“I say this calls for a beer.” Gage pushed up. “We’ll share one, let the others get colder.” As Gage walked off to the stream, Cal and Fox exchanged looks.

“You ever had beer before?” Cal wanted to know.

“No. You?”

“Are you kidding? I can only have Coke on special occasions. What if we get drunk and pass out or something?”

“My dad drinks beer sometimes. He doesn’t, I don’t think.”

They went quiet when Gage walked back with the dripping can. “Okay. This is to, you know, celebrate that we’re going to stop being kids at midnight.”

“Maybe we shouldn’t drink it until midnight,” Cal supposed.

“We’ll have the second one after. It’s like…it’s like a ritual.”

The sound of the top popping was loud in the quiet woods, a quick crack, almost as shocking to Cal as a gunshot might have been. He smelled the beer immediately, and it struck him as a sour smell. He wondered if it tasted the same.

Gage held the beer up in one hand, high, as if he gripped the hilt of a sword. Then he lowered it, took a long, deep gulp from the can.

He didn’t quite mask the reaction, a closing in of his face as if he’d swallowed something strange and unpleasant. His cheeks flushed as he let out a short, gasping breath.

“It’s still pretty warm but it…” He coughed once. “It hits the spot. Now you.”

He passed the can to Fox. With a shrug, Fox took the can, mirrored Gage’s move. Everyone knew if there was anything close to a dare, Fox would jump at it. “Ugh. It tastes like piss.”

“You been drinking piss lately?”

Fox snorted at Gage’s question and passed the can to Cal. “Your turn.”

Cal studied the can. It wasn’t like a sip of beer would kill him or anything. So he sucked in a breath and swallowed some down.

It made his stomach curl and his eyes water. He shoved the can back at Gage. “It does taste like piss.”