The Shuddering

stand, but this had turned to vinegar. She let the fridge door swing shut as she stepped away from it, abandoning the spoiled bottle of wine on the counter. She pivoted on the soles of her sneakers and stepped into the walk-in pantry, flipping on the light. When they were kids, their mother kept the pantry lined with a barrage of various dried goods—boxes of whole-grain pasta and rice; enough to keep them fed in case someone dropped an atom bomb. But Michael Adler, while amazing at mergers and acquisitions, wasn’t much of a planner; for the two years they had known her, Alessandra hadn’t exactly proven herself to be “domestic.” The pantry was nearly empty. Jane and Ryan hadn’t visited the cabin in over a year, and from the look of it, if Alessandra and her father had ventured to southwestern Colorado, they certainlyhadn’t shopped. Next to the obligatory boxes of stale saltines and graham crackers nobody ate, a bag of gluten-free chocolate chip cookies roused a smirk. Their father had a serious sweet tooth, one that had been passed on to both his children, but since he’d gotten together with his Italian girlfriend, it was sugar-free this and gluten-free that. Jane considered it karma.
    She plucked a can of tomato soup off the shelf and checked the expiration date: still good, but most certainly not enough.
    “I already looked,” Ryan said, startling her. She pressed a hand to her chest and gave him a look. He responded with a sheepish grin. “But we knew we’d have to swing into town, regardless.”
    “You should have thought of that earlier,” she told him. “Your shortcut is actually going to waste time, not save it, and I don’t think I can make it up the driveway myself.”
    “I don’t want you to make it up the driveway yourself.” Ryan unclipped the bag of cookies and stuck his nose inside. “I need the Nissan for another few months. After that, you can destroy it all you want.” Fishing one of the cookies out, he took an overly cautious bite. She watched him as he chewed, his face twisting in confused disgust. “Sawdust flavor?” He coughed, checking the bag to see what in the world he was eating, and, despite his protest, stuck the rest of the cookie in his mouth before rolling up the bag and tossing it back onto the shelf. “I’ll just leave those right there. Sweet Jesus.”
    “There’s water in the fridge.”
    “Is it gluten-free?”
    “Pretty sure.”
    “That’s good,” he said, turning to walk into the kitchen. “Because I wouldn’t want to break my diet.”
    Jane and Lauren shopped while Ryan wandered the produce department, plucking grapes off the vine one at a time, covertlypopping them into his mouth as he continued to mess with his phone. Jane had nearly talked him into piling Oona back into the car for the twenty-five-mile trip it took to get into town, but Ryan refused. He wasn’t about to drag the dog back into the car and put up with the hassle of keeping her on a leash while the girls bought groceries. It wasn’t like it mattered what Oona did to the house anyway. If they returned to a steaming pile of crap on the couch, he’d congratulate the husky on a job well done.
    “I think we’re ready,” Jane announced, rolling a grocery cart alongside a pyramid of oranges. Ryan eyed her selections, raising an eyebrow at the amount of stuff.
    “You think that’s enough?” he asked.
    “It’s four days.”
    Leaning forward, he plucked a box of oatmeal out of the mix, giving her a look.
    “For breakfast,” she said.
    “This isn’t even flavored.”
    “You put fruit in it.”
    Lauren stepped up behind Jane, tossing a box of Lucky Charms into the cart.
    “See, that,” Ryan said, motioning to the cereal. “That’s good taste… This?” He shook the box he was holding.
    “I hate oatmeal,” Lauren confessed. “There’s just something about it.”
    “Baby vomit,” Ryan told them. “The look, the texture.”
    “Am I to assume you’ve eaten baby vomit in the past?” Jane asked, snatching the box away from him.
    “You’re in big trouble, pal,” Ryan said. Jane rolled her eyes at the Happy Gilmore quote before he finished it, having heard it a million times. “I eat pieces of shit like you for breakfast.”
    Lauren didn’t miss a beat. “You eat pieces of shit for breakfast?”
    Ryan blinked at her, impressed, surprised at the shared joke, both of them trying not to laugh. Ryan finally spit out an offended “no” and they cracked up,