I burped and gagged.

“You want a wastebasket?” Fellis said. He got up from the bed.

Again, I burped and gagged.

“Yeah,” he said. “Let me get you a wastebasket.”

. . .

I woke up to the sounds of Beth’s cooking—the sizzling of a pan and the opening of the fridge. The red-lit clock read eight, and I sat up. Fellis was asleep on the floor, about an arm’s reach away. The wastebasket was at my side. It was empty. I threw the blankets off me and dressed. The bottoms of my jeans were damp and cold and muddy. I dug around the floor for my lockbox that held my methadone. It was under a pile of dirty clothes. I opened it and took out my last bottle of that pink drink and sipped it slow like coffee.

I crossed the hall to the bathroom and I glanced at Beth in the kitchen. She was bent over and picking something off the floor.

In the bathroom, I peed and washed my face. I scrubbed my hands with soap three times. I turned the shower on but didn’t shower. Sitting on the toilet, hands in my face, I said out loud, “That motherfucker better be alive.”

The hallway floor creaked and creaked. A door opened and closed. Silence. I flushed the toilet and went out into the hall. Beth had gone into her room. In the kitchen, bacon spat in a hot skillet and eggs fried in another. The kitchen smelled of pepper and grease. I put on my jacket and laced my shoes. Fellis’s Jordans were caked in mud.

The sun was hot gold in a cool sky. I hurried, cutting through the woods—I saw one beer from the ripped bag, but left it. I passed the community building and pond and food pantry and church. Father Tim was opening the double doors and I didn’t say “Father,” just passed by him and walked to the bridge, and halfway over I glanced back and saw no Father. A wind had blown shut the church doors he had opened.

I walked slow to where he’d been left, and I made sure no cars were coming when I dipped into the woods. I kept my head down, watching the ground, not wanting to know. Finally, I had to look. Meekew was gone, but an imprint of where he’d been remained in the mud next to the river, and the great heap of earth Fellis had covered him with was scattered about. I wondered how long it would stay that way.

In the mud was Fellis’s iPhone. I picked it up. It was wet. The screen was smeared, and I tried to turn it on but it was dead. I thought about skipping it like a rock over the river, but then I’d have to tell Fellis that I didn’t find it, and he’d be convinced that Meekew took it.

Halfway back to Fellis’s house I was feeling sick again. I made it to his road, and up a ways something brown waddled over the sidewalk and into the woods. Money. I crossed the street and then ran after the porcupine, split through dense pine trees, and as I chased it, following its sound of crunching leaves, I had to stop and crouch down and puke. I spat. My head throbbed, and when I stood and wiped my mouth on my sleeve I heard nothing but a dull ringing in my ears.