There were probably snakes burrowed in the coils by now, but I sat down on it anyway. It felt rather new, as in left in the last few years for sure, maybe even within the year—the desert aged everything prematurely. I leaned back and stared up at the sky. Sweat beaded down my back, and I had started to feel dizzy from the sun. When I heard the distant buzz of an ATV, I knew it was time to get back to the house. I didn’t want to interrupt anyone’s trip to the sex couch, but its presence reinforced my belief that anything could happen out here.

WHEN I GOT BACK to the cabin, I went about doing what I always did: looking through the items left behind by both the owner and previous guests. Usually, it was boring stuff, like half-used soy sauce, hot cocoa mix, and hotel-sized bath items. I went through my own things and found my weed pen, but when I attempted to take a hit I found that it had finally gone empty. A panic set in, and I started playing with my wedding ring.

I hadn’t taken it off yet, but at least it was no longer on my ring finger. I wasn’t trying to hold on to Bobby or anything; it just didn’t feel right to take off the nicest thing I owned. After I went to Bobby’s apartment, since I didn’t want people to think I was still married, I’d moved it to the opposite ring finger. In the cabin, while I thought about how I was going to get a new weed pen, I moved the ring to my middle finger. A finger it did not fit.

I was also just about finished with a bottle of wine, so jamming the ring past my knuckle felt like no big deal.

I watched headlights pass over my cabin’s front windows. I watched them train their light on the house for a while. I looked through my purse for pepper spray in case someone was going to try to get inside. The car finally drove away, leaving the cabin once again ensconced in darkness. I went to bed after checking every window and door twice. I waited to hear desert night sounds, but all I heard was the wind. This was the desert for me—vast and free in the light, terrifying and claustrophobic in the dark.