Audrey said, “I have a dead mom, too.”

The way she said it, so casually, struck me as funny and I laughed without meaning to.

“What?” she said.

“I’m sorry. You make it seem like such a normal thing to have, when you put it that way: I have an apartment, I have a cheese sandwich. I have a dead mom.”

“Yeah,” she said. “I have a pair of scissors, an accordion, a Dolce handbag.”

“Why do you have an accordion?”

“I found it in my place when I moved in,” she said. “What, you don’t?”

“No,” I said, “but I have a CIA coffee mug that I found in my apartment.”

“Close enough.”

“It was weird. It was on the floor of the bedroom closet.”

“That’s where spies always keep their dishes.”

“What happened, with your mom?” I said.

“It was years ago. She had cancer. How did yours die?”

“OD’d,” I said. “Prescriptions.”

“That sucks.”

“It’s weird,” I said. “It’s not like she took care of me. And it’s not because I miss her. I mean, I miss her, sure. But that’s not what bothers me. It’s like now there’s no buffer between me and . . . I guess everything.”

Audrey nodded. “Exactly,” she said. “You’re alone.”

“You’re alone,” I said. “And you’re going to die.”

Our little encampment under the umbrella seemed haunted. Danielle huddled in on one side, my mom on the other.

“It’s like you’re next,” Audrey said.

“Yeah, as if it goes in order. Stupid to think that way.”

“It’s not stupid. I mean it feels true, right? But you don’t have to be scared of it. It can make you free.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“If you’re going to die no matter what, you can do whatever you want. Nothing matters.”

I wished I could believe that; it would make things easier.

“Nothing matters? Do you really think that?” I said. “There’s nothing you care about?”

“That’s not what I’m saying. I’m saying you can do anything you want.”

“So what do you want to do?”

“I don’t know. More blow.”

She took my arm and we walked through the bar into the alcove of restrooms. Audrey pulled me into a stall and brought out the coke. With one more bump the world drifted from the stream of regular existence. I loved the separateness of it. I opened the stall door. Black granite covered the floor, the walls, the counter of sinks. The polished surface reflected light but the darkness underneath sucked it in. I watched the struggle between the stone and its sheen, like a tug-of-war, pulsating. I smelled the cocaine in my nostrils, a plastic bitterness that repulsed me if I gave it any thought. Back at the picnic table I was jittery, excited. The music played louder. We had to be close in order to hear.

“I saw one of your movies,” I said. I heard my voice shaking.

“You did? Which one?”

Haltingly, I described the video of Danielle and Audrey together.