Jane walked in with Darya, and we waved her over. ‘Darya, where were you last night? We did brownies. It was horrible!’

‘You did? Brownies suck. I did them when I was like, fifteen, with my cousins, and it was seriously like, no, never again.’

‘Why, what happened with you?’

‘It was like, kind of, I couldn’t hold on to a single thought, you know? And so many things were happening. It was fucking scary.’

We came to the conclusion that pot was not for people who already had a lot going through their heads. We were too smart to smoke pot. That was the story.

But I tried it again. And it was better the second time, so I took a bong rip at the next party too. It got fantastic. I could finally reach the sublime truth of The Killers’ beats, could finally feel the complete force of Titus Andronicus.

It made so much sense to keep lowering myself into the columns of glass-covered smoke, to make it a daily ritual. It kept the nights shorter—which was very important.

Darya reached for the Funyuns and knocked the bong over. The foggy water spilled all over the beige carpet. Thomas laughed. I knew he had to be as high as I felt because sober Thomas would never laugh at a mess he’d have to clean up later.

She squealed. ‘Theooo Thomasssss! I’m sorry, do you hate me?’

‘Naw, pumpkin, I can never hate you! You’re my pet! My little pet! Beepbeepbeepbeep.’

‘Oh my God, tamagotchis? I used to love them!’

‘Yes! Me too! I still have like twenty of them in the basement back home.’

I had to ask, the question was burning a hole in my throat. Speaking took a lot of effort, though, so it was a while before I said, ‘Is it that little thing, with the keychain and the little screen?’

‘Yeah, tamagotchis! Did you guys not have them?’

‘No, but I met someone who did, once.’

On many weekends, I would eat spaghetti minus the meatballs and watch home videos with Thomas’s family. He asked me in an aside whether I was bored. I said, no, watching him as a kid made me laugh. He accepted that answer with a grin and some comment I didn’t hear. Thomas and his sister dancing to the Backstreet Boys and screaming down Slip ’N Slides on screen was making my skin rise in little bumps. It’s a distorted sort of familiar, a past I lived but didn’t live.

I could’ve told Thomas this. I told him a lot of weird shit. And I knew all his weird shit. But I couldn’t bring myself to say it. These longings felt too shameful, too private, to be shared as confessional bonding. I felt like a thief, and these spoils were mine.