“Everything good?” X calls to me from his beach chair. He’s really more observant than he needs to be.
“Yeah,” I say, and just like Dad, I poke at the logs, which absolutely don’t need any poking.
“Pyromaniac,” X says.
It’s the perfect night for a bonfire. The temperature is just right—cold enough that you want to sit next to fire, but not so cold that you’d rather be in the fire. Even the wind is cooperating, swirling so gently that smoke drifts straight up into the air instead of gusting sideways into our faces.
I toss another log on and listen while the four of them chat a get-to-know-you chat. X tells them where he’s from and about his band and about dropping out of high school. Cassidy is really impressed with that last part.
I try not to watch X as he talks, but I can’t help myself. Firelight flickers across his face and lights him up. He does a lot of grinning and chuckling. I decide I like people who are generous with their laughter.
Once X realizes the three of us have been friends since middle school, he begs for funny—meaning embarrassing—stories about me. I threaten to douse the fire. Cassidy declares herself impervious to cold. She tells him the story of when I peed on myself while running up a very long staircase in first grade. X laughs and tells the story of how he peed on himself on the school bus in second grade and how he sat and waited until everyone was off the bus before getting off and running all the way back home.
Eventually we get to the Tipsy Philosophicals portion of the evening. This is when we’re all just tipsy enough to ask and answer pseudo-philosophical questions. We’re allowed at most once short sentence to explain ourselves. We can answer “I don’t know” only once.
Martin starts us off: Is seven years too long a time to be unrequitedly in love with someone?
Martin: No amount of time is too long for true love.
Me: Yes, especially if that someone is related to your best friend.
Cassidy: All my loves have always been requited.
Sophie: Yes, unfortunately.
X: Yeah, I don’t know, but I think I might be finding out soon.
I’m next: If you could find out when and how you were going to die, would you?
Martin: No.
Cassidy: Nooooooo.
Sophie: No.
X: No way. Imagine all the dread you’d feel waiting for it to happen. It’d take the fun out of being alive.
Me: Yes, it’s always good to be prepared.
Next is Cassidy: Is unconditional love real?
Martin: Of course.
Cassidy: Absolutely not.
Sophie: Yes.
X: Yeah, for sure.
Me: No, and also shouldn’t there be conditions?
Then Sophie: Is there such a thing as happily ever after?
Martin: Yes.
Cassidy: No.
Sophie: Yes.
X: Absolutely yes.
Me: How long is Ever, and when is After? What I’m saying is “no.”
And finally, X: Is there life after death?
Martin: I don’t know.
Cassidy: God, I hope not.
Sophie: No, not according to science.
X: I don’t know, but I hope so.
Me: I don’t know and I don’t want to know.
We play a few more rounds. Martin asks if love can last forever. Cassidy and I are the only ones who say that it can’t. Cassidy is just being her ornery, cynical self.
I, on the other hand, have actual proof that it doesn’t.
Despite our rule about not getting into long-winded discussions about the answers, we do anyway. X can’t believe that I’d want to know where and when I was going to die. “It’d be terrible,” he says. “You’d have a huge existential cloud of doom hovering over your head all the time.”
Everyone gives Cassidy a hard time for saying she hopes there’s no life after death. “Once is enough for me, thank you very much,” she says. Eventually, though, she relents and says it’d be okay if she “ends up where all the cool, fun people are.” It’s not clear to any of us if she thinks that’s heaven or hell or someplace else.
After a while we move on to gossiping about our classmates, which means we gossip about their love lives. I know for certain that the next topic will be our own love lives.
I’m not sure I’m ready to hear how active X’s has been. “I have to pee,” I say, too loud from tipsiness.
“I’ll walk you,” Martin says, as he always does. The bathroom is too far away and too isolated for us to go alone, so we use the buddy system. Martin’s always the buddy.
“I need to go too,” says X.
Martin sits back down and winks at me.