Drew stood in the gas station topping off his Honda under the blasting sunlight, his heart thudding at what was to come. He tried to remind himself it was only a silly beach barbecue, a celebration of the New Moon or something, and that Patrick and Joe would be there.

     It didn’t help.

     When the thudding edged toward full-on panic, he practiced the grounding exercises the therapist taught him, speaking aloud the current year and his age and taking stock of the physical world around him: the scent of gas that tickled his nose, the stupidly bright sun, the two fliers taped to the metal pump, one a man and the other a woman with MISSING stretched across the tops, but he only glanced at them, and when he looked straight up at the sun he caught in its assault the glint of a silver seahorse.

     He blinked it away. Of course there wasn’t any seahorse.

     His pulse barely bothered to calm, so before he sped off, he popped a Xanax.

     Thanks to some wrong turns and no signal or map, it took Drew three hours to reach the shoreline. By the time he found the clump of cars on the cliffside, the violent sun was gone. He headed down the trail alone. He was twenty-eight, his body sinewy, mostly due to genetics. He had a face of stone and he religiously kept his hair and nails short. Among his deficiencies (he had a list) was coordination, and this dark trail only proved it. He stumbled on the initial descent, then stopped and breathed in the brackish air and felt it cool against his skin. He heard the scream of the waves. Above him, no light, no moonlight, not even starlight, as if all the blackness of the universe had congregated here at this one particular cove.

     Another breath and he continued along the trail with its damp stone steps, no railing, a trail made for treachery. He navigated it in utter darkness, the roaring surf answered by silence, and in this darkness he felt transparent, a ghost, a blip.

     Eventually the trail curved, revealing the horseshoe cove below, and deep within it, bonfire flames that danced like demons. Shadows shifted near its light. He caught the stab of voices and told himself he could still turn back.

     Instead he navigated the last stretch of trail to the bottom with an animal competence until his feet hit packed sand wedged between choking scrub and crowding rocks. The bonfire lay a distance away; flames would flare and in their light he glimpsed limbs jutting as if dismembered and he heard laughter that could’ve been screams. and something else, something his mind told him was in fact a scream, but this one a child’s, a conclusion he quickly jettisoned as insane.

     He headed for the flames as if pulled by a magnet. On his way he stumbled over a mass in the darkness. He set his hand down on skin soft and sweaty. He blurted out an apology and got a grunt in return, which he let fall from his mind as he closed in on the bonfire, and as he did, he heard the pounding of a bongo drum that rode in time with the crashing waves, then in time with his own heart, and he had to convince himself that, no, someone had not in fact pulled out his heart and hoisted it throbbing above the bonfire, that it was only the beating of hands on stretched leather. Along the surrounding rocks cigarette embers floated like lightning bugs. He caught the pink cavity of a mouth. A flash of blonde. White teeth. The bongo pounded. Bodies jerked. Laughter crawled around the flames and when he was almost at the bonfire he felt fully the confines of the fortress he’d built for himself and the abyss underneath it.

     This made him stop.

     From behind him hands grabbed his shoulders. His heart outpaced the drum. “Drew, you tardy motherfucker.”

     Drew spun around. Patrick stood shirtless, his muscles shimmering in the dancing firelight, muscles that Drew suspected were a shield against the arrows of despair. “I got lost.”

     “Lost.” Patrick rolled his eyes. “Of course you did.”

     “I don’t get it.”

     “Get what?”

     Drew fanned a hand out toward the dancers, the spliff-smokers, the beer drinkers, the making-out-in-the-shadowers. “All this.”

     Patrick gripped Drew’s neck in a show of puppylike dominance. “Some moon thing. Some ancient goddess thing. Dude, relax. It’s just a party.”

     The drumming slowed. Drew heard that child’s scream again. “Who’d bring a kid here?”

     Patrick laughed.

     “Maybe I should just go.”

     “Maybe you should drop that block of ice you’re always carrying with you and just enjoy yourself.” He fished a beer out of a cooler and peeled the cap off with his teeth. “Here.”

     Drew sighed before taking a drink. Beer and Xanax didn’t mix. Drew and parties didn’t mix. He heard that sound again. Not a scream. A bleating. He slid away from Patrick toward it. On the other side of the bonfire, close to the roiling surf, he found a lamb tied to a stake in the sand. Drew ran his hand along its fur. He let its wet tongue lap his palm. It looked up at him with liquid eyes and loosed a shaky-legged bleat.

     “I think it’s love.” Drew felt an arm coil around his neck. He looked over to Joe. Joe always moved like that, fluid — a snake sliding sideways across the desert. The scent of pot hung around him. In his free hand Drew spied the ember. “Careful there,” Joe said. “You might get your heart broken if you get too attached.”

     “Why? Why would that happen?”

     Joe turned his head and took a drag. His aquiline profile glowed in the firelight. He inhaled and coughed and laughed. “Oh, you’re gonna love this, brother.” He stuck the spliff between his lips and rat-a-tat-tatted Drew’s stomach before slinking off. “Don’t say you weren’t warned.”

     Joe was Patrick’s friend, not Drew’s. Getting to know him was like trying to grab onto an eel. Drew wanted to like him. Really he did. The lamb scream-bleated. Drew left its wet eyes and walked toward the crushing surf and gazed out toward the ocean, so purple it was nearly black. He swigged his beer and fingered those loose Xanax in his pocket.

     Not yet.

     The bongo resumed its thrashing. Drew heard a scream turn into a laugh and he caught just enough light to see a woman grab a man’s arm and jerk it as if trying to break apart a mannequin. Then she bit into his forearm and ran off. The man stood and watched her leave. Blood trickled down his arm and dripped off his fingertips onto the sand and for a moment Drew thought it was him there, standing bleeding and frozen while everyone around pretended everything was fine.

     He called out a tentative “hey.” Without looking up, the man flicked blood off his thumb and padded away in the opposite direction.

     “I only wanted to…” Drew mumbled. He looked back toward the women and men, all clean and smooth-limbed like Abercrombie models flailing their arms as they danced around the firelight and then he looked past them toward the waves that churned along the shoreline.

     “I like your shirt,” a woman called out. “Can I have it?”

     He spied her among the rocks. She was black with hair braided tight to her head. The ember of her cigarette bobbed in the dark. Another woman sat beside her, head tilted away as if bored or sleepy.

     “It’s just an ordinary shirt. Plain blue.”

     “That’s not a no.” She twirled her cigarette like a wand.

     “What’ll I wear then?”

     “What the goddess gave you, darling.”

     He crinkled his mouth and looked back at the empty spot where the bleeding man had stood. “Did you see what happened to that guy?”

     She let out a groan. “Oh, don’t you worry about him. He’ll be fine when the morning comes. You will be too, darling.”

     “What?”

     “You’re Drew, aren’t you? I’m Sestina. Lovely to meet you. So glad you’ll be joining us.”

     He pulled at the hem of his t-shirt. “I’ve already joined you.”

     “Have you?”

     In the glow of her ember he caught her smile and he couldn’t tell if it was reassuring or mocking or maybe a bit of both. Somewhere the lamb scream-bleated and he shot his gaze in that shadowed direction.

     “Be seeing you later, darling.”

     He wandered away from the smashing waves and tumbled rocks and bodies paired up in the places where the firelight couldn’t penetrate and he headed back toward that light, another beer on his mind, still fingering the loose Xanax in his pocket, convinced that that woman Sestina would strip him naked if given the chance and he couldn’t tell if he was terrified or excited by it. But the air had cooled — sweatshirt weather — and he didn’t want to get any colder, not anymore.

     “Come here, my man.” Patrick, again. Still shirtless. Had Sestina gotten to him? He flung an arm around Drew’s neck half hug half choke-hold, what Drew understood as his way of affection. “There’s someone I want you to meet. A girl.”

     “I already met one. She wants to strip me.”

     Patrick’s grin glowed. “Look at you making the moves.”

     Drew could smell the soap on him, and a tinge of sweat. “I didn’t make anything. I was just standing there.”

     “You gotta quit being like this. Change it up already.”

     “Like you did?” Drew could almost taste the bitterness on his tongue.

     “Yeah, asshole.” Patrick tightened his arm. “Anyways, her name’s Meadow.”

     “Sounds like a type.”

     The arm locked tighter. “Don’t.”

     “Okay.”

     “Grab a beer, take a piss, do whatever you gotta do. The fun starts in like five.”

     “What fun?”

     Patrick loosened his grip. “I’m glad you decided to come. It’ll be for the best. I swear.”

     The arm fell from Drew’s neck and he was left there alone.

     Away from the fire the air cooled. Drew exhaled. Mist danced before his face like restless spirits. He caught the odor of seaweed through the smell of the burning wood. Standing there away from the light and laughter he closed his eyes and listened to the roar of the hungry sea and his solitude howled louder than that ocean.

     The drumming returned. Fingers laced his hand. He looked down, startled. “Come.” Sestina pulled him toward the flames, where people in swimsuits or jeans, sweaters, t-shirts, skirts, cut-offs, all stood in a semicircle around orange tongues that arced up toward the impenetrable black. Sestina let him go and headed closer. He went to follow but she thrust a hand behind her, so he stayed put.

     To Drew’s left Joe pounded the bongo with rubber arms. His eyes reflected the orange of the fire. A woman with short black hair writhed around the fire, edging so close that Drew got terrified she’d fling herself into it like some willing Joan of Arc. Instead she raised her arms toward the sky and thrust her head back and whirled around delirium-eyed.

     Patrick joined her, still shirtless, black smudges painted around his eyes. He danced around flickering firelight that bronzed his skin. Drew watched him spin and hop, so different, so free, so uninhibited, and a sliver of envy cut his heart. As the cold crept back into his veins he wondered if he’d gotten it all wrong.

     From the other side of the fire a woman’s voice rang out, a voice that silenced the shouts and mellowed the drumming. Cerridwen, he heard her say, or something like that, and then she came around to Drew’s side of the fire. She wore a white sleeveless shirt and a skirt that nearly reached the ground. He traced the swell of her hips, her flat stomach, the curve of her chest. Her hair fell in cornsilk ropes and something in that hair glinted in the flames. She called that word out again — Cerridwen — and a smattering of voices returned it, first weakly, then with a militaristic conviction. She called out words Drew couldn’t understand, so pleadingly that her voice turned husky, and then she raised her fingertips toward the blackness above and said, “Accept this offering.”

     A scream battered the rocks.

     Patrick came toward her cradling the little lamb in the crook of his elbow. He stopped before her and held it up. Sestina was there, a cup in one hand and a knife in the other. The woman took the knife and slit the lamb’s throat. She twisted its twitching head to the side as Sestina caught the spurting blood in the cup.

     Drew watched a line of blood slither down Patrick’s arm. He reached into his pocket, pulled out two Xanax and grinded them beneath his molars. Then he ran his tongue along the pockets of his mouth searching for the last of that bitter powder.

     The lamb kicked its back legs, then it stilled.

     Drew backed up along the rock-strewn sand, keeping his eyes on these people as they lined up to sip from the cup the woman held out. His heel hit a rock and he tumbled down and smashed his hip against stone. The pain was a surprise but already he could feel the Xanax bubble-wrapping it all.

     The drumming silenced. The shouts tapered off. All he got was the gush of the waves. What was he even thinking coming here? He’d be gone soon enough. He’d leave them, alone. Splayed out on the rock where he’d fallen, he covered his face with his hand and reminded himself to breathe.

     Minutes later, fingers danced along the crown of his head. He looked up at a face buttery in the dying firelight, arched eyebrows, a full bottom lip. The one who slit the lamb’s throat.

     “I’m Meadow,” she said. “May I sit with you?”

     Drew felt several layers deep in that bubble wrap. He nodded and noticed that her sleeveless white shirt was snug in all the right places. She squatted beside him and twisted her cornsilk hair and he caught a glint of silver before it vanished over her far shoulder.

     “Patrick told me all about you.”

     He flinched. “Everything?”

     She nodded with a gentle smile. “All of us are broken in some way.”

     He looked away.

     “Why’d you do it?”

     “Why’d you decide to stay?”

     He shrugged.

     Him. A ghost. A blip. “When I came to, nothing changed. The world hadn’t changed.” The words came slow to him. “So I figured, it really didn’t matter, one way or the other.”

     She pulled his face toward hers. “You know what I think? I think you need us.”

     Beside him lay the battering sea. Above him the black sky. He wanted something different. Truly he did. But it all seemed so far away.

     She placed the cup in his hands. “Drink. Commit yourself. To us. To her.”

     Inside the cold metal cup he saw sloshing black. “It doesn’t feel right.”

     She dipped a finger in the lamb’s blood and rubbed it on her lips. Then she cradled his neck and pulled his face close to hers and kissed him. He kissed her back and when he ran his hand through her hair his fingers caught on something. As they broke apart he held that thing up to the thin light and saw a silver charm shaped like a seahorse. He licked his lips and got a chemical shock like he’d stuck his tongue on a nine-volt battery. She smiled and rose and walked off and in her wake he caught that flash of silver again, and as he wondered where he knew it from it came to him: that gas station, that missing poster, the girl in it wore a silver seahorse charm just like that one, but that girl was not Meadow, she was someone else entirely, and as this mystery barreled through his mind he felt the desolation of the black sky on his eyes and the anger of the sea on his ears and the stench of the dying fire on his skin and the tang of the lamb’s blood on his tongue and then he collapsed onto the sand.

     Somewhere far away light punctured the edge of the black, light that seemed like it was part of God’s primordial creation, light that slowly, slowly, drip by drip, diluted the night. His mind was bleary and his skin was cold and he felt the sand against his cheek, and a slickness on his tongue.

     “Patrick,” he croaked. He peered through the surrendering darkness. All he could make out was  misshapen lumps like slumbering ogres, and as he stared at them they began to move, hesitant and jerkily — one here, one there, then two and four and more, all these misshapen masses moving on the sand, and as Drew watched them undulate in the dawning light his heart raced and his hands shook and when the shapes congealed into a singular creature that slithered across the ground toward him, he reached into his pocket for some Xanax but they slipped through his fingers and he lost them in the sand.

     He lay prostrate beneath the rising sun that began to warm his skin and he stared at the mass that came toward him. In it he saw pieces of the revelers: Sestina and Joe, Patrick and Meadow, the man with the bleeding arm and the woman who bit him and all the others, all fused into one being, a hand here, a leg there, arms and torsos melting into each other, heads turned sideways and eyes blinking and tongues lolling, and as this thing converged on him the last thing he saw was that silver seahorse and the last thing he felt was an utter sense of belonging like nothing he’d ever known.