Lark goes to the box set and opens the DVD case to get the second disc out. He finds the wrong disc in the case; Return of the King where The Fellowship should be. He looks blankly at the DVDs for a while, suddenly sluggish, daunted by the idea of searching.

“Are you going to keep watching?” Oli asks him. “You should really try to sleep.”

“I will,” Lark says. “I just like to have something on in the background.”

He can only fall asleep with his headphones in, YouTube on autoplay, inane videos going from topic to topic, the light from the laptop on his face. It was like when he was a kid, and he’d take his Walkman to bed. He’d fall asleep to the tape hiss, then get jolted awake by the clunk of the auto-eject. He doesn’t like listening to music as much now. Despite having never been much into gaming, Lark has started watching some quiet Let’s Plays and Twitch streams, or sometimes long-running broadcasts of friends playing Dungeons and Dragons. Some channels would run ten or even twenty hours of play footage at a stretch, just the game, and increasingly exhausted commentary.

Lark rationalizes that the sound itself is a comfort. It gives him just enough to focus on that he doesn’t have to think his own thoughts. The real appeal, though, is that the voices are like friends. It feels like falling asleep at a party that he is only just peripheral to, conversation going on around him. Kindness without expectation.

“It won’t keep you up, will it? If I have the TV on?” Lark asks Oli.

“No, not all.” Lark nods but doesn’t move, doesn’t take out the disc. Oli doesn’t move either. “Are you okay?”

“The disc is just. Not the right disc.” Saying it prompts Lark to pull out the sleeve for The Return of the King. He blinks when he finds a DVD of X-Files episodes where he was expecting his second disk. “I’m never lending anything to Reed again.”

“He can be a bit scattered,” Oli concedes. He joins Lark at the TV and runs his hand over the top of the DVD player. He finds two discs there, shiny side up, but neither are The Fellowship. “Let’s try the X-Files box then,” Oli shrugs.

“Don’t worry about it,” Lark says. “It’ll turn up. Or it won’t. I know what happens.” It was, after all, Lark’s boxset. He’d left it with Reed before he even moved to Portland, a kind of parting gift.

“It’s okay. I’ll help you,” Oli says. “Then sleep.”

I hadn’t gone to see Quinn and Jules in weeks. Quinn still picked up practice room keys with me on Wednesdays, Jules met Squires at our local gigs, but I’d let the intimacies of our friendships—long text conversations, spontaneous visits, weekend movie nights—drift away.

Did something happen? Quinn asked. At my birthday? We’ve hardly seen you since then.

I shook my head. I’d found out I couldn’t drink anymore and convinced myself that Jules would risk their partnership with Quinn to hook up with me. Nothing had really happened.

I’ve been distracted. I’m sorry.

You’ve left already. In your head. You’re gone. Quinn suggested this with a note of pride.

It was an over-charitable interpretation. I kept going through the motions of work and auditions. My heart wasn’t in the present, but the future was an unreachable island, isolated by the dark waters of anxiety and uncertainty.

Max and Dana booked flights back to the East Coast to spend Christmas at their family homes. I decided to stay even after Dana took me quietly aside and offered to pay for the plane ticket.

It’s not about money, I admitted. That was just the lie I told my parents, the convenient excuse.

Dana was worried I’d be lonely and left behind wrapped gifts for me that I only discovered after driving her and Max to the airport. I got back to the apartment and spent two days alone laying on the couch, eating bowls of instant noodles, thinking and doing nothing. I devolved and dissolved into a depressive sense of vacation; without anyone around, I depressurized. I felt no responsibility to act even vaguely normal.

When I pulled myself back together on the third day, I took a shower and opened the unread messages on my phone. Both Jules and Quinn had texted to invite me to their Christmas Eve dinner.

We host it for our favorite orphans every year. It’s just a few of us. Please, please come. Jules texted the day before.

You don’t have to bring anything, Quinn messaged as a follow-up. Another text came through while I was reading: If you don’t text us back, we’re going to assume you’ve died. We will come to your apartment and make you feel bad about it.

I texted back a flurry of apologies for the slow reply, said I hadn’t been feeling well. I’d like to come, though, I said. Thank you.

When it was time for me to leave, I had an attack of the usual anxiety I felt about going to anything. But the reality of the house was a comfort, the celebrations manageably small. There were only three other strangers at the party: Jules’ favorite graphic designer, a guitarist from a band on their label, and an Irish ex-pat who introduced himself as one of Quinn’s classmates. Jules sat me between them and the guitarist, got us started on a conversation about pedals.

Around midnight, everyone but Quinn and I were drunk enough to demand I play carols on the piano so everyone could sing along. Jules had their hand on my shoulder, Quinn was leaning their head against the piano, and was watching us with a smile. The whole of the party reached for the high notes in Holy Night.