Pandora put her hand up. “No, don’t tell me. No divisiveness in the pod.”

“What else you got?” Linnea asked her brother.

“Man, slim pickings. There are some reruns. How about Wimbledon.”

“Ooh, Wimbledon,” exclaimed Pandora.

“How about some surfing in Australia?” asked Gordon. “Check ESPN.”

Everyone perked up at this suggestion.

“Yeah, surfing,” said Pandora, smiling at Gordon.

Linnea groaned inwardly at Pandora’s increasingly obvious effort to always take Gordon’s side.

Anna rose and said, “I’m going for a refill.”

“Slow down. It’s only one o’clock,” Linnea said.

“It’s five o’clock somewhere. Anybody want something?”

The porch door slid open and John came in like a breath of fresh air. His face was lit with excitement as he stepped into the room and clapped his hands.

“Up and at ’em!” he called out.

Cooper groaned and threw a pillow at him.

John caught it in midair and tossed it back. “Seriously, man, all hands on deck! I’ve got a great idea.”

More groans sounded in the group.

“Do you know what this bunch of zombies needs?” When no one answered, he pushed on. “A fort. A man cave. Sorry, I mean a pod cave. And I’ve found it.”

Everyone turned their heads lazily and without enthusiasm.

“Come on, follow me. I’ll show you.”

No one moved.

“Hey, I said come on! Look, it’s got to be better than this, right?”

“We’re fine,” Gordon said, and slipped his arm around Linnea’s shoulders.

Cooper clicked off the television, rose, and tossed the remote on the table. “He’s right. I’ve got to get out of here.” He put his hand out to Anna. “Let’s go, babe.”

Pandora rose and reached for Gordon’s hand. “Come on, grumpy.” Begrudgingly, he took her hand and rose. “Come on, Lin,” she added with a bright smile.

Linnea tilted her head, curious about Pandora’s brazen grabbing of Gordon’s hand.

“Far be it from me to be the spoilsport,” she said, and, lifting Luna, followed the group out the porch door. She giggled to herself as they marched in single file across the driveway and through the white picket fence gate into Emmi’s yard. They looked like they were playing follow the leader, and leading the troupe was Peter Pan. The boy who wouldn’t grow up.

John stopped in front of the carriage house. Linnea had spent many hours upstairs in the loft apartment that summer with John, the amazing place that once was Flo’s mother’s abode. But in all the years she’d been staying at the beach house next door, she’d never seen the inside of the lower area that had been Miranda’s studio.

John waited till they were all gathered; then, in the manner of a master of ceremonies, he lifted the wood bar that bound the two barn-style wood doors together and swung them open, calling out, “Ta-da!”

Everyone took a step forward. The inside resembled a barn, rising past rafters to a high ceiling. Everyone in the group was creative enough to spot a treasure when they saw it. The space was packed to the gills with stuff, but peeking from behind the wooden bedposts, the wicker rockers, the rolled-up oriental carpets, were the gorgeously rendered, vividly colored sea animals swimming in blues and golds in Miranda’s mural: whales, dolphins, jellyfish, sea turtles, sharks, and countless colorful fish. Linnea had seen the similar mural in John’s loft upstairs, but this one was larger and even more breathtaking.