“What did I just say?” said Touch—but Ros and I were already out of the car.

The cabin was a darkly shingled A-frame cottage with an overgrown lawn and cinder-block steps, a twisted tree in the front yard with a hollow big enough to hide in. Ros and I barreled past Touch as he unlocked the front door. A full tour might’ve taken a normal person three minutes; Ros and I, hopped up on independence and gas-station snacks, saw the whole place in thirty-five seconds flat. Downstairs, a living room with a picture window that went all the way to the ceiling, with a view of the river; a potbellied pellet stove; a kitchenette. A bathroom and what would be our room, Ros’s and mine, a single tiny room off the kitchenette with matching army cots, the space between the beds narrow enough that our knees would touch if we sat on our beds at the same time. The place was furiously green, houseplants stashed in every corner, some even taller than we were, some so small they could fit on a fingertip. We squealed like pigs. We jumped up and down. We could hardly believe our luck.

Up the stairs—a spiral staircase, a death trap, especially if you took the stairs two at a time, as we did now—was Touchstone’s room, which was really more like a sleeping nook in a grown-up, rococo tree house than a true bedroom, with a bedspread that looked like Persian rugs and a deep blue velvet headboard and pillows, endless pillows, so many that Ros and I each snatched one for our beds downstairs and there were still enough to build a pillow fort that was more like a castle.

In the kitchenette, Touchstone called his uncle-who-was-not-his-uncle—Hi, Henry, it’s Andrew, we made it, yup, we’ve found the plant-care dossier—while Ros and I made faces at him and tried our feverish best to remember how his uncle-who-was-not-his-uncle was related to him, which had become our favorite game since we’d found out we’d be staying at the cabin.

“Okay—the cabin belongs to Henry, and Henry isn’t related to Touchstone.…”

“Henry is cousins with Freddie!” said Ros.

“No, he was married to Freddie,” I said.

“And Freddie was Touchstone’s second cousin?”

“Or Freddie’s mom was Touchstone’s second cousin?” I said.

“Yes—the mom—but there’s a divorce in there somewhere!”

“We can’t forget the divorce!”

“Can you two shut up?” Touchstone hissed.

We cackled and continued to run around gleefully, now noticing details we hadn’t before: the outrageously opulent stained-glass chandelier; the heavy leather high-backed chairs; the antique trunk full of plush blankets we draped around our shoulders like cloaks worn by royalty; the crowded art, the sepia-painted wooded landscapes and prints of peacocks and a quail; and an actual stuffed pheasant standing on a little ledge built into the wall.