“Well played,” Cammie says, pulling a lidded plastic cup out of the cooler and shaking ice water off it. She peels the lid off and tips the cup back. When the shot doesn’t shake loose, she plunges her tongue in dramatically and runs it around to free the Jell-O.

“Gross,” Erin says to Cammie, laughing.

“Dibs on the first massage,” Cammie says, plopping on the floor in front of Syd, who is still messing with her phone.

“Just a sec,” Syd says, petting Cammie’s hair absently. Cammie leans her head back into Syd’s lap, smiling with her eyes closed. Erin settles in on Syd’s other side, cross-legged, and feeds Syd a Jell-O shot. Syd is trying to work her phone at the same time, and she’s laughing, her mouth open, her head tipped back. Finally Erin sticks her finger into the Jell-O to loosen it and slides it into Syd’s mouth, then licks her finger. They’re all laughing.

And I’m just watching. Thinking.

We are all so affectionate, so tactile. So comfortable. We have a whole history of hair play and massages and cuddle puddles. Touching, so much touching. And then there’s Sam, who could barely handle a hug. Is it because of her home life, her history? Or because she likes girls? I never considered that things like hugs and touching might be confusing to her for that kind of reason.

I glance up as a flash of glinting red appears in front of my face.

“Zo?” Erin holds out a Jell-O shot.

Alcohol. I hesitate only briefly. “Sure,” I say. I tip the Jell-O shot back, and the flavors explode. “Wow, those are good,” I say after I swallow. “I can barely taste the alcohol.”

I slurp down another. Erin goes downstairs and comes back with soda and buttered popcorn, which we devour. As we talk and laugh and rub shoulders and braid hair, I work my way through all the flavors of the Jell-O shots, and then I repeat the ones I like best. The more of them I have, the less I care about how many I’m having. It feels like a small consolation on a truly crappy day. No, a shit day. A fucking shit day.