Okay. Vansh patted his shoulder. “It’s fine, I wasn’t  . . .”

Hari buried his head into his elbow on the table and started sobbing so hard his shoulders bounced.

Vansh looked around. There was no one close enough to notice. For a few minutes, Hari just cried and Vansh just patted his arm and made reassuring sounds, trying to calm him down without embarrassing him.

Without warning, Hari sat up and threw an accusatory glare at the empty champagne flutes. “It’s really good juice. I’ve never had juice this good ever. I think all that sugar is making me sick.”

“Actually that’s not . . . never mind, I’m glad you liked it. Did you drive here?”

Another sob spurted out of Hari. “I don’t have a car.” More hiccupping sobs. “Do you think they’ll care if I get another glass?”

He tried to stand.

Vansh tugged him back as gently as he could. “That’s probably not a great idea. And it’s okay. I don’t have a car either.” Maybe he shouldn’t have said that. Was that a terrible privileged-person thing to say, given that he had access to seven Teslas in his family alone? “I’m sorry,” he said.

Hari slipped him a quick sideways glance, then looked away again. “You’re so nice. You’re even nicer than your brother, and I don’t know anyone who’s nicer than Yash.”

“Same. I don’t know anyone nicer than Yash either. Listen. Do you have a friend who can drive you home? Or I can arrange for something. That orange juice, it was—”

Hari started weeping again. He pressed his face back into his elbow. “No one can drive me home. I don’t have a home.” As soon as the words left his mouth he sprang upright and pressed a hand to his mouth and jumped out of his chair again.

And teetered on his feet. Again.

“Here, let me help you.” Vansh grabbed his arm and walked him to the alcove behind the pool house, where he forced him to drink a bottle of water, which Hari promptly threw up into the bushes by the pool, hopefully also expelling some of the alcohol he had consumed.

“Am I sick?” the poor man asked miserably. “Am I going to die?”

“We’re all going to die someday,” Vansh mumbled, then said, “Actually, that orange juice . . . it wasn’t just orange juice.”

“But it tasted exactly like orange juice,” Hari said with equal parts confusion and conviction.

“That’s because there was orange juice in it. Along with champagne. Well, sparkling wine made in Sonoma.”

Hari looked horrified. “But I don’t drink.”

Not what the puke in my bushes says, buddy.

“If I drink. If I drink . . . I . . . I . . .” The sobs started again.

Okay, time to get him to a bed. Vansh pushed him into one of the patio chairs and brought him more water.