Last-minute shoppers swarmed through the corridors of the mall: frenzied people quickly bouncing from store to store with bags in their hands. The buttery smell of toasted almonds, coated in cinnamon sugar, was laced through the air. Aria wove her way through the crowd to get outside the building behind the food court. She waited until no one was passing by and grabbed the first thing that her hands could reach out of the dumpster. It was a styrofoam takeaway box with a divvy of partially eaten lo mein noodles. Instead of standing there, she took them to a corner of the bustling parking lot and ate them with her hands. Whoever had finished the first portion of the noodles had drowned them in soy and sriracha hot sauce. It made her mouth and stomach burn, but she ate them anyway before heading back to the car lot.

Luke woke them up in the morning by knocking his elbow against the glass. In his hands, he was precariously holding two paper cups full of instant hot cocoa. He had taken the packets and cups from a bank office three days before with Christmas morning in mind. Like almost everyone else, Luke had nowhere to go this Christmas. But in typical fashion, he had taken it upon himself to prevent them all from sinking into sorrow.

Taylor opened the door and took the cups from him. “Merry Christmas. It’s cocoa,” Luke announced. “I’ll be back in a second.”

Taylor handed one of the cups to Aria. It was so hot that the film of wax on the outside of the cup began to come loose on her hands. They watched Luke go back into his tent and carry little cups to every person in the car lot, except for Ciarra, Aston and Mike, who had been gone for two days to visit a relative somewhere in Hemet, California. When he got around to Anthony’s tarp, Anthony refused to respond. He was not asleep; he simply didn’t move. He stayed where he was, lying on his stomach, staring off into a chasm of depression that only he could see. Luke placed the cup of cocoa in front of his face, where it stood the least chance of being knocked over but where he would be forced to see it.

Luke came back to the Land Cruiser with his own cup of cocoa and Palin in tow. They both got into the back seat with Aria, forcing her to slide over to one side. “Mmmm, a subtle note of cherry, maybe some oak and definitely some chocolate undertones,” he said, jokingly sipping his cocoa as if impersonating a wine sommelier.