He and Violet are sitting cross-legged, facing each other. Lance’s head is bowed, and his hands are in his lap. He looks like a massive kid.

They look my way when my flip-flops slap on the wood. “We’re starting the campfire soon.” I offer them each a beer.

Violet shakes her head as she unfurls from her seated position. Standing, she extends a hand to Lance. “You coming?”

“In a bit.”

She touches his shoulder. He tenses at the contact, but remains still.

“Thanks.” His head stays bowed.

“You don’t have to thank me. You know we’re here for you.” As she passes me she whispers, “You should stay with him.”

I drop down beside him and hand him a beer.

He takes it and clinks it against mine. “You checking up on me?”

“Yup.”

“I know I’m an asshole, but I would never make a move on Violet. Or any of my friends’ women.”

I feel bad that he believes this to be the first assumption I came to, and that he’s correct. “You’re not an asshole, Lance.”

“Yeah, sometimes I am.” He looks up at the stars and then at me. “But I mean it; you don’t have to worry about your girl with me. I won’t ever touch a woman who owns someone else’s heart—not on purpose anyway. That’s cruel.”

He looks away and rolls his bottle between his hands. We’re silent for a minute while I process what he’s said. I wish I was better with words.

“I don’t think it would ever be intentional. Sometimes lines get blurred without us even realizing it.” I know all about that. Lily and I started out as a casual hook-up, but that changed pretty damn fast, and I almost fucked it up more than once. Lance was part of the reason I didn’t, and lucky for me, Lily’s a patient, understanding woman. Patience and understanding don’t apply in this situation, though.

“I dunno.” Lance drops his head. “But Alex and Violet are solid. That’s the only reason I can talk to her. That woman is devoted. What she went through with him earlier this year? She proved herself. She might say ridiculous shit a lot, but she’s made for this life. She’s got balls. Besides, Alex threatened to murder me a long time ago if I so much as lay a finger on her. We’ve got a good understanding.” He downs half of his beer.

“You don’t ever worry that you’re gonna start having feelings for her that you shouldn’t?”

Lance laughs.

I back track. “I’m not saying you shouldn’t talk to her; I just don’t want things to get complicated for you.”

“Violet would see that coming before it happened. She’s like family. Like a sister, you know? Besides, I’m not really interested in the good girls.”

I nod to his now-bandaged hands. “You see Tash? Is that what happened here?”

“Yeah. You’d think I’d learn, but I don’t.” He drains the rest of his beer in one gulp.

“You need to quit her like a bad habit,” I say. “She kind of is a bad habit, eh?”

“I know.” His nod is solemn, but the way his shoulders hunch forward tells me more about how he’s doing than his words.

This girl has wrecked him, more than once. I don’t get why he keeps letting her do it. “What happened between you two?”

“Too much and not enough.” He holds up his empty bottle. “I need another beer.”

That’s as far as our conversation is going to go. I follow him back to the cottage, and we all get shitfaced at the fire—except Sunny and Miller. He stays sober out of solidarity until she’s ready for bed, which is much earlier than the rest of us.

Less than an hour after they disappear upstairs, Miller comes back out and ties one on. It’s good for Lance, since that means he’s not feeling like a seventh wheel with no one to go to bed with later.

The girls are sitting on chairs, taking a million selfies, while Miller roasts his fifth hot dog. Sunny being in bed means it’s a Miller meat free-for-all.

“Oh, no, my battery died.” Lily gives me her drunk pouty face. “Can I borrow your phone?”

It’s cute, but I’m hoping she’s drunk enough to want to get her uninhibited freak on, yet not so drunk that she passes out before we even get our clothes off.

“Yeah, of course, luscious.” I pat my pockets, then remember I didn’t have it with me this afternoon. “It’s probably in the truck. I can go have a look for it, if you want.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll send you my pictures.” Violet has a serious slur.

I cut Lily off around one o’clock, because she’s getting bleary eyed, and hangovers hit her hard. We don’t go to bed until after three in the morning, and when we do, we leave Lance and Miller out there alone. I make sure Lily takes aspirin and drinks a boatload of water before we get into bed. We have slightly uncoordinated, lazy sex and then pass out hard.

No one gets out of bed before ten the next morning, except Sunny. I’m up before Lily, and I don’t bother her with my hard-on. Instead I take care of my own business in the bathroom. Usually I pick one of our recent videos and play it on repeat while I jerk off, but today I’m forced to use my imagination. It works, but it takes longer. I need to check the truck for my damn phone. Also, my hands aren’t as soft as Lily’s, so that makes it less pleasant than, say, her hands, or her mouth, or her sweet, sweet pussy.

When I venture out, Sunny’s in the kitchen cutting fruit. Actually, cutting is the wrong word. She’s hacking at it like she’s trying to machete her way through a forest, not slice a melon. Violet’s sitting at the island, her head resting on the counter, a glass of juice in one hand.

“Morning,” I say.

Sunny raises her knife in greeting but doesn’t turn around.

I take a seat beside Violet. “Feeling rough?”

“Shhhh. Too loud, Horny Nut Sac.”

“That bad, eh?”

“I killed half my brain cells last night.”

“I guess it’s a good thing you’re smart, and you can afford to lose a few.”

“Not smart enough to avoid shooters, apparently. They’re a lot like anal: it seems like a good idea at the time, but the actual execution and the aftermath aren’t really all that awesome.”