She held the jar up to the light. It certainly didn’t look like the pot she’d smoked in high school, which was brown and clumpy and unappealing. This pot grew in fuzzy, forest-green whorls, pretty enough to decorate a sweater with. There was a little white label on the jar with the words PURPLE HAZE written in purple calligraphy.
“I got this, too.” Stuart retrieved the little purple pipe he’d bought at a shop on Atlantic Avenue on his way home. It had a USB port and released vapor, not smoke. The guy at the store had showed him how to use it. Smoking a joint was still probably more fun, but this was how everyone smoked now. He was excited to try it. “Why don’t I get it set up and we can go down to the stoop?”
“The stoop?” Mandy hadn’t sat on the stoop since June. She hadn’t left the house in a week. More than that maybe—she’d lost count.
“Yeah, come on. It’ll be fun.” Stuart walked around to her side of the bed, took the jar out of her hands, opened it up, and sniffed it. “How can you resist?”
Mandy folded her arms over her chest. “I can’t,” she said, more worried about getting out of bed with Stuart watching than smoking the pot. Her legs probably had a diamond-shaped pattern on them from the mattress.
“You can. Come on. I’m going to do this over the kitchen counter in case I drop some. Then we can sprinkle it on our toast in the morning.”
As soon as his back was turned, Mandy heaved her legs out of bed and pushed herself to a stand.
“You need help?” Stuart called out.
“Nope. I got it.” At least her yellow T-shirt was big. And her black cutoff sweats hid most of her legs except her calves and ankles, which were huge. “I better put on a bra, in case the neighbors see us,” she added and thudded as gracefully as she could into their bedroom. Her bras had been put away neatly, untouched for months. She chose a black lacy one because this felt like a date, like in the old days, before she supposedly came down with MS.
“All set?” Stuart leaned in the bedroom doorway, the purple pipe dangling from his lips. “Let’s go.”
It was a straight shot through the living room and out the front door. Mandy hovered on the top step of the stoop and clutched the railing. “Whoa.”
Stuart took her hand and helped her down the four steps to the middle of the stoop.
“This is good, right?” Mandy stopped and clutched his hand as she lowered her bottom down, already slightly out of breath. “What’s wrong with me?”
“You have MS,” Stuart answered gently.
Mandy took a deep breath and patted the step beside her. “Come. Sit.”
Stuart sat and handed her the pipe. “Take a hit.”
Mandy glanced around. The street was quiet. A taxi rumbled by. The air was dull and still. It would probably rain. “Shouldn’t we be worried about people seeing us and smelling it?”
Stuart scooted close and put his arm around her. “No one cares what we do anymore.”
That was sad, but probably true.
“So I just suck on it?”
“Yup.”
She held the pipe to her lips and took a hit. It tasted sweet and warm and almost grapey. She held the hit in her lungs for as long as she could before blowing out the vapor in a thin stream. “This thing is great,” she said, examining the pipe. No leaves in your mouth, no burning paper, no matches. “I love it.”
“Uh-oh.”
She laughed and held it out for Stuart to try. He took an enormous hit and blew a few perfect smoke rings, showing off. His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down.
“More?”
“Yes, please.”
They passed the pipe back and forth, settling into the pleasantness. The clouds cleared. Stars were beginning to come out. Smoke curled from a lone chimney across the street. A woman in a black hoodie and sunglasses hurried by with her tiny white dog.
“Do you feel it?” Mandy asked.
“Oh yeah.”
Their perch on the steps felt a little precarious. She braced herself against Stuart’s strong, skinny arm. “I hope we don’t fall.”
He wrapped his arm around her and pulled her close. “We won’t fall.”
* * *
Big Boy looked forward to his nightly walk with the family. The enormous mutt was old, a year older than Liam, and these days he walked extremely slowly. They went at night, after dinner, because it was cooler then. It