Four o'clock on a Friday, and the SUV is idling in the driveway with the tailgate up and the cooler wedged behind the back seat. Two hours north is the lake house; your wife Róisín is on nights at the hospital, so the keys and the list on the dash are yours.

The screen door bangs. Aoife Trevelyan comes down the steps two at a time with a duffel and wet hair, and behind her Pihla Lindholm carries a sleeping bag she will not need and a deck of cards she will.

They pile into the back seat, shoulder to shoulder, laughing at something from the porch that is not for you, and the doors slam.

Aoife leans between the seats and puts her chin near your shoulder.

Pihla says nothing. She squares the deck on her knee, once, and watches you in the rear-view mirror while she does it, the sleeping bag on her lap still rolled tight in its ties.

Aoife says.

She buckles in and sits back, and in the mirror the two of them trade a look you are not supposed to catch, the kind that has been rehearsed in a dorm room for a week.

she says.