EPISODE 11: THE LAST NIGHT ## CHAPTER 1: NOT A FEW The air smells like warm onions and too much potpourri. The kind of scent meant to hide whatever actual odors accumulate over four decades of human existence, a cloying sweetness that sits just under the fingernails. I stand in the kitchen while someone—I don't know who, only that they are already sweating through their nice cotton shirt—is wrestling with the electric mixer near the island. The sound is high and whining, fighting against the murmur of conversation happening somewhere past the curtained doorway. Dolly curls up on the edge of a chair where she usually hates sitting because it forces her to be in proximity to shoes, but today seems too warm for protest. She grooms one foreleg with slow deliberation, watching the chaos from a safe distance. This whole gathering feels like an exercise in forced conviviality, forty people crammed into a space built for maybe twenty-five and designed only for polite conversation and the consumption of mediocre finger foods. The counter is piled high, elbow to elbow, with serving dishes: one deep purple casserole dish that probably held green bean bake, another square aluminum pan promising something involving diced ham, and stacks of slightly charred toast waiting for mustard or maybe just an act of architectural...