Briggs has a son older than me! He got some girl camper pregnant. Here. How? On purpose, or did the Reverend mate them at some point? I mouth a quick, silent prayer that Nightlight’s program doesn’t include forcing us to have sex. When they ask you to be my husband, say yes. Darcy’s note reverberates in my head. I can’t stop picturing nightmare scenarios:

Darcy and me, in bed together while Briggs and the Reverend watch with notepads in hand.

Darcy, pregnant.

Me, a deadbeat gay dad, with one official child and one unofficial one.

My mom, jubilant that her son is a trailer trash teen dad through multiple women, but at least he’s not getting sexed in the butt.

How do I begin to write about Avery, a boy who isn’t mine, in my Expulsion notebook, never mind read it aloud to a room? And what sins did Ricky Hannigan surrender in that office? He collected too many Playbills?

On autopilot, I follow Briggs’s orders and step through the draping palms that had earlier engulfed Ramona and Molly. The brutal, wet heat dissipates, and I emerge into a blissfully shaded hollow where a mobile home crouches like a hermit. This home is larger than any trailer I’ve ever seen; a creature made of iron and plywood squats among waist-high underbrush, as massive as a shipping container.

Inside the home, everyone waits for me—and for a moment, I forget I’m on an island. A comfortable, suburban living room has been constructed within the mobile home, complete with a solid oak coffee table, a sofa smothered with throw pillows, and a circular rug to tie the whole visual together. I gravitate to Molly’s side with the pull of a magnet. She offers me a paper cup of water and a weary smile. The water evaporates the moment it reaches my tongue, and I return Molly’s glum expression. Her eyelids have drooped heavier since I left her; Ramona’s introduction to Expulsion wasn’t any more pleasant than Briggs’s. What was Molly’s Expulsion story, anyway? What was her version of “You Can’t Come Home Until You Support Your Mom’s Life-Destroying Conspiracy Theory”?

In front of the coffee table, Ramona clasps her hands and greets us: “Now that we’re all here, welcome to my two newcomers. This will be your first course of Home Life Behavior.”

“‘Miss Manners,’ they call her,” Molly whispers. Miss Manners is definitely a more fitting name than Ramona, but all I need to know is where she keeps her taser. It must be in a garter belt. Where else could she keep one inside that hideous dress?