I find myself seated in the kitchen. Familiar old wooden table. P.J. used to make me hot chocolate here when I walked her home from the library on winter evenings. Sometimes she would bring me delicious cookies that her mother had baked. I would sit in this very chair and she would sit next to me, in the rickety chair in front of the refrigerator. If her parents weren’t around we would hold hands and smooch. I once smooched her so hard her chair tipped over and her hot chocolate scalded both of us.

“Would you like some cookies?” Mrs. Peters asks me now. Not “Where have you been for the last six months?” Or “Why did you break my daughter’s heart?” Or “Please leave before she sees you, and never, ever come back.”

Extremely weird. But what can I do? I take a cookie. “Thanks.” Pop it in my mouth. Delicious.

Mr. Peters comes back into the kitchen. He’s taken off his jacket. Seems very hyped up. Almost feverish. “Good,” he says, “you served him a cookie.”

“And I’m making him some tea,” his wife adds.

“Good. Tea. Good thinking. Yes. Tea.”

I’m looking from one to the other. Are they out of their minds? What’s going on here?

“I owe you two some sort of explanation,” I say. “You must think awfully of me. I want you to know how much I care about you. And P.J.” My voice breaks.

“You don’t have to explain anything,” Mr. Peters says quickly, glancing out the window. “Where’s the tea, Ruth?”

“Right here. Piping hot.”

“Great! Milk, Jack? Sugar?”

I stand up. Starting to get freaked out. “Who cares about tea? Why aren’t you curious about where I’ve been?”

Mr. Peters is trying so hard to smile that it looks like his face may crack apart. “Sit, Jack. There’s no need to rush off.” He tries to push me back into my seat.

I resist the pressure. Somewhere down the block I hear sirens. Could there be a fire nearby?

Mr. Peters pushes harder. “You really must sit.”

I pivot away so that he stumbles and almost falls.

Mrs. Peters screams. I look at her. She’s holding a cleaver. “Damn you, park your butt in that chair or I’ll cut your nose off,” she threatens. All warmth and hospitality gone. “Where’s my P.J.? What have you done with her?”

The news registers—P.J.’s missing! I take a step back just in case she’s serious about hacking off my nose.

Sense a blow coming from behind. Dodge sideways. Mr. Peters with a baseball bat. It smashes across the wooden table. Salt and pepper shakers splinter. Napkins take wing like a flock of doves. “Where’s my little girl?” he demands. “Tell me or I’ll beat it out of you.”