Tim went into his spiel then, selling the place like a real estate agent, rhapsodizing over the weather, the sun, the crystalline sea that was warm as a bath and completely untouched so that the snorkeling was as good as you could find anywhere in the world. He was talking to the room, but kept breaking off to address him directly. (“Have you been snorkeling, Fitz, really snorkeling? And I don’t mean in the ice tank off Martha’s Vineyard, because the fish, the colors, the shapes, the whole thing down there is a trip in itself, believe me.”) He talked about what they could achieve too, free of constraints, free to vary dosages and just lie back and trip as often as they wanted in order to see if they could attain a kind of group consciousness like the communards in Huxley’s new novel (“Island, Fitz—have you read it? No? Read it. Now. Tonight”) who developed higher powers through the use of moksha, a kind of next-generation psychedelic.

The sombrero shaded his face, but his teeth gleamed in the grip of his closer’s smile. After a while, it became apparent that not only had the others already heard Tim’s appeal but had come to a decision, all of them, Ken and Fanchon, Charlie and Rick—and presumably Charlie’s and Rick’s wives and kids too. They were going to Mexico for summer vacation. They were going to live an idyll right out of a Huxley novel. And further the research into the bargain.

Ten minutes later, Tim seemed finally to run out of breath—or change tactics. He leaned into the desk, poured more tequila all around—for Fitz too, even though he tried to put a hand over his cup and say no—and then he raised his cup to propose a toast before apparently thinking better of it. “Wait, wait,” he said, the thread balls writhing and dancing under the brim of his hat. “We can’t really toast the summer camp until we have unanimity here. Right? What do you say, Fitz?”

He wasn’t caught by surprise because he could see all along where this was going and he didn’t draw back because what he was hearing was irresistible and so very, very right. To hell with the Jersey Shore and the way Joanie’s father looked at him as if he were a form of light entertainment (“Psychology? Don’t you have to be certifiable to study that?”). Mexico was a shining dream. The whole inner circle was going. How could he say no? How could he even think of it? But then, even as everybody’s eyes fixed on him and Tim held the cup at half-mast, he thought of finances—reality, that is. “But,” he stammered, “I’d like to—nothing I’d rather do. I’m flattered, I am, but we can’t afford—I mean, the whole summer?”