“He stormed off to his cabin after you left,” I said. “Obviously I followed him. But he was meeting Dominique there.”

Serena bit her lip. “I thought she was done with him,” she said.

“After last year,” Janet said. She shifted uncomfortably on her cushion.

“What happened last year?” I asked.

Serena waved her hand. “Long story,” she said.

Laurel was still regarding me coolly, as though she knew something had changed, and was trying to figure out exactly what. I felt a stab of fear. I didn’t know what Serena would do if she found out I had broken the rules.

But then again, there was no reason she would. I would keep my secret. Glass door. Pineapple. Hole. I smiled at them. I shrugged.

We snuck into the kitchen that night to prepare the nettles. Tenzin had printed up a healthy number of signs since the last time we’d been there, and posted them everywhere: THIEVES WILL BE BOILED, they read, above a black-and-white photograph of a steak. Janet drew a smiley face on one of the steaks in purple Sharpie, to throw her off our trail.

We made the soup with Tenzin’s immersion blender, mixing water and the cooked nettles with handfuls of sea salt and garlic and lemon. I tried a spoonful, and was surprised by how much I liked it. The tea, which we made by straining the nettle boil-water, tasted good too, somehow both bright and earthy, and though there was no sting, I swear I could feel a resilient tingle in my throat, the barest hint of danger.

“Freud thought the human dream of flying was all about sex,” Laurel said afterward, as we cleaned the bowls. “Both being rooted in the same obsession with the unknown.”

“Freud also thought that women only want sex so they can pretend to have their own penises,” Janet said.

“Typical,” Serena said.

“You can’t blame him,” Laurel said. “All men think sex is about them. It’s hardwired. Even the words for sex are all masculocentric, have you noticed? Screwing. Banging. Nailing. Pounding. Smashing. Ramming. Tapping. You’d think they were building a goddamn boat.” She poured the nettle tea into a large thermos. We had tucked the soup in the back of the fridge. I had noticed her drinking surreptitiously from a flask again. I wondered where she was hiding it, and what exactly was inside.

“Masculocentric?” I said.

“I told you I’m not fucking stupid,” Laurel said. “Look it up.”

“Bumping uglies is pretty neutral,” Janet said.

“I hate that one,” Serena said. She looked down, put her hand between her legs. “Anyway, mine’s not ugly.”