Liz didn’t tell her brother Tom that she invited too many people to the cabin. They split the rental fifty/fifty, and she knew he’d push back, give a hard no to hosting any of her friends. She helped Tom gather dry brush for tonight’s bonfire, nodded along as he lamented his latest failed money-making scheme. He thought deck sales would soar this summer. He could recite all the pros and cons of vinyl decking, took the time to learn all the state and local regulations. By the end of the quarter, he only sold one minor gazebo repair. The woman was still leaving him lengthy voicemails long after he completed the job. Liz told him his fear of being chained to a desk was hurting him financially. She told him all his time spent trying to hit the jackpot was time wasted. She did not tell him that Chad and Tara and their two infant sons would be dropped off at 6am by the bus from the city the next morning.

That night, Tom and his wife Melanie placed a grill over the bonfire and cooked ribeyes they’d bought in the city. Liz and her husband Santiago worked together at a gourmet food and wine delivery app, Liz in operations and Santi a buyer. They introduced the other couple to how delicious raw radishes could be when coated in Kerrygold butter. They drank four bottles of a juicy Gamay and sat back on the tall wooden slats of the Adirondack chairs on the deck, pointing out the constellations they knew. Melanie opened up about her low egg count and cried a little and Tom broke out his weed. They listened to dogs howling in the distance.

The group passed out around midnight, retiring to the two available bedrooms, and all four slept soundly until they were awakened by the thwack of the cabin’s screen door at 6:10am. Then, the sound of bags thudding to the living room floor. Then, high-pitched screaming and crying, followed by desperate shushing. 

“I guess they know about the new people now,” Santi said. He gathered the quilt around his ears, rolled over, and snored on. Liz squeezed her eyes shut and didn’t dare get up.

Around nine, Santi pulled Liz out of bed, and they stepped into the cabin’s living room to greet their guests. Melanie looked up from the coffee maker and gave Liz a tight smile. “A family is here,” she said. The family was all set up on the couch. What was once a bare, dusty little room was now full of diaper bags and stroller seats and bottles of milk.

Chad hoisted the older boy off his lap, stood up, and wrapped Liz and Santi in a bear hug. They hadn’t seen each other since the electroclash lock-in at the Basilica Hudson. Chad showed off the bags of groceries he brought. The couple was on a meat-only diet. “And on the weekends, we eat,” Chad said. He pulled out a massive tomahawk steak, using its bone as a handle. Santi rustled around the bags and took out sliced prosciutto, packets of bacon, several cans of foie gras, three whole chickens, and a variety pack of squeezable Gerber pouches.

Liz greeted Tara and the two babies while Tom hovered in the doorway. She picked up the six-month-old, and the little boy started to wail. She waved him in circles in the air, not knowing what to do to calm him down, and gave Tom a guilty smile. He shook his head in disgust, retreated into his room, and shut the door.

“It means so much to us that you invited us out here,” Tara said, raising her voice over her children’s crying. “We haven’t been on vacation since this little guy came along. And then there was the whole thing with the ICU, and I picked up pinkeye from somewhere in that hospital, and then the lil guy got the pinkeye from me, and I could barely see my new little boy while I was wiping his eye out for a whole week. And of course he’s screaming the whole time.”

“Then I got Tara onto the meat and her eye cleared out right away,” Chad said. “Where we sleeping?”

Tom emerged from the bedroom with a large canvas bag and crossed the room to Liz. “Put your friends in the tent,” he hissed.

“What?” said Liz. “I can’t hear you over the baby.”

He dropped the tent at her feet, and sulked back into his bedroom.

Melanie took a seat on the couch next to the toddler and handed him items from the coffee table. “Dad always does this with my sister’s kids,” she said. “They’re kids, they’ll play with anything.” The little boy picked at the rubber buttons of the remote for awhile, then moved on to ripping up a Town & Country. Melanie collected the magazine scraps as he worked and made a little pile on the table.

Santi and Liz helped Chad set up the tent, the men chatting and catching up, while Liz crouched and drove the stakes into the ground with a rusty mallet she discovered on the lawn. The group then all changed into their bathing suits and set out on a hike through the forest to find the beach. Santi pointed out a wooden sign announcing that the Rocky Neck State Park Wolf Preserve was one mile away. They craned their necks in the direction of the sign’s arrow, but couldn’t make out any fencing or buildings in the distance.

The group emerged from the trees, and the beach’s murky hazel water came into view. Something was glistening every few feet apart in the sand. The beach was littered with dead jellyfish. Liz walked up to one, gave it a wary nudge with her flip flop. 

They all laid out their towels, stepped out of their dresses and shirts and pants, and splashed around in the water. Tara and Chad stayed ankle-deep, each holding one of their babies upright in the sand. Santi wondered loudly about the wolf preserve, joked about its possible shoddy fencing. Would their lean-to cabin be enough to protect them? 

“We’re in a tent, though,” Tara called from the shore, and the parents gave one another a worried look.

Tom and Melanie finally seemed at ease now that they were in the water, Tom staring up at the sky and guiding Melanie back and forth while she floated on her back. Liz thought this might be a good time to bring up the fact that her Latvian friends Raimonds and Ieva were arriving on the 6am bus from the city the next morning. Liz swam over to her brother and sister-in-law and asked if they were excited for the fancy dinner. “We might need even more food for tomorrow. We might have a bigger party...” she said.

Tom glared at Liz. “What do you mean?”

“The family brought foie gras. Gotta say I’m a little nervous about the foie gras,” said Melanie. “Mom would buy it sometimes at Christmas but I’ve never tried it before.”

“Why do you always say ‘Mom’?” asked Liz.

Melanie asked what she meant.

“I mean, why do you drop the possessive? When you talk about your parents?”

Tom glared harder at Liz.

Liz continued, “We don’t share a mom, so wouldn’t it be ‘my mom’? Isn’t it weird to preface it as, ‘Mom’?”

Tom guided Melanie’s body away from Liz. “Liz, can you just—” At that moment, a jellyfish soared through the air and clipped the side of Tom’s ear. They looked over to see Chad grinning from the beach, his toddler draped over his shoulders and cackling. Chad told his son to hold tight, leaned to scoop up another jellyfish, and took aim at Santi. Liz watched the corners of her brother’s mouth turn downward, into a humiliated shock. Tom could not take a joke. She knew it was his worst quality, the most tragic part of his personality, she was always telling everyone. Liz felt liable. She should have warned her friends about her brother’s anxiety before they agreed to come to the house. Yet somehow, Tom relaxed. He dunked his wife below water and swam to the shore. 

Soon all the adults were out on the sand, plucking up the transparent slime, flinging and dodging. Liz was hit in the thigh and she watched the jelly slide down her whole leg, too afraid to touch it to move it along. Which was ridiculous, she realized. If the jellyfish still had stinging power, her whole leg would be throbbing in pain. Melanie pulled dismantled strands out of her hair and Tara removed a jelly from the cup of her swimsuit. The six of them paused to take a breath and assess the battered and stretched carcasses of fish lying around them, and agreed it was time to head back.

At the cabin, Tom got the bonfire started while everyone else took turns using the shower. Liz came out to join him, her wet hair darkening the shoulders of her blue cotton dress.

Tom jumped up and down on the deck. “Feel that bend? That’s rotting wood.”

Liz sat in an Adirondack chair and rested a cold pack of bacon on her thigh, which was aching and swelling from what they now knew were slow-releasing jellyfish stings. Tom’s ear looked red and swollen. He was going on about the different types of decking he would recommend to the cabin’s Airbnb host, should he still be working that job, when their heads shot up at the sound of crushed branches. In the distance, a man in a kelly green polo and khakis sprinted between one clearing of the forest to the other. Liz looked up at Tom. “Was that a park ranger?” The two watched the trees in silence until the others joined them on the deck. They all pressed their wine glasses against their jellyfish stings and Melanie asked if she should make a salad. Santi recommended she throw together some lavender goat cheese and arugula to pair with the steak, if they had any. She disappeared into the cabin but came back empty-handed, reporting that the only vegetables they had on hand were a few radishes.

Chad manned the grill that evening. He cooked the tomahawks one at a time, and piled them bleeding and medium rare on a platter in the middle of the table. The group sat around and pecked at the foie gras with forks, having no crackers or bread to spread the rich paste onto. The two babies were on their best behavior, the toddler dangling strips of prosciutto into the flame of the citronella candle, the baby half-asleep and drooling on Tara’s shoulder. They fell into a silence, enjoying the sounds of the birds and the warm, gentle breeze over the deck, watching Chad flip the last of the steaks, when all of a sudden Tom pointed towards the woods and said he saw the kelly green polo in the distance. He threw his chair back and waved his hands in the air. “Hey! Hey, there!”

The man jogged over to the cabin. He stood by the deck, below their flip flops, low enough for the group to have a bird’s-eye view of his bald spot. He was older, in his sixties, his bearded face flushed and sweating. His polo’s breast pocket was stamped with Rocky Neck State Park Wolf Preserve and a small cartoon of a wolf’s snarling jaws. “I’m sorry to tell you guys this but… the fence of our pen broke open today. Lothar and Nancy are out here somewhere. Brother and sister and both vicious.”

The group stared down at the ranger.

“Shit,” said Santi.

“I should probably text Raimonds and Ieva...” said Liz.

“What?” Tom whipped his head from the ranger to his sister. “Who?”

“I would cool it with the grilling,” said the ranger. “They love that smoky meat smell. And maybe stay inside and close all the windows and turn off all the lights. And don’t make any sounds like crinkling bags or rolling dice or talking.” He sprinted off back where he came from, huffing and puffing. 

“So…” said Santi. “This whole time? There were wolves running around? While we hiked?”

“Oh God. Oh God,” said Melanie.

“Oh my God,” Liz said, nodding and trying to meet Melanie’s eye. “Oh my God.”

“I do not feel safe having my babies sleeping in that tent with wolves running around,” said Tara.

Liz stood up and hugged Tara and stroked the baby’s head. The child woke up, looked at Liz, and began to wail. 

Chad placed the last steak on the pile and rested the grill tongs on the deck’s rail.

“Someone’s got to switch with us. We can’t stay in that tent. A wolf will thrash right through.”

Tom asked Liz to repeat what she mentioned right when they heard about the wolves, about people named Raimonds and Ieva. Liz recommended her brother take some meds for his anxiety. “Would it kill you to relax a little, get some face time with my friends?”

A wolf howled in the distance. Tara clutched her babies tight to her breasts and started to cry.

“Seriously though, Liz,” said Tom. “Who else is coming to the house?”

Liz picked out a plastic bottle of Perrier from the cooler and told the group the couple she and Santi befriended in the Latvian section of their local wine store would arrive on the 6am bus the next morning. Liz found the pumpkin wine they’d persuaded her to buy to be sickly sweet, but they had kept in touch. Raimonds and Ieva will tell us tales of their home country and add a really nice, educational energy to the group, Liz promised.

“Okay, okay, okay,” said Melanie. “We have to leave, right? On the morning bus? I have to call Mom and Dad.”

The sun was setting and the violent streaks of oranges and pinks turned the group’s attention to the sky. Santi poured everyone more wine and Chad passed out plates. They chewed the tomahawks in silence. Liz scanned the forest back and forth, and whipped her head when she saw movement in the nearest crowd of birch trees. A tuft of tail sailed from behind one tree to another, so light it seemed as if it was made of a furry black gas. Liz let out a loud gasp. “I saw… I saw the flash of a tail,” she said. 

The group sat forward in their Adirondacks and peered through the surrounding trees. “It was definitely a tail, a wolf’s tail. It was held out straight and flew forward in a beautiful hop,” Liz said.

Chad stood up and grabbed a garbage bag. He shoveled everyone’s plastic plates, still piled high with steak, into the bag, and told Tara that they should set up for the night on the cabin’s couch.

“Raimonds and Ieva... sort of already claimed the couch,” said Liz.

“And I mean, your stuff’s already in the tent...” said Tom.

“Your kids were super loud this morning,” said Melanie. She clutched her wine glass and sunk deeper into her Adirondack.

“Goddamnit,” said Chad. He threw the garbage bag on the ground, and one of the tomahawk bones skidded off the deck into the bush below.

“Liz just saw the wolf,” Santi said. “Which means those escaped wolves are probably circling this cabin, eager to rip our eyeballs out and gnaw on our spleens.” The baby stopped crying, noting the seriousness of Santi’s tone. “We have to all pack up and get on that bus to the city at 6am tomorrow morning. We have to keep each other safe.” 

The group moved inside and locked the cabin door and turned out the lights. Chad broke out a pack ‘n play and put the kids to sleep in the corner of the room. They finished six more bottles of wine, Tara fell asleep on the couch, followed by Chad on top of her legs. The others retired to their rooms, and they all slept through the 6am bus the next morning.

Liz and Santi and Melanie and Tom woke around 6:10am to the thwack of the cabin door. Liz recognized the harsh syllables of a Baltic language, and heard the opening and closing of the cabinets. She peeked out of her bedroom. Tara was changing under a blanket on the couch and Chad was introducing himself to the newly arrived couple.

Tom’s head emerged from the other bedroom door. He took in the scene and then spotted Liz. “You didn’t tell these people about the wolves? Are you insane?”

“I guess I forgot, in all the excitement.”

Tom rested his head on the splintered, unfinished pine. “I overslept.”

“Me too.”

“Is the family gone?” Melanie said, swinging the door open and facing everyone. “Oh. Hi.”

Raimonds popped up over the open fridge door. He and his wife had striking white-blonde hair. “Nothing for vegetarians in here? We would go to the store, but we do not have a car.” He took out a couple of radishes and the butter.

Santi fell out of the bed behind Liz and asked her if it was time to head to the bus.

“Thank you so much for inviting us to this small cabin, to meet your large group of friends,” said Ieva. She walked over and gave Liz a stilted hug. “You know, you smell as if you are made of meat.” She sniffed Liz’s shoulder. “The smell of flesh is seeping through your pores.”

Tara sat petting her toddler on the couch and made calls. She begged the bus company to pick them up but they reiterated they only had one bus a day, at 6am, and she would have to wait until the next morning to catch a ride back to the city. She called the police and they advised her to stay inside until their officers could find and shoot Lothar and Nancy. Raimonds and Ieva gracefully accepted their inherited danger and braved the deck, peering through the trees. Liz went back to bed and slept as long as she could to avoid the awkwardness of the full living room. She rejoined the group around noon.

Tom was waiting for her. “Liz. You have to be honest with me. Is anyone else coming to the house?”

She looked down at the carpet. “I don’t like your tone,” she said.

“For the love of God, tell me.”

“Don’t be so dramatic. No.”

“You are sure? Are you lying?”

Liz took out and checked her phone. A chat lit up in her notifications. She quietly lowered the screen to her side. “No one else is coming to the house.”

There was commotion on the deck, then three distant gunshots. Chad poked his head into the cabin. “The cops are driving up and down the clearing and firing randomly into the woods.” He added that it might be a good idea to enjoy their last bonfire now, early, while they had some protection from the police. The gunshots drew closer and the two babies started to wail.

The group assessed their resources. They had three chickens, some bacon, a handful of radishes, and the variety pack of Gerbers squeezables. Raimonds brought three bottles of the pumpkin wine he said Liz had loved. Chad and Santi lit the fire outside. Tara bounced her young son up and down on the deck and tried to get him to stop crying. She pointed at Melanie and asked if she could check on the toddler. Melanie cursed under her breath but headed inside.

Santi balanced the grill rack over the bonfire and placed two chickens on top of it. Soon they were breathing in sweet paprika crackling off the chicken skin. At the smell of meat, the Latvians turned moody. The couple talked quietly to themselves and sucked on Gerbers pouches. The gun shots picked up. The group sat back in their Adirondack chairs, sipped on the sugary pumpkin wine, and watched the two police cars crawl up and down the clearing.

Over their early dinner, Liz and Tom told stories of the several stepmothers they had growing up, while everyone else listened and grew bored. They debated the details of the one from their junior high years. This stepmother’s family was very famous in Colombia, but they forgot why. Tom swore the woman was related to an assassinated member of the country’s Communist party. Liz said no, her relation was a bigger deal than that. A Colombian president, but from a very long time ago.

“The Communist thing makes sense,” Tom said. “He got shot and the family had to flee before they all got shot too.”

“She fled to the U.S. and was so desperate, she agreed to marry Dad,” said Liz. She laughed at her own joke and took a sip from her plastic Perrier bottle.

“Don’t you mean, my dad…” Melanie murmured.

“Why are you always taking cheap shots at Dad?” Tom asked.

“Why don’t you ever take shots at Dad?” Liz asked.

“Why did you invite all these people to our cabin?” Tom said, his face growing red. “Why didn’t you even tell me?”

Liz leaned forward in her Adirondack, opened her lips to feign a response, but flicked her Perrier bottle towards her brother instead. A splash of seltzer water streaked down his shirt. He slammed his bulky wooden chair backwards and pointed his finger in Liz’s face. Santi hovered over his wife and shouted at Tom to stop shouting.

“You can’t throw water,” Tom said. Melanie nodded her head in agreement. Chad and Tara kept their heads down, busied themselves by doling out more chicken onto everyone’s plates. Raimonds and Ieva whispered something between them. They had gradually pushed their chairs backward so they were no longer a part of the circle.

Liz stood up to shout back at her brother. “How is it okay for you to throw a jellyfish at my face but not okay for me to throw a tiny bit of water onto your t-shirt?”

Tom sniffed. “It’s about respect.”

 The toddler, sucking on a chicken leg, stumbled away from the shouting towards the forest clearing.

“Stop, stop, wait,” Melanie said, trying to pull Tom down back to his chair.

“Throwing water is a sign of disrespect, as we all know very well,” said Raimonds, from behind the group. 

Tom turned in his chair to face him. “Thank you, Raimonds.”

“Do you guys hear that?” asked Melanie. They all quieted down and listened. A deep, long howl rose up from the trees. 

“Hey. The gun shots stopped,” Santi said, looking around. “The cops are gone.” 

The toddler, a few yards away, fell down in the grass. Chicken grease dripped down his chin and the last rays of the sunset bathed him in a red-golden light. The boy held out his drumstick towards something moving in the trees closest to them.

“I don’t understand why we’re not already inside,” said Melanie. She hissed at Liz, “Can’t you get your friends to take care of their children?”

Tara overheard Melanie. “I take care of my kids. You don’t even have kids.”

“We are not all fitting in that cabin,” said Tom. “Liz—you’re taking the tent.”

“Melanie can’t even have kids,” said Liz.

Melanie howled. She picked up a fork and threw it towards the forest. 

“What did you just say to Melanie? About kids?” Tom asked Liz.

“I mean, it’s not like you can even afford to have kids,” said Liz. “You can’t even sell decks.”

The group fell into a shocked silence. Liz even shocked herself. A wolf howled again in the distance.

“Fine. We’ll take the tent, happy?” Liz stormed down the deck stairs over to the tent and fiddled with the zipper, which was caught in the folds of the entry. “If you’re so offended by every little thing I do.”

Santi raised his hand. “Sweetie, um, I might...”

“And you’re what, a grocery store worker?” Tom followed Liz down to the grass and grabbed the tent flap out of her hands. “No one’s taking the goddamned tent.”

“It’s a grocery app, asshole,” Liz said, and pushed Tom hard. He stumbled backwards and tripped over the rope of the tent’s fly. Behind him, two jet black wolves emerged from the trees. They stood with their chests puffed out and took in the cabin scene with ice yellow eyes. The taller wolf turned to the other and licked it across the face with a long pink tongue.

Tom and Liz, closest to the animals, froze. Chad swooped forward and retrieved his son from the grass, hoisting the small body over his thick shoulder like a rug. He ran back to the rest of the party and they all hurried up the stairs of the deck. The wolves pitter pattered towards the tent in starts and stops, hopping and yipping and pliéing around one another. They paused every few steps to take a pant and size up Tom and Liz.

“Should we stay here? Or go there?” Liz called from the side of her mouth, not wanting to make any sudden movements. She stood planted, knees bent, beside the tent, holding her arms out to the sides for balance.

The group on the deck stood staring at the wolves with hands over open mouths. Liz strained to make out Santi in the graying dusk. He was leaning over the wooden railing, seeming to be waving her in. Melanie paced the deck like she would a widow’s walk, her eyes locked on Tom. Liz watched Tara quietly slip into the cabin with the two children and shut the door.

The wolves stuck closer together, their hides touching, as they sniffed the air and skulked towards the tent. Tom was stuck in a bridge position, his hands resting on the ground behind him. “Should I make a lot of noise? Scare them?” Tom called back. No one answered. Liz could see now that one of the wolves was bigger than the other, with a broader snout, a fuller chest. She guessed that one was Lothar. 

Lothar took a bold step towards Tom and sniffed Tom’s sweating, planted hand. “I think… I think they’re friendly? If we don’t scare them?”  

Liz let out a high screech and rushed the wolves, flapping her hands up and down. Lothar growled and bared his teeth, crouching over Tom, who was now trembling and had tears rolling down his cheeks. Nancy followed her brother’s lead, crouching and growling, and the two pivoted to look back in the direction where they had come from. Then, surprising Liz, the two bolted forward, past her and the tent towards the cabin. The wolves darted up the stairs of the deck. Chad, Santi, Melanie, Raimonds, and Ieva shrieked and rushed to the far railing. A loud cracking sound ripped through the air and echoed between the cabin and the trees.

Lothar jumped onto the table and lapped up scraps of the roasted paprika chicken. Nancy disappeared under the stairs and emerged with the runaway tomahawk steak that had been kicked into the bushes the night before. The deck’s far wooden railing bowed outwards, snapped, and crashed to the grass two feet below, Chad, Ieva, Raimonds, and Melanie tumbling down with it. Lothar and Nancy, grasping all the meat they could in their jaws, leaped down the stairs and ran back into the woods.

Tom crawled to a stand and wrapped Liz in a hug. “Oh man. Oh man,” Tom said, wiping away tears. “I thought that was the end.”

Liz took an instinctive step backwards, not used to hugging her brother. She blew out a long breath. “Did you see the deck?”

They peered over to the deck, which now looked bare and expansive without the railing. Chad was helping Melanie up, and Ieva was steadying Raimonds, who looked like he had rolled his ankle, onto the side of the cabin. 

“That’s rotting wood,” Tom said in awe.  

She watched her brother bend to tie his laces. He pulled a black sock higher up his shin and snapped the elastic. His hair was matted down with sweat and his face was flushed as scarlet as the jellyfish burn on his ear. Tom’s white t-shirt, which he had been wearing for the entirety of the trip, was streaked with grass stains and soaked all down the back. She noticed a small amount of paprika grease at the bunching of his cotton hem.

“Let’s get inside, sis,” Tom was saying. “Have a really chill last night. I just want my little sister safe.”

Tom stood up and looked back to where the wolves had made off into the trees. He must have rubbed his fingers off on the side of his shirt while eating, instead of using a napkin. Tom was still shivering. Liz watched him close his eyes and breathe in deeply. She wanted to ask if he had any collared shirts to change into before rejoining the party. She kept quiet. She knew, somehow, that asking would set off one of his flare-ups.

The group crowded into the living room and Tara locked the door for the night. Tom, feeling sorry for Raimonds, whose ankle was definitely broken or at least sprained, asked Raimonds to tell them about growing up in Latvia. 

“Everyone gather round,” Raimonds said, his voice hushed. He laid down across most of the couch, with his ankle elevated on Ieva’s lap, leaving everyone else to settle around him on the carpet. “In my hometown of Riga we have a famous statue of a dog, a cat, an ass, and a cock.” The story of the statue is simple, he said. The statue was a gift from Bremen, Germany. Bremen is of course famous for the Town Musicians of Bremen, a fairy tale. The dog, the cat, the ass, and the cock are worked almost to death on a farm. They decide to escape to Bremen and live a life of music. On their journey they spy a house being robbed. A bear, a lion, and yes, our own neighbor, the mighty wolf, are ransacking this place. So the dog barks, the cat scratches, the ass kicks, the cock crows. They send the robbers away. 

Liz tried to make eye contact with Tom so they could share a smirk. Tom was giving Melanie an absent-minded backrub and didn’t notice his sister.  

Raimonds continued in a sing-songy drawl, like he was reading from a picture book. Bremen erected the statue of the animals stacked on top of one another’s backs, working together, supporting one another, each with their own talent. Thirty years ago, Bremen gifted his town of Riga a copy of their statue, with a twist: the four animals, stacked upon one another, are stepping through a crack in a wall. The crack is meant to symbolize the Iron Curtain. They are looking at the new world in front of them and asking one another, is it safe? Whenever he and Ieva pass this statue near the old Saint John’s Church, he said, they make sure to join the tradition and rub their little bronze noses. 

Liz grew more and more frustrated with Tom, who now had his back to the rest of the group. He was stretching his calves, his legs in a wide L. 

“Tom. Why don’t you ask Raimonds a question?” Liz asked. “You wanted to know more about Latvia.” 

Tom turned his neck and gave Liz a grim stare. “I’m recovering from the horrifying wolf encounter,” he said. “When you spooked that wolf and it almost mauled me.”

“Tom. Don’t be rude.” 

“Okay. Sure,” said Tom. He touched his head like he was searching inside for a question, any question. “Umm.. Why are you talking about a city in Germany when I thought you were from Latvia.” 

“Riga was part of the Hanseatic League,” chimed in Ieva. “Bremen is our sister city.”

Tom stood and helped Melanie off the ground, and they disappeared into their bedroom without saying goodnight. Liz watched their door close and the living room, while still full of bodies, felt empty for the first time on the trip. Liz and Santi forfeited their bed to the family, and, exhausted, fell asleep easily on a pile of blankets on the kitchen’s linoleum floor. They all slept through the 6am bus the next morning.