The one incident from that second summer that stuck out—that was embedded in her brain, actually—was the one that ultimately brought the whole thing down and sent her, Fitz and Corey on a hellish premature trip across the brown back of Mexico, up into the featureless flats of Texas and on through the heart of the Deep South to the frigid waters of the Jersey Shore, where there were no palm trees, no margaritas and, worst of all, no sessions in the lifeguard tower, no sessions at all. It was a disaster and it broke her heart—and Corey’s too, Corey’s more than anybody’s. He’d looked forward to Mexico all winter, talking about nothing but the fish, the iguanas, the tacos and taquitos and Soldados de Chocolate and laying out an elaborate schedule of what he was going to do on the first day and the second day and so on. And she was as eager as he was, the winter hanging like a gray sheet over Boston, her waitressing job not only exhausting but a humiliation too (they’d filled her position at the library and her supervisor was very sorry but they had nothing else for her at the moment) and their apartment even more cramped, drafty and depressing than the one they’d given up. She’d tried not to be bitter. She slogged through her days thinking of Mexico and only that. And then what? They no sooner got there than the whole thing came crashing down—and why? Because Tim was a jerk, that was why. Because Tim never listened to a word anybody said. Because he thought he was God.

The problem was publicity—too much publicity. If it was up to her, which it wasn’t and never would be, she would have kept things quiet, contained, with access limited to the circle of people who really counted, but that wasn’t the way Tim saw things. Restraint wasn’t in his vocabulary. He was a promoter, an impresario, a showboat, giving lectures around the country on the benefits of mind expansion, writing articles, sitting for interviews, always talking, talking, talking. He hired a PR firm to publicize the summer sessions and roped Fitz into writing up the prospectus, and people responded, all the sessions fully subscribed, which would have been fine, just fine, but for the explosion of negative press, beginning with headlines like HARVARD DRUG PROF FIRED AND PARADISE IN MEXICO—2 FIRED HARVARD PROFS OPEN COMMUNAL HOTEL and finally just devolving to DRUG HOTEL and TRIPPING ON THE BEACH. None of the articles mentioned science, therapy, the quest for knowledge, breaking set or lifting imprints, but only drug use, topless women and promiscuous sex. All of which was true, of course, but in a way the sensationalists could never have imagined.