Because it’s always dusk, we make everything neon: our clothes, our furniture, our streetlights. The City is far north enough that the sun never breaches the sky—it skates the horizon’s rim, dips up and under like a coin circling the drain. Neon is our bioluminescence, and it’s always cold in the city.

I don’t remember how I started researching liminal spaces. Couldn’t even say which ology my post-grad work is classified as. I just know that my grant is approved and that it was supposed to snow tonight but it hasn’t, and that both things work very much in my favor.

What makes them liminal? Kieran asked me a few weeks ago.

“The feeling like you’re on a threshold,” I said. “Like you can fall through reality if you press hard enough.”

Am I one?

“A liminal space?”

She nodded. Choppy purple fringe curtained her square face, her pointed jaw. Gray eyes ringed with moonish silver.

“How can a person be a place?”

I don’t know, she said. I was just asking.

 An unhappy crinkle surfaced on her forehead, and I spent the rest of the evening trying to prove that I was, in fact, a pleasant young woman. A companionable companion. I must have been successful, because she invited me back the next night. And the night after that. She doesn’t ask me stuff like that anymore.

The heater is broken, she whispers.

She’s shivering, and I cup my hand around the back of her neck. “That’s alright.”

Kieran doesn’t like anyone looking at her while she’s naked, so all the lights are off—even her turquoise lava lamp is unplugged.

Missed you, she says.

 I move against her. She props herself up on her elbows, tilts toward me until our foreheads touch. At some point, we both close our eyes, shuttering ourselves inside our respective bodies.

I take a Novalise to keep me awake on the train ride home. It never goes down easy—the pill is chalky and dense, but I’m too stubborn to wash it down with water. The lift is always worth it, though—that little buzz that zaps up through me once the chemicals hit my bloodstream and the proverbial party is started. For a few hours, sleep becomes less of a need and more of the distant cousin of a want.

I squint to read the street signs, careful not to miss my stop. Fluorescents bounce off puddles of yesterday’s rain and tomorrow’s ice, refracting on the windows: skyscrapers of one-way glass.

~

Because my husband Felix and I are gay in opposite directions, we share a happier marriage than most.

How’d it go? he asks. He’s flopped backwards on the couch.

“Successfully.”

His dimples flash. I had a good date, too.

“Gerund Klaus?”

Who else?

Felix met Gerund at a bowling alley a few weeks back and hasn’t stopped gushing about him since. Felix calls him a lightning bug, which is how I know his feelings are serious—Felix has never had a crush he didn’t nickname after an insect. I nod to the vase of pink peonies and roses on the kitchen table.

“Those from him?”

Your mother.

 I dig out the little greeting card tucked into the bouquet. Sure enough: “My Darling Felix And Lavinia—Happy Three Years Of Marriage & Wishing You Many More. (And Some Grandkids As Well) Love, Mom.”

“I’ll have to call and thank her,” I say.

Is it bad she remembered our anniversary and I didn’t?

I rub my thumb into the cream-colored paper. It feels expensive. “She put your name before mine.”

He laughs. Did she really?

“See for yourself.”

I try to hand it to him, but he swats it away. I believe you. I know I’m her favorite.

When I first introduced Felix to my mother, they hit it off instantly. By the time dinner ended, she was already calling him her son. She likes that he always tells her what she wants to hear—apparently, not enough people are doing that these days—and that he’s studying something she understands.

“How should we celebrate tomorrow?” I ask.

I was gonna have Gerund over. But I’ll reschedule, and we can get dinner just the two of us.

“No, don’t flake on Gerund. We’ll do something another night.”

He smooths a hand through his wiry curls, electric blue against his dark skin. You can third wheel if you want. Just for dinner, of course.

“I’ll consider it.”

We go onto the fire escape for a nightcap. The city is coated in a purplish haze. It pulses in the dark like a galaxy, a neutron star.

“My grant got approved,” I tell Felix. “Found out this morning.”

His eyebrows rocket into his hairline, and he rushes to swallow his mouthful of cognac.

Vinny, that’s great! Congrats.

“Thanks.”

 He snorts. Don’t get overexcited.

“I am excited.”

Does your programming let you get excited?

I needle my elbow into his side. “Leave me alone.”

Oh, before I forget, I need you to quiz me for my test.

Felix is in his second year of law school, and the brutal mundanity is wearing down the nub of his willpower more than he’ll admit.

“Not gonna quiz you on shit if you call me a robot,” I say.

You’re no fun.

“Not my problem.”

Keep it up and I’ll divorce you.

“On our anniversary?”

It doesn’t start for another twenty minutes. Anything goes.

When we met in our freshmen year of college, Felix and I couldn’t figure out if we were in love or not. We felt there was between us a kind of electric tug, a tandem synchronicity; the kind of silent, inexplicable togetherness that only seemed to manifest in romance and sex.

Do you think maybe we’re each other’s exception? Felix had asked.

We stared each other down. Felix still had braces on his bottom row of teeth. I leaned forward and pecked his lips, and we immediately sprang apart.

“Nope.”

Never again.

And that was that. We once paid a psychic to give us a past-life reading, and she told us that our souls have been orbiting for centuries—never lovers, always together. Now, in exchange for pledging to produce a child within the first five years of our marriage, Felix and I reap the benefits of the City’s Population Procreation Program: lower taxes, free healthcare (aka free Novalise), student loan aid, extra confectionary rations to satiate Felix’s sweet tooth. We meet our other needs elsewhere.

Below us, the street is empty. Felix rests his chin on his knee.

“Hard day?”

He nods. My professor tore up my paper in front of the whole class. Went on a twenty-minute tangent poking holes in my argument and ranting about unjustified opinions.

“How’d everyone else do on the paper?”

Mine was apparently the best one.

“Jesus.”

He presses his forehead into the crook of my neck. Felix’s temperature runs higher than mine, so he always feels feverish to the touch. When we first moved in together and couldn’t afford heating, I hugged him constantly, shuffling from the kitchen to the couch with my arms latched around his waist.

Seems like things are good with Kieran.

“It’s a little early to tell.”

Untrue.

“Oh?”

If you can’t tell, then things probably aren’t good.

“We had a nice time tonight.”

His fingertips drum against the floor. Vibrations echo out like ripples.

“I’m taking it slow. Emotionally, anyway.” I know I’ll find disapproval in his face, so I don’t look. “What am I quizzing you on?”

I’ll get my notes.

 The fire escape creaks as we stand. Under my jeans, I can feel the zigzags that the grated metal has stamped into my skin. I rub my thumb into the imprint. Felix and I have agreed not to think about the promised child until we absolutely have to. As it stands, we still have two years before the City comes knocking to collect its due. Felix will be a good father—he’s patient, adaptable, selfless in every way that matters. I’ve tried not to think about myself as a parent. I can’t help but dread the day I’ll have to start.

~

 When I was seventeen, I slept for four days straight and woke up with a Noctosolar Disorder diagnosis. A complication of living here: the lack of natural light makes my circadian rhythm glitch, and I ricochet through cycles of insomnia and hypersomnia. Last year, I went through a period where I hardy slept at all and had to take a medication that was essentially the opposite of Novalise. I don’t remember much; it made me groggy, forgetful, and, according to Felix, I acted like my personality had been scooped out by a melon baller. But then the temperamental wind of my brain chemistry blew the other way, plunging me into the most acute fatigue I’ve ever experienced.

The most unfortunate side effect is that I need to regularly endure the company of my doctor—Nichols—and his orange goatee. If Nichols didn’t have a fish tank in his office, I would have left him a long time ago. He’s well aware of this, which means all pretenses of pleasantry are null and void and I can lay my contempt out plainly. This suits both of us just fine.

How has your mood been? he asks.

“Good.”

How would you rate it on a scale from one to ten?

“Ten being the best and one being the worst?”

On his good days, Nichols looks like a deflated clown. Today is not a good day.

No, he says. The other way around.

“But that doesn’t make sense.”

Sure it does. One is the winning number. First place, right?

“But it’s the lowest.”

Why don’t you do it your way, then. Since it’s easier for you.

“I’d rate my mood a five.”

 Why a five?

“Maybe a six. Or a four.”

 Nichols’ fish tank is hexagon-shaped, its water tinted with indigo light. A single pufferfish floats inside. He doesn’t move much, but I know he always listens in. I imagine that Nichols found him in a storm sewer like a stray cat and lured him into his office with a trail of fish food flakes. I wish my problems were more interesting, for no other reason than keeping him entertained. The tank is completely bare. He needs all the excitement he can get.

About how many hours are you sleeping?

“Probably eleven.” It’s never very refreshing. Since my four-day coma, I haven’t known rest without some degree of hypervigilance.

Last time you were here, you said it was seven hours.

“I might have been wrong.”

Did you lie?

“No. I just might have been wrong.”

Nichols clucks his tongue. The pufferfish exhales a gust of bubbles.

“If I wasn’t wrong,” I venture, “how big of a problem is it? That I’m sleeping more.”

There’s a chance it could be nothing. He sounds unoptimistic. But it could also indicate the start of an episode.

“What should I do?”

Upping your dose would be a good precaution.

“By how much?”

Just 15 milligrams. Come back in two weeks, and we’ll check in. See if it’s helping you sleep less.

“Fine.”

We begin the closing rituals. Nichols likes to reserve the last minute of our appointments for small talk.

I saw your mother in a war bond ad the other night.

I know the ad he’s talking about. It goes like this: my mother pops into the frame, pink-haired and ebullient, and flutters her hand in a girlish wave. If you know me, then you know how much I love my city. That’s why I’m proud to buy war bonds in support of our militia. I hope you’ll join me in doing the same. Remember—a city needs its citizens! She winks. There’s a small gap between her two front teeth that people find very charming. I didn’t inherit it.

I thought she was wonderful. She has such a nice presence, doesn’t she? Even through the screen.

“She does. I’ll tell her you said so.”

 And things are good with you and your husband?

“My mother wants us to start having kids.”

I thought you didn’t want children yet.

“I don’t.”

In that case, I would recommend holding off.

“Good idea.”

 When I step outside the office, the waiting room is stuffed to the brim. Several people are standing against the wall or just sitting on the floor. The best part of my affliction is that it’s not a rare one. About 15-20 percent of the City’s population deals with it on some level. For most, it’s an occupational hazard. An inconvenience. Different things work for different people—some patients can get by with resting under a sun lamp for half an hour a day, others walk around chugging full gallons of orange juice, and others still line the walls of their apartments with ultra-reflective mirrors. I’ve tried all of it, of course. Nothing works on me but the pills. Nichols once assured me that my resistance to treatment is not an indictment on my character.

“I never said that it was,” I replied. “But I’m glad you agree.”

~

A liminal space is a motel bedroom or an empty airport or an elevator or any variety of doorway. The technical definition is vague: “a transitional space between two places.” Fortunately, ambiguity is the beating heart of my field. My new study is qualitative. It involves bringing a group of participants to questionably liminal locations, asking them to rate their discomfort, and keeping a detailed log of what features trigger disquietude or sensations of unreality.

For the control group, I’m using the kitchen of a preserved historical home that once belonged to the City mayor. In my literature reviews, I’ve frequently encountered the notion that the kitchen is the heart of a house. That suits my purposes very well, as I need a grounded, homey place to function as my baseline. Right now, my working hypothesis is that the two key factors in what makes a location feel “liminal” are room width and lighting quality.

When strangers ask me what I do for work, I say I’m a researcher. If they ask me what I research, I say I’m a crypto-anthropologist. If the person I’m talking to is especially irritating, I say I’m between jobs at the moment.

My mother, in a pensive mood, once turned to me and said, Life is kind of a liminal space, isn’t it?

“I don’t think it works like that,” I said.

I guess you’re the expert.

“If you’re the only person studying something, does that make you an expert?”

Somebody’s gotta be the expert. Why not you?

 “I guess you’re right.”

 The wineglass clinked against her teeth. I’ve been telling you that for years.

“It won’t happen again.”

 She laughed in the way she does for TV interviews. Oh, Vinny, you’re just a riot. You’re a riot, aren’t you?

The first liminal space I remember encountering was the long, narrow hallway between my seventh-grade classroom and the principal’s office. I was being sent down for a reprimand—I had cheated on a science exam, was caught scribbling formulas onto my palm just before the test was handed out. The walk to the office was suspended in its own miniature eternity. Everything was an echo, everything was paused, everything was on the cusp of becoming something else. When I finally reached the door, I hovered there, my guilty, ink-splattered hand not quite touching the knob. As long as I stayed there, in the middle ground between action and consequence, I was a free agent, not bound to any one outcome. I could run away, I could hide, I could fabricate an elaborate lie that managed to pin my wrongdoing on someone else. Or I could do what I was always going to: open the door, step inside, glance back over my shoulder to see the vanishing horizon behind me, the thin shadows dissolving, a figure ducking out of sight before I could see its face.

I found it again, eventually. I know what I’m looking for now.

~

Gerund Klaus is my favorite person Felix has gone out with. I pass this judgement ten seconds after meeting him, when he says, I like your earrings.

They’re dangling glass jellyfish, neon green to match my hair. “I like them, too.”

Gerund is blind in one eye. I give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he still observed the jellyfish in all their glory.

My wife has impeccable taste, says Felix.

Gerund lets loose a booming peal of laughter. His fork clicks cheerfully against his bowl. I’ve heard a lot about you.

“Likewise. Felix tells me you were a pilot?”

He nods. When I was drafted, they put me in the flight division.

“What was it like?”

Flying was fun. Not so much the fighting.

Gerund is dressed with piratical elegance: a billowy silk blouse—oyster-colored—velvet leggings, a leather eye patch. It’s easy to identify him as a veteran; his skin has the burnt, overexposed look of someone who has spent too long in the light. He seems at ease around me, which is nice. The arrangement Felix and I have isn’t unheard of, but it’s not very common, and our cohabitation sometimes scares off potential suitors. It’s understandable, of course—if this weren’t my own life, I don’t know exactly what I would make of it. Felix is a topic I’ve rarely broached with Kieran. She likes to pretend he doesn’t exist, and I don’t ask her to do otherwise.

“You wouldn’t happen to know my father, would you? He’s in the militia, too.” I tell Gerund his name, and although he takes a polite pause to mull it over, I know immediately what he’s going to say.

No, don’t think so. I’m sorry.

“It’s alright.”

He laughs again and spoons up another bite. Felix has concocted some kind of seafood pasta for dinner. The sauce is dark and garlicky, and it’s loaded with generous chunks of canned clams and frozen shrimp.

This is phenomenal, darling, says Gerund.

 Felix looks down modestly.

Do you cook too, Vinny? Gerund asks.

 I nod. “Not as well as Felix.”

That’s an unfair standard, says Felix. Very few people cook as well as me.

 Another bellowing laugh from Gerund. His frame is so slight that the sound feels wildly disproportionate—like he’s a ventriloquist dummy for a man five times his size. Your work seems very interesting, he says to me once he’s quieted down.

 “It is. I think so, anyway, but I’m probably biased.”

 Another laugh. Well, it’s more interesting than what I’m doing. I’ve just been collecting my injury pension from the militia.

As Gerund talks, I watch Felix’s face. He’s completely smitten. Every so often, his eyes shift to me and then flit back to Gerund. He wants my approval.

 “Gerund,” I say as we’re clearing the table, “I’m going to need a research assistant for my new experiment. It’s a paid position. Is that something you might be interested in?”

His heels twitch, as if itching to click together. Are you sure?

“I need someone with a lot of spare time and some degree of competency. You seem to meet those requirements.”

He accepts the offer exuberantly, pumping my hand until my shoulder socket aches.

Felix catches my eye. Thanks, he mouths.

My lip twitches up against my will.

What kind of research do you do? Gerund asks.

“Do you know what liminal spaces are?”

 Like, creepy places? Like old stairwells and stuff?

“Basically.”

 What about them are you researching? Are you looking for ghosts?

He’s surprisingly close to the mark, but I don’t intend to clue him in. I’ll make Gerund useful by filing paperwork and organizing data—what I’m really hoping to find is something I intend to find alone.

“It’s a kind of survey,” I say, “of what environmental factors people associate with liminality. Broad strokes. Mostly consolidating preexisting research.”

 After we finish washing the dishes, I leave Felix and Gerund to their own devices and go to see Kieran.

I want to be on top this time, she says as soon as I step inside.

“Yeah?”

Is that okay with you?

“Sure.” It’s not entirely true, but I want to indulge her.

She makes quick work of it. Her fingers are careful, gentle, searching. There’s a rhythm she finds, and I lean into it, follow it, chase it, give her as much of me as I can without unclenching my fists from where they grip the sheets.

You’re beautiful, she says afterwards.

“You too.”

There’s a beat of quiet, and then a sniffle. I roll over, reaching for her.

“What’s wrong?”

You didn’t like it, did you?

I swipe blindly at the wet splotches on her face. “I liked it fine. This was just different for me.”

I thought it would make you happy if we switched. Make us closer or something.

“I don’t need you to do that.” I pat her sturdy shoulder in what I hope is a reassuring way. “I like you, Kieran. And if you liked this, I’m all for it.”

We shift together until we’re resting like spoons, Kieran’s arms hugging my stomach from behind.

“You’re not bad,” I say. “Just so you know.”

She smiles into my back. Yeah?

“If you ever get in the mood to do that again, I wouldn’t be opposed.”

Duly noted.

I wake sometime around two in the morning. Try as I might, I’m never able to sleep a full night in another person’s bed. Kieran’s mattress is softer and squishier than my own, and I don’t like the way she mumbles in her sleep. I also dread the thought of making stilted conversation in the morning over bad coffee and dry cereal. Although the light doesn’t change much, the night is still the night, and once you’ve spent a breakfast with someone, you know too much about them to pretend you don’t. The sheets whisper as I brush them aside. Kieran stirs blearily.

Are you leaving?

“I have work tomorrow.”

She hums and rolls back onto her stomach. Text me when you get home.

I smooth back her soft coif of hair and assure her that I will.

Nothing noteworthy occurs on the subway ride home. When I reach my apartment door, I jiggle my key in the lock a little louder than necessary to give Gerund and Felix enough time to get decent. It turns out to be an unnecessary precaution—the living room is empty when I step inside, and Felix’s bedroom door is closed. A small relief. I’ve walked in on Felix in the midst of his (alarmingly acrobatic) trysts before, and it’s not an experience I’m especially eager to repeat.

I scrub off my makeup and fall into bed. My room shares a wall with Felix’s, and murmured laughter and soft conversation float in from the other side. Felix is saying something about the difference between geckos and salamanders, and Gerund is insisting they’re the same animal.

Home, I text Kieran.

As soon as I press “send,” she shoots back two emoticons: a thumbs-up and a green heart. I don’t know whether she stayed awake waiting to hear from me or if the sound of the message notification woke her up. Both scenarios make me feel guilty for leaving, but not guilty enough to wish I had stayed.

Goodnight, I type hesitantly.

I’m a little relieved when another reply does not follow.

~

In the morning, I call my mother. “Thanks for sending us those flowers. They’re pretty.”

Oh, it was nothing. Her high heels clip against tile. She must be in her kitchen.

“It was sweet of you.”

Anniversaries are special. I hope you and Felix did something nice. There’s a wink in her voice.

“We did.”

I’ve tried telling her that my marriage is a union of platonic partnership. She didn’t quite follow, and I haven’t found the energy to try explaining it again.

“How have you been, Mom?”

Fine, fine. I had a meeting with Muldoon yesterday. He’s helping me renegotiate my contract.

“That’s exciting.”

She grunts noncommittally. My mother’s agent is the bane of her existence. Coincidentally, I find him delightful.

While I’ve got you, I have something to ask.

“Go ahead.”

Micah is having a graduation party on Friday.

“I already told her I can’t make it.”

Why would you do that?  

“I have something planned that night. For work.” It’s mostly a lie, but not entirely. There’s always something I need to be doing for work—churning through overdue paperwork, trying to slice off the multiplying hydra heads of my emails, sifting through data reports. It’s in my best interest to never make plans with anyone, which is one of my regularly deployed excuses.

It would mean a lot to her if you came.

“I don’t know. I just started a new project. That grant I submitted got approved—I meant to tell you earlier.”

Finishing drama school is a big deal for your sister. She’s worked so hard, balancing her courses with being on set.

Micah isn’t my sister—not even by step or half. In the sitcom my mother stars in, Micah plays the role of her daughter.

“I’ll see if I can move my schedule around.”

Bring Felix too, won’t you? And a present. Something nice. You can be so sweet when you want to be.

~

I spend my work day scouting out liminal locations to bring the study participants. I’ll be taking one group to the mall parking garage after hours, another to the hallway of a motel, one into an elevator, and one into a subway station. I’m up in the air between a few different options for each place, but I eventually land on a solid list of sites. All that’s left to do is everything else.

After flicking off the lights in my office, I meet up with Kieran at the gritty dive where she bartends. It’s where we first met. Felix and I had gone to a singles night together and split off to scout potential lovers for each other. I’d wandered to the bar to take stock of the men and see if any of them were Felix’s type. At first glance, they all seemed a bit too beefy and hulking for his taste. But once I caught sight of the bartender and her plunging neckline, my mission promptly fell to the wayside. I leaned across the counter and waved her over.

“I’m Vinny,” I yelled, straining my voice against the pounding music. “Nice face.”

Thanks, she replied. I worked really hard on it.

“You’re funny,” I said. “I’d buy you a drink if you didn’t have to make it yourself.”

 She smiled, just a little. How about I buy one for you this time?

“If you insist,” I said, sliding onto the nearest stool. “Did I mention that I liked your face?”

She blushed. Matters progressed from there. Felix, unable to find me, left a series of increasingly frantic voicemails and before I finally called back to tell him that, no, I had not been abducted, and yes, I had left the bar to become acquainted with a new flame, and yes, I was sorry for having worried him. After I hung up, Kieran rolled over in bed and gave me a perplexed look.

I’ve been the other woman before, she said, but the other person never knows.

“He’s my best friend,” I said. “But he’s not my woman.”

 She cupped my cheek in her hand and kissed me, a little too deeply for my liking. I squirmed away and resisted the urge to wipe my mouth.

Vinny’s a cool name, she said. Is it short for something?

I flopped onto my back and looked up at the ceiling I couldn’t see.

“No,” I said. “Don’t think so.”

 Tonight, the bar is quiet, and Kieran is silently wiping down the counter when I approach. Her turquoise hair looks a little flat.

“How are things?” I ask.

 She startles and jerks her head up. Vinny?

“The one and only.”

She smiles and reaches for a glass. She knows my drink order.

I haven’t been to your house, says Kieran. It sounds like a question.

“No, you haven’t.”

I know she has a follow-up question, but she doesn’t ask it, and I don’t answer.

~

I’m drifting into the left lane again. I jerk the steering wheel back into place. Neon smears and slurs, dripping from the glowing windows of the skyscrapers. The buildings meld with the darkness behind them, casting the illusion that the windows are hovering in midair. Like an empty cathedral filled with candles. Like a sideways bargain between light and gravity.

You sure you don’t want me to drive? asks Felix.

“It’s fine.”

Wake up or pull over. I’m gonna throw up.

 “Sorry.” I shift forward in my seat and pretend there are toothpicks holding my eyelids open. I think about how different I would be if the sunlight were able to properly calibrate my brain and body. I think about how I might not be any different at all—if the seed of dark, foggy oblivion would have taken root in me regardless. Or if the seed is not something separate from me, but me myself. Nichols would tell me to rate the relevance of this concern on a scale from one to ten. I’d tell him that my worries are resistant to numerical assignment. Felix would tell me that regardless of where my malaise comes from, I deserve to get free of it. Not that I would burden him with my hypothetical troubles. I like to be selective about what problems I share with people—even my husband. There’s no reputation worse, I think, than that of an incessant complainer.

Felix leans against the passenger seat window, draws a cartoonish smiley face in the condensation. We’re passing through the Financial District, and we make fun of the stockbrokers holed up inside the glass dome of the Money Bubble. We joke back and forth about how the stockbrokers probably wouldn’t recognize the faces of their own children even if they walked up and kicked them in the shins. It’s well-trodden territory between us, but it still gives my ribs that sore, satisfied good laughter feeling.

 I talked to Gerund today, says Felix. He’s excited to start work.

“I’m excited, too.”

 It’ll be good for him to have some routine. Readjusting has been hard.

“I like him for you.”

That’s high praise.

It’s true. Out of the boyfriends Felix has had in the time we’ve known each other, there were none that I found particularly impressive. There was the dancer with an allergy to splitting the bill, the zookeeper who mourned for six weeks after the City’s lone zebra died, the drug dealer with shark tooth nipple piercings, the entertainment journalist who turned out to be fishing for information on my mother. I never spoke my distaste of these men aloud, of course, but it was obvious enough for Felix to read. I hear that I don’t have a particularly good poker face.

“Gerund had better prove himself worthy of it,” I say. “Approval can always be redacted.”

Felix snickers. The road we’re driving down is closed off for construction up ahead, so I pull over and make a U-turn, slipping down a tight side street. The GPS makes a ping of alarm at the sudden change in direction and scrambles to recalculate our route.

“Micah’s probably gonna make a speech,” I say. “Ten bucks she’ll break into song.”

Ten is child’s play. I bet twenty.

“Do you even have a twenty?”

No. But if I did, I would still bet it.

Rush hour is long over, so traffic is light. I fiddle with the radio dial, and the stations blip between disco and rock and staticky war reports from the frontlines. The reports consist mostly of explosions. I eventually land on an old show tune.

 Have I told you that your music taste is shit? asks Felix.

“Not recently.”

Your music taste is shit.

I turn the volume up. “Thanks for humbling me.”

That’s my anniversary resolution—I’ll remind you at least once a week.

“Are those a thing? Anniversary resolutions?”

They should be. If not, I just invented them.

“What’s my resolution to you?” I ask.

How am I supposed to know? That’s for you to figure out.

“Well, I can’t think of anything. I’m pretty perfect, you know.”

He lets out a donkeyish snort that nearly makes me miss the turn into the hotel parking lot. It’s easily one of the tallest buildings in the city, made entirely of glass and ornate metallic trimming. The fountain in the lobby glows like the heart of a nuclear reactor.

We don’t need to stay long, Felix reminds me.

I unbuckle my seatbelt. “Wasn’t planning on it.”

On the rooftop ballroom, I hear my mother holding court by the chocolate fountain—snatches of a familiar joke warble through the cold. The group of listeners she’s accumulated huddle to her voice like vagabonds around a firepit. But when I shoulder into the cluster, I realize my mother is not there. Not in person, anyway—she’s tuning in from a video call on someone’s laptop.

She pauses and acknowledges me graciously when I approach. I’m sorry friends, but you’ll have to excuse me—my eye-apple is here.

The small crowd murmurs understandingly and shuffles back.

You look very striking, she says.

“So do you.”

Oh, don’t flatter me.

“I was under the impression you’d be making a full appearance.”

I wanted to, Vinny, I really did. But someone from the militia called this afternoon and asked if I could film a new announcement tonight. I couldn’t say no in good conscience, so I decided to just pop into the party virtually.

“What’s the announcement?”

I can’t spoil the surprise, she says. But it’s big news. It’ll probably air tomorrow morning.

“I’ll keep an eye out.”

We should’ve thrown your wedding reception here. Isn’t this stunning?

“The place where we had it was fine.”

She hums. I know she’s comparing the florid scenery around us to the cramped bistro where Felix and I had our first dance. There were substantially fewer ice sculptures.

“I got Micah a new camera and tripod. So she can tape her auditions and stuff.”

Very nice. My mother combs a hand through her bubblegum bob, fluffing and smoothing. See? You can be so sweet when you want to be.

Felix nudges his way through the pack of guests. He’s just dropped Micah’s present off at the designated gift table. My mother’s face glows a few watts brighter when she sees him, and she flings out her arms in a pantomime of a hug.

My dear, it’s been entirely too long.

He crouches slightly and waves. It’s good to see you, Mom.

She gets the attention of a server and orders a round of drinks for us. We carry the laptop to an empty table to sit and chat with her for a while. She does most of the talking, and Felix indulges her with polite questions.

My mother never went to drama school. Up until four years ago, she was a waitress and limo driver and small-time standup comic. One night, she served a martini to a casting director who told her she had excellent bone structure. From there, she booked a few guest roles on TV shows and bit parts in movies until she landed her current sitcom. This militia gig is another offshoot of her local fame.

Do you mind if I borrow her for a sec? I’m a big fan. I just want to say hi.

 Felix and I look up at the waiting party guest. The excitement is trembling out of him.

“Go ahead.” I plop the laptop into his outstretched hands. “Just don’t drop her. Talk to you later, Mom.”

 Goodbye, darlings! she calls as she’s lifted away.

I try to muffle my yawn.

Feeling okay? Felix asks.

“I’m good.” My eyelids start to burn. “Maybe I’ll take a Novalise.”

He frowns. When was the last time you took one?

“Four hours ago. Maybe five.”

You gotta go easy on that stuff, Vin.

“Nichols told me I could take it as needed.”

‘As needed’ doesn’t mean ten times a day.

I give him an affronted look. “I never take more than three.”

Three should be fine.

I reach into my purse. “Thanks, doc.”

A few minutes after the bright jolt of wakefulness kicks in, Micah comes over. She’s gotten taller since the last time I saw her, but she’s the same age as me—twenty-four, give or take a few months—and decidedly too old for a growth spurt. It takes me an embarrassingly long time to realize she’s wearing stilettos.

I’m so happy you made it, she gushes, sliding into the seat next to me. Her perfume is sharp and citrusy. Thanks for coming.

“Of course. Congrats on graduating.”

Micah is the only person I know who doesn’t dye her hair. She keeps it a natural brown, dark and muted against her rosy face. How’s everything going with you? How’s work?

“Fine,” I say. “My grant got approved, so I’m starting a new study.”

She chirps for a minute about what terrific news that is.

Can you tell me about the study?

I resent Micah, but I don’t actually dislike her. Under different circumstances, I think we could be friends. These are not those circumstances.

“Maybe later,” I say. “I think I hear my mom calling me.”

Oh, of course!

She scooches her chair aside and lets me slide out. I meander through the crowd, pretending to look for the laptop, and then kill ten minutes hiding in the bathroom.

My prediction comes true—before the last course of dessert is served, Micah makes a rambling but well-meaning speech in which she breaks into song not one but three times. The guests toast her with a standing ovation. Micah is called over to sit with her somber-looking family, but she sends a few more smiles and cheerful waves over to me.

Felix gets tipsy and ends up forming a half-hearted mosh pit in the middle of the dance floor. A few people drift over and tell me my husband is a fabulous dancer.

“I’ve never seen that man in my life,” I inform them.

At some point, I lean against the railing that trims the rooftop. The focused throb of energy that accompanies Novalise is starting to ebb. It’s dark outside. It’s always dark. At around eight in the morning, there’ll be a glint of pink at the horizon. Sometimes orange or yellow. The colors don’t last long—within hours, they’re reabsorbed, swallowed back into the night that makes up our days. The sun is too small and cold to do much in terms of warmth—it just holds the earth in its wobbly orbit, weakening every year. I wonder if we’ll even notice when it’s finally fizzled out for good. Like an absentee parent—do the missed child support payments really matter if all the bills get paid? It’d be nice to have extra help, but it’s not essential. We have greenhouses for produce, neon for light, fuel for heat. If we’re careful with what we have, we could outlast the sun for millennia. If it came down to it, we could probably even hang up a new sun in its place.

Micah emerges from somewhere behind me. She pinches a cigarette from its box and ignites it. You want one?

“Is that allowed here?”

Her lip scrunches in a smirk. We’re outside, aren’t we? Plus, it’s my party.

I accept a cigarette, and she lights me up. I kiss tobacco and exhale neon steam. I remember something: I didn’t take three Novalise capsules today. I took four.