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I rarely drink. But late that night, when I get back to my apartment, I pour myself another glass of tap water and add a shot of whiskey. It’s cinnamon flavored and objectively disgusting, the only liquor in the cupboard, left over from my ex-best-friend’s bachelorette party almost two years earlier; even with the water, it burns going down my throat. I don’t stop chugging until the glass is empty, until I’m wiping my mouth with the back of my hand.

“Calvin?” I gasp. “Are you in here?”

In here sounds better than home . I wouldn’t use that word to describe our apartment. My old loft was two blocks away from Frida’s. Every window on the south side had a view of the bay, and in the mornings before kitchen prep, I’d sit in my grandmother’s hand-me-down armchair with a mug of chamomile tea and watch the boats come in, not fully realizing just how blissful my life was.

I miss those mornings. I miss everything about that time in my life.

From somewhere in the (albeit small) depths of our apartment, I hear a muted Sup . Sup , for my roommate, Calvin, is still very much in today’s vernacular. He did not leave it in 1992. When I first met him, he reminded me of that strange roommate in Notting Hill , the one who hotboxes in his scuba suit. Only, Calvin has exceptional hair. He briefly moonlighted as a hair model before finding his calling as an employee of the York County tax bureau—and, like Notting Hill man, is also perpetually high.

Tumbling out of his bedroom in a gray sweatsuit ensemble, he offers me a glazed blink. “What happened tonight?” This is Calvin’s favorite question. It’s like he’s very gently interrogating me, not asking if I had a good evening.

“Not much,” I say, shrugging, although the shrug comes out too fidgety. My shoulders jump, jive, and suddenly I’m looking for something to do with my hands. Eating. I could eat something. Riffling through our cabinets, I try to process everything that’s just happened, but how is that possible ? How does a person even begin to process a CIA solicitation before a wedding, or—

Bingo! The third cabinet reveals a semi-stale bag of Humpty Dumpty sour cream and clam potato chips. I shove a fistful in my mouth as Calvin cocks his head in my direction, curly black hair springing over his ears. After observing me for a second, he circles his pointer finger around my face, finally landing in a gentle nose-boop, like I’m a golden retriever. “Something’s different about you.”

“Couldn’t tell you what that is,” I say. Really, I can’t. I’d sound like I’d hit my head on the bar and hallucinated Gail’s body-double request. “Hey, do me a favor? If anyone comes to the door for me, can you not answer it?”

“What if it’s a pizza?”

I speak around potato chips, pushing my bangs back with the polka-dotted headband. “I’m not going to order any pizza.”

“What if you change your mind?”

“I won’t.”

“Right,” Calvin says. “You want to rewatch that Australian show we like, about those farmers who’re looking for wives?”

“As tempting as that is,” I reply, “I’m…I think I’m going to hit the hay. Maybe another time.”

He wishes me good night and hands me the potato chip bag to take with me. I like Calvin. It was a random roommate situation. He had an ultracheap spare room; I needed somewhere to live. That’s it. Well, that, and I was fairly confident that if this did turn out to be a serial killer situation, I could take him. He may or may not have a turtle living in his bathroom. Not a pet turtle. Like, one he rescued and is rehabilitating in the bathtub. Say what you want about him, but the man is wonderfully soft.

In my room, I wrench open the window and let the night air wash over my skin. I feel shaky, sick. The breeze helps; soap scent from the laundromat downstairs hits my nose as I cocoon myself under my Nana’s summer quilt, mentally replaying Gail’s speech. Assassin. Prime minister. Vacation. Easy role! The more I think about it, the more batshit it sounds. If the CIA thing is true, if someone is trying to kill Sofia Christiansen in Italy, wouldn’t the smart plan be just to cancel the damn vacation?

Polishing off the rest of the potato chips, I whip out my phone, tapping the cracked screen to wake it up, and google the prime minister of Summerland. I’ve done this before. Never so intently, with my heart jumping in my throat. Like before, though, all the images that pop up are sparkly. Clean-cut shots of a clean-cut person. In one, she’s commanding parliament with a pensive expression, dark brown hair pulled into a low bun. In another, she’s sporting a black-sequined blazer and tailored shorts, heels sky-high, using a small handbag to shield her face from paparazzi. PRIME MINISTER OR PARTY PRINCESS? That’s what the headline reads, and it strikes me as dramatically unfair. Surely the woman’s allowed to have a life? She takes only one vacation a year—an annual trip to Rome and the beaches of Positano, just like she did when she was a kid.

We’re not related somehow, are we? Somewhere down the line? That’s crossed my mind before. We’re definitely not first cousins or second cousins, or anything super close—but Nana Frida was from Summerland. Everyone on the island has a hint of similarity.

I click on another article. According to British Vogue , Sofia has reframed her platform to lobby even harder for women’s access to education around the world; she’s single, loving it; she’s a mental health advocate, with a heart that’s equal parts gold and steel. There’s a picture of her opening a shelter for homeless cats, another of her supporting a martial arts class for survivors of domestic assault. She’s put a near-total end to weapons trafficking in Summerland. It’s hard not to like her, and really hard not to see the glaring similarities between us: the roundness of our ears, the freckles by our noses, the way she cocks her head when she’s thinking, the way I’m doing that, right now, at the screen.

“If I’m too forceful,” Sofia says in a YouTube video clip, “too powerful, speak my mind too clearly, I’m labeled words that I won’t repeat here. If I’m quieter, gentler, then I’m meek. I’m not powerful enough to lead my nation. And there is no in between. There is no middle ground for women. In some people’s eyes, we are always one or the other, aren’t we?”

By three in the morning, I’ve gone so far down the Sofia rabbit hole, I’m unconsciously whispering at the video, at all of her videos, wondering if I can get my vowels to sound like hers.

Body double . Could I actually pull that off? I mean, seriously, could I? How hard would it be to play a prime minister on vacation? If anyone did try to come after me…I am fit. After months of manual labor, hauling everything from kegs to banquet tables, I’m in the best shape of my life. I feel like I could run pretty darn fast, if I tried, and dodge just about anything that’s thrown at me. Plus, goose shooing aside, it’s not like I’d miss much back home, and wouldn’t this give me a purpose? Who deserves protection more than a woman spearheading all these international causes, who’s fearlessly leading her country and—

For crying out loud, Max. Do you even hear yourself?

I chuck my phone across the room, yank my quilt over my head, and force myself to sleep.

···

The next morning, someone is pounding at my door.

My eyes spring open, the heels of my hands swiping at my face. Outside is the muted pink of sunrise, and it takes only a second before everything from yesterday comes flashing back. I know exactly who’s at my door—and exactly what she wants. Calvin isn’t answering. Good! Good, Calvin. Cautiously, I slip out of bed, black-and-white catering uniform half-unbuttoned, bangs plastered across my forehead. Through the front door peephole, I spy Gail’s distorted frame, haunting my hallway.

Not today, Satan! The last thing I should do is open the door. Only, after the sixtieth knock, each one growing increasingly louder, the neighbors start banging on the walls. If we get another noise complaint, if I get kicked out of this apartment and can’t afford rent anywhere else…

“We started off on the wrong foot,” Gail says, thrusting a white paper bag through the newly opened doorway. “I brought bagels. You don’t look like you slept well.”

“Thank you,” I say through gritted teeth.

She clearly thinks I mean about the bagels, not the insult. “Poppy seed,” she says, waggling the bag. Dammit . Poppy seed is my favorite. Brushing past my shoulder, Gail cranes her neck into my apartment. “Perhaps this conversation might be better suited for inside your home. Is that charming roommate of yours about?”

My head’s starting to throb. “I…I don’t know. Probably?”

“Mmm,” Gail says, pulling out her phone and shooting off a quick text. Asking for surveillance on Calvin’s whereabouts? Less than three seconds later, her inbox pings. “Ah, he’s gone out to purchase some coffee and what looks to be about two hundred grams of marijuana. A little much for a Monday morning, but to each their own, I suppose.”

“Look.” I rub my thumb, hard, between my eyebrows. “I said no. I said no to what you’re asking. So, if you don’t mind—”

“Oh, but I do mind,” Gail says, fully pushing past me now. “You didn’t say no about the bagels . The bagels really are crucial to this part of the operation.”

I snatch the bag from her hand, just to get her to shut up about them. “They’re not drugged, are they? I’m not going to bite into one and wake up on a plane to Positano?” Gail pauses at my hunter green sofa, swiping off a few crumbs before smoothing the back of her coat and sitting down. This only adds to my snippiness. “I thought people like you wouldn’t wear trench coats.”

She cocks her head. “People like me?”

“Spies. It just seems a little obvious.”

Gail crosses her legs, folding both hands on top of her knees. “Well, Max, I wouldn’t call myself a spy.” She glances around the apartment, at the stacks of used coupon booklets and a full bin of empty ranch dressing bottles. “I would call myself your best option to get out of this hellhole.”

“Hey!” I’m genuinely offended. “We have a microwave.”

“I am absolutely sure, Max, that hell has microwaves.” Gail is the type of person who says your name a lot in conversation—and not in the friendly way. In the condescending way. As if she’s speaking to a disobedient six-year-old. “May I ask what is with the ranch dressing? Surely one can’t need that much. That’s nearly…fifteen bottles.”

At least I can answer that one. “My roommate gets stoned a lot. He puts ranch on everything.” Tired and frustrated, I plop down in the opposing fold-out chair. “Even if you are who you say you are, you’ve made a mistake, okay? You don’t want a washed-up chef. My main skill used to be making really, really good clam chowder, which isn’t—”

“Did you know,” Gail says, cutting me off, “that Julia Child was an asset for the CIA? Chef, too, wasn’t she? You’d be just like her, in a foreign country, carrying out clandestine duties. Who doesn’t want to be like Julia Child?” Gail perks up even more. “Think of this as a getaway for you . Don’t you want a nice vacation, Max? What we’re asking, it isn’t hard. Mostly, you’ll just sit in a beach chair, read a book. It’s a simple job in beautiful Italy. The food will be exquisite. Eating with the season. Fresh pancetta and buttered noodles. Lemon gnocchi…”

“And all for the low, low price of…possible death!” I say, like I’m a game show host.

“Max,” Gail reasons, “we all trick ourselves into believing that we’re safe. The truth is that every time we step out our doors, we’re in danger. Every time we drive our cars, we’re in danger. Every time we step in our showers, danger . Eating, danger. Sleeping, danger. Do you know how many people accidentally strangle themselves in their bedsheets every year?”

I stare at her, unimpressed and vaguely horrified. “Hallmark would not hire you.”

“Fine,” Gail says, clapping her knees and rising to a stand. “I thought that some shut-eye might help you think clearly about all of this. Five million dollars is a lot of money.”

The living room tilts sideways. The ringing returns to my ears. “What did you just say?”

“Five million dollars. The five million dollars we’re offering you, if you complete the assignment to our specifications.”

“You never mentioned five million dollars.” I’m standing now, too. All the blood is rushing to my face. “If you were going to offer five million dollars, you should’ve led with five million dollars.”

“I’ll note that for next time,” Gail says, infuriatingly. “Although, it could have been that I purposefully withheld that information, knowing that you’d say no at the first approach, and this is all part of the gentle process of acceptance. I should also mention that I know about your financial situation.”

Memories flash through my brain, ones that always come when I’m low—of my mom, stopping by my apartment with a few groceries when she noticed the barren state of my fridge; of my dad, selling his Chris-Craft for cash and draping his arm around my shoulder. It’s just a boat, Max-a-million. But that boat was his whole damn life. “It’s bad.”

“Yes, it’s horrendous.”

Actually, it’s worse than horrendous. Horrendous would just be losing my restaurant. Horrendous would just be an insurmountable mountain of debt. Here’s what I’m looking at: the dissolution of every relationship I valued. I borrowed money from everyone .

And I lost every penny.

“It’s not often, Max, that one gets the opportunity to completely turn their life around within a matter of days. Think of your parents. Think of what they could do with a share of that money. Retire, perhaps? And your friend Jules. Your relationship’s a bit strained, isn’t it? Wouldn’t you like to mend that in seven simple days? Just a quick trip to Rome and the Amalfi Coast, then back again. You can return to your…” She gazes around at a stack of moldy pizza boxes. “Your home. Move on with your life. Maybe even open a new restaurant. This isn’t just an opportunity; it’s a time machine. Turn back the clock. Right your wrongs. Reclaim your—”

“Hello, hello!” Calvin has wandered through the door, plastic grocery bag stuffed with coffee beans and weed. “Who’s our new friend?”

“I’m from the Maine State Lottery,” Gail says automatically, turning to Calvin. “Your roommate has won one of our secret cash prizes. An all-expenses-paid European getaway.”

Calvin’s already-dilated pupils widen at me. “Dude, really ?”

Intrinsically, I know I have seconds. I know that the deal’s on the table, and something tells me if I don’t take it now, I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. My family deserves this chance…and honestly, if I need another reason, Sofia deserves it, too. Protecting her would be, by far, the noblest thing I’ve ever done.

Swallowing the gigantic lump in my throat, I do my best to smile like I have just won the lottery. “Yes. I’m going on vacation.”