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Sullivan sat in front of her one-person tent unwillingly listening to Journey played from a nearby SUV parked on the sand.

If you wanted a good campsite in the spring or summer, you reserved it in February or you backpacked a long day into the forest, which is why Sullivan ended up on the side of a lake watching motorboats trying to whip around fast enough to make the water-skiers they were towing fall over in a chaos of waves from the wake.

It was apparently a consensual act as were the ATV races taking place on the sand.

And these people were probably half the reason this lake wasn’t built up with vacation homes.

They made it a recreational area . Why did people have to use something to see its value?

Why couldn’t people just save the lake to save it?

She closed her eyes. She remembered standing in her grandfather’s living room, eight years old, stomping her feet, tears streaking her face.

I hate loggers. Why do they have to cut down trees?

Her grandfather had sat her down on his lap and pointed up to the ceiling.

What do you think this house is made out of?

Trees. How do you think our family owns this beautiful old house?

At eight, she hadn’t understood what her grandfather had meant by timber money , but she’d gotten the message.

Plus Oregon can grow trees fast. If we don’t grow them, people will cut down forests that take hundreds of years to regrow.

We’re all part of the problem. We can all be part of the solution.

A gang of boys raced in front of her waving sticks at each other.

They’d been going all morning. Up and down the beach until one of them got hit and went weeping back to his mother, who lifted her head from her lawn chair long enough to say, What did you think would happen if you played with sticks , which the kids seemed to take as instructions to go back to hitting each other with sticks. The cycle of life.

She should call Kia. This wasn’t Kia’s fault.

Opal was right; Kia was a talented, ambitious Black woman entrepreneur who’d taken advice from a knowledgeable consultant and live streamed a deal she had every reason to believe was a sure thing.

How could Sullivan just blow off Kia’s texts and go camping?

Wasn’t closing someone out one of the worst things you could do in a relationship?

But what would she say if Kia said she was going to take a deal from Mega Eats?

Or what if Kia didn’t answer her call? Didn’t even do her the favor of telling her they were breaking up and Kia was taking a deal from Mega Eats?

Sullivan couldn’t bear it. At least if she didn’t talk to Kia, part of her could pretend, for a few more hours, that Kia cared for her, and that they would be all right as a couple even if they lost the lawsuit.

She swatted at a mosquito, although it was only trying to live its best life on her elbow.

If she called Opal right now, Opal would tell her they were not going to end up broke and alone.

Kia still had her followers. Sullivan was still one of the most respected chefs on the West Coast. Any restaurant would hire her.

Kia could hit the road again. And her thoughts ended up back where they started: watching the taillights of the RV as Kia pulled away for the last time.

Nina’s name appeared on her phone.

“Sorry to interrupt your forest contemplation,” Nina said.

“I’m at a lake. It’s not forested.”

“Are there bears? It’s all the same if there are bears.”

“No, ATVs and Jet Skis.”

“Worse. Look, I wanted to give you more time, but Mega Eats called with an ultimatum. You take the deal by five today or it’s off the table.”

The kids with sticks stopped hitting each other for a moment.

“How much more time do you need to think?”

“None. I can’t testify against her.”

The kids returned to their stick wars. An ATV threw sand on a woman’s beach blanket, and she yelled, “You’re dead to me, Brad!” In the water, a jet boat was doing doughnuts in its own wake.

“Can you please think this through, Sullivan. Really, really think about how you’re going to feel in a year if you say no.”

“I want to get married for real someday.” Sullivan drew her hands over her face, getting a grain of sand in her eye. A tear chased it away.

Nina waited.

“I want something that lasts, and there’s no way I can believe that kind of love is possible if I hurt Kia just to save myself. How can I believe in love if I can’t be the kind of person I want to be with?”

“You’ll end up like me: jaded and alone?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“I call it savvy and independent,” Nina said. “You don’t have a lot of time, but take a minute and think this through.”

“I don’t need to.”

“You’re really going to stay in? Risk everything?”

A man and woman walked by. She caught a snippet of their conversation.

“I love you, but your brother is a loser, and you act like an ass when you hang out with him.”

“Don’t say I love you if you aren’t going to…”

Their voices faded away. It didn’t sound like they loved each other, but if they did, they should stop fighting. They should realize what a blessing it was to have a partner and be with someone you cared about.

“One more time, Sullivan. Are you sure?” Nina asked.

It felt like a fairy tale where you had to say no to the poison apple three times before the curse broke.

No one ever got it right in fairy tales.

And baby-queer Kia had preferred the frog over the prince (despite her feelings about nature).

That was so sweet and innocent. How could Sullivan betray Kia?

“Yeah.” Sullivan felt calm and sick to her stomach at the same time. “I’m sure.”

“Okay.” It sounded like Nina had something else to say.

“What is it?”

“You know love is just propaganda to hide the fact that romantic”—Nina spoke the word in quotation marks—“relationships are economic agreements based on survival and self-interest.”

“You’ve said.” The tiniest smile tugged at Sullivan’s lips. Nina was nothing if not consistent.

“As an attorney, I think you’re making the wrong choice.

If Mega Eats makes Kia the same offer, she’d be smart to take it.

And as your friend, I wish you had some sense of self-preservation.

And I will perjure myself before I admit this.

” Nina’s voice softened, and she became someone Sullivan only glimpsed in split-second moments separated by years.

“But as a person… just a person who wants to think there’s something worth saving in this world, I’m glad you said no. ”

With that Nina hung up. Sullivan didn’t call back. If she had, she knew Nina’s voicemail would have picked up before the first ring.

Kia arrived home the next day, desperately hoping to see Sullivan, but Sullivan’s sedan was gone.

A note on the table read, I hope you had a good trip.

I’ve gone camping. Miss you. The miss you was a good sign.

The silent house wasn’t. Finally, Kia worked up the courage to call Sullivan instead of sending intentionally casual texts.

Sullivan didn’t pick up. She was probably out of cell range.

Maybe she’d climbed some mountain and fallen in a ravine and broken her leg.

No one would find her, and she’d have to crawl down the mountain, and her leg wouldn’t heal right, and she’d never stand in a kitchen again, and it’d all be Kia’s fault.

Everything bad in Sullivan’s life was Kia’s fault, and she hadn’t even invited Sullivan to go to Grants Pass with her.

At least if Sullivan had been there when Kia realized her accounts had been canceled, she wouldn’t have to agonize over whether to tell Sullivan.

If Sullivan was communing with nature, maybe Kia should try that too.

She put on a light sweatshirt, one of Sullivan’s that hung by the door for quick jaunts to the mailbox or to check on whatever Sullivan checked in her vegetable garden.

Kia walked into the Bois, which was looking ridiculously lovely.

Where was the rain when it would’ve fit Kia’s mood?

Today, she wanted to beg Sullivan’s forgiveness, then burst into tears and pour out all her fears and disappointments while Sullivan held her.

She felt something touch her neck. Something had fallen from the forest canopy. It was touching the collar of her shirt. It was—

“Fuck!”

Something had gone down her shirt. It was slithering down her back.

She knew communing with nature was a bad idea.

She flung off her shirt. What if it went down her pants?

She almost stripped those off too. But the thing was off her.

She looked around. A movement caught her eye.

A green ribbon had come to life, graceful as a coil of light.

The miniature Oregon tree snake! She shuddered, the memory of its body still slithering down her back.

The snake that only lived in the Bois and was seen once a year had fallen on her.

More accurately, the hand of karma had plucked it off a branch and dropped it on her.

The snake was probably pissed. Kia had ruined its day too.

Why do I have to fall out of a tree because she messes up everything she touches? What were the chances?

Slim. As slender as the now-disappeared snake. The board should put it on their liberal water bottles. Save the whales. Save the Redwoods. Save the miniature Oregon tree snake from Kia Gourmazing’s bad karma tossing it out of a tree.

“That’s it! I’ve got it!”

And with that, Kia was flying over the roots and rocks and jumping over blackberry vines like a hurdler.