So the Monday after we found him, an angsty day at the end of March, David texted Sarah, “Time to talk?” and Sarah replied with no fewer than two exclamations and three questions, saying effectively, yes, absolutely. David, adrenaline running high at the effusiveness of her response, customarily answered one of those questions, and that afternoon they met at Sarah’s house after school. They went up to her bedroom because they weren’t adults yet and the living room seemed like too formal a place to talk, as if they were going to divide up land or furniture. David made a tactical decision and took the desk chair, Sarah sat on the bed. The walls had recently been painted a dusty blue to Sarah’s specifications, and the new color still felt untested, alien.

After a while David ran his hand through his unmanaged curly hair and said he’d had a lot on his mind lately, as if in apology for their lack of contact.

Sarah sensed an opportunity to help out, but she didn’t want to assume it was about her. “What is it?”

He fretted and swiveled back and forth in the chair, one sweaty hand clamped on the armrest. He was demonstrably nervous. Sarah thought about putting her mouth on the armrest after he’d gone. “I guess I’ve been hanging out with these people lately? We’ve been spending a lot of time together.”

“Which people? Like Collin and them?” David’s sporadic collection of stoner-y acquaintances; she never understood if they were properly friends, or merely around.

He looked confused. “No, like a group … It’s not really kids from Adena.”

“What kind of a group?”

“It’s kind of like a society. Like you have to pass these tests to get in, it’s pretty strict. But, Sarah”—she wasn’t used to him saying her name, thus the moment felt staged—“it’s so addicting, the atmosphere. You should come sometime.”

There was that word again, society. Sarah tried to ignore the fact that David’s other hand was resting absently on his crotch, as was his habit, an easy correction to make but she didn’t have the heart for that, not as friends. “What do you do there?” she asked.

He pushed himself up in the chair, let out a breath indicating to Sarah that he had prepared for this, he wanted to spill, and then David, groin in hand, told her exactly what they did.