sitting on each other’s laps or leaning against walls, gesturing with drinks in their hands, drifting around, never alone. No one seemed to pay much attention to her as she stood there, chewing on the end of a strand of hair and looking around the room for anyone she knew. Watching the motion of the crowd, a familiar feeling of immobility settled in her. She willed herself to take a step forward, then another one.