The two of them walked down the path to the stables. “When did you come live here?” Karina asked.

“End of last summer, about four months ago,” Ericka said. “It was a godsend, this place. Micah. I needed a safe haven and I’m so lucky I found it.”

Karina glanced sideways at her as they approached the stables, where the horse was chewing on the front bar, eager to be let out. When she opened the stall, he ran into the field with a loud whinny. “How so?” She grabbed a rake from the tack wall and began shoveling out what appeared to be several days’ droppings from the stall.

“I was in a bad situation. I’d been living with this guy—the love of my life, I thought.” Ericka shook her head. “It was good in the beginning, but after a few months . . . He didn’t treat me right. He had a temper.” She looked at Karina. “It was bad. But I didn’t have anyone to turn to. Not really on good terms with my family, know what I mean? And I know it’s not smart—everybody warns you not to do this—but I grew apart from my girlfriends after being with him for a while. It was just so intense. It took all of me, you know?” Ericka offered to take the rake from her and continued cleaning out the stall.

Karina nodded, knowing too well that feeling of being all-in; how it could destroy you when the thing you’d handed yourself over to suddenly vanished, leaving a giant void in its place. She felt reassured that she wasn’t alone in that, but also an unexpected flicker of gratitude that James had been decent, at least until the end. Karina opened a bag of fresh shavings to scatter on the ground.

“I was working at a juice bar on the beach where Micah and his friends surf sometimes, and they’d come in afterwards with their wet suits off to their waists, like half-peeled bananas.” Ericka giggled. “The boss always made them sit outside so they didn’t drip all over the floor. When things got worse at home, I started working at the juice bar more—for the money, and also just to get away. One day, Micah came to pick up his carrot-ginger juice, and he just stopped and looked at me, really looked at me. And he asked me why I was so sad.” Ericka’s voice cracked, her eyes shiny. “I burst into tears, and my boss was so freaked out, he told me to take the rest of the day off.” She took a deep breath and exhaled. “Not really comfortable around too much estrogen, you know?”

Karina smiled as she refilled the water bucket.

“So, I took off my apron and sat outside with Micah and Justin and Cameron. Have you met Cameron, from the bike shop?”

Karina nodded, remembering Cameron had been a guest at Thanksgiving. At the time, Karina had been proud to be the first of that group to move in. Now, tossing fresh hay into the stall, she was ashamed of her pettiness.